Welcome to the Jungle (Jeisen)

Dusk began to set in as Jolyne stepped off the dirty greyhound bus. It was the middle of a heat wave and even as the sun went down, temperatures were still in the high 90s. None of that mattered though, because after a five hour bus ride, two trains, a taxi cab, and a small amount of hitchhiking, she finally had made it. It wasn't easy, but she was finally in a big city, where heroes are made. The other passengers pushed by her as she took in everything around her, busy streets, bright lights, the towering skyscrapers in the distance. Even the stink of pollution smelt sweet to her, this is what she had been dreaming of since she was a kid. This was her chance to make a name for herself.

Jolyne walked to the side of the bus to grab her bag. She didn't bring much with her, this was a new start after all. All she had in her bag was a handful of clothes, her father's jacket, and some water bottles, on her person was her phone, $23.57 in cash, and most importantly a piece of paper with her godfather's address and phone number. Her godfather, Uncle Kan as she called him, had been her mentor from youth in all things heroic. She had come to the city to meet him and start her own life as a hero. Kan didn't know she was on her way yet, but she was sure he would take her in with open arms, he was her godfather after all. Jolyne checked the note again, he didn't live too far from where she was now, just a couple blocks.

With her minimal luggage in hand, Jolyne departed the bus station. As she walked along she thought about her poor mother. Susan Kennedy had always been overprotective and overly worried about her daughter's wellbeing, she was probably in hysterics right about now. Jolyne didn't take pleasure in putting her mother through such turmoil, but she had a dream that she wasn't going to just give up on. She made a mental note to give her mom a call once she was with her Uncle Kan, surely she would understand, or at the very least, she would know her daughter was safe with family. She was so deep in thought that she didn't notice the area she was in shifting, there were less people walking around and the streets were narrower. The sun had completely set by this time and a couple of dim streetlights managed to barely illuminate the street.

"You look lost missy."

She didn't even notice that someone else was on the street with her. She jumped a little, startled by the new presence. She turned around to see two men behind her. The one who spoke was tall and fit, wearing a dirty wifebeater, a cigarette in hand. The other was shorter and fat, he wore a shirt that seemed two sizes too big, even for him. Besides the three of them there was nobody else around. The situation made Jolyne uneasy.

"No, I know where I'm going, thankyou."

She smiled politely at them and hoped that would be the end of it. Before she could turn and walk away though the tall one put his hand on her shoulder.

"You sure? You look pretty lost to me," he smiled fakely, "Hand that bag over and let's see if we can help you out."

Jolyne was no longer simply uneasy about the situation. Her palms were sweaty and her heartbeat was escalating. She looked to her sides, trying to find some sort of power source so she could activate her metahuman abilities. The streetlamps were far too high up and she couldn't find anything apparent along the sidewalk. Without a source, she had no power. All the same though, she wasn't frightened. Her heart pounded in her chest. This wasn't fear she was feeling, it was excitement. Her hero's journey was about to begin.

There was a blue flash across the sky, lightning streaking across it. It was followed by no thunder and caused by no cloud yet there it was streaking across the sky faster then most would even be able to see. Sadly, that included Jeisen who was said lightning bolt. That was fine by him, he enjoyed the blurry sights and specially at night. He smiled for a moment as he took it all in before him... and promptly lost all concentration in keeping his form.

He was pulled right out of the night sky and back down to earth in a massive bolt of lightning to a streetlamp. He was conducted through and thrown out the other wise of it was a too much force for his liking. Jeisen slammed into the asphalt of the road which his body carved a trench into. He was unharmed, but damn that was always disorientating. He sparked a bit as he rolled over onto his back. he lay there looking up at the stares, just getting his barring for a moment. He pulled himself up into a sitting position and looked over to his left...


Where he saw three people who could not have failed to notice the gigantic lightning bolt that crashed down next to them. He blinked at them a couple times, trying to take in what he was seeing before it finally clicked in his brain.


"Fuck..."

Was about all he could manage as he tried to stand up. A lot harder then it sounded when you had just kissed the pavement. For sure not his best entrance ever, not that he intended to give one.

There really wasn't a single thing Jolyne could pull electricity from nearby. She began to slowly reach for her phone in her pocket. It wouldn't be much just a couple volts, but even with that much she would be able to hit a little harder for a short amount of time and hitting a little harder was all she'd need for a couple of street thugs like these. The fat one noticed her reaching for something in her pocket, he opened his mouth to say something when a flash of blue light came from the sky. What appeared to be a lightning bolt struck the light post next to them. Broken glass rained down on them from the blown bulb.

"Fuck..."

Jolyne hadn't even noticed the boy who didn't look much older than herself. He was laying on the ground where the lightning bolt struck the streetlamp. Jolyne's heart skipped a beat. A metahuman? Less than an hour after arriving in the city and she had already found another metahuman. She couldn't help but grin stupidly as she quickly grabbed her cell phone.

The thugs were, obviously, quite startled by the sudden lightning strike. This time it was the tall one who tried to say something. All he managed to let out though was a muffled gurgle as Jolyne smashed her hand into his throat. She then swept his legs out from underneath him, sending him to the ground. Jolyne was a small girl, and not particularly strong, but with a little juice and her years of training she could throw down with the best of them (and these guys were far from the best of them). With the tall one dealt with she turned to fatty, unfortunately the robust thug was surprisingly fast for someone so fat. He had taken off in a full sprint as Jolyne was taking down his buddy. For a moment she considered chasing him down, teach him a lesson or something. She discarded the thought. This was a very important moment, her first meeting with another metahuman (besides her godfather of course, she never counted him).

Jolyne walked towards the boy who fell from the sky, unable to contain her smile. She reached out her hand to help him up and spoke, a hundred words a minute, "You're a metahuman? A metahuman like me? I'm Jolyne. Jolyne Kennedy. Or you can call me Jo, my friends do. But you're a metahuman. Are-Are you a hero?"

Jeisen watched as she took down the men with relative ease. He had drawn a knife if he needed to intervene but she handled it pretty well he thought. She was defiantly good at fighting. He started to get up when she was suddenly above him offering her hand. He used it to get up and started to brush himself off when she started a barage of questions. Jeisen paused midbrush to look up at her

You're a metahuman? A metahuman like me? I'm Jolyne. Jolyne Kennedy. Or you can call me Jo, my friends do. But you're a metahuman. Are-Are you a hero?"

Jeisen didn't know what to say to that for a second before he got his barings. He held up a hand to stop her from asking more questions

"Whoa whoa whoa... one question at a time there ma'am..."

Jeisen brushed the dust of from his crash then stood up striaght looking at her for a second. She seemed harmless enough

"Yea. I'm a meta though no hero, sorry.You can call me Winter though. Come on, best get out of here before the cops show up"

Jeisen looked around, trying to figure out where he was exactly. Whenever he crashed, it always took a bit to get his bearings. He motioned for her to follow him as he took off down the street, walking.

"Those were some pretty good fighting moves you had back there."

Jeisen didn't really know what to talk about to her. This was all kinda weird for him, but he was just going to roll with it

Even Jolyne, high on adrenaline, could tell that the boy called Winter was being overwhelmed by her question assault.  She took a second to breathe in deeply and get a hold of herself.  She counted down from ten in her head.  This was an momentous occasion, her first metahuman encounter, she had to control herself and not ruin it.  Winter seemed to want to flee the scene before any cops showed up.  Jolyne didn't personally think it necessary, she was an ally of justice after all, the cops would surely understand, but she figured Winter was the more experienced metahuman here (even if he wasn't a full fledged hero).

"Those were some pretty good fighting moves you had back there."

Winter seemed a bit at odds in the situation, but such small details went completely unnoticed by Jolyne.  She had just been complemented on her fighting skills by a (not)hero.  The praise went straight to her head and once again, a dumb smile crept onto her face.

"Well, I may not be a hero yet either, but I've been training to be one since I was just a kid,"  She tried to hide her smug satisfaction, but to say that Jolyne wore her emotions on her sleeve would be an understatement.  "I was actually trained by a real big-shot hero from before I was born, Kan Ingvar, you've probably heard of him.  Honestly, I don't mean to brag or nothing, but those two goons were hardly a match for someone as powerful as myself.  If only I could get a real challenge, no way I'll make a name for myself beating up on low level trash like that."

Once she was done proclaiming how strong she was, Jolyne grasped onto what little self-awareness she had and decided to change the topic before she appeared to be overly boastful.

"But um... That aside...  What about you?  Do you have weather powers or something?  You fell from the sky with that bolt of lightning."

((sorry for irregular posting, busy weekend))