Meeting 'Snowflake'

The one watching you looks more like a civilian than a hero. He's quite tall but slight of build, though it's hard to get a good look at his physique under the high-collared brown trenchcoat that goes all the way down to his feet. Short-trimmed but slightly unkempt hair, as white as chalk, peeks out from under the brim of a rather unstylish fedora. His face is quite pretty and gentle-featured, and his skin tone is that particular ambiguous shade of light brown that makes it literally impossible to tell what ethnic background he's from - it could be anything from light-skinned afro-american to south asian to caucasian who's spent too much time in a tanning bed.

As if reading your thoughts, this stranger gives a little huff and mutters in a somewhat high pitched voice that he's trying to modulate into a low, raspy growl: "Hmph, so not only is it another white girl, but she's being put in charge of the team? Yet again, the League shows that it has one foot in the fifties and still supports white supremacy."

You furrow your brow in annoyance. "Hey, screw you, man! First of all, my grandparents came to this country with nothing, and haven't you heard that there were 'No Irish Need Apply' signs on businesses in that era? As their descendant I don't see how any of this 'white supremacy' discourse could apply to ME. And besides, don't you realize that Dr. Rainbow is Japanese? Erm, I mean, she's not FROM there, but... Anyway, we're going to have to be working together so I'll just ignore that bullshit and ask - what's your name going to be? 'The Amazing Neckbeard'?"

"Oh," your new teammate says, eyes rolling dramatically, "I can practically FEEL the privilege radiating off of this stripper. I hope you realize I'm fully aware of my rights and quite prepared to start a new grievance file, even on the first day with this team. Ahem... the codename our Euro-colonialist science maven applied to me is 'Snowflake'. Nice to meet you, 'ThunderBox'. After meeting you and my other teammate, I really have to hope that this 'Doctor Rainbow' character is a little less embarrassing than the other two."

"Hey!" Petit Mort snaps her fingers irately several times. "Insult ThunderBox all you want, but you are in the middle of my testing chamber. Do not insult ME by keeping that ridiculous getup on, you cannot claim to need to be inconspicuous or blend in with a civilian crowd here. Haven't you gone through enough coats and hats in yesterday's testing with W.B.?"

'Snowflake' gives a put-upon groan and grudgingly tosses down his hat on a nearby table, then shrugs off his trenchcoat... revealing that "he" is very much a "she", and quite a knockout of one, at that. Her actual costume is a full bodysuit covering everything except little portholes atop her shoulders, but you would hesitate to say it is less revealing than yours; Although the arms and legs are opaque white, there is a huge oval section in the middle running from the collar around her neck down to the inner half of her thighs which is almost completely transparent, showing off her honey-brown skin, toned figure and tight backside to anyone looking. Her perky breasts aren't the biggest in the League, but they are no smaller than yours... a tiny bit bigger, actually, and the solid white portion of the spandex covers about 51% of them, just barely enough to stop her nipples from being plainly visible with seemingly less than an inch to spare. You're suddenly a lot less confident that you will be this team's main sourece of sex appeal.

"Oh, you're a woman... Uh, sorry about the 'neckbeard' comment, I was thrown off by the 'vigilante growl' you were doing with your voice. Well, that's kind of a relief, actually, from what I've seen, my mentor said that mono-gender superhero teams are for the best and do a lot to cut down on drama..."

You are intending to sound conciliatory, but that seems to irritate her even more. Snowflake clenches her jaw, puffs out her chest and looks down her nose at you. "EX-CUSE ME?!? Did you just assume my gender?"

Petit Mort puts a gloved hand up to the bridge of her nose and shakes her head, muttering under her breath. "Mon Dieu..."

"Uh," you say, caught a bit off guard. "I mean..." your eyes track down Snowflake's perfect 'beach body' and zero in on the space below her hips, where she(?) is wearing nothing but a white thong underneath the translucent part of her costume, a little fig leaf of modesty that Green Streak and Mort had seen fit to leave her. "Well, from where I'm standing, you clearly don't have a... I mean... oh shit, you aren't one of EX-Man's victims, are you...?"

"No, and that is an extremely stereotypical, privileged assumption for you to make!" Snowflake says, waving an index finger in your face and glowering. "I am a GNBASPT person, and respect for my identity is a bare requirement for working together. Looks like in addition to fighting criminals, I'm going to be doing the unpaid labor of educating prejudiced so-called 'heroes' yet again..."

Thinking back to yesterday, you sift through your memories for anything that sounded like that seven-letter acronym. Despite having listened to an hour and a half worth of speeches on gender and sexuality yesterday (and your hearing was so good that the sounds of a bunch of cops gang-banging you and another girl in the tight confines of a police cruiser hadn't caused you to miss any of it), it isn't ringing a bell now. "Ah, I... don't intend any offense, but could you tell me what 'Guh-nasp-t' stands for, please?"

Snowflake rolls her(...?) eyes again and sighs loudly, speaking in a condescending monotone as if the answer should be common sense: "Gender non-binary, androsexual, pronoun 'they/their/theirs'. And what pronouns do YOU prefer, 'ThunderBox'?"

"Uh... 'She' is fine." you say awkwardly. You think back to your high school English classes and common latin root-words. "'Andro-sexual'...? so that is to say, you're straig-" Her glare intensifies so rapidly that you **** yourself off before the last syllable. Damn it, this girl - err, person - really has a chip on her... err, 'their' shoulder. Time to move the conversation onto safer territory.

"Powers, yes, let's talk about powers. I'm guessing you can do something with snow and ice?" you ask. That does seem to mollify Snowflake, slightly, and they visibly relax a little, and she nods curtly. "Yeah. Forming and manipulating crystallized particulate water, including the control of fully-articulated and combat-capable Snowpersons. It's pretty clear that I'll be having to do the heavy lifting on this team in more than just the empathy department. If you'll forgive the pun, your ability doesn't 'sound' very impressive to me. I'm guessing that your main contributing is going to be through foxy-boxing? And... hmph... leadership?" she says, using her hands to add some very rude air quotes.

"A fair warning to you, Thunder," Petit Mort steps in again. "Snowflake has already gotten themselves kicked off of one superhero team and quit another one, due to 'personality conflicts' in both cases. However, Mood Ring has informed me that due to public image concerns for the League, we will not be able to dismiss them from another team no matter how quarrelsome they are, as they have a rather high-powered lawyer on retainer. Do your best to put up with the spoiled brat and keep 'them' pointed at the costumed, cackling agents of injustice out on the street, will you?"

The awkward silence is cut by a cuckoo clock going off - except that the 11 hours are counted off with 'Nevermore!' instead of just 'Koo-koo!'. Petit Mort gives an irate huff and stamps her foot. "J'en ai ral le cul... She said she was just going to the lavatory, and that was an hour ago. Being mission control for this team is going to be like herding les chats, I can tell already. I would send a message to Green Streak to go find her but he would use that opportunity-"

Before she can speak further, the door opens again. You perk up and smile when you see that one of those coming in is Dr. Rainbow, looking as effervescent and peppy as ever. Alongside her, following along with gravity-defying, floating skips, is another woman who you've not met before. And considering the institution you're in, the fact that the newcomer's costume is just as slutty as yours and Snowflake's isn't much of a surprise...