ikag-guy-a-draft1

GUY A CHARACTER

First one, I'll just call him Guy A.
He has the power of instant healing. Any living thing he touches is instantly healed of any injuries and cured of any diseases. His power can't regrow lost limbs or other extremities, but can place a sort of temporary blueprint within someone's body for missing internal organs that their body can then work to fill in provided they eat right for the next 30 days (the power does not create or destroy matter).
What makes it really broken is it chains through living things. When used, the target faintly glows for about 10 seconds (healing is instant), anyone who touches the glowing organism is instantly healed as well and begins to glow too, but the 10 seconds are not refreshed so it all stops at the same time. Mass healings are not only possible, but something done a few times a day in like a football stadium.

The guy himself is short tempered and hates traveling, like absolutely despises traveling. He also has raving paranoia and distrusts most organizations, especially government and religious organizations. Comparing him to religious figures or trying to make him the subject of a religion is a sure way to set him off. Part of his paranoia stems from his powers always being active for himself, so he can't be killed via anything physical. He charges nothing for healing people, but they have to come to him. Runs a non-profit organization to upkeep facilities that streamline the mass healings.

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Guy A didn't manifest his powers until his mid 20s and by then he already had a cynical view of the world, but still opts to heal anyone who asks or comes to him regardless of weather of not he may personally hate them. He views the world as a shithole and decides to try to do something to make it less shit even though he's super paranoid about being abducted by the government and held somewhere indefinitely (being trapped is like his number one fear). He's built up a large organization, but he only trusts maybe a few people in it; he's very much of the opinion that most people are assholes and believes he's going to be the most sinful person on Earth by the time his life ends since he feels responsible for any acts of evil anyone he may heal will commit in the future. He just has severe trust issues.
He's not really fit, but he isn't fat either. He's the type who would see if he can raise the dead by testing his powers on a freshly deceased animal, it may or may not have worked with emergency rescue assistance to restart bodily functions, but it's not something he wants to let other people know.
He won't travel to places that are incapable of helping themselves since even if he healed all the people who came to see him when he visited, they'd just end up immediacy sick again as son as he'd leave.
I'd imagine he'd make his home on an island or a coastal city somewhere tropical where cruise ships visit to make it easier to heal many people at once.

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Guy A has worked to make the healing process impersonal and indiscriminate. He basically has a football stadium and has people hold hands or stand barefoot on a grassy lawn as he activates his power so it can chain through them all at once. He doesn't do individual healings unless the person is going to die right there and then or it's to experiment to see how it will effect them. Otherwise they can wait just like everyone else holding hands at the designated time and place feeling incredibly silly doing so.
Guy A doesn't have any faith in anyone to be better after being healed, he's too cynical for it, but deeply wants to be proven wrong.

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Anyone willing to come to him gets the healing if they go through the proper procedures. He's a very "I'm not going to treat you special" kind of person.
As for radar, he avoids politicians and religious figures. He does not want his image used for anyone's agenda other than his own, no amount of money can sway him.

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GUY A STORY, FIRST OUTLINE

A politician is inside Guy A's office, demanding priority in being healed. He'll give Guy A anything he wants - fortune, riches, cash - but these are anathema to the doctor. Guy A says that something like Smallpox will always be a low priority to him. The politician, backed by a fleet of armed bodyguards, decides he has to do something he really doesn't want - and drops to his knees begging like a child. "At least spare my son, he's been poisoned by radiation!" All Guy A can say is, "What? Again?!" With no context given to the audience, Guy A then recovers and demands the man have dignity - if he and his son want to be cured then they can join up with the other patients at the next scheduled curing. The elated politician promises to make Guy A famous; he blanches and kicks the politician out of his building in rage, where we see protestors and cult followers mixed with confused football fans and a vendor or two.

Guy A responds unpleasantly to a phone call, which turns out to be from the principal of the school Princess Daughter attends. The principal would like to organise a field trip to a certain city on the East Coast, and the 'children' would be delighted if they could tour Guy A's facilities. Guy A snarks that he can't cure superpowers and the principal laughs (out of courtesy). If the children can keep their hands to themselves, a tour shouldn't be a problem.

The tour isn't mandatory for school students, though the facilities for those staying behind are fairly limited. The methods of transport to Coastal City [placeholder name] reflect the students' ranks - the councillors ride in a private plane, unescorted; the A-B students get a flying bus with a share of the supervising teachers; the C-D students test-ride a sea-train with tracks built across the sea as well as the countryside, with a nice-but-shaky view of the ocean, escorted by the other half of the supervisors; the E students have to hike, possibly swim. This is treated as a normal experience by the students and staff.

[Rudy rides the flying bus, but I'm torn on how Conner gets to Coastal City. On the one hand he could trade privileges with an A/B-rank student who simply didn't want to go on the trip, we'd have some more interaction between Rudy and the students who are trying to sandbag/keep Conner out of the group around Rudy. On the other hand we could have Rudy alone on the bus and another student mocking Conner for having to hike, only for everyone to arrive at the City and Conner is escorted out of the private plane (handwaved as him being far too dangerous to be left unsupervised, even on the bus, so the councillors kept a closer watch on him), but that might be a bit too favorable for the character. We could also have Rudy on the private plane instead, mostly for his own safety from being mobbed by fans. If Pepper is around at this point in the story she could also blag her way onto the flying bus, though since she's a B-rank student it's not necessary at all.

Regardless of how it works out, this is the ideal opportunity for an ignorant/tired student to express skepticism and for another student to bring up an unauthorised YouTube video of Guy A's mass-healing in action. Some of the people in the video deify Guy A and he grows furious at their perceived helplessness.]

We get a better look at the football stadium that's been cleared out for a scheduled mass-cure session - a verbal acknowledgement between Guy A and the manager of the local sportsball team, the Coastal Fireguards [placeholder name] means that Guy A can use the stadium each day at certain hours without interrupting training or matches. As soon as the students arrive they're immediately asked to stand on the stadium grounds, filed up beside the day's wounded and diseased, and hold hands - which understandably takes some encouragment. Guy A has his own bodyguards that work with the teachers to get everyone holding someone else's hand, including the politician and his son, a bright-eyed boy younger than Rudy and Conner. It all seems like a weird hippy practice but the healing aura is no joke - 10 seconds pass and everyone in the staduim is reasonably healthy at the very least. The politician's son explains to Rudy that Guy A is his hero and treats him regularly - he explains that he has the superpower of nullifying and absorbing radiation, but his father quickly asks him not to spill his guts to random strangers. The cured are asked to leave while the councillors and teachers get the students to congregate for an impromptu talk with Guy A.

Guy A attempts to explain his power the best he can and leaves the floor open for questions - many questions, some of which have clearly been asked a trillion times before (Student D asks can you bring back the dead, Student A asks if a guy was missing all his limbs could you bring them back etc), some of which explain the Guy's backstory and power capabilities for the audience's benefit. Rudy asks Conner what he wants to ask Guy A -- he thinks of a mundane unrelated question like, "what's your favourite baseball team" -- he is chided for wasting the opportunity by asking a stupid question -- another student asks about what if a person were to be missing limbs -- Conner complains that ALL of these questions are stupid. Student D flinches.

Now we get a tour of Guy A's offices proper, which are located in the same buildings that house the facilities for the stadium. Row after row of employees taking calls, studying chemicals, studying patients for the severity of their ailments - Guy A explains that he used to run the entire operation of diagnosis and research himself, but has begrudgingly taken on some staff when it grew massively out of his own control. He complains about having to fire people who attempted to abuse their position (from his perspective it's abuse, from their perspective he was being paranoid as shit), then shows the tour group the door leading to his own office. He walks on, leaving the group confused - aren't they going to have a look inside? Guy A adamantly refuses and instead changes the topic to lunch.

The stadium has a cafeteria for the football teams, fans and patients (paid out of Guy A's own expense but he would never admit to it being charity). The students dine there before the buildings start to shake violently - Guy A's bodyguards reassure the teenagers and supervising teachers that attacks on the stadium are common and there is a forcefield and other countermeasures for these situations. We see a supervillain trying to break through the forcefield, before being stopped by a wonder-woman who is rumored to have radiation-induced superpowers. Guy A himself is unfazed by the attack until he wonders if he left the five locks on his office door unlocked and runs blindly back.

At the end of the day the A-D students are escorted back to their modes of transport, while the E students are still on the road towards Coastal City. Student D, Darien, stops Rudy before he gets back on the bus/plane and asks if he can hold onto his books for him. Rudy obliges without a second thought - assuming Darien is running from bullies or in a natural superpowered-teen sort of hurry. By the time the A-B students return back home the school period is more than over, so Rudy decides he'll meet up with Darien in the morning.

The students are put into a state of panic when the school is put under lockdown - the councillors announce an inspection of everyone's bags and lockers. "An inspection, this early, unannounced?" Rudy's class is confused, but Conner somehow has the deets - Guy A rang the principal up, furious that his research notes had been stolen during the school tour. Why does Conner have the deets? Because the councillors naturally assumed he had something to do with either stealing the notes or trading them. So Conner was already inspected, but he turned out to be as innocent as the day he was born, and even pledges to help investigate (the councillors decline the offer and in fact they insist he not screw things up for them in the process). All Conner knows is Guy A's description of the notes ("it's a set of black books with gold trims and rainbow lace, they can't be that hard to find"). Rudy feels a dreadful void in his stomach.

This is as far as I've gotten, have to bump the thread first lol

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THOUGHTS TO SELF

Guy A would probably accuse the school of hubris; just because the principal is Queen Mother and the councilwoman is Princess Daughter, they think they're above the law and can steal/disgrace with impunity. Queen Mother is amused, but maintains that the pedigree of staff means dignity and abiding by the law are paramount for the school, more so than other less-endowed institutions.

Rudy would make the argument for Guy A trying to see Darien's side of things, Guy A would maintain that Darien would need to get over it and move on. Rudy would look to Conner to back him up, but Conner would agree with Guy A - he'll just make it worse if he holds a grudge against himself.

Could Rudy be convinced to help Darien steal the notes in the first place? He would reassure himself that Conner would want to make use of the notes, but Conner would be disappointed in Rudy ("I thought you were smarter than that").