capitalooc | MARCH 9TH, 2014 EDITION

NIGHTFORCE MIA

Local vigilantes reported missing by forlorn teammate
-------------------------
Julie Winters
-------------------------

Almost a full week after their disappearances, four members of the amateur vigilante group Nightforce were reported missing to local police yesterday. Swansong, the apparent last member standing, was the one to file the report after confessing to have lost hope in her team's retrieval. Though Swansong refused to reveal her civilian identity to the government, she did allow herself to be questioned. She reported an account of the strange messages her teammate, Dr Dynamo, had left her before disappearing under the radar entirely, along with the rest of Nightforce.

Swansong from a viral publicity photo
shoot circulated late last year.

"I thought he was having a bad trip, to be honest," she said in her report. "He was obviously terrified, but so out of it that he couldn't seem to explain what was going on." Though the details were fuzzy, she expressed her belief that his messages had been a distress call. When asked why she hadn't sought aid sooner, her answer was unusually candid.

"I'm pretty sure they were already dead," she said, "and I didn't want anyone butting in and trying to tell me that I wasn't allowed to kill whoever did this to them."

Swansong fled police custody soon after, the situation a grim reminder of the risks inherent to taking vigilante action outside of the CONDOR mandated registration system.

"If you do this as a vigilante, there's no one to help you but you and your own," Detective Pierce later commented. "If the members of Nightforce had been registered, it's possible that they could have been retrieved days ago."

Alongside Dr Dynamo, team members Red Ranger, Windwalker, and Fury's Fist were confirmed missing in action. Any information regarding their disappearances should be reported to CONDOR immediately.

VIRAL MARKETTING STRIKES AGAIN?
Mysterious airborne messages leave city stumped
-------------------------
Ali Schaffer
-------------------------

After January's infamous "rainbow hair" incident and the spate of showers of frogs that struck LA last fall, we all thought we'd seen everything when it came to strange objects falling from the sky. But over the last week, reports of strange balloons dropping over the city have been threatening to trump both. The balloons, apparently made of animal gut and filled with hydrogen, are attached to printed messages with varied and idiosyncratic content. Seven have been found at locations across the city since Friday, with more being reported daily.

The attached messages range from odd punctuationless screeds to seemingly unrelated prose and poetry. Although the author, or authors, have yet to be identified, similar messages have been reported online, posted by unidentified users to a seemingly random selection of social media platforms.

Speculation is rife as to the messages' meaning, with no one having claimed authorship, but many believe this is the first stage of an involved viral marketing campaign, and enthusiasts are already busily comparing notes about those messages that have already been archived, hoping to glean hints or hidden meanings by comparing the content of the messages and looking for patterns.

"Honestly, it could just be some kind of cult," said one hobbyist, who declined to be named. "Personally I haven't found any useful clues in any of these yet, and I think we might all just be wasting our time poring over weird junk from whatever occult whack jobs are going to try to raise Beelzebub in the center of town this year. It would explain the balloons being made out of animal intestines or whatever it is, it's probably just the remains of their sacrificial goats or something."

Whatever the purpose of the messages might be, where exactly it is that the balloons are being released from remains a mystery.

LOST DOG

Male white german shepherd, last seen in Belvedere Park. Answers to "Pewter". He is very friendly and loving and his family misses him very much.
Any information please email wearesosad@aboutourdog.sob ASAP

[Remember that player-submitted articles can be sent in here.]