Cohost writing prompt: @Making-Up-A-Villain — Villain who needs a lot of graphite
"Why graphite shipments?"
Fornax jiggles his leg and pulls a face. "You'll have to excuse me," he says sourly, "this isn't the first media attention I've had. You've googled industrial uses of graphite and seen the words used in nuclear power plant cores and already written this story, that's why you even want to talk to me. Nuclear villain, that's sexy news. And I have heat powers, so you can spin me as a walking radioactive furnace, it all fits together nicely, and who lets a little thing like complete bullshit stand in the way of a journalism award?" The air around him ripples. "You know what a refractory material is?"
"Something to do with lenses? Refraction?"
He grunts. "Reasonable layman guess. No; refractory, from the French réfractaire, means 'high-melting'. High-temperature insulation, the kind of stuff you build for handling molten glass or metal. I have heat powers; you think I can furniture shop at Ikea? Listen, do you know how hard it is, how expensive it is, to live with a common non-bionormative need, like wheelchair access? An everyday life that costs up to orders of magnitude more than average, demanded from the people least able to generate income in our society? It's not just fucked; it's fascist."
The chair he's sitting on is sizzling away in a cloud of burning-plastic fumes. He doesn't seem to notice the dirty-orange flames licking around his lap.
"And then there's me — and my needs are, basically, unique. The society we live in won't accommodate me, and simultaneously says that I should pay for everything I need to exist as bespoke one-offs out of my own pocket — not just the life-ruining tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars for a wheelchair, something that industries already exist for, but literally millions to tens of millions for a fucking chair, because the only industries that handle the materials I need are ones that make industrial equipment. I'd have to negotiate with the kind of company that contracts for billions of dollars with governments to build steel foundries to research, design and build me one chair."
He reaches for a coffee mug that's been strategically placed on the table near him, and simply holds his hand near, as if to wrap it around. The ceramic blackens and cracks, while the coffee inside visibly, violently starts boiling away.
"So yeah, I steal graphite shipments," he says sharply. "And I kidnap engineers. And I live in a volcano lair, actually in an active volcano. Because all I want is a house, but all society will allow me is dying in a gutter, as far away from all the flammable houses as they can force me. The world made me do this; if I've got to have supervillain dreams, why not dream big?"