2013.10.09 - Like Oil And Fire

There are some things that, no matter how important it is they get dealt with, you still kind of hope never ever happen, or that it's not you that everyone is depending on when it does. An oil spill in the middle of the freaking Atlantic Ocean late at night, with the addition of some moron's brilliant idea to set the oil on fire so that it would burn itself off. The issue is that the oil platform is still pumping oil, and it's all leading right back to the source. So those flames are also racing along the tarry slick that coats the waves and poisons the waters, and it's only a matter of time before the night ocean that is already ablaze with oranges and metallic reds like the world viewed through Hell-colored glasses goes even deeper into the inferno. When the flames reach the source, there will be a huge fireball that will burn and burn and burn and spread the oil more and more.
It's really only a matter of time. Sea life, humans who haven't managed to escape the area yet following the genius idea to set fire to the very water they had to cross to get to safety, anything in the area is in danger and none of them can do anything about it. In the sky above, as dense, toxic smoke rises from the disaster area, a glowing green light speeds closer and closer... And begins to descend very quickly.
Oil spills, the bane of all life in the ocean. Few things were as devastating and had such a long-lasting impact. The only things worse were the trash gyres forming in every major ocean of the world where the currents inevitably deposited every single bit of trash that was thrown overboard if it didn't wash up on shore first. Not even the radioactive waste shunted into the ocean had anywhere near as big an impact!
Major oil spills had a tendency to destroy habitats for hundreds of miles in every direction.
Unfortunately, Lorena Marquez, Aquagirl, did not have the watermancer powers that some Atlanteans had. She couldn't wave her hands and command the currents to keep the spread contained. She couldn't summon a tsunami to crush the oxygen out of the blaze. No, she could... swim really fast and communicate with the fishies.
A humanoid shape breaks the waves, soaring through the air as the fire reflects in her dark eyes and off the wet scales of her suit. She flies through the air like some sort of leaping dolphin, before disappearing back beneath the surf at the culmination of her arc, having seen the devastation. And it had started as such a good day, too, hanging out with a group of hammerhead sharks that were surprisingly playful for predatory packhunters.
Until the tides had brought her a strange 'scent', causing her to investigate. Now Lorena Marquez was broadcasting her telepathy through the ocean as far as she could reach, touching the mind of every waterborne animal she could in order to compel them to flee, to run lest they be covered in oil and doomed to a slow, suffocating death. She dives deeper as she feels the oil near the surface begin to cling to her skin, moving rapidly towards the oil rig.
She had no idea how to stop this blaze, or shut down the drill, or plug the leak. But there were probably stupid, STUPID humans who needed rescuing who couldn't simply be told to 'run away' like the fish could. Not and expect to do it. And as sure as she was that these stupid, STUPID humans deserved their fate... that didn't mean she could simply leave them to it.
Fortunately, there is someone who DOES know how to deal with the blaze and the oil. And that someone is...! A giant... Luminescent... Green... Seive? Yes, a giant glowing filter of some kind coming out of the end of a long, gradually-narrowing beam of green energy has just shot down, seeming directed by some glowing-green woman up above (well, she's not glowing, but there's a glow AROUND her) and is presently both seperating the oil out of the water and dealing with the flames that continue to spread using the oil as a medium. Deal with one to deal with the other. It's not quite enough, given the amount of oil, but the green-skinned, green-haired, green-eyed flying woman chews her dark-green lower lips a bit with pearly-white teeth, and then changes tactics. She instead project a ginormous energy bubble from both hands to surround the entire oil rig, seperating it from the flames, and then, trying to maintain her concentration she produces protrusions and extensions off the main bubble -- walls that seperate this area of ocean into different sections.
It's not exactly easy, since it requires maintaing perfect focus and a perfect will to do this sort of thing at all, let alone in a complex fashion. And Jade doesn't have unlimited supplies of either willpower or energy. But still, as she cordons off the contamination site more and more, she can let the fire burn itself out in the air-tight pockets, and create openings for the people in trouble. It's like an interlocking network of canals or something. But because she's primarily focused on putting up all these walls and cleaning up the oil, she can't pay full attention to the rig workers or aid them beyond letting them depart at their own pace on mere life-rafts. It's a good thing someone else is available to handle that part.
As the red haze turns to an unearthly, mystical green glow that turns the ocean and sky in the vicinity a deep emerald (at least as seen from the water and the surface of the same), and the oil is kept contained in its own pockets, Jade is already sweating from the mental and physical effort of doing all this at once. She's not a veteran. She can keep this up for another minute at most. If the fire is out by then, great. If not... Well, she isn't going to give up anyway. That's what seperates the OTHERS who wield this particular power from those who are unsuitable to do so. They keep getting back up.
If there were no people in the way, the green-skinned woman could focus on cleaning up the oil by just gathering it all up in a big bubble. But there are people there, and she can't gather anything without endangering them too. It's already taking everything she has just to do all this multi-tasking construct-crafting! She grits her teeth. She has to keep going. Because somewhere down there, she thinks she saw someone leaping out of the water like a dolphin -- but shaped like a human. Is help here?
It's only due to the unnatural grace and athleticism with which she swims that Lorena manages to avoid plunging face-first into the sudden appearance of a giant green wall. Beneath the waves, she was aware of nothing other than a faint green glow overhead, and so she seeks ways around the obstructions, using directions from what aquatic life was still around to guide her to reach the workers, who were currently trying to escape in flimsy, easily-melted constructs of very thin vinyl plastic.
"...Idiots."
They'd never make it, they'd have a better chance grabbing a piece of wood and trying to kick their way to safety! Liferafts were too wide, too flat to offer any mobility against the tide, designed for stability, not maneuverability. Which meant the tide would carry them right along with the oil riding on that same tide, and thus right into the fire!
When Lorena finally breaks the surface again, she's doing so with a prodigious leap halfway up one of the metal 'legs' of the rig, six-foot gleaming golden trident at the ready, like some kind of feminine Neptune. This is used to break and cut a chain that used to help hold the supports together, because they could probably hold themselves, and she needed it more right now, dammit!
Falling back into the ocean with her trident tucked behind her and a brand new thirty-foot chain in her other hand, Lorena disappears with barely a splash into the surf beneath.
Only to then pop back up a mere moment later right next to one of the rafts. She ignores the questions, shouts of fright, screams for help, or whatever else the workers might be yelling at her and simply loops the chain under one of the thing strands of rope that ran around the edges of the raft. Then she ducks back under again. She arrives next to the second raft, looping the chain through this one as well, having towed the first craft to within range. A worker from this one grabs her arm and yells something at her in Spanish.
Reaching up with a fierce scowl, Lorena yells something right back at him in that language, and then tosses him to the other side of the raft, before vanishing once more. By the time she's gotten to the third and final liferaft, she doesn't even come up out of the water all the way to loop the chain.
Then all three miniature rubber vessels are getting towed out of there at speeds a motorboat might envy, skimming along the tops of the wave as if they had an outboard motor aboard each of them. Stupid, STUPID humans, but at least whichever Green Lantern that was up there would be able to handle the spill. Probably. Before it claimed any more lives, the dark-skinned teen thinks sullenly, as she passes yet another dead fish.
All the humans are out thanks to some mysterious fish girl of some kind. Jade isn't really sure who that is and isn't really paying enough attention to look more closely, instead she is peripherally aware that the rafts are out of the way thanks to someone, and now it's time to make sure no one else -- human or otherwise -- gets hurt. All the walls and canals and channels being used to siphon the oil from the ocean bulge outwards and expand to fill the bubble as it just gathers all the oil spilled so far and then compresses it into a more manageable glowing-green ball. Jade is panting for breath, but this is a lot easier than the mile or more of forcefields she was trying to handle previously. Enough so that she can even make a giant green welder with her other hand and seal up the source of the leak that caused all this to begin with.
She has nowhere to put the oil in particular, so she just lands on the rig to save energy since she's feeling pretty drained and then push the bubble full of petroleum on a beam of light, up into the air, and out into space. Not a perfect solution, but it will hopefull freeze or something up there. Its momentum is likely going to carry it straight to the moon, unless it hits something else inbetween, so she'll make sure to tell the BSAA about it. She feels very good about how she did, over all. She has been a heroine for a few years now, but that was primarily training and small-scale stuff. She's not well-known quite yet, and she's till more or less a rookie.
She couldn't have done this without aid. So she wanders to the side of the platform and looks down into the now-dark water, hoping to spot the person who made sure the day was truly saved. If she can't, she takes a moment to catch her breath and then enforces her will upon her powers again and flies towards where she saw the girl last. Those rafts -- and the people who likely need transportation to solid land or at least a bigger ship of some kind.
Once they're out of obvious danger from the flames and oil, the rafts immediately begin to lose speed, almost as if whatever was towing them is slowing down... or has simply stopped towing them. Beneath the surface, Aquagirl has let go of the chains, reversing direction on a dime and heading back to the source of the disturbance. There was little she could do, except get pissed off at the destructive incompetence and excesses of the air-breathers, but she wasn't just going to LEAVE with HER ocean on fire.
Even if she kind of preferred the Pacific with its warmer, more tropical climate.
The dark-skinned teenager's head and shoulders break the surface closer to the rig at about the same time the oil and whatever flames were left go rocketing off into orbit in a giant green sphere. The youthful brunette squints up at the top of the giant, hideous construct, noticing first that the leak was at least plug, thus preventing the spread of more of that foul toxin, and then that the woman responsible was atop it.
Was that green skin? Green Lanterns were an intergalactic police force, from what little she knew of them. Was this one of thier aliens?
<<You've saved many lives today. Those who live in this ocean send their thanks.>> Actually they were still panicing and swarming around haphazardly, unsure if the danger had passed or not, but whatever. Lorena sends the thoughts towards the strange female figure telepathicly, though it's not hard to resist hearing them. She wasn't a skilled telepath yet.
Jade looks relieved as the other heroine pops up. She does need to get those men back to safety, but she also needs a bit of a breather. When she hears the mental voice in her head, she barely blinks. She can't mimic that feat, so she just calls down, "Please tell them that they're welcome. Though they and the workers also owe YOU their thanks. ...And so do I. I couldn't have done it without you getting those men out of the way, and I notice there's an absence of sea life in the immediate area. Almost like someone warned them." The green-skinned women is smiling as she sits down on the edge of the rig with her legs hanging over the side. "I'm Jade. It's a pleasure to meet you. Would you be willing to have a chat for a little while? I've over-exerted myself a bit and I need a little while to recharge, but I'd really like to talk to such an interesting hero like yourself." She pats the the structure next to her with one hand.
Then a thought occurs to her. "...Or if that doesn't work for you, maybe I can join you down there?" It would be cold as heck, but a low-level forcefield should let her float without risk to her health and still regain enough energy while resting that the minute expenditure would be negligible.
The girl floating so easily in the water, the head of a three-pronged spear sticking out beside her, bobbing up and down with the waves, uses her voice this time to respond. She had half expected the heroine to fly off after saving the day, leaving the workers to be picked up by the Coast Guard. But she was obviously too concerned with the air-breather's safety for that.
"The men never would have been in danger if they hadn't constructed this ugly contraption in the first place. And many would still be alive." Yeah, it's sometimes hard to talk to a wildlife-loving hippie. "But thanks for the help. I couldn't have stopped the spill or the fire, and the devastation would have been much worse if you hadn't shown up."
"Lorena, or Aquagirl, if you prefer." She makes an offhand motion by raising her hand out of the water, using it to push back her wet hair away from her face. She might need to cut it soon, as it's length made it difficult with the way water tended to make it go wild like kelp dancing in the current under the waves, and hang in long, sticky strands above it. "Sorry, air-br- Jade, I'm not going to climb onto that toxic pollution death device. But the water is nice, if you'd care to come down here."
Well, it was nice for HER, since she was immune to its cold, but Jade could probably sit on a catwalk or something. Anything for Lorena to avoid having to scale that hated device. She may have been human as little as a couple years ago, but damned if those hadn't been two very long, life-altering years. "You're a member of the Green Lanterns, aren't you? I... don't know of anyone else who can use powers like that."
But then, she wasn't really up-to-date on current world affairs.
"Not exactly," Jade offers with a lop-sided smile. "I was born this way. I'm not sure why I have powers similar to the Green Lanterns. I haven't gotten to meet any of them yet to ask about it. But I've always been green, even though I was born right here on Earth -- a human." Then she lifts up off the platform, shrouded in a thin green line of energy that silhouettes her, and descends into the water, using her force field to keep her warm and dry. "What about you? Are you from Atlantis? I've heard about them but I am as much in the dark about them as I am the Green Lanterns..."
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