Young Bloods(IC, Reboot Open)

[Bentus]

Cowritten by Auropa, Bentus, Finland SSR, Galnius, New Finnish Republic

What is this, some kind of Suicide Squad?
A Collab, Part Three
San Diego

Part Two

---

Blinking in surprise as she saw Floyd stumble slightly on his rafter, Lisette’s gaze followed his own until it ended on the trio of needles sticking out of his arm. As the swordsman confidently shrugged off the drugs now coursing through his system as if they were little more than an inconvenience, Lisette’s lips slowly curled up into a smile. Furrowing her brow towards the now disoriented and inebriated swordsman, the girl calmly cracked her knuckles as a menacing glimmer began to shine in the corner of her eye. Oh, she was going to make sure that she enjoyed this.

“Well, if you insist.” She replied, launching herself off of her beam towards her opponent to continue their battle.

Meanwhile, pushed by the sounds of destruction and violence, two young heroes darted through the building as they tried to close in on the source.

“I swear! if Marionette hasn’t killed him yet then I’m murdering him myself!” Forge grunted as he barged through another set of doors with the trickster Selene following him closely behind. “I mean would it have killed him to wait just a few more minutes before kicking everything…off?” He began to say as he pushed past one last door and into a scene of chaos.

The room was practically in ruins and littered with debris and damages from the ongoing confrontation. Fighting at its centre was one of their targets, the thread wielding, psychopathic villainess Marionette. But instead of finding their teammate fighting against her, they saw a few arguing twins holding canes along with another infamous and equally dangerous villain. “Selene. Just making sure here. But um, is this really happening? Because I have no idea what is going on right now…” He asked.

Selene’s eyes got distracted by the scenery of the tower as she trailed behind Forge, but as soon as she stopped and witnessed what the fuss was all about - and, above all else, saw that man before - she leapt behind her ally in fright, instantly reactivating her illusion of invisibility and muttering.

“Um… don’t-don’t ask me.”

“Alright, alright. I’m confused but I guess this is still not the strangest thing we’ve seen.” He said as he watched the twins argue and Marionette seem to turn into a reverse fishing as she tried to shake Floyd loose. “Probably… Okay, this is good, this can be really good. While the villains fight, we can get the hostages out. Easy.”

“Rescuing the hostages should come first. Just...” Selene muttered and stopped for a second. Her eyes followed Floyd before settling back towards Forge.

“Just don’t try to confront that guy. You weren’t on the team when that happened… but I know him from earlier.” She stood behind her teammate, ready to run forth and cast illusions to cover for them at a moment’s notice.

Nodding once, Forge paused for a moment to face Selene with a heavy twinge of guilt hitting him as he saw her. During the tournament, when everything went south and the team needed him most, he wasn’t there for them and a lot of people were put in danger as a result. But now, now he was here and he wasn’t going to let things go the same way. “We’ll keep each other safe.” he said simply enough as he placed a hand on the girl’s shoulder “No matter how this goes, I’ve got your back. I mean, at least until we’re back at the tower, then I’m throwing you and Red under the bus to save myself from Naja.” He added to try and coax out a smile and cheer up the usually bubbly Selene. “Come on, let’s get to those hostages, then we can deal with the circus acts.”

Back up in the rafters, Floyd was sent reeling back along his beam as Marionette landed another powerful blow to his jaw. Stumbling, the swordsman swung half-blindly at the air in front of him in an effort to deter any future attacks, even as his cloudy, swaying vision challenged even his ability to stand up straight. Waiting patiently out of the reach of his clumsy swings, Lisette smirked at the other villain, relishing the clear trouble he was having with the fight. Giggling, the girl waited for Floyd to realise that she wasn’t immediately pushing her successful blow.

“What’s the matter, Floyd? Having a bit of trouble today?” Without giving the man much time to respond, the girl sent a thread to try and pull one of his feet out from under him, hoping to further exploit his hampered senses. As the battle wore on, they both knew that Floyd’s physical exertion would only accelerate the drug’s passage through his system, enhancing its effects over time until he’d hardly be able to put up even a token defence. And Lisette, for her part, was hoping to make the most of her time before that brought an end to her fun.

“You know what they say...”

As difficult as it was for Floyd to stay on his two feet and keep his sword in his hand, a smile never faded from his face. It’s taken him a while to get a hang of himself, as if he was figuring out a new set of controls for a video game… but he was finally starting to get the hang of it. Once again, the melee continued - this time, however, instead of fighting against his sleepy urges, the swordsman embraced them. He “stumbled” to get out of the way of another punch, dropping to his feet and suddenly spinning to clear out the threads surrounding him, before “slipping” off the rafter to fall onto the one beams below.

“Only pussies think it’s fair to fight on equal footing!” he yelled as soon as he pulled himself off the rafter he fell onto - face-first and rather painfully, but who cares? Whatever Marionette may be thinking about his fate being sealed as soon as the sleeping drug takes effect completely… he figured she was probably right, but he at least resolved to not make it an easy victory.

The Dan's, for their part, had stopped arguing long enough to actually come up with a plan. One by one, they escaped the general clutches of the threads, save those on their ankles. In the split second they had of freedom, they removed themselves from the equation.

Instead, a single Dan could be felt at the bottom of the stairwell, with the cuts and bruises the other's had amassed covering him and a thread somehow appearing around his ankles. He was the fourth of five, and he had finally made his appearance. Raising his cane, he fired a single dart towards Lisette's left leg. It's pretty sad when you can't even trust yourselfs.

As she only narrowly managed to dodge one of Floyd’s flowing, drunken swings, Lisette couldn’t disguise the wide grin that had stretched itself across her features. Despite the tranquilizer that was inhibiting his movements and slowly shutting his muscles down one by one, Floyd showed no signs of giving up. If anything, she’d have thought that his movements were becoming more coordinated as he embraced the chaotic motions of his half-functional body. By all rights, Lisette should have been furious at the villain’s continued resistance, but instead she found herself relishing the fight. So what if she thought that the swordsman had a point? So what if she thought that just sitting and waiting for the heroes to finally show up and treat her like a proper villain had slowly been twisting the knife of boredom in her gut? She had been itching for the chance to really prove herself to Weatherman, and this fight was going to be her way to do it.

Lashing out with a closed fist, Lisette blinked in surprise as Floyd seemed to twist on a dime to avoid her. Stumbling on their shared rafter, the villainess' attention was momentarily distracted as she sought to keep from falling to the ground below. Regaining her balance, she turned back to her opponent just in time for a punch to slam into her jaw. Knocking her backwards, the strike left her stunned and Lisette had to shake her head to clear away some of the stars that momentarily clouded her vision. Lifting a hand to her lips she saw that her fingers came away with a hint of red. Turning her attention back to Floyd, the girl offered the man a smirk.

“Come on, Tolson. I thought you could hit harder than that.” She goaded, giggling to herself as she felt the adrenaline coursing through her system. I can...I can actually win this one, can’t I? Just the thought nearly made the girl giddy. She could do it, she knew she could, just as long as she put her all into it. If she did, then she wouldn’t just be a henchwoman holding some civilians hostage. She would be a real villain that the heroes would be coming to fight!

Meanwhile across the room, Lisette’s threads were unrelenting in their attacks on Spectre, swarming and stretching through the hall like a flood of vipers. Marionette had never managed so many at once, and she could feel the strain at her like an overworked muscle. But she wasn’t going to let that stop her, not this time. Wait, how many of that idiot were there before?

Pausing, Lisette turned towards where her threads had been assailing the cluster of Dans only to see a single one remaining, with a narrow tube pointing in her direction. Immediately, a flash of light erupted from the cane and she only had a moment to react to the dart flying towards her. Flicking her hand, the girl grimaced as she forced her threads to cluster into a thin barrier between them, just in time to stop the needle midair. Scowling as she lowered the thread wall, Lisette felt a slight stab of pain at the incision, but was otherwise unharmed. If Dan or Floyd looked closer, they might have also been able to see her chest rising and falling more than before, with beads of sweat betraying her exertion. Though the effort didn’t seem to faze the villain at all.

Tutting, Marionette raised a hand towards the sole remaining Dan. “A tranquilizer dart, again? I’m not going to let you get away with a cheap victory like that, Spectre.” Responding to her command, the tangled mass of writhing threads swarmed together towards the now isolated hero. Nevertheless exposed by the distraction, Lisette let out a brief yelp as she turned to see Floyd rapidly closing the distance between them. Reacting instinctively, she just managed to hop over the older man’s clumsy swipe for her legs, and she refused to allow him to keep his advantage. With a look of determination on her features, Lisette swung herself around to try and deliver a kick to the villain’s side, following up with another flurry of blows as she tried to overwhelm his slowing reaction times.

With every single blow sent, no matter if a success or a failure, the smile on Floyd’s face crept up just a little bit more. This was actually a lot of fun, even when dazed! The swordsman’s eyes narrowed, focusing the increasingly blurry vision to such precision that all of Lisette’s blows slowed down to him. A few of the strikes, especially the heavy kick to the side, managed to slip through his defenses, but the rest ended up landing only on his palm or the edge of his sword.

“We should do this… more often...” Floyd spoke up, his voice constantly getting broken by yawns. “Just maybe… with less… sleepy… juice...”

The man’s body finally gave in and the sleeping Floyd slipped off to the floor, falling right onto Spectre.

Watching as Floyd’s limp figure finally gave in to his injuries and the tranquilizer coursing through his veins, Lisette stood in the rafters with her chest slowly rising and falling. Blinking, the girl seemed surprised at first as the heavy sounds of fighting seemed to fade away. Turning to glance down to the floor below, she saw the tangled mess of her opponents lying in a heap on the ground. Floyd was knocked out cold, and Lisette’s threads circled menacingly around his bloodied ally as if just waiting for her final command to strike. Slowly, the feeling of blood pounding through her skull and the intense adrenalin of battle subsided as the weight of what she’d accomplished began to sink in.

I...I won.

Lisette’s mouth crept up into a wide grin as a twinkle seemed to take route in the corner of her eye. Suddenly, the girl burst out into a mixture of laughter and cheers, a sense of triumph washing over her. She could hardly believe that she’d actually done it! Squealing with excitement, the girl forced herself to try and reign in her celebrations. This was her first real victory over some heroes sent against her - even if they were only mediocre names at best - and she had to make sure that she did things right. Using a thread to slowly lower herself from the rafters, Lisette did her best to appear calm and composed. Seeing no need to rush her victory, the girl offered the pinned Spectre a smug grin.

“Well, well, hero. How does it feel to be defeated at the hands of the nefarious Marionette?” Lisette’s smile seemed to waver slightly as she looked over Dan’s face. Eugh, it’s a shame that my first time’s with him, but at least it’s a start. Pushing aside her momentary dissatisfaction, the girl continued with the script. “Now as my prisoners, you’re going to have no choice but to watch helplessly as I enact my evil scheme!” Lisette paused for a moment, realising that the lines didn’t quite fit. “Well...Weatherman’s scheme, I guess. But I’m helping, so it counts by association. And it doesn’t change the fact that you fai…”

Blinking in surprise as her voice seemed to fail her, Lisette brushed aside a sudden sensation of dizziness that washed over her. “It doesn’t change...that you failed…”

Instead of passing quickly like she’d expected, the feeling intensified until the villainess felt her legs rapidly turning into jelly. Furrowing her brow in confusion as her vision began to fade in and out of focus, the girl seemed to only just now realise that sheer quantity of severed threads that lay scattered around the room. Immediately, Lisette felt a feeling of dread start to grip at her heart. No, no, no, no...I won! Doing her best to ignore her own body’s complaints at her expenditure of so much energy during the battle, the girl forced herself to continue with her monologue.

“You failed...hero. But I still bet that you’d like to...to know...what my plan…” Lisette’s voice had become fainter, and she was visibly swaying now, nearly stumbling despite standing still. Focus, Lisette. Just focus, please! It was no use, not when the world seemed to be turning black before her eyes. “...what my plan…is…” Despite her best efforts, Lisette would never complete her sentence as the fatigue finally consumed the last of her energy. She seemed to sway one last time before her legs gave up, her heavy eyelids falling closed as she rocked backwards onto the ground. Around the fallen villain, her threads also collapsed motionless to the ground, with their bright colour seeming to fade.

[Finland SSR]

Renata Martinez, the heroic Stella!

---

Ares was not an ordinary supervillain. He was a supervillain with a clear past with the leader of their team. Renata glared back, listening to the villain's each and every word as she desperately resisted against his offensive. Nightshade? A traitor? To him?! The origins of the hero Nightshade were not exactly clear, sure, but he was a member of the Justice Queens, wasn't he? Or an ally, or something like that...

Blocking a sword strike with her armored forearm and even releasing a point-blank plasma blast at Ares to retaliate, Renata nevertheless found herself grabbed by the collar and lifted up afterwards, all while Ares declared, almost with glee, that he'll settle on killing his friends instead. No matter how much the girl struggled against the grip, ripping at it was like trying to rip away at a claw of steel. Almost on instinct, the atoms in Renata's neck released their built up energy, manifesting a scorching heat - even that did not seem to do anything, however. Ares clearly didn't feel it.

"Oh... yeah?.." Renata gushed out, her legs flailing and eyes glaring at Ares with bottomless fury. "Well I'm not really... friends with him anyway..."

Casimir's strike from behind forced Ares to suddenly drop Renata, and Mike suddenly lunging into the battle blocked a sword slash descending towards her right after she had fallen to the floor. In the nick of time, her teammates had shown up to lend her a hand - and yet, when the heroine rose from the ground, she saw not a relieved teammate, but a dismissive Mike. To him, she was just in the way.

Help from a distance, or leave. Be support for the real heroes, be a nobody, standing in the sidelines. You know, just like in the Andean Condors.

Renata's lips let out a faint whisper.

"You..."

Heat radiation began to build up within the girl's palm, forming a blast of plasma between her fingertips - right before she slammed it straight across Mike's cheek, however, the entire world went dark. Ares, her team, and the entire world around her vanished. The only thing which remained was her... and Mizu, hiding behind what she could only assume was a table consumed by the pitch black void a dozen or so meters away. The realization that this was one of her teammate's illusions instantly popped into the puzzled Renata's mind.

"S-stop that!" Mizu yelled in a mix of fear and anger. "You're half dead, you're bleeding from every body part which can bleed, and you'd rather attack your friends instead?!"

Renata said nothing, merely turned at Mizu, the furious glare she reserved for Ares and Mike now offered to her as well. Taking a few heavy, adrenaline-filled breaths, she slammed her fists down at the table and continued:

"Darn it, you'll be able to shout at everyone for days after this is done, just don't sabotage our chance to stop a supervillain now!"

A silence set in the illusionary void, again. Mizu stared, giving her friend the floor to speak, and yet she remained completely silent. The glare faded, only to be replaced by a troubled downwards stare. That wasn't even the worst part. Renata simply wouldn't let Mizu tell whether she agreed with her or not. Whether, if she were released from the illusionary void now, she'd actually follow her teammate's plead or-

"Watch out!"

The illusion instantly snapped away, and less than a second later, Oberon's massive concussive blast smashed straight into Ares, and the wounded, distracted Renata found herself blown to the floor by the shockwave. Several painful, bloodied bounces across the floor later, her body finally came to a stop. Snatching the baton from Kabuto, Oberon was taking on the supervillain now, pinning him down while laying down orders for everyone else. And, of course, Renata got the boring, side job of scouring through the building for documentation.

Despite the pain ringing across her whole body, Renata pulled herself back up regardless. For a good few seconds, she stood puzzled on what she should do. She's still got a lot of fire in her, after all, and could probably blast her way at Ares even if Oberon is now in the way...

She raised her hand, firing off a narrow blast of pure, invisible infrared radiation. Not at any of her teammates this time, but rather at the pinned down Ares's hand. The metallic palm may have been durable enough to endure the heat, but the floor underneath was not, turning into a small puddle of molten ooze and allowing the hand to submerge within it. In a matter of seconds, however, it would start to cool, once again turning solid as rock.

Mike and Casimir could perhaps appreciate the help in pinning the bastard down.

Renata herself stumbled through the battlefield, until she finally made her way to the fallen Mars, grabbed his helmet and started pulling up.

"Get back up, mierda!" she yelled, gushing out through her teeth, and finally sighed. "Sorry about what just happened... but don't mention it. I'm really not in the mood to argue with you."

[Segral]

Whitney Alvord
October 3rd

Whitney knew two things. One, she was starving. Two, today had been a shitty day. Thing #1 was partially responsible for Thing #2, and Thing #2 had also helped cause Thing #1. They were two interconnected harbingers of war, death, famine, and pestilence on her life, always chasing each other in a circle and only growing stronger if the other one was stamped out. If she wasn't starving, she had been cheating her diet and it was a shitty day. If it hadn't been a shitty day, she hadn't been eating to help cope and she was likely starving. Eventually, they both came back and began chasing each other again, when her will broke and she cheated the diet again to help make herself feel better, resolving to do better the next day and ending back up with hunger, a shitty day, or both when that next day rolled around.

Why was it so hard to be healthy?

That's the question she asked herself as she idled in on El Cajon Boulevard, stuck in a massive traffic jam that she had been swimming through for what felt like an eternity. San Diego was always a mess in the more urbanized areas, and the coast was no exception. You'd think the October weather would discourage most people from visiting the coast, but every day, cars continued to clog and choke the streets like cholesterol in concrete arteries, Whitney's Mazda usually somewhere among them. She loved driving the damn thing, especially in the early morning and late night. The roads were practically empty, and it was the perfect time to get a quick, relaxing cruise in, the ocean right next door. It was one of the few times she wasn't at home, at work, or in the lab, a rare moment where she could let all of her worries go and just enjoy herself without any distractions. No irritable commuters, no stray cyclists, no multi-car pileups. Just her, the car, the road, and the ocean.

Unfortunately, it wasn't just her, the car, the road, and the ocean today. There were irritable commuters, stray cyclists sticking to the gutters, and what appeared to be a multi-car pileup causing the jam in the first place. Instead of letting both of her worries go, she let them stay in the car with her, forcing out any other thought. Thing #1 had come first, the results of a skipped breakfast creeping into her stomach during the late morning and causing it to growl ferociously. It was a good thing, it meant she was finally losing weight, but she couldn't stop thinking about how hungry she was. Her mind should've been focused on lesson planning for the afternoon, but instead it was focused on how to avoid eating lunch. When the dreaded break finally rolled around, she ducked into the coffeeshop across the street, ordered a black, and quickly gulped it down, supplementing it with an apple from home. Her teeth were so sensitive she could barely eat it, but it was a small price to pay for losing weight.

Then Thing #2 rolled in, in the form of Michael. She walked back into the building early from her lunch break, something that greatly pleased Michael's sense of punctuality. With his usual gruff smile, he dropped a comment that, by all means, was nice, encouraging, something nobody else would've thought twice about besides Whitney.

"Thanks, Whitney. You know, you've been doing great work lately, I would keep an eye on that assistant manager position once Sharon leaves, you never know what could happen." he said with a beaming grin on his way out. At first, Whitney was excited, returning Michael's smile with one of her own. Better salary, better benefits, what could go wrong? But then, the realization hit her; she didn't want to become an assistant manager! She wasn't doing this tutoring job because she loved it, she was doing it because it was a good experience gig in high school and she had nowhere else to go. She was completely stuck, and getting promoted would just make it harder to get loose. The mere thought of continuing to manage the school for years just made her bummed, and she was out of it for the rest of the day. Thing #1 popped back into the fold soon after, thoughts of dinner and how to avoid eating it without making her grandparents more suspicious and overbearing than they already were, crowding her mind when she should've been focused on math tutoring.

And now, even in the car on the way home, Thing #1 and Thing #2 continued to run around in her mind, allowing her to think of nothing else. She was still starving, but forced herself to put it out of her mind. If she didn't eat as much, she would lose weight, and if she lost weight, she wouldn't have to binge and purge anymore. It was simple science, she just wished it didn't have to hurt so much.

Sighing, she turned on the radio, hoping to get some break from the monotony of San Diego coastal traffic. A scratchy, somewhat grainy news report began to resonate throughout the car. "We're going to our traffic report now," the woman said in a flat, monotone voice, the same voice she used for all traffic reports regardless of importance. "We have a report of a major accident on El Cajon Boulevard, with fatalities and injuries currently unknown at this time. Eyewitness reports claim that a man fired a large blast of energy at a group of cars, blowing a large hole inside the road and destroying several vehicles. Motives are currently unknown, but police are investigating to see if the attack was gang-related. The suspect appears to be a Caucasian man in his mid-twenties, with dark brown hair and brown eyes, wearing a brown jacket, blue jeans, and white running shoes. As the man appears to be a metahuman, he is considered highly dangerous and should not be interacted with. If the suspect is seen, viewers are urged to contact police immediately..."

Whitney groaned as she passed by the exact wreck described on the news, a burnt-out husk of a car flipped over on the side of the road, surrounded by police officers, sirens, and yellow tape. It was clear that nobody had survived in that car, considering the roof was basically pounded flat against the main body of the car. Anyone who survived the initial impact would've been either burned to a crisp or had their necks broken by the impact. She envied the cops there. Nobody became a cop without purpose, without drive. Their jobs had meaning, they were contributing to society in so many ways. What the hell did Sharon the assistant manager contribute to society? The woman had been working there for fifteen years and never left because she "loved the job". If she loved the job that much, she would've gone to teacher's college. Whitney didn't want to be like that, she wanted to be like those cops, people with meaningful ways to help prevent the problems that always seemed to pop up.

As if right on cue, as she adjusted her rear-view mirror, Wonder Tower came into her line of sight, the massive behemoth structure that had become the center of attention in San Diego for the past few months. Once again, a familiar question that had been persisting for the last few days came back into her head, one that she didn't know the answer to. Could she become a superhero? She had powers, she was old (or rather, young) enough to do it, and it was something admirable, something she would actually enjoy doing it. But was she ready for it? She couldn't even get the never together to apply to college, could she fight dangerous supervillains and protect dozens of lives? Could she even fight at all? Part of her said yes, that not every Young Blood was an epic fighter, that they probably would welcome some home-front support, that her chemicals could be put to good use instead of sitting in a lab freezer all day. The other part of her said no, that she wasn't ready at all, that she would regret it and could get herself killed. Too much advice, not enough good advice.

First, she needed to focus on getting through this shitty day. Then, she would deal with this problem, this Thing #3 that always remained ever-changing and stubborn. It was like a science experiment, Thing #1 and Thing #2 were variables, always fluctuating and altering, but Thing #3 was the constant, the control keeping everything in place. But you never observe the controls, you observe the results of your variables. Right now, she had no interest in observing the control.

---

Carter Graystone
Chapter 1: A New Beginning

The plane was dark and most passengers were asleep already, trying to get some rest in the middle of the eleven-hour flight to Tokyo. Carter couldn't sleep though, he was too anxious...and claustrophobic. The plane had a lot of legroom for an economy flight, and he had an empty seat next to him, but he couldn't fall asleep. It wasn't his ADD meds, he had taken those already. Or did he? It had been a busy day, between leaving home, the two-hour drive to LA, the airport process, and the boarding had completely screwed over his internal clock. He didn't know his head from his ass by this point, let alone whether he took his meds or not. Planes were complicated for him, they were like overbearing girls; they were pretty attractive, but also annoyed the living crap out of him. Popping ears, crying babies, shit food, the usual complaints. Although, this flight was pretty decent; at the very least, there was a ton of legroom.

He still couldn't believe it. India? Him? Movies? It was a cool idea; he could catch a break, earn some money doing what he usually does, maybe pick up some moves from that Garuda Punch guy, but he was still bewildered by the prospect. Why him? Was it because he was talented, or was it just because he used to be a Young Blood. He knew it was probably the second answer; nobody would even know who the hell he was if it wasn't for the Young Bloods, but it annoyed him that the first thing people thought of when they heard his name was "Aeolus, Former Young Blood". He loved the Young Bloods (except for Red, he still hasn't forgiven him for that submission move), but he didn't want to be identified as one anymore. He wanted to be a normal guy, working a normal job. Granted, superpowered stuntwork wasn't that normal, but it was more normal than heroics! Maybe if this gig went well, he would get more stunt jobs. Stunt jobs could lead to TV roles. TV roles could lead to movie roles. Could he be an actor? He had never been to acting school or anything, but he liked the idea of making people's days better through entertainment. Instead of making people smile by saving them from a psychotic walking bioweapon cyborg bitch at the zoo, he could make them smile through a TV screen.

Drama kids are weirdos though, so maybe not.

In any case, he was excited. Of course, he was going to be on the set a lot, but he wanted to explore a bit! This was his first time leaving North America, so he wanted to see everything he could. Including all of the beautiful ladies. Sure, he didn't want to associate too much with the name Aeolus, but a namedrop here and there could go a long way at Sector 17. The market for females was dryyyyy in San Diego, they were all taken or thought he was "too immature". Of course, his height didn't help, but he wasn't that short. Maybe Garuda could give him a hand, he probably has girls fawning all over him.

For now though, sleep. He needed it; once he touched down, he would have to quickly hustle over to the hotel for a one-night stay before his final flight from Tokyo to New Delhi. After that, a four-hour train ride to Chandigarh. He both couldn't wait and couldn't remember why his stupid ass agreed to do this in the first place.

[North America Inc]

-Ares-

"Mei Cuo." Chen affirmed as he listened to the ensuing chaos above. As Floyd ran out to meet the fight head on, Chen got to work. Digging under the table to retrieve his Type 92, he scoured through the pile of papers resting on his desk. Shouting in Chinese to his subordinates in the immediate vicinity, "Burn it!" Chen dug through his notes, pulling out any notes that weren't already secured offsite. "Damn it..." the sound of Renata's light blast rang through the air, fear ran through his spine. Everything was progressing way too quickly.

"Lao shi!" A women wearing a lab coat ran into his office, brandishing a pistol, "We need to go now!"

"Yes...Yes!" Chen flung open the doors to a white cupboard, grabbing two distinct red and clear containers. Pouring the Red container all over his table, the gasoline soaking into the unnecessary paperwork. The other bottle doused a near by private server, the acid quickly eating through the hard drives. Dropping the empty bottles, Chen ran too the doorway; pulling out his cigarette lighter from his left coat pocket, before throwing it onto the table. The fire quickly ignited, consuming everything below.

Helping the limping middle aged man, the female scientist watched a very similar scene in the Laboratory. As the guards and Floyd held the line, a loose collection of scientists haphazardly got to work destroying any sense of incriminating evidence that pointed towards their benefactors. The rest ran. One of the first out the door, a young man straight out of university, bolted out of the elevator towards the SUVs as soon as they opened. An armed entourage followed suit with explicit orders to evacuate as many scientists as they could. Guns drawn and solely focused on the vehicles ahead, Wendy made short of them with a basic flank and her robotic companions. The young scientist reacted far too slowly to fall back to the Warehouse, instead falling back to the sight of an approaching mechanical canine.

As Wendy shouted onto him, demanding him to answer, he said nothing beyond incomprehensible sounds. Unfortunately for either, neither spoke the other language. So Wendy was left with a cowering young man before her. A shot rang out, and a bullet punctured the left shoulder of the scientist. "Help me!" He begged repeatedly.

Behind the relative cover of the Warehouse, a faceless guard unleashed sporadic fire at the silhouettes he barely could make out. One shot hit the side of a canine, but there seemed to be no effect. Turning over to the three scientists sitting, "Go, I'll cover you."

Chen, with help from his assistant, stood up. Tapping his ear piece, "Ares. Its' Chen. They cut us off. We need another way out of here!"

[The Republic of Atria]

Sina

Sina noticed his rather sullen mood pretty quick, and to his slight surprise, she asked what was wrong and if it was the food. "No... the food's fine. I wish I would've have known ahead of time how this actually worked. I wish I knew a lot of things actually..." He sighed. "I don't know. I just feel like I don't belong here. I'm only here to support my "real" dad and he's off talking to who knows who. These're all rich people talking about... Money, and how much money they're gonna be making and whatever businesses they have. I'm not rich, my dad is."

He sighed and went back to nibbling on his food for a second. It helped him feel at least a little bit better. "Anyways. Ever since I was little, I always dreamed that I'd get to see this someday. That I'd leave the humans behind and live among my own people! Never having to deal with the bullying and crap I got anymore. I guess that's my fault for idealizing this a bit too much, but now... I want to go back to the humans?" He said almost in a questioning tone. "I think at least. It feels like I've got more in common with them than just my species. I also thought I'd be spending more time with him instead of just flapping about I guess."

"Honestly. At first I dreaded you showing up. For reason that should be obvious, but now that you're actually here. It makes this more tolerable, y'know? I'm glad you were willing to put up with that dress. I realize it's pretty selfish, but I do want to say thank you for coming. Even if you didn't mean for this to happen. How about enough of my moping, how the Sandstorm practicing going?"

[Galnius]

Mika and Ash, Friendship Stirring and Plots Thickening


Mikaela Mynd walked through the halls looking like an absolute wreckage. Her hair was messy, her socks didn't match, she was wearing a sweatshirt one size too large, and she had noticeable bags under her eyes. It wasn't anyone's fault, really. She had been up until 2am playing video games, and had trouble falling asleep even after that. Still, the petite girl found herself in good spirits.

A guardian angel huh? I wonder if he's serious about the calling him part. Should I…? Mika pondered calling for the virgil known as Jan now, but decided against it. It was enough that he showed up randomly, she didn't want to push her luck. Besides, she had other plans for the day. Mostly, napping in class and people watching.

Watching, however, was something the dark haired girl wasn't doing very well today. As she turned a corner sharply she nearly collided with another student. This particular student, though, Mika instantly recognized.

"Woah, hey there. Ash, right?"

Turning around the corner, Ash was frowning at the map on her phone as she tried to figure out the way to her next class. Holding the device on one hand, she cradled a haphazard pile of books and notes in her other three arms. Fully aware that she was at risk of being late for another one of her lessons, the mutant was hardly paying any attention to the path ahead until she nearly collided with the shorter girl. Letting out a surprised yelp at the near-collision, Ash had to react quickly to make sure that she didn’t drop any of the textbooks or sheets that she was balancing. The stack of books would have looked excessive for any other student, but she’d quickly fallen in love with scanning through their pages - peering at pictures and diagrams even when she struggled to decipher the words. Her math teacher, Mr. Baker, had in particular been quick to hand a series of extra reading to the surprisingly capable pupil.

Looking up from the near-disaster, Ash’s face lit up as she recognised the other student. Her wings fluttered with a slight gust of happiness. “Mika, yes! It is very good to see you!”

She supposed that she’d found it harder to make friends in her class than she had expected. Even Rebecca, her friend from her favourite class, always seemed to be busy whenever Ash tried to talk to her. She supposed that it made sense, after all, they were there to learn in class, so of course people didn’t have as much time to talk as she’d like. They were already spending all their time together anyway, so it would be rude for Ash to try and impose herself as a new student.

Grinning, Ash’s intense focus on getting to class on time evaporated at the chance encounter. “Are you going to your class?” The girl glanced around the hall curiously. “Is it nearby?”

"Huh, I'm not going to class. Was a bit late, so I'm heading to the nurse to give them my doctor's note. Between you and me, it's total bullshit, but it keeps me out of trouble." Mika waved her note as evidence. "I missed the first few periods so I had to call in a favor."

The dark haired girl eyed Ash's massive stack of books with curiosity. "What are all those for? There's no way you're taking all those classes. Don't tell me you read those for fun or something."

Sighing, Mika came up with a plan to improve this girl's school life. "Come with me you loser. I can edit this to give me a little bit more time, and can probably pull one for you too if I want. I owe you pizza, and there's this great place nearby where I get a discount."

Ash frowned as Mika gestured towards her books. Glancing down at the stack of texts nervously, Ash hesitated before responding. Of course she was reading the books for fun, wasn’t that why everyone was reading them and going to class? Fortunately for the mutant, Mika seemed to move the conversation forward as a mischievous idea seemed to mold itself in her mind. Blinking in surprise at the offer, Ash bit her lip as she remembered how upset Naja had been when she’d missed her classes to hang out with Casimir.

Before she could say anything, Ash’s stomach growled at the prospect of pizza. The thought of the delicious dish was already making her hungry, especially after such a busy day of classes and work. Warily, the mutant stole a glance towards the note in the other girl’s hand. “I suppose that it is okay to miss school with a note, yes?” That was what the rules said, at least. In which case it would be fine for her to go with her new friend if she really could get her her own note? With the solid foundation of her logic, Ash felt increasingly confident at her decision as her features began to light up. “Okay, yes. I would very much like to see this pizza place with the discount!”

"Well, I'm not sure I could get you a note…" Mika scratched the hair on her temple as her eyes wandered, searching for an answer in how to get Ash out. "Alright, give me your number. I have a plan, you'll just need to follow my script. For now, to the exit! We have pizza to conquer, friend."

Shifting nervously, Ash remained silent for a few moments as she seemed to consider Mika’s own doubts about whether she could succeed in getting her a note. The mutant didn’t want to get in trouble again, but the other girl seemed pretty confident in her plan? She is my friend, yes? And friends should trust each other. Ash thought to herself, gradually making up her mind as her stomach made its own comments with an audible growl. Slowly, a determined grin spread across the girl’s features as reached into her pocket.

“Ok!” Ash declared, pulling out what looked to be an out-dated Nokia. Pressing away at the physical buttons on the practically ancient device, the mutant navigated to her contacts list before selecting her own name and offering her phone to Mika. “This is my number.”

Mika, for her part, was doing her best to stifle a laugh. The oversized device was at least ten years out of date, and it likely couldn't even access the internet. Out of sheer curiosity, she scrolled through the apps on it. "Holy shit, this thing is so old it still has snake. Wow." At this point, Mika could no longer contain her laughter and burst out laughing. "Okay, first things first, we need to get you a better phone. Now let's see if I can remember how to use this thing as we walk. The pizza is about two blocks away."

Exchanging some messages back and forth between the two phones, Mika quickly constructed an impromptu story about her needing Ash to save her from a guy she was hiding from on the way to school. That, at least, should get past basic scrutiny, as long as Ash stuck to the script.

From there, Mika used the phone for...other purposes. Namely, to satiate her curiosity on any of the Young Bloods. However, such a thing seemed missing. The only messages were from some person called Naja who seemed very disappointed in Ash (her mom?) and this guy called Casimir.

That seemed to be the bulk of the messages, in fact, and intrigued Mika all the more. "Wow Ashy, for someone who has no friends you talk to this Casimir guy a lot. What's that about, is he your secret boyfriend? Does your beau Kabuto know?"

A look of confusion flashed across Ash’s features as Mika criticised her choice of phone. She hadn’t been aware that the device was ‘out of date’, and she blinked in surprise as she cast a curious glance over it as the other girl continued to tap out a series of messages. All the while, the mutant never once considered whether or not her new friend might accidentally stumble upon her over conversations. Having been about to ask why a newer phone was better than what she had at the moment, Ash wasn’t able to get a word out before a sly grin spread across Mika’s features and she asked her about Casimir.

Immediately, one of Ash’s hands shot out to try and grab her phone back. Speaking quickly as she was suddenly terrified of accidentally revealing her best friend’s secret identity, the mutant nearly began stumbling over her own words. “N-no! Kabuto does not know at all.” She stated, trying to sound as convincing as possible. “Casimir is...he and I are best friends. It is very normal for two best friends to exchange the messages, yes?” Ash hesitated slightly, pulling her phone in nearly protectively now that she realised that its contents weren’t necessarily as secure as she’d assumed. “He is a boy too, so I suppose that does make him a boy friend as well?”

Wait, Ash is cheating on a Young Blood with a random? This is….interesting. With an impish grin, Mika led Ash out of the school building and towards the pizzeria. "Don't worry Ash, your secret is safe with me." Until tomorrow when I post it in the school paper anyway. Who could pass up something this perfect?

Mika finished the rest of the admittedly short walk as she explained the cover story to Ash. "So, I say someone was following me. You save me by scaring the guy off. I treat you to pizza for being my hero. Easy peasy, believable, and gives us a reason to be at the pizza place. Worst you'll get is someone saying you should've come straight back, but that's not even a slap on the wrist. So...here we are."

Turning to her left, Mika entered a busy pizza place and waved to the man behind the counter. "One large pizza please! I have a guest, and you can put it on my mom's tab."

The man, seemingly the owner, sighed and shook his head. "I was told not to let you do that anymore by your mother. If you want the pizza, you'll need to pay up straight."

"What?!" Mika took a deep breathe to recover from the surprise of her initial plan being denied. That said, it's not that she couldn't pay. ".....No, no, it's fine. Here. Meat Lovers."

Slamming forty dollars onto the counter Mika walked away and didn't even look back for the change. She had taken that money from her mom's purse anyway, so she didn't really care. Finding an empty table, she motioned to Ash to come over. "So...two guys huh? Bold of you. How far have you gone with them yet?"

Planting herself across from her new friend, Ash’s attention was greedily focused on the visible kitchen behind the pizzeria’s counter. Mika had made the right choice with the Meat Lover’s, and the mutant’s eager anticipation for the coming meal was palpable, until the other girl’s question caused her to frown in confusion. “Where I have gone with them?” She asked, wondering why Mika was interested in something like that. I must be careful. I cannot make her think that Casimir and Kabuto are the same person. But that was easier said than done, and Ash had to think quickly as she tried to come up with something that could be believable.

“Um, I think the furthest I have been with Kabuto was New York. That was during the tournament with the rest of the team. And with Casimir, I, uh, we…” Ash’s voice trailed off as her antennas twitched uncomfortably. Think, Ash. Where is somewhere else that you could have gone? “...he has come with me to school before?”

"That's….not what I meant Ash." Realizing quickly that euphemisms wouldn't work, Mika changed tactics. "Have you gone on dates with either of them? Held hands? Hung out at their place? ....kissed?"

Mika sighed, trying to wrap her head around needing to explain the intricate details of dating to this mutant. She herself didn't really have experience, but how could someone not know how these things were done? They were in high school for fucks' sake.

"Alright. So, you really like Kabuto and this Casimir dude, right?"

Visibly surprised by Mika’s questions, Ash struggled to respond as a rush of colour began to flood her cheeks. Smiling sheepishly, the girl shifted uneasily on her seat as her wings fluttered behind her. “Oh well, yes. I very much do really like both of those dudes. I said that we were best friends, yes?” Ash’s grin wavered slightly, and she hesitated before she continued cautiously. She hadn’t ever kissed Casimir though. She’d never really considered it, having thought that it was a rather peculiar action. But for some reason she couldn’t help but feel a strange fluttering in her chest as she pictured it, as if her heart had sprouted a pair of wings of its own.

Frowning at the strange feeling, Ash continued. “What…” The girl hesitated, before allowing her own growing curiosity to get the better of her. “What is a ‘date’?”

Mika was taken surprise by the question. This girl really had no idea what Mika was talking about. Was she...not dating either of them? Still, from Ash's body language (and her now pinkish face fuzz, which even Mika couldn't help finding a little cute) it was clear that she probably wanted to. She just didn't know it yet.

"Alright Ash, I can see I'm going to have to take you under my wing here...er...so to speak." Thinking deeply, Mika came up with a quick, flawless fix, that killed two birds with one stone. "Okay, I've decided. You are now my student. After all, I am an expert." Or at least, her mother was.

"So, a date is something boyfriends and girlfriends go on, just the two of them. See, it's like best friends, but more, and you do so much stuff more together. The kissing, for instance. We'll start with that. If you can...get me into wonder tower, I'll help you pick out clothes. I'll wear a blindfold unless I'm in your room even, if that helps. If anyone asks, tell them…tell them a man named Floyd is after me, and that you are helping him protect me.' After all, he did say he knew the Young Bloods. This might be my chance to get closer… "Then, we can make Kabuto jealous, and I have just the way too…"

Ash hesitated. Making Casimir jealous didn’t necessarily sound like a very nice thing to do, and this all felt like it was going so fast that it sent her head spinning. But she liked the sound of what Mika was saying. She and Casimir had been best friends for a while now, and they both got on really well. She liked spending time with the hero, and maybe figuring out this whole ‘date’ thing would be a fun surprise for him? On top of that, she couldn’t deny that she was having fun with her new friend. She’d been going to school for a few days now, and even though she was enjoying her classes and her teachers were all very nice, she was starting to get the feeling that her ‘friends’ didn’t really want to hang out with her. She had felt shy about telling Casimir or the other Young Bloods about it, especially since they seemed to be really busy with the recent drug cases. But now that Ash had found the prospect of a real school friend in Mika, she was eager to cement their new relationship.

“Ok, yes. I would like that very much.” She said, the idea quickly growing on her. “And I would be able to introduce you to everyone too! And show you my room and all of my things!” The mutant paused for a second before an excited grin spread across her features. “Wait, friends always have parties of slumber - we could do one of those, yes?”

"S-sure Ash." Mika was a bit shocked by the incredible turn of events. By all means, this went perfectly, and she could help Ash and cement herself into her circle. She wasn't too sure on the slumber party thing though...but if it got weird she could flash home with a picture of her room. "So, you can get me in right?"

Having stuffed her mouth with a slice of pizza at this point, Ash looked up happily towards her new friend before nodding vigorously. “Mm-hmm.” She declared, her words half-garbled as she spoke while chewing her food. “Ish going to be eashy peashy!”

"Perfect."

[Galnius]

Andrew, pre first raid

Slowing down, Andrew put his full force into a fist, coming up to clash with Zoe's powers. The whole time, he had been checking back and Wyatt was far behind. Needless to say, he shouldn't have too much of a problem, and focused on this blow as he watched Zoe's move.

Then, without warning, Wyatt arrived. Taken by surprise, Andrew quicklyturned and tried knocking all the force away. The clash...was not in his favor. With a burst of sound like an explosion, his vision went black....

Andrew awoke some time later in what he could only assume to be the clinic. He had no idea how many tons of force he just took to the face, but it left him feeling a little dizzy even now. As he turned and saw Bael, a stupid grin graced his lips. "It seems I uh...overestimated myself huh."

---

Keone

Somehow, someway, the late jog had become a norm for Keone, who still got up at five in the morning. It's not that he didn't know why. The woman he had met that day had intrigued him. Usually he would ignore such curiousities in lieu of his goals, but those had hit a dead end.

Recently, no new leads had come up. Minor superheroes and villains both avoided where he stalked at night, and work was, well, work. Due to this, Keone was stuck to his hobbies for enjoyment. The issue was, he never was allowed a hobby before, so he really just jogged, worked, and explored the area.

Thus, he found himself here once again. Somedays he saw her and tried to strike up a conversation, others he just ran while listening to music to clear his head. Today seemed to be one of the former. Taking out his ear buds Keone raised a hand in greeting. "Hey, it's Mackenzie right?"

[United Kingdom of Poland]

"Little busy here, Makeshift." Wendy called out over the radio, ducking as another salvo sparked against Spot's metal hide. A groan escaped her lips as she watched the scientists rush towards the SUV. Sending Spot after the gunman firing at her, Wendy charged the SUV. The scientists were just getting inside as she reached it, slamming her shoulder into the driver's door to through off the aim of a female scientist pointing a pistol at her. Grabbing the gun she twisted it to the right hard, the scientist crying out in pain as she forced to let go. Picking up the gun, Wendy pointed it at the the Engine block and emptied the magazine into it, white steam soon erupting from under the hood. "And does anyone know where Shi ran off too, because I don't speak Mandarin..."

Wendy's voice trailed off as a series of explosion began erupting from the top floor of the warehouse. At the same time a figure wearing black body armor with a pair of swords strapped to his back came walking out the same entrance the scientists had come from...

[Tomia]

The Raid
As the swarm of insects surrounded Ares, a blast of bright red energy flew through the the air, incinerating thousands of bugs throughout the room. While he eliminated a large number of them, a number of ants still managed to penetrate weak points in the mercenary's armor. This clearly caused him a great deal of pain, but rather than slow down, he seemed to enter almost a frenzied state as he moved his arm raced around the room with deadly speed and precision. Even the kick to the head didn't seem to slow him though there was clearly now a cut across his forehead. Meanwhile the ants on his person were actually taken out largely by Makeshift, who managed to knock him backwards before pinning him to the ground with the strength of her mech.

"I'm tired of this. No more playing around, it's time to make my exit." He said, fortunately the fact that he could not use his arms did not deter his plan. Instead he forcefully bit down on one of his teeth, which was revealed as false tooth carrying an explosive trigger. Suddenly explosions started popping up across the first and second floor. One of them managed to drop debris on top of Oberon, giving Ares his opportunity to escape. He headed out the side exit, the same door that served as the secret basement exit. There however he proved not to be alone.

For her part. Wendy didn’t know what to make of Ares as he stepped out from the secret entrance, other than to assume the fighting stance Roy taught her as he walked towards her. “I’m going to need you to stop right there.” She ordered, Spot growling as he paced behind her.

“Oh really?” Ares asked mockingly with a chuckle. “How could I possibly refuse such an intimidating hero and her attack dog?” Just as he finished his rhetorical question he sent a fierce front kick to Wendy’s chest before spinning gracefully and sending one of his blades in the direction of Spot.

Wendy managed to block the kick with her staff, the force of the attack knocking her back several feet. She was about to respond when she heard a sound from Spot she hadn’t ever heard before. He was whimpering, limping back towards her as he did so. Her eyes settled on the sword sticking out of his side as Spot began to shut down, the sword damaging his battery, before shifting back to the figure. “Okay, now I’m going to kick your ass for hurting my dog.” She swung the end of her staff at Ares’s head.

“Now wouldn’t that be a sight.” He said, grabbing the staff with his metal arm before twisting it out of Wendy’s grip and dropping it to the ground. “I see that traitor I once adopted has been training you. He is as poor a teacher as he is a warrior it seems.” He then closed the gap between him and Wendy with a quick movement and raised a knee aimed at her stomach.

Wendy dropped to her knees, gasping for air as her vision blurred. Using what little strength she had left, Wendy dove at Ares in a desperate shoulder tackle, only for him to immediately knock her back down.

Floyd drew his second sword, holding it over Wendy’s neck. “I could kill you right now.But it’s clear you’re important to Roy. So instead I’ll wait until he finally finds the courage to face me. Then I’ll let him watch you die before I finally give him the death he deserves. But do not mistake this for mercy, a fighter as pathetic as you deserves none.” With that he slammed the flat of the blade against her head, knocking her unconscious.

With that finish Floyd made his way towards the disabled van, ushering the scientists out and leading them to the boat he had stored at the dock. Together they drove off, having been dealt a setback but ultimately achieving what they wanted out of San Diego.

As he was trying to figure out how to complete Alexis' task, while Renata was trying to pull Rocket along Mars was deemed lucky when the piece of floor he laid on collapsed. He didn't get a chance to respond to Renata's seemingly dismissive apology as he fell down into the basement, which didn't seem to be exploding but was cleared out and abandoned. Still there, were clearly things left behind and Mars abandoned Rocket for a moment to search the different rooms. "Look, we can talk about it later. I'm busy right now." Mars called back to Renata as he went off to search. One seemed particularly promising as it held a number of centrifuges, microscopes and various data sheets. He grabbed everything he could, including blood samples and documents indicating results and tests that had been done. Beyond that he also discovered that he was not currently alone. In fact there was a scientist who was wandering around, looking panicked and lost. Fire was starting to spread and so Mars "offered" to get him out, and seeing he had no choice the scientist agreed. Mars grabbed all the things he had collected and headed back to Rocket with his new acquaintance. He then reduced Rocket down to a suitcase with the press of a button. He'd have to make repairs later but nothing like the last time.

Meanwhile he then took to his comms to speak. "Someone want to give me a lift? Not sure I really trust the elevator right now. Also, I found one of the scientists, I'm bringing him with me."

[Bentus]

Cowritten by Auropa, Bentus, Finland SSR, Galnius, New Finnish Republic

What is this, some kind of Suicide Squad?
A Collab, Part Four: There's no need to be afraid, the Young Bloods are here!
San Diego

Part Three

---

As the unlikely duo made their way throughout the hallways, Red felt the occasional rumble of something crashing around somewhere further down in the building. It didn’t hold the same sensation as that of an explosion, so for the time being he felt confident that his presumption of the explosives being potentially faked was still correct. Still, if it wasn’t that, he understood what this meant.

Whoever Spectre is with must have run into either Marionette or Weatherman. Whichever of the two it is, we need to hurry up and get to those hostages before they get into harm’s way, Red thought with a small grimace as he glanced around the corner of a hallway they were approaching. Spotting a pair of armed guards looking around nervously with their weapons held down at their waists, Red wasted no time in reaching for his hip, tossing out in quick succession two pairs of what appeared to be two separate metallic balls attached together with a string. As they flew through the air, the balls quickly began to unravel until they became a twirling whirlwind, wrapping up in the blink of an eye around the lower legs of the pair of men and immediately tightening up so much that the men were toppled over onto the ground. Before they even had a chance to realize what was happening, an electric surge raced through their bodies, shocking them to the point that they soon fell unconscious in an unflattering heap on the ground below.

Daniel had been watching Mask as he snuck around and disposed of his targets with mild disinterest. The other hero was taking far too much time in his opinion, and slowly more and more cuts and bruises lined his body. What are those idiots doing to me.

“The hostages are being held on the opposite side of those doors,” Red said in a low voice to Spectre, his attention directed towards the large pair of metal doors that led into the main room he had last scene the hostages were. “I should be able to roll the device over towards them and from there cut the power. Now promise me you’re actually going to get them out and not do anything stupid here, okay?” Red said, a small amount of doubt in his voice as he spoke over to the Outrider.

"Yeah, nothing stupid. I'm good at that", Daniel replied in full confidence. Alas, such a promise wouldn't last. Through the hallway behind them came the next patrol. Daniel, recognizing them, instantly dropped his guard.

"What in the hell-who are you two?" A scantily clad tall woman glared, nearly bestial eyes prepared to pounce. Behind her, a very built man in a clown costume held an oversized club.

Daniel, of course, had but a simple reply. "Napkin of doooom-gwah!" Dodging from the woman transforming into a mythically sized lion, Spectre was slammed into the wall as the clown tripled in size and flung him into the door behind him. Looking at Mask, Daniel said "Wouldja believe me if I said he was bigger last time?"

“Not the fucking time, Spectre!” Red yelled as he tossed one of his rederangs towards the enlarged clown, a small set of explosions ringing out as the villain was sent flying backwards away from his impromptu teammate. The sound of sharp nails scratching the surface of the floor tiles next to him prompted Red to turn around, acting in pure instinct as he lifted his arm up to shield his head from the crushing jaws of the lioness. Red let out a wince of pain as the pressure from the bite radiated through his arm, his thin armor plating only doing enough to prevent any serious damage from occurring. Letting out a grunt, Red delivered a sharp headbut to the lioness’s snout, causing it to let go as a pained snarl erupted out of its mouth.

As the two maintained a small amount of distance from one another, Red glanced out nervously towards the door they had been heading to before stumbling upon the henchmen of Marionette. The jamming device that rested on his hip seemed to increase in perceived weight at Red understood that they were at a complete risk of the hostage area ending up as a crater should his assumptions about the validity of the explosive devices be wrong.

With little other option remaining, Red waited for the moment the lioness chose to pounce. It didn’t take long, as seeing the apparent hesitation in his body movement caused it to spring into an attack. Waiting for the last possible moment to move, Red’s hand that had previously been gripped around his waist suddenly opened, revealing a spherical object that floated in the air right in front of the face of the lion. A split second later a massive blinding flash accompanied with a deafening bang erupted in the hallway, causing the now disoriented lioness to fall face first into the wall right beside where Red was located.

“Keep that thing’s attention!” Red yelled over to Spectre as he took off in a mad sprint towards the doorway. Every single ounce of muscle memory kicked in for him as he reached downwards towards his waist without breaking his stride, grabbing the jamming device and activating it with a small press of a button. Reaching the door, he kicked the door open, nearly sending the metal door snapping off its hinges in the process as he was met with startled gazes from the group of hostages that were bound and assembled. Wasting no time, he tossed the device into their midst, causing a great deal of panic from many as they assumed he had thrown an explosive.

"I think keeping it's attention is going to be pretty-woah!-easy. I think -oh shit- he remembers me!"

“Relax! I’m here to save your assess, and that thing is going to prevent you from getting blown to kingdom come!” Red shouted at them, noticing a few of their eyes widening as they seemed to recognize the distinct appearance of Red’s costume.

I feel like I should say something inspiring here. That’s what heroes are supposed to do, right? Red thought to himself, opening his mouth as he prepared to speak when suddenly he felt a pair of claws dig into his back, dragging him backwards with a startled yelp as he was tossed across the floor, tumbling like a ragdoll until he eventually skidded to a painful stop.

“Turning your back to an enemy? How foolish of you,” the lioness spoke to him, its voice a mixture of feminine and ferocity. Walking slowly towards him while staring at him through the cold and unforgiving slitted eyes, Red could see that he had most certainly angered her with the earlier flash grenade that had gone off right in her face. Letting out a grunt, Red got back onto his feet, a burning sensation running down his back from what he already knew was blood from the wounds inflicted on him. Reaching down towards his waist, Red retrieved a pair of his rederangs, their sharp edges shimmering dangerously from the lights above them as he made a small curling motion with one of his fingers.

“Alright little kitty, I’m down to play around a bit.”

An irritated snarl erupted from the lioness as she pounced forwards towards Red, her sharp claws slicing through the air towards the direction of his throat. Stepping to the side, the edges of Red’s rederangs caught the claws, locking the two together in a position similar to that of two dueling swordsmen as the two rapidly exchange blows with one another. While managing to deflect most of the attacks away from him, a handful of swipes managed to land at least partially on him, causing sparks to fill the air between them as the sharp claws were unable to pierce through the much more heavily armored chest plate of Red’s exosuit.

While at the current moment he was relatively safe, Red knew all it would take would be one lucky hit on his less protected areas around his neck or joints for him to be in serious trouble. Understanding just how dangerous those claws were, Red decided to switch up his tactics, waiting for the moment between the rapid swipes to suddenly leap up and kick downwards towards the lioness head, effectively using it as a springboard as he gracefully flipped over behind her. Before she could react, Red dropped his pair of rederangs and leapt on top of her back, wrapping his arms around her neck as he interlaced his legs underneath the long body.

Placing his forearm across the neck of the lioness and grasping onto his bicep with the same arm, Red began pulling his arms towards himself as he locked in a rear naked chokehold, his iron grip providing zero space for his opponent to escape from as it panickingly tried to buck him off of her back. Given her current form, there was no means in which it could even attempt to swipe at him, so this futile attempt at freeing itself was the only option. The lioness even went to the lengths of attempt to charge towards the walls, smashing Red with such force that the walls cracked from the impact and sent dust floating into the air from the ceiling tiles above.

However even with these actions, Red’s grip around her neck only tightened as he remained firmly in place, holding on for dear life like a bull rider at a rodeo as he waited for the lack of oxygen to take hold over his opponent. And after several more desperate moments of attempted escape, he could feel the lioness’s movements become more sloppy and lethargic, until the legs of it eventually gave out and sprawled out to the ground below. A second later the form of the lioness changed back into the woman from before, her body completely limp as she lay there unconscious.

Dan meanwhile had been avoiding the lumbering attacks by the oversized clown, just barely moving out of the way in time to avoid injury. Finally, his savior came. Another Daniel sprung forward as he dodged a fist and started shooting the clown in the knee.

"Fuck yeah, two on one!" The demented duo called out simultaneously. Peppering the clown with darts and bullets, they managed to get the giant on one knee. However, the cost was great, as one Dan was sent flying and the other nearly blacked out from the pain.

Then, the rarest thing happened. "Dan, I've got a plan! Leap Frog!" Instantly knowing what he meant, the other Dan recovered and avoided a head sized fist. Getting on to one knee, he boosted the first Dan into the air, who subsequently shoved two cloths into the clowns nostrils. Soon, the clown teetered and fell, giving Spectre the victory.

"Napkin. Of. Doom Motherfucker."

Unbeknownst to those in the room, two more costumed figures had been quietly moving through the unfolding chaos, working to carefully untie the hostages then, lead them to a recently made exit one by one. Up until now, Selene had managed to cover their approach and actions with her illusions, but with the fight raging on so much closer and her needing to constantly shift and change them to cover the fleeing hostages, Forge didn’t know how much longer she could keep this up for and to make matters worse, he could only hope Red would be able to pull through.
Resisting the urge to try and join in, he did his best to keep silent and avoid blowing their cover. For now, they needed to focus on the hostages. He didn’t know how well Red’s device would work but if Marionette caught wind of what was happening, it could be the end of all of them. Instead he did his best to focus on his own task, ‘only a few more’ he thought to himself as he tore his eyes back towards the nearest civilian. Placing a hand over his mouth, the man’s expression changed to one of sudden shock as his surroundings began to change around him and he was brought into the growing illusion. Moving into his sight, Forge gestured for silence as he pointed to other, undone restraints now littering the ground beside him before gesturing to a recently made and concealed hole leading to an exit on the lower floor. Realizing what was happening, the man looked back to the ensuing carnage before giving a rushed nod of understanding. Slowly moving his hand away, Forge focused his powers and caused the restraints to buckle and fall as their joints turned to ash. And after helping him back to his feet, guided him through a short, terrifying walk around the battlefield and remaining guards, before finally sending him out with the others only to repeat the whole process all over again.

By the time the last hostage was running for the exit, Red had somehow managed to choke out the monster he was up against while his somewhat unique partner (or partners?) had been able to defeat their own opponent in some concept of the word. Leaving only two more enemies in the room and facing the now tired out heroes.

Looking towards the villains in the room, Forge came to a quick decision. One was an adult male, armed with weapons he hadn’t seen before while the other appeared to be a small girl with some dangerous looking gauntlets. Neither looked particularly harmless, but for now they still had surprise on their side giving them both a small window of opportunity. Making his decision, he waved at Selene and began pointing towards himself and the man, before doing the same towards the girl and her, before neatly summarising his plan with an overhead swinging motion towards their heads.

Wait, what? Selene immediately figured out what her teammate was asking her to do, then turned at the girl with giant metallic fists for arms and gulped. Before she could protest, however, he was already gone.

After a quick nod and morphing the nearby debris around him into an impromptu staff, Forge slowly walked up behind the man and reared up for heavy blow. “Hey.” He said somewhat casually, before violently slamming the bar down against the back of his head. Folding over from the sudden blow, the notorious villain crumpled under the impact and unceremoniously flopped to the ground in front of him. ‘This is so much easier when they can’t see us’ Mike admitted to himself.

“You know we have communicators right?!” He finally called out to Red. “What is this like, the third time you’ve run after Marionette solo!? And who are these clowns? And who is this?! Do you know he’s working with Floyd! Or his twins are! Are you working with Floyd? And what was that! Do you know how many things could have gone wrong with trying to choke a- whatever that was?! I mean… ugh, Sel could you drop the illusion?” He finally asked with a sigh as he rubbed the back of his neck.

“What I mean...Is good work not getting killed and how can we help?” He finally asked.

Selene’s illusion faded instantly, only to instantly fill the entire room with a scream. The purple-haired girl was running towards Forge as fast as her feet would allow, a heavy steel fist smashing into the ground behind her with each step. Turns out hitting the Digger in the back of the head with weak Lunarian arms would only piss her off, who knew?

“Ah, okay. Umm, one sec” Forge added as he turned to see the situation Selene had ended up in. ‘That.... might be my bad’ he admitted to himself as he focused his powers and readied himself. Apart from probably traumatising Mizu and losing the last of his brownie points, this was actually a pretty good setup for him.

As Selene ran past, Forge stepped forward and swung his staff again. Seething with rage and ready for carnage, Digger moved one of her gauntletted fists up to block the incoming attack as the other reached back to launch a strike of its own. When the staff made contact however, instead of harmlessly bouncing off as she expected, her once powerful fist crumpled and folded around the attack as it deformed under its weight. Confused but not ready to give up, she threw her other arm out towards the so called hero only for him to redirect it outwards, move in close and hit her across the temple with a sharp elbow blow. The sudden, admittedly brutal impact was enough to send her head reeling and eyes spinning. In a bid to keep the fight going, she took a half step back and tried to adopt a fighting stance while mumbling what was probably meant to be a targeted insult towards the heroes. But before she could finish it, her vision began to go dark and her balance started to crumble, before long she had fallen face first into an unconscious heap besides her dad.

Forge meanwhile, had his moment of pride shattered with a sudden realization. ‘I just elbowed a kid in the face so hard she fell unconscious… Oh my god I just knocked a small girl out. I didn’t even hesitate! Am I a bad person?! Is she going to be okay?’

“Well…” He finally said with a clear slouch and broken spirit “That’s just about the worst thing I’ve ever done… So what now?”

Brushing off the dust and debris off of his metal chest plate, Red carefully approached where the small child was laying on the ground in an unconscious heap. Reaching downwards with two fingers, he gently placed two fingers towards her exposed neck, pausing for a few moments before eventually nodding his head.

“She’s still breathing, at least. Given the situation, Forge, there’s not much else you could’ve done. Don’t think about it too much,” Red said, doing what he could to reassure the panicking Mike. Reaching to his back pocket, he quickly tied together the small wrists of the girl together with a reinforced zip tie, doing the same to her ankles as well. Grabbing a few more, he tossed them towards Mike. “Let’s get them restrained for now, then we move on to finding where Marionette is.”

Walking over to where the woman whom he had defeated previously was likewise laying on the ground unconscious, Red began to do the same procedure. However, as he was tightening up the last zip tie, he paused for a brief moment, his thoughts returning to what Mike had said to him moments before. “I didn’t ask for your help for a reason, Forge.” Tightening the restraints, he paused once more, this time looking backwards so that he met eyes with Mike. “But I’m not mad that you did. So thanks.”

Once this was done, Red glanced over to where Spectre was, a suspicious look on his face that remained hidden underneath his scratched helmet. “So, I’m assuming you already know where she is?” he asked, fully aware of what Spectre’s capabilities were.

[Zarkenis Ultima]

October 3rd

---

---

"Understood, WiFi. I'll see if I can't reach-"

The blonde girl's words were cut short as suddenly, after growing frustrated and threatening to escape, the mercenary somehow set off a series of explosions that tore across the building without using his hands. "Watch out, everyone!" Alexis called out to her team in an urgent tone before looking up, just in time to notice two massive slabs of concrete from the above floor break loose and begin falling straight towards her. Immediately, Oberon raised both arms, pointing them towards the falling debris as they transformed into energy cannons, which let loose powerful concussive blasts that easily pulverized both falling hazards. However, this allowed Floyd to make a run for it, no longer forced into the ground by the overpowering mech.

Realizing her mistake, Alexis did not panic or chastise herself. Instead, she simply took off after the mercenary, quickly gaining on him... until a chunk of falling concrete struck the mech's shoulder, promptly sending it to the ground and stopping the girl's pursuit. Forced into the ground, the girl was nonetheless bent on getting back up and continuing to chase after the runaway criminal, but she was quick to reconsider once she saw that most of the ceiling was in the process of collapsing on top of the ground floor, and more importantly, her teammates. The situation left her with a trying dilemma: continue going after one of the most wanted criminals in America and the world, or make sure that her friends were not harmed?

She didn't think twice before making a decision.

My duties towards my team take precedence.

Getting back up, Oberon began using both arms to fire a barrage of energy blasts against the falling debris, ensuring that her teammates would be pelted by a light rain of dust and pebbles, and not crushed to death by the ceiling. Though some of her blasts missed their mark and let some chunks of debris slip through, most of the danger was successfully cleared away by her relentless assault.

As the dust cleared, however, two things caught her attention in quick succession. The first was Mars, who, along with Renata, seemed to have fallen through a hole in the floor that opened up due to the explosions. "Mars!" She called out swiftly, Oberon already headed to the opening in the ground. However, her teammate soon replied to her call, stating that he was fine, which meant that she could set her attention elsewhere.

The second thing was Wendy. The pin that monitored her vitals showed increased adrenaline, shortly followed by a sudden drop in activity - something had put her out of commission. Alexis immediately opened her comms once again. "Whoever is available, head to the back of the factory to check on Wendy right away. Her vitals just dropped, she needs help." She announced to the team.

Rather than head out herself, however, the genius girl instead approached the hole in the ground upon hearing Mars calling out for help. She carefully jumped down toward the basement, Oberon's wings slowing its descent and preventing it from crushing the genius boy or his charge. Once there, Alexis placed her mech's arms around the two and then flew back out of the hole.

"We should not linger here. The explosions must have severely weakened the structure - we likely don't have long until it collapses altogether."

[Absolon-7]

The Raid

Alexis

Casimir Herman October 3rd
Casimir could barely process the rapid fire series of events that followed in between his shortness of breath and the overwhelming shock of feeling the deaths of thousands of his swarm he could barely concentrate on getting up. He turned over to his side and saw a small trail of blood from Ares as Oberon flew off with him. He heard Alexis order to get something to restrain Ares but the sudden series of explosions breaking throughout the building like a opera's crescendo. Chunks of the ceiling started raining down around Casimir but he jump around like a cricket to avoid them. He gave a mental order to disperse the remainder of his swarm that couldn't fly while the ones that could disperse outside.

As his swarm left the building he could feel the vibrations of the building through their legs acting like tens of thousands of little fingers. It was unstable and the vibrations erratically caused violent tremors in certain sections of the building. Alexis calling out that the building was going to collapse only confirmed his fears and he was dead set on escaping but suddenly seeing where he had webbed up Bolt reminded him of a consequence of their raid. Normally he wouldn't even consider it but he figured the rest of the team was too squeamish to let it happen. He ran towards Bolt while picking up another guard along the way he wrapped them together in webbing before chucking them out of a window. He repeated the process as he ran as fast he could picking the guards they had defeated on the first floor and throwing them out cushioned in webbing.

"Someone should get the guards on the second floor before this building collapses," said Casimir into his comm device, "I'll go check on Wendy."

He followed through on his word and went towards the docks looking around for Wendy. A wasp spotted her some distance towards the exit gate of the compound and he wasted no time rushing towards her. He bent down to gently pick her head up and placed two fingers on her neck. She seemed mostly all right but she was pretty frail as far he knew and he was going to get her help. Her being mad at him be damned.

"Hey, Wendy, can you hear me? We need you to stay awake until we get you to the infirmary," he said to her before he spotted an injured mech wolf in an apparent shutdown. He reached for his comm with his other hand and said, "We're gonna need like a pickup truck for Spot. He's looking in just as bad of a shape as Wendy."

[Bentus]

Cowritten by Auropa, Bentus, Finland SSR, Galnius, New Finnish Republic

What is this, some kind of Suicide Squad?
A Collab, Part Five: The Finale!
San Diego

Part Four

---

After the chaotic scenes of the superpowered brawl, an eerie silence had fallen on the studio hall. The dripping of water leaking from broken pipes, and the occasional sparking of frayed electrical wires, provided the foreground to the distant whining of police sirens from outside. The remaining Dans, battered and beaten from the fight, were left with little more than their own heavy breaths for company as both Floyd and Marionette lay incapacitated. He’d emerged victorious: the last man standing, as it were. But before he could fully bask in the glory of his triumph, an explosion tore through the room’s main entrance. Sending the heavy doors flying halfway across the hall into a crumpled mess, the detonation sent smoke and a flash of light streaming into the room, causing Dan to cover his face from any stray shrapnel or dust.

Fortunately, the explosion had been specifically crafted to avoid any such dangerous projectiles. Instead, it had been intended as a precise incision in the building’s secured exterior, opening an entrance for the silhouetted figures that now calmly walked into the devastated battleground. Standing at the front of the approaching group, Captain Quake grimaced as he surveyed the scene around him, his cake hanging proudly behind his every step. Behind him, the beautiful Star Queen followed closely, a faint trail of smoke still rising from her hands. Passing his gaze dismissively over Spectre and noting the presence of an immobile Floyd and Marionette, the famed hero let out a tired sigh.

“Well, ain’t this a shitshow.” Turning towards his partner, Quake cracked a smile. “Looks like we showed up in the nick of time though, huh?”

Ignoring her team leader’s overconfidence, Star Queen frowned as she looked at Spectre. “Are you hurt?” She asked, before quickly continuing. “And where are the hostages? Who knows whether Marionette set up some kind of timed trigger, our work’s not done yet.”

Rolling his eyes, Quake waved his hand dismissively. “Relax, Rebecca. I’ll call in the Commissioner and tell him to send his men in to sweep the building. They’ll be faster than us, and with these two out of the picture,” He said, gesturing towards the two limp figures before them, “even they’ll have an easy time of it. Though that does open up a question.” Turning back towards Spectre, the Captain folded his arms across his chest as his eyes narrowed. “What the hell were you thinking barging in like that? The professionals had everything under control, you idiot.”


As the heroes focused on how to clean up after the mess that had been made from Marionette’s actions, the young girl’s thoughts began to stir. For a moment, she lay still until recollections of where she was and what had happened began to return. Slowly, her eyes flickered open as a wave of nausea washed over her head. Groaning quietly with what little strength she had, she felt like her entire body had been turned into a gelatinous soup. A hand of terror gripped at Marionette’s chest at the sight that greeted her. There, not a few painfully small steps away, stood none other than Captain Quake and Star Queen. She felt her heart skip a beat as she realised how close she was to the famous heroes.

No, no. That’s not fair! They came here to fight me, really? Marionette wanted to scream at fate for being so cruel. This was supposed to be her great debut among the pros, but instead she couldn’t even garner the strength to stand - let alone put up a worthwhile fight. She wanted to curl up and cry as she saw the heroes talking to Spectre, directing their attention to him instead of her. Slowly, the girl’s feelings of defeat began to harden into determined anger. She might have been beaten, but she hadn’t lost yet. Not when she still had a chance to leave her mark and ensure that the Nefarious Marionette would be remembered in infamy. Reaching down to pull the detonator for the hostages’ explosive vests out of her pocket, the girl ignored the sharp pains in her limbs with a determined grimace. She made no effort to disguise her actions, an involuntary grunt escaping from her lips as he gripped onto the simple trigger. I can still do it. I know I can. A wild smile began to spread across the girl’s face as a surge of energy seemed to grip her, allowing her to shakily prop herself up on her free hand. Lifting the detonator, she held it up towards the gathered heroes.

“Hey heroes, you...really think...you’d be able to win so easily?”

Blinking in surprise at the raspy voice, all the eyes in the room turned to see the girl and the innocuous item being held in her hand. Immediately, Captain Quake’s jaw hardened. “Oh fuck.”

Raising her hands as if to try and calm the unstable villainess. Star Queen cursed under her breath at the sudden change in events. Walking slowly towards the girl, the woman forced herself to try and appear friendly. “Marionette, stop. You don’t want to do this, not really. Just think about all those people up there. They have friends, family. You’ll just make things worse for yourself.”

A giggle escaped from Marionette’s lips, a glimmer shining in the corner of her eye as she finally received the attention that she’d so greedily craved. “So what? Their little boring lives and their little boring families hardly matter when you think about it. If anything, I might be making their deaths the only interesting thing about them.” Star Queen felt a cold hand grip at her chest at the casual reply, fearing that she’d misread the young girl. Narrowing her gaze, the older woman continued, more forcefully this time.

“Marionette, I’m going to give you until the count of three. One,”

The girl’s grin seemed to only widen at the threat. Before Star Queen could even utter another word, Marionette offered her a friendly wink as her thumb pressed down on the trigger. “Three.”

Immediately, Star Queen’s jaw dropped as she raced forward. “NO!” Meanwhile, up in the higher floors of the tower, a beep sounded from each explosive and red lights flickered into existence as their detonation commands were received.

Time seemed to freeze, as everyone in the room held their breath in anticipation for the oncoming concussive wave from the explosions to rock the building. However, after a few moments of silence, a shared sense of confusion swept through everyone who was present, none more than Marionette herself as she looked down at the detonator in her hand, pressing down on the button several times rapidly in a desperate panic.

“Keep pressing all you want, Marionette. They’re still not going to go off.”

A familiar voice rang out from behind where Marionette and the heroes were standing, their heads snapping back to see Red standing with his fists curled up, deep scratch marks etched into his exosuit’s armor. Just behind him were the remaining heroes, each staring down at the confused villain with menacing gazes.

“W-What do you mean they’re not going off?!” Marionette shouted back, rage filling her voice as she took a stumbling step backwards, still tightly gripping the detonator in her hand. Taking a step forward, Red’s blue eye slits in his helmet seemed to burn like blue flames as he stared down the villain who had caused him and so many others an uncountable amount of pain and misery.

“I jammed the signal a long time ago, and we’ve already evacuated the hostages far away from this building.” Reaching towards his waist, Red pulled out a pair of rederangs, spinning them on with his fingers with anticipation as he continued to stare down the wide-eyed Marionette. “Your ace up the sleeve is gone, Marionette. This is your one chance to surrender while you can, because no matter what you choose to do next, it’s going to end up with you getting locked up with the key thrown away.” Glaring down at Marionette, Red pointed the sharp end of one of his rederangs towards her as he got into a fighting stance, prepared to act the second he saw even a shiver of movement come from the villain.

“So, what’s it going to be? Getting sent to prison in handcuffs, or on a stretcher?”

The colour seemed to drain from the villain’s face as she glanced between the heroes, each of their impassive expressions looking down on her with a looming menace. Looking at the detonator in horror, Marionette couldn’t believe how quickly even her last ditch effort was collapsing around her. Dismayed, her legs gave out from under her as she fell onto her knees, the intense feeling of fatigue from before continuing to weigh down on her limbs like a draining weight sucking her dry. “I...I’m…” She wanted to be defiant, to vow to fight to the end and never go quietly, but how could she? She could hardly stand, let alone use her powers or put up anything close to a fight. It was all that she could do to simply watch as Red approached her, handcuffs and rederang dangling from his hands.

Daniel had meanwhile managed to get Floyd off from him and been watching everything unfold and kept looking between Marionette and Mask. One one hand, he had defeated the great Marionette. On the other hand, villains weren't supposed to go to jail, they were supposed to escape to fight once again, threatening the hero's life time and time again. Besides, in a way, wasn't this...more...challenging?

Vanishing from the views and senses of the others, Spectre moved closer to Marionette, getting her and Floyd just in his range. "Alright, alright...here we go."

Reappearing, two Daniels called out a quick, seeming horrified bald face lie. "She has my parents!" Just as quickly, he vanished again. If she could get outside, he could do a full getaway. She just needed to improvise and roll with what he said. Grabbing Floyd with two other Dan's, he made his way just outside.

Her eyes widening as Spectre vanished with Floyd, Star Queen took half a step toward the hero before he disappeared from her senses. “Spectre, don’t!” She called out, although it was already too late. Captain Quake didn’t react nearly as quickly, his face twisting into a scowl as the rookie seemed to throw away what little good he’d done in helping them wrap up the crime scene. Though he couldn’t help but notice that Star Queen had had to shout louder than normal to carry her voice. Frowning, Quake seemed to notice for the first time that the wind outside had worked its way up into a furor, a flash of lightning even being visible outside one of the studio’s windows. Blinking in surprise as Spectre’s immediate stupidity was ignored, the member of the LA Stars glanced down at his communicator to see an unread message from the rest of his team.

He’s not here.

His eyes shooting open, Quake turned towards his partner. “Rebecca, it’s Weatherman!”

Just as he shouted his warning, the winds circling the building all turned inwards at once, shattering windows and screaming into the room with a howl of glass shards and debris. It felt as if a tornado had suddenly tore into the building, knocking the heroes off of their feet as Marionette had to simply hold on for dear life lest she get blown away. Squinting against the powerful gusts, she looked up to see a man striding confidently into the centre of the hall.

“You heroes didn’t think it would be that easy, did you?” He called out, his voice booming out above the maelstrom of his own creation, while an eye of calm seemed to follow where we stood. Cackling as the heroes struggled to fight against his attack, he turned towards his sidekick with a look of genuine concern across his features. “Marionette, are you ok?!”

Despite her exhaustion, Lisette gritted her teeth as she pulled herself back onto her feet, a distraught expression on her face as the famous villain came all this way to clean up the mess that she’d caused. It looked like she was on the verge of tears, feeling like their whole plan was falling apart just because she couldn’t play the small part that she had been entrusted with. “I’m so sorry! I really, really messed up. And now you’re here instead of with the machine, and...and…” Dismayed as she struggled for words, Lisette simply held up the detonator as if to somehow explain her failures. “I let them jam the signal. They got past me, and they jammed it. I couldn’t even -”

“It wouldn’t have worked even if they weren’t jamming it, Marionette.” Weatherman stated bluntly, cutting the girl off. Blinking in surprise, Lisette struggled to process this new information. That didn’t make any sense, why wouldn’t it have worked? Weatherman felt a twist in his heart as he saw the confusion on the girl’s face, a stab of regret at his past actions. “I’m sorry, but it was I who let you down.”

For a few seconds, Marionette could wrap her head around the meaning behind the words, but it wasn’t long before her jaw dropped as she realised what the villain was saying. Stunned, she took a step away from him. “You...you gave me fakes?” She stated, taking the revelation like a blow to the chest. “You planned for me to fail...didn’t you?”

“No, please. It wasn’t like that at all, I just -”

“Yes you did, you really did!” Lisette screamed back. Crying out as she felt herself suddenly waking up from the too-good-to-be-true dream of the past few weeks. “All that talk of us working together didn’t really mean anything, huh?!”

Weatherman winced as the girl lashed out at him. He saw the pain in her eyes as she spat her words with venom. She’d been a fan. A real, genuine fan, and he’d tossed her trust to the gutter. He wasn’t stupid. He knew what the heroes often said about him, how they didn’t treat him like a real threat. At the end of the day, he brushed off the criticism with a smile, telling himself that he didn’t care. But then he’d met someone who actually did look up at him with awe and wonder, and how had he treated her in return? Some supervillain he’d shown himself to be. He opened his mouth to apologise, to try and explain to Marionette that he hadn’t been thinking and that he would do better from now on, but another voice cutting through the gale force winds cut him off.

“You won’t get away with this, Weatherman!”

Whipping his head around, Weatherman’s gaze narrowed as he saw Captain Quake standing firmly against the buffeting winds, while Star Queen pulled herself up beside him. The pair of heroes stood ready for the coming battle, looks of righteous determination etched onto their features. Clenching his fists, Weatherman smirked at the pair. He knew that he wasn’t going to get out of this one, but he would make it a battle for the ages! Glancing over his shoulder, he made perhaps the first decision of the past few days that he felt proud of.

“Marionette, run!”

For a few moments, the girl stood motionless. It was happening so fast that her legs felt like they were frozen to the ground, but as she met Weatherman’s almost pleading gaze, her own expression hardened and she nodded. Turning on her heels and digging up whatever energy she had left, the villainess ran as fast as she could.

[Segral]

Whitney Alvord
October 3rd

Whitney unlocked the door and pushed it open, letting a warm rush of air hit her. Finally, home. Unit 505, her grandparents' apartment. It wasn't massive, but it was cozy, with all of its warm paint tones, the constant aroma of something simmering on the stove, and all the handmade quilts and blankets that her grandmother had labored hundreds of hours over. When she was younger and in San Diego on visits, the apartment felt massive, but as she grew older, it felt smaller and smaller to the point where she felt like she dwarfed the place. Maybe it was the ceilings. Their heights were...inconsistent, ranging from needing to bend over in the living room to having plenty of space in the bedrooms, but it somehow added to the charm.

Closing and locking the door behind her, she kicked off her boots, calling out "I'm home!" to let her grandparents know of her presence. Today, the aroma was of lamb. Yesterday was chops, and knowing her grandmother's inability to let any of the weekly grocery haul go to waste, today was most likely stew with the leftovers. It was amazing, the onion and garlic and mushrooms and everything else combining together into one savory combination that was enough to make her mouth water in a completely different room. Home might be her sanctuary from Thing #2, but it was also the place where Thing #1 became an even bigger issue. It was a predictable trap: her grandmother would cook something amazing, she would try to get out of it but end up at the dinner table anyways, her grandparents would ask a bunch of questions about food, eating, and weight, she would try to come up with a response only for the words to get stuck, and start shoveling down food to try to avoid the questions. Today, that wasn't going to happen. She'd take a little bit of food and eat it slowly so she didn't binge, just large enough to avoid suspicion. No binging, no awkward questions, and everyone would go their own separate way.

"Whitney? Is that you?" her grandfather called from the living room, shaking her out of her reverie. "Yeah, it's me Pop." she called back, making her way into the living room where her grandfather was sitting in his usual spot, watching The Price is Right. "Really Pop? Again?" she said with a smirk, pecking him on the cheek as she kneeled beside his chair.

"It's a good show, I have no idea what you have against it." Pop cheekily replied back, tousling Whitney's hair affectionately.

"I dunno, Pop, seems like every typical game show to me. There are a lot of game shows where people win money for being smart-asses, why do you like this one?" she replied, laying her head on his shoulder.

"Because, genius' don't need to win a car, or a barbecue set, they already have cushy enough jobs to pay for that. This is a show for regular people, like you and me. It's genuine." he said with a wise air, scratching his beard. It looked freshly trimmed, and so did what little remained of his white hair. He had probably gone to the barber today. "Do you mind changing my position? My legs are starting to feel sore." he asked, grimacing as if he just felt a stab of pain.

"What? How long has it been since you changed positions?" Whitney asked with sudden alarm, standing up quickly.

"I'm not sure, I had a change around noon-"

"It's been six hours?!" Whitney asked, officially beginning to panic. "Oh my god...Pop, you have to be more careful about this stuff, you know you can't stay in the same position for six ho-"

"Whitney, darling, I'd love to hear you lecture me all night long, but I'd like to move before I develop a pressure ulcer." Pop said sweetly, cutting her off. Whitney opened and closed her mouth once in shock before sighing, pursing her lips into a smirk, and bending down, outstretching her arms. Smiling, Pop threw his arms over her shoulders, using her neck as support. Straining as hard as she could, she wrapped her arms around her back and lifted him up out of the wheelchair, feet dragging on the ground. With a bit of pushing and pulling, she eased him onto the couch, rolling him onto his side to air out his legs and tailbone.

"There." she said with a hint of satisfaction, surveying her work with a slight grin. "Now lie here for a bit until dinner, and don't even think about scaring me half to death like that again."

"You'll kill me, right?" Pop asked with a smile, his blue eyes twinkling.

"No, I won't kill you. Your ulcers will." she said with a grin as she made her way into the kitchen, ready to give her grandmother an earful. It was hard to blame Gran; she was old and 5'3", and it was hard for her to move Pop around. Plus, Pop was stubborn, and would never admit he had a problem. He could have an entire body covered in ulcers and still refuse to complain. But that was all the more reason why she should be attentive to him. Never mind, she wasn't relenting on the earful.

"Gran, seriously?" Whitney asked, as she walked into the kitchen, seemingly disturbing her grandmother's intense focus on her cooking. "You know Pop needs to be moved around every few hours, how could you let him sit for six?!"

"Oh, you're overreacting Whitney." Gran said dismissively in her light Italian drawl, giving her a sharp glance. "Your grandfather is a strong man, he can take a few hours sitting in a wheelchair."

"He can't!" Whitney shot back, her fury growing by the second. "Nobody can! He relies on us, we're his caregivers! What happens if we don't take care him?"

"He's fine!" Gran sighed, continuing to stir her pot. "The doctor said he was in great health last appointment, his records came back excellent."

"Yeah, I would know, considering the fact that I'm the one who drove him there!" Whitney retorted, crossing her arms as she leaned against the table. "Gran, I can't always be helping Pop 24/7. I have...work, I have all these things to take care of, I need you to work with me so that we can both do our job.

"Whitney, please." Gran snapped, her tone patient but firm. "This is not about 'we', I can take care of him myself. I know you're scared about going to college, but you can't use your grandfather's condition as an excuse for everything."

Whitney was speechless for a few seconds, before seemingly stammering back to life. "Tha...That's not the point, and that's not even remotely close to true! Clearly, this is a 'we' problem, considering you can't even be bothered to change his position every few hours lest it interfere with your cooking!" she yelled, knowing in her head that what she was saying was a terrible idea, and that she was about to receive wrath like she had never seen before, but saying it anyways, letting it all spill out.

It actually worked somewhat, as Gran actually took a full 180-degree turn from her cooking and stepped towards her, mouth trembling with anger. She was a full head shorter than Whitney, but her presence felt six feet taller. "How...DARE YOU!" her grandmother spat with vile, causing Whitney to flinch. "I take care of my husband 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Do you know who cooks his meals for him? I do. Do you know who bathes and dresses him? I do. Do you know who wakes up in the middle of the night to flip him over so that he doesn't develop a hundred more sores on his ass every night? I do. And yet you, who sits here all day doing god knows what, complain that I don't care for him enough. Why? Because you put him on a couch once?! Do you know how hard it is, every day, to care for my husband and run a business? Sometimes I don't know if I can cover the bills for the month, sometimes I wonder what I will have to cut back on, but I will never, ever cut back a single cent on medical bills, because I'm married to that man for a reason, and it is my job to care for him. So don't you dare tell me I can't be 'bothered' to do my job, because I am, and I have been doing it twenty times longer and better than you ever have! Clear?!" she spat with a final air, her breath heavy and eyes alight with rage. Whitney looked and felt the exact opposite, her shoulders hunched and eyes staring at the floor, tears welling up despite her hardest efforts to push them back.

"Clear." Whitney whimpered as she nodded, the tears now rolling full-steam down her cheeks. Her grandmother's face softened as she saw them, seemingly regretting her outburst. "Oh...child, come here." she said, stepping towards Whitney and bringing her into a tight embrace, rubbing her back to comfort her as she began to cry into her shoulder. "I'm sorry for losing my temper. It's just...it's hard, you know? Having to do all these things, pay all these bills, worry so much. Your grandfather is so proud, too proud to admit that he's not as healthy as he used to be. He wouldn't admit something was wrong unless it was killing him." she said, eliciting a small laugh from Whitney. "Just...be patient, okay? Trust in God, he always has a way."

"Y-you know I haven't been to a church since I was ten, right?" Whitney asked, extracting herself from her grandmother's hug as she wiped a few stray tears from her eyes.

"You should go with me some time!" Gran said, lightly smacking Whitney's arm. "It would do you some good to have some presence of God in your life."

"And be like you and all of those old ladies swooning every time the pastor mentions John? I don't think so." Whitney teased, eliciting a scowl from her grandmother. "Don't they have anything better to do than hit on a man thirty years younger than them? For a church, it's pretty infor-"

"Stop that!" Gran said sharply, smiling as she lightly whacked Whitney around the head, causing both women to laugh. "Dinner's almost ready. You set the table, I'll go get your grandfather. It will be a 'we' job, okay?"

"Alright then, I suppose so."

[Auropa]

A friendly chat with Mizu

Mike Mathews
A Few Days Prior
Still sounding slightly like his soul was leaving his body, Mike did his best to lighten the mood and recover with a half-hearted chuckle at the oddness of it all.

“Yeah. Kinda weird I know but my parents tend to work abroad a lot so I had to move around a bit growing up and couldn’t really take a dog with me. Though a spider in a box, that was somehow fine. Long story short, Webby the tarantula is probably my oldest friend… Which saying out loud, is a lot more depressing than I realised.” He said with his voice dropping slightly further as he realised what he just said. “Annnddd the fact she’s been missing for the past 2 weeks or so probably isn’t a good thing either…”

“But she’s stubborn and its not the first time she’s disappeared. Personally, I’m just hoping she doesn’t show up in school again, that would be pretty awkward. I guess that’s just how some things go. But hey, if she doesn’t show up then at least we’ve still got Casimir as our team’s pet-mascot-thing right?”

---

---

---

Forge
The Raid
‘Well that went bad fast’ Mike thought to himself as Ares broke free and explosions started detonating across the building. While trying to get some restraints set up, the long-time villain pulled his trump card and threw the team into chaos as hidden explosives went off and shattered the foundations of the structure. Before anyone knew what was happening, the team was thrown into chaos as rubble came crashing down around them and a decision had to be made.

Being one of the first to react, Oberon made the choice to protect the others and let the villain escape. Targeting the larger pieces of falling rubble, she did her best to cover the others before shooting off to help those trapped below. Casimir meanwhile, and to Mike’s surprise, began evacuating their unconscious enemies from the first floor before calling out for others to do the same as he went off in search of Wendy.
Giving an unexpected nod to Casimir as he ran by, Mike decided on his own actions. Without any sort of super strength at his disposal, there was practically no way he could carry everyone out in what little time they had left. What he could still potentially do though, was extend the clock. All he needed was a good, central position.

Scanning his surroundings for a way up to the second floor, he came across a still mostly navigable set of stairs and set to scrambling over the rubble before pulling himself up to the next level. While the initial smoke still obscured parts of the building, it was easy to see the extent of Ares’ damage from there. The detonations had been purposefully set to bring the structure down, and now lacking its main supports and carrying a weight it couldn’t handle, the building was starting to lean and already looked to be on the verge of collapsing. Still seeing few handfuls of regular, now unconscious guards dotting the second floor as well as the rest of his team working below, Mike closed his eyes, dropped his hands to the floor and concentrated.

The building was in bad shape and was going to fall. That much was certain. But if he could focus on the weakest points and hold them together for even just a little bit longer then he could help the others get everyone to safety. Though the difference between thinking something like this up and actually doing it were astronomically far apart. Up until now, Mike tended to reinforce planks of wood, pieces of armour and the occasional bits of wall. As well as being mostly small objects, he also didn’t usually need to be reinforcing more than one or two things at a time. Here, he was trying to reach out across an entire building and forcefully hold up the dozens upon dozens of pieces all on the verge of failing. It almost felt impossible, with every fragment of support he reinforced, another two would have collapsed and by the time he had secured another the weight he was holding had become that much worse. Feeling a warm, trickle of crimson start to run down his nose, Forge made his choice and pushed himself to reach further.

People here needed help and whether it was possible or not, he wasn’t going to give up on any of them. As the trickle’s pace grew and a familiar taste of iron crept into his mouth, his powers continued to spread until finally, with the sound of his own heartbeat defeaning his ears and his mind feeling on the verge of cracking, he felt some form of control come into reach and then moment by moment, the violent shakes that rocked the building began to slow. Loose rubble still fell, and the structure would still collapse, but for now at least, he was holding it in place.

“We need to get everyone outside before this place comes down! I’m doing my best to give us some more time but it’s not gonna to be that long.” Mike managed to call out over the comms “-and I’d really appreciate someone telling me when I can drop this mess and start running.” He added through gritted teeth as he struggled to maintain his power’s grip.

[Finland SSR]

Bael

Sina As'tari, sponsored by the Desert Sandstorms!

---

No, of course it wasn't the food which bothered Bael, his issues were a lot more deep rooted. The Dra'Quinni simply did not feel like he fit in with everyone else. As it turns out, he was only attending the ball out of duty for his father, one of the wealthiest men in all of N'Toak, who was off talking to someone else and left his son on ice. He's lived among humans his whole life, and yet, now that he's rejoined the rest of his species out here in the desert, he's longing to return back to the former

Then, he asked how her new gig as a member of the Desert Sandstorms was going. Sina took a large bite of turkey and began to speak immediately after swallowing it:

"Oh, it's going pretty well. I haven't actually participated in any races so far, the team is getting me up to speed. Turns out, uh, I'm not as much of an expert as I thought when I gotta compare to professionals. But Aegi says I've got a lotta potential, so," Sina then pointed at the window on the other side of the hall, which displayed the vast panoramic skyline of the city, with dozens of skyscrapers peeking into the clouds. "I live iiiin that one. On the ninety first floor. Don't really use the room, though, I installed myself a hammock outside the window instead. Sleeping with four hundred meters of air underneath you is pretty fun, especially when the wind starts blowing."

The girl returned to her meal, finishing off her turkey and taking a swig of juice, before speaking again:

"Honestly, though, I kinda get how you're feeling. I haven't lived among humans as much as you have, but I still spent almost my whole life with just my family in the Rockies, y'know. I'm a country bumpkin over here, and it kinda shows when I talk to people... But I mean, it happens. You build expectations of something you've never seen before, they're bound to not match with reality." She then sighed, folding her arms. "Humans aren't the worst thing to feel nostalgic to, anyway. They can be kinda fun. I still think about the Outriders sometimes, myself."

How have they been doing? Now that she's here, Edward's off to the Middle East, Isaac returned to solo work and Vendetta is dead, there's really no chance for them to get back together, is there? Maybe, if somehow, by the grace of the divine, Vendetta turned out to still be alive, maybe they'd have a some sort of starting point, but now...

Sina took a glance towards Yharon, then leaned closer to Bael and whispered:

"So, uh, your dad... does he know about your... special stuff? Can-can I call it Super Dra'Quinni as the safeword?"

[Tomia]

The Raid
Mars nodded to Alexis insistence that they get out of there before the building collapsed. "You're right, I'm ready when you are." He told her as she flew Mars up alongside Renata and their new captive. Other members were working to make sure everyone was outside. He hoped Wendy was okay, very worried about the news Alexis had shared but for now they had to make sure they themselves escaped. Once they got outside they waited for the others to join them and after a head count to make sure everyone was accounted for the team made their way to their plane and headed back to the tower.

Wonder Island
It was certainly not without difficulties, but their raid against the drug facility was a success. They had destroyed the facility completely, prevented any casualties, and uncovered evidence to help Roy as well as captured one of the members of the drug making operation. Already across the news that night people were talking about another triumph of the Young Bloods. Still, from Mars' point of view he wasn't yet ready to celebrate. Roy was still in the infirmary as Alexis worked hard to synthesis an antidote for him, and now Wendy had joined him there. Still, they had faced a serious villain and came out alive, and they had helped their fellow students. Meanwhile Mars had visited Roy and Wendy before heading upstairs to mingle with the team for a bit. Finally he found himself starting on his repairs for Rocket. After a while he took out his phone, his finger hovering over Kiris' name for a few moments before he started up a text.

Hey, sorry I haven't been around much today. Had a busy day today, with the raid and all. Don't worry, I didn't get hurt though Renata managed to damage Rocket a bit We destroyed the place, and got the info we needed to cure Roy but we also encountered Floyd, that guy who raised Roy... He was scary. He escaped but I think we gave him a run for his money haha. I'm going to head to bed soon but I hope you had a good day.

Meanwhile Angelica had spent a short time in the infirmary before Jacob said she could head upstairs with the others. She didn't want to bother Alexis while she worked so she went to the living room where a bunch of people were hanging out. She made her way towards Viv who seemed to be bubbly chatting with Casimir.

"Hey Viv, I wanted to thank you for before. You really helped me out." She said to her friend sincerely.

[Segral]

Whitney Alvord
October 3rd

Eventually, dinner was served. As Whitney had suspected, it was lamb stew, a huge communal pot for everyone to scoop their portions out of accompanied by a mountain of freshly baked bread. Despite being busy as she was, Gran never stooped low enough to buy bread rolls from the grocery store; everything had to be made from scratch. The pot itself smelt even more delicious, the aroma an orgasmic combination of simmering meat, potatoes, onion, garlic, mushrooms, bacon, and whatever else she had crammed in there, which varied with each iteration of the stew. Unlike most grandmothers, who stuck to their traditional recipes, Gran had a very "everything-but-the-kitchen-sink" approach to cooking, often experimenting with amazing results. Last time, it had been chickpeas, cinnamon and dried apricots added to the stew, which was good enough to make the Moroccan lady living next door beg for a recipe. Gran had nothing to give her, because there was no recipe, just Gran throwing whatever the hell she felt like into the pot. Every single time, it was the nemesis of her weight-loss efforts.

Soon enough, everyone was seated at the table, Whitney at the head of the table, Gran to her left, and Pop's wheelchair pulled up to the right. After Grace was quickly said, everyone grabbed their servings, Whitney scooping an extremely modest portion into her bowl while Pop and Gran practically filled theirs to the brim. Soon, the only sounds were spoons clacking at the side of the bowl and the occasional sip. Whitney was eating as slowly as possible, taking minuscule spoonfuls each time and drinking as much water as possible to stretch out her eating. She wanted more, but she knew that if she ate too fast, she would start binging, and then this whole day would go to waste. Maybe she could just hold it back? Eat just enough to stop the hunger, but not enough to make her full.

"Don't be stupid." a voice from inside her head told her. "You know you'll overeat. You shouldn't be eating at all, but now that you're here, the least you can do is limit all the crap you're eating. If you just had more mental nerve, you co-"

"So Whitney, how was your day?"

The question from Pop shocked her out of her own thoughts, causing her to look up suddenly with her spoon still hanging in mid-air. She blinked a few times, still trying to wrap her head around the question that had just been thrown at her. "Uhhhhhh...." she started, beginning to blush a bright red as she tried to form a coherent response, words getting lodged in her throat. "It-it was g-good." she stammered, trying to keep her composure. "Yeah, uh...things went well, Michael was in a good mood today. He said he was happy w-with the work I've been doing lately, said I had a solid chance of getting promoted. The assistant manager position's opening." she finally spat out, taking a huge mouthful of stew to signal the end of her answer.

"A promotion?" Pop asked, leaning back in his wheelchair with a frown. "I thought you said you wanted to leave that job? You mentioned something about putting your powers to use, trying something out." he said, rubbing his beard as his eyes focused on Whitney. Her grandparents knew all about her powers, as did her parents. It sort of had to come out after she got expelled, hormonal teenagers don't just stumble upon extremely powerful and sophisticated steroids. Her parents couldn't care less; they were too concerned with shipping her across the country, but her grandparents thought she was a miracle, even if the most she had used them for was tinkering around in the Thomsen High lab a few nights week. When Pop heard the news, he looked at her with bright glowing eyes, proud ones. Now, the eye contact was unbearable. The disappointment, the second-hand embarrassment radiating off of them was too much, boring a hole through her skull and making her blush even harder. She made a non-committal grunt, hunching over again to inhale a few more mouthfuls of stew.

"Jack! Let her be, she's doing her best. Tutoring isn't a fool's job, it takes skill, dedication. It's honest work for a good salary, which is the best anyone can hope for." Gran chided, beaming at Whitney, who was too busy beginning to shovel down her food at an increasing rate. She needed to slow down, but she was so goddamn hungry. It would just be until the hunger pangs stopped, then she would go back to eating normally. "Besides," Gran continued, bending over her own bowl. "What team hires an eighteen-year old? Those teams are for trained professionals with sob-story backgrounds, not...regular people like us." she said with a proud air.

"Well, there's those Young Bloods, they're all what, 16, 17? That's their whole shtick, they're young folks!" Pop retorted with a bemused face, ripping up a fresh roll as he spoke.

"They'll never accept me, Pop." Whitney said with a chuckle, somewhat muffled by the hunk of lamb she was swallowing down. "Everyone on that team is practically a trained warrior. If they can't beat someone up, they can fly over them, erase their memories, destroy their technology, or blow them up. I'm just a regular person, I haven't beat up someone since fifth grade."

"You beat someone up in fifth grade?" Gran asked, now very curious.

"Yeah. He threw mud at me during a snowball fight, so I threw his head through a jungle gym." she said, eliciting a hearty roar of laughter from both grandparents. "I hit him with a few punches, and he got so scared he tripped over his own snowpants and slid headfirst down the slide. By that point, he was crying so hard I just felt bad." she said with a laugh, reveling in the memory. Good ol' George. She wondered what he was up to. She hadn't seen him since ninth grade, after he left school. Moved to Saudi Arabia for his dad's work.

"Anyways," Gran said with a snicker, sipping from her water. "The point is, however you use your powers is completely up to you. You may never touch them again, or you may save the world. That is your choice. But I still think you should consider applying to schoo-"

"Gran!" Whitney said tersely, her good mood spoiled. "For the last time, I haven't ruled it out, I just...I don't know, there are other things to consider. I don't know if I'm ready to live on my own, I don't know if I can even afford a place in California...there's too many variables. I still have a couple months to decide, anyways." she argued, cutting off the conversation entirely by going back to her food. It was so good, she just couldn't stop. The meal was mostly silent after that, which gave Whitney plenty of time to forget her moderate routine in favor of gulping down as much stew as she could fit down her gullet. Before she knew it, her spoon was scraping the bottom of an empty bowl, her food reduced to a few stray dregs clinging to the sides. Looking up and around, she was once again the first to finish her meal. Gran and Pop had only finished half of their bowls.

"Wow, you must have been starving." Gran said with a knowing smile. "Do you want more, dear?"

"Don'ttakeitdon'ttakeitdon'ttakedon'ttakeitdon'ttakedon'ttak-

"Yeah, sure. Why not?"

---

She knew she shouldn't have taken that second helping.

She knew it when she was washing dishes, thinking about how she broke her diet so close to the end of the day. She knew it when she snuck the half-finished box of cookies underneath her blouse to her bedroom, planning to eat them today so they wouldn't be there to tempt her tomorrow. She knew it when she finished eating them after less than two minutes, her stomach feeling like it was about to burst. And she knew it now, kneeling in front of the toilet bowl again, staring at her own vomit swirling in the water. It had gotten on her face, destroying what makeup had survived from crying earlier with a warm, sticky sludge that she didn't even want to try wiping off. Not that it mattered, she was already tearing up again from the force, welling up from the sheer pressure of having puked her whole day's worth of food away. She gripped the toilet seat so hard that her knuckles turned white as nausea rolled over her in tidal waves, her whole world spinning like her vomit in that toilet bowl.

A light knock rapped on the locked door, bringing her back to her senses. "Whitney, are you in there?" Gran called, the door creaking as if she was leaning against it. "...Y-yeah, I'm inside." Whitney weakly called back after a long silence, her voice reduced to a hoarse croak.

"Are you okay? You've been in there for a while?"

"Uh, I'm fine." Whitney said hesitantly, trying to come up with an excuse off the top of her head. "I'm just...in the shower, that's all. I'll be out soon."

"Oh, alright then." Gran said, sounding like she didn't entirely believe the blatant, transparent lie, but opting to go with it. "Are you alright, you're voice sounds...odd."

"Yeah, I know." Whitney replied, a calm coming over her knowing she had a practiced excuse for this. "I don't feel too well, I think I have a sore throat. I've had one for the last few days, I think."

"Right, you didn't sound good at dinner either. Make sure you take some Advil before bed, yes?"

"I will."

"Okay. Goodnight, darling. I love you."

"Love you too, Gran." Whitney said, refusing to stop holding her breath until she head Gran shuffle away down the hall, likely mulling over the conversation they just had. It was a conversation of lies, all of it was lies. Whitney lying about why she was in the bathroom. Gran lying by pretending not to know she had a problem. Whitney lying to her grandmother about her problems. Gran lying to her granddaughter by telling her she could be fixed with Advil. Everything was lies, her entire relationship with her grandparents was all lies. Every relationship she had was built on lies, lying to people she sold to, lying to people to make friends, lying to her school's administration, lying to her goddamn family. Lying to herself, too.

She sunk back, leaning against the tub as she buried her head in her hands. She was covering her palms with vomit, but she didn't care. There were no more tears, just shame. The shame she had felt when Pop had looked at her at dinner. The shame she had felt when she told her parents she had powers. It lingered like piss in a toilet, an acrid smell that burned its way into everything she touched. The worst shame of all? She couldn't even lose a few pounds without throwing up and crying, day after day, with no change. She needed to do better. She needed to fix this.

Standing up, she grabbed a towel and thrust it under the sink, wetting it before dragging it across her face to wipe the vomit and stray tears off her face. She looked horrible, her eye makeup smeared and dragged down her face and her skin all blotchy. She'd take it off with one of her masks later. She'd fix everything soon. Today was ruined, but she could finish all the half-finished box of muffins in the pantry now, so she wouldn't be tempted by anything tomorrow. It would be a better day, a day where she didn't binge or purge. No more feeling sorry for herself, she had to suck it up and deal with it.

---

Finally, it was over.

She was lying in bed now, unable to fall asleep despite the clock on her nightstand showing "1:00 AM" in bright red letters. The last few hours had been hell, a nonstop cycle of eating, feeling too full, throwing up, take a smoke break every once in a while, wash, rinse, repeat. It hadn't stopped at the muffins. It had been the Oreos afterwards, and finally the crackers before she finally ran out of half-opened packages and her stomach felt just right. Not hungry, but not full either. Just enough.

It was rare to ever eat just enough for her.

Now, she was scrolling through her phone, trying to fall asleep. It was counter-intuitive; using her phone before bed would just make falling asleep harder, but it was already hard enough as it was, how much harder could it get. The news was typical; LA Stars this, Young Bloods that, bank robbery this, shooting that. It was always the same. 70% superhero gossip, 20% viral content, 10% actual news. The Young Blood boys were cute and all, but they weren't that cute. She had gone to school with most of them, there was nothing special about them. They were just regular guys. A few dumbasses, a few chick magnets, a few quiet kids, but all regular guys. Just like her.

"So why can't you join them?"

The persistent thought came back, but this time it made more sense than usual. Yeah, they had different superpowers, possibly a tad more offensive than being able to brew the perfect coffee cup with chemical sense, but they can't have all started as trained mercenaries and heroic legends. Teenagers, as much as they hated to admit it, were immature and not very bright, and a combination of routine training and smarts usually won over brawn. She had no brawn, but she had smarts, and maybe she could get the training. Not everyone had to be a fighter, surely there was support, right?

But could she do it? Everything she had just said was a speculation, wishful thinking. They were all likely in way better shape, and had months of training as opposed to her, who was starting at ground zero. Maybe she could've joined two months ago, but now? Fat chance they'd accept her. Besides, there was there was college if she ever went, there was Pop and his condition that Gran wouldn't be able to handle alone, there was her job...so many other things that she couldn't even mention. She would be nothing, a waste of space on the team. What did she know about being a hero?

A notification from the local news popped up on her phone, a breaking report. "Six Dead After Superpowered Attack on La Jolla Boulevard". Opening it showed a picture of a flaming wreck on the road, surrounded by cops, ambulances, and a few noble firemen spraying the fires down gallantly. There was a car beside the wreck, a burnt husk flipped upside down on the side of the road. The same wreck she had passed by on her drive home. Six people dead, including three children ages 3-13. Three kids lives taken just like that, because some people couldn't resist the thought of destroying another person's life until it was nothing, until a parent had to bury their child and not the other way around.

Sighing, she turned off the phone and placed it on the nightstand, crawling under the covers with a small smile on her face. Her throat was still sore, her breath was still heavy, and her stomach still ached like a bitch, but for once, she had a plan. A plan to beat Thing #1 and Thing #2. For Thing #1, she just wouldn't eat tomorrow. Nothing for breakfast, nothing for lunch, nothing for dinner and not a goddamn calorie in between. Nothing to "sustain" herself, nothing to "indulge", nothing to avoid "temptations", just nothing in general. For Thing #2, she was going to see if this superhero thing had any merit. She didn't exactly know how, it wasn't like she could hand in her non-existent resumé and cover letter, but it was worth a shot.

After all, how hard could it be?

[Aidannadia]

...

As the punch connected with the side of Aleta's face, she spun in the air from the force, cutting off much of her Pitch at her forearms to try to absorb the damage. As she spun, she cursed, tasting iron in her mouth as blood began to flow from the inside of her cheek. Without her armor, a solid punch from Zoe would put in the work, and in slowing herself down to restrain the hero, she'd opened herself up to attack. She spit on the ground not far away as she landed, and turned to Zoe, whom still had pitch covering parts of her arms and legs, but she was seemingly moving despite the elasticity. Paragon clenched her fists and faced Impulse confidently, trying to get the Pitch to hold position against her foe as the pair fought and allow Andrew to finish her off. "Get to it, pretty boy."

[The Republic of Atria]

The Raid

It was too late. Ares had already bolted before he and Jason managed to defeat the monsters. The team did manage to capture a scientist to help make an antidote for Roy. Though he wasn't quite sure of how exactly that would work. Despite knowing he needed to speak to Renata as soon as possible, he did want to double-check and make sure everyone was alright as well as cool his temper before he started speaking to her. Everyone seemed okay bar Wendy and Angelica, the only damage Mars got was to Rocket which was about as good as he could have hoped for. Other than seeming a little on edge, Jason seemed to be perfectly fine as well.

Angelica could have been in worse shape, but her wounds were being tended to. He was still mentally kicking himself for the overall performance of the mission, even though he knew that no one would blame him for not knowing about Ares. "Hey Angie... Just popping by to see if you're alright. I have to go do the whole leadership thing and administer some discipline, so that's gonna be fun..." He said a little sullenly. There was no way he could have predicted it unless he could see the future. Let alone have to deal with the summoner instead of helping everyone with Ares. "Get well soon." He nodded and left, taking a deep breath, knowing what he had to do next was going to be the most painful part of the adventure tonight.

Speaking of pain, he glanced down at his hands where the molten rock had gotten sprayed. Second-degree burns adorned his knuckles, and the pain had set in a little, but he would heal up just fine in a day or two. Once he'd mustered up the willpower necessary, he approached Renata and took a stern tone. "Renata. Out front. Now." He pointed with his uninjured hand. "You've got a lot of explaining to do, and I'm you'd rather do it in private." He knew that if he didn't take her outside, half the team would be lining up to yell at her for what she did during the fight with Ares.

"Alright. Your behavior lately has started to become an issue. I was willing to let the thing with Drake slide, accidents happen in the heat of the moment, but what you did during the raid... That wasn't an accident. You intentionally shot at Mars. This is very serious, Renata. And we're not going anywhere until you tell me why. I don't care if we have to stand here all night."

[Absolon-7]

Wonder Island

Casimir and Viviana October 3rd
The raid was through and through a success and while the apparent head honcho of the guards had escaped Casimir was quite confident he'd be itching in places he'd never thought of for days thanks to his fire ants once the adrenaline weared off. As for Casimir himself, after he dropped Wendy off in the infirmary he had gotten a quick look over by Jacob and after treating the bruises on his chest from the bullets he could pretty much sleep off whatever other injuries he had but not without a warning to lay off on training for two days. Viviana had her arm healed by Jacob and as her injuries were localized there it was over pretty quick. For now the two held hands together in the living room's couch watching the local news network cover the team's escapade of that evening.

"Okay so you for sure didn't watch the episode without me?" asked Viviana with a serious expression.

"I didn't I swear. I don't even like it enough to watch it on my own," said Casimir.

"Huh! Why are you making have you watch it then!," gasped Viviana, "If you hate it its like I'm forcing you go to Alcatraz every night!"

"I didn't say I hated it. I just oh look they're doing a recap of when we crashed broke into the building," said Casimir turning his attention to the big screen.

"Don't change the subject ya scrub! Oooh! Me and Oberon sure do look pretty cool in that shot," cooed Viviana, "Too bad they don't have footage of what went on inside. I'd say me clocking Bolt is prime time stuff, yup."

Angelica then appeared to walk over to the two with the tall blonde thanking Viviana for helping her out after Ares defeated her.

"Aw, that's sweet of you. And no problem!" said Viviana clasping her hands together, "With that big bad weirdo fighting everyone I couldn't just leave you there."

Casimir had been keeping himself to the news for any segments on himself but eventually he tuned in to Viviana's and Angelica's conversation. Maybe he could try warming up to her..."A heroic last stand and helping the injured out of danger are pretty big hero things to do so you were both pretty rad. So uh want to watch the news with us? I think they're showing off clips of Oberon now."

[Bentus]

Naja - Nicole Reyna
San Diego

---

“It’s a golden opportunity, Nicole. The team could really benefit from the exposure and the kids need to come out from their shells eventually.”

Alice’s argument failed to put Naja at ease, and the reptilian woman’s frown remained firmly in place as she held her phone to her ear. Humming doubtfully, she hesitated despite the case being made by Jordan Scott’s right-hand woman.

“Alice, I’m really not sure that they’re ready for this. Scott has to know as well as anyone that some of the team don’t have the best track record of public appearances. Hell, half the time I’m doing all I can to keep them away from the cameras and journalists. And now you’re saying that we should shine a spotlight on them and throw them to the wolves?”

A slight chuckle echoed through the speaker, and Alice shook her head at the other woman’s nervousness. But even though she spoke with a calm assurance, the call was going about as well as she’d expected when Scott had instructed her to make the necessary arrangements. Come on Nicole, work with me a bit here. “I never pinned you as a doomsayer! It’s hardly that bad, you know that. They’ll be the guests of honour, and they’ll be among supporters. It’ll be a private function, organised by Scott’s foundation for charity. We’ll control who gets in and what the cameras see. If anything, this is going to be the best way for us to manage the media’s response. The Young Blood’s are a hot commodity at the moment, and they’re going to get attention whether you like it or not. At least this way, we have a chance to steer the narrative.”

Scowling, Naja’s frown deepened as she shot back. “Yeah, steer it in a direction that serves your boss above all else. You do realise what the team’s been through, right? First the tournament and then going toe-to-toe with Ares. Roy and Wendy haven’t even recovered from their injuries yet!”

Sighing at her old friend’s harsh response, Alice reached forward to press the pause button on her treadmill. With her breathing still slightly elevated from her work out, she brushed some hair out of her face as she adjusted her earpiece. “Look Naja, you know that asking you for permission is just a formality for this. Since Scott agreed to help support your project, we haven’t been seeing the returns on the investment that we first expected. This is a step to try and change that.”

Naja blinked in surprise at the other woman’s blunt words, momentarily taken aback that she would frame the situation like that. She furrowed her brow as she replied, a hint of irritation seeping into her tone. “Returns on the investment? You’re sounding more and more like him, Alice.” Rubbing the bridge of her nose, the heroine continued. “If this is so important to Scott, you know that the least he could’ve done is call me himself.”

“I know, and he apologises for that. He had a scheduling conflict, but he wants to be just as involved in this as ever. We’re on your side in this, Nicole - we’re after the same thing, remember. This will be a good experience for the team, too. I bet if you asked them, plenty would want to attend even for a chance to relax. They deserve a bit of fame for what they’ve done.” Alice replied, deftly ignoring Naja’s earlier barbed comment.

Naja frowned, finding herself for the first time unsure whether the other woman was being entirely truthful with her. It wasn’t that Naja didn’t mind Alice’s company, but she couldn’t remember the last time they talked about something other than ‘business’. Over the years, she’d been helpless as she’d watched her friend engross herself into the machinations of Jordan Scott’s corporate empire until she was nearly as much a part of it as he was. Alice had always been ambitious and driven, with the frontline hero work never quite appealing to her in the same way as it had Naja, but she’d never once questioned whether her friend would choose the bottom line over doing the right thing. Now, Naja wasn’t so sure.

“How are you, Alice?” Naja suddenly asked bluntly. “Outside of work, I mean. We should find some time to meet. Catch up and all that.” On the other end of the line, Alice blinked in surprise, a genuine look of confusion flashing across her features as the question came out of left field.

“I-I’m fine, Nicole. Thanks for asking.” She replied, hesitation creeping into her voice as she tried to put her finger on what had caused the change in topic. “I’d love to Nicole, but you know how it is. I’ll have to take a look at my calendar, and I’m sure the team is keeping you busy all the time, and -”

Naja brushed aside Alice’s attempt at a polite response. “No, don’t worry about it. I understand.”

“Though you know what, I’ve been meaning to visit the Tower and meet the team at some point.” Alice offered, speaking before Naja could reply. “We can try to arrange a time for that, and while I’m in the area we could go out for a cup of coffee?”

Naja smiled at the woman’s attempt at an olive branch. “Coffee sounds great.” Rolling her eyes, she continued. “And I guess I’ll talk to the team about the ball. But I want to leave it up to them. If anyone doesn’t want to attend, we can’t force them. Deal?”

“Deal.” Alice replied immediately, happy at how the call had gone. “I’ll let Scott know, and I’m sure he’ll look forward to seeing some of the team there.”

Naja’s eyes shot open. “Wait. He’ll be there?!”

---

Jordan Scott
San Diego

---

Stepping up to the front of the ballroom, Jordan waved down one of the support staff for the live musicians to bring him a microphone. Slightly elevated above the packed floor with mingling guests both standing and seated at the luxuriously furnished tables, he clinked a spoon against his wine glass. Lifted above the background din of conversation and the shuffling of waiters, the crystal sound caused heads to turn collectively towards the event’s unofficial host. Smiling as he waited for the last whispers to die down before thanking the staff member, Jordan held the microphone in front of the crowd with a practiced ease.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I can’t thank you all enough for coming here today and choosing to donate.” He began, immediately earning a few scattered rounds of applause. “Thanks to the Scott Foundation and your contributions here tonight, all of our proceeds are going straight towards rebuilding efforts in New York as well as care and support for those affected by the horrific events we witnessed during the NASL tournament, as well as their families.” Another round of applause, more concerted this time.

“Seeing such a heartfelt willingness from so many to give back to our fellow man and woman, I think, really highlights the strength of our community throughout this great nation. Truly, I think it is no overstatement to say that each of you is contributing to a heroic act by helping in the rebuilding efforts that even now are beginning on the east coast. And rather than be cowed by the actions of terrorists and villains, we will rise taller than before, and the new Freedom’s Nest will stand as a monument to our determination to never bow down to those who would wish to do us or our way of life harm.”

That really caused a more serious ripple of claps, along with a few supportive cheers. The corner of Jordan’s mouth twisted upwards into a smirk, with the reaction of the crowd hardly coming as a surprise to him. “But part of the reason we’re here today is also to thank some of the real heroes. Ladies and gentlemen, I think it is only appropriate to show as much appreciation as we can for the brave actions of some of our esteemed guests: Red and Blue from the LA Stars.” Now the crowd really went wild, with a spotlight shifting to illuminate the brother-and-sister duo who were present to represent their team. “And our city’s own Young Bloods, who didn’t hesitate in New York to selflessly put a stop to Dark Star’s horrific attack!”

As the spotlight shifted once again, it fell upon the table that had been set aside for the members of the young hero team who had chosen to attend. The applause was nearly deafening, and it was accompanied by prominent cheers that rippled through the audience. Though the focused light would have effectively blinded the heroes, causing those clapping around them to appear as faceless silhouettes.Even though Red and Blue were notable heroes in their own right, the Young Bloods were the real stars of the show. Being so camera shy compared to the more established teams, their presence at the function had been the topic of discussion throughout the city. Lifting his hands to try and get the applause to quieten down, Scott chuckled at the clear indication of the rising team’s popularity.

“Now, many of us here have been following these young talents for a while, and let me be the first to say that I have been stunned to see how much they have accomplished in such a short time. In fact, just earlier this week the Young Bloods led a raid against a deadly drug ring, and fought none other than the supervillain Ares. In honour of their actions, I’d like to announce that Scott Industries is pledging to cover the medical and rehabilitative care for all those young victims of this drug in San Diego.”

Allowing the applause at his surprise announcement, Jordan neglected to mention that said medical care would go through his company’s medical insurance division, providing a convenient boost in positive publicity and membership as they took advantage of the state’s own announced support. In a similar vein, he didn’t want to bore the crowd by highlighting the prominent role that Scott Industries subsidiaries were playing in the reconstruction of the new Freedom’s Nest.

“Now, I know that I’ve already taken up enough of your Friday night - but I’d like to end on one final note. With everything that the Young Bloods have achieved so far, I can only imagine what they’ll be doing in the future. But right now, it’s the rest of us in this room who can help nurture this talented group of heroes. By sponsoring and supporting their team, we can help give the team and their leaders the resources they need to train, improve, and make this world a safer place for everyone. Even beyond financial support, I urge each and every one of us to read up on the laws and regulations that limit and restrict the formation of young teams such as the Young Bloods. It is time for us to set up a structured and effective pathway for young heroes to learn their trade, and I am proud to watch as San Diego’s own Young Bloods blaze the trail for years to come!” Raising his voice to speak over the final applause, Jordan offered the crowds a wave as the din of conversation and the live music resumed. “Once again, thank you all for being here! Now, enjoy your dinner, enjoy your drinks, and I hope you have a great night!”

[Galnius]

Angelica Dalin
October 3rd

Twenty years. It had been twenty years since she had been on this island. Twenty years since she looked up at this tower. Since she stepped in those doors. It seemed mostly the same, but the differences from what little she remember shook her. It was a staunch reminder that the world moved on, not around her but without her. She was used to the technology of course, but the entire tower just felt different.

Angelica was here for something her old self would never have done, up to and including offers by the Wonder Warriors, not that Angelica Dalin would know it. In every way that she was the same, there were also key differences, much like the tower itself. Both were artifacts from a previous generation of teen heroes, and found themselves repurposed in this generation. The previous tower was a place of parties and media attention, while this one seemed like a refuge from it. The previous Angelica was a staunch supporter of the Wonder Warriors but would never join their ranks, while the current Angelica Dalin was here to do just that for the Young Bloods.

She had gone through all the proper channels, of course. With help from Steven Baker, another relic of a time both long along yet not very long ago at all, she had done all the proper paperwork. She had registered herself and scheduled an interview ahead of time, and was now here for that final step. She just needed to...walk through that last door. With a deep exhale, she entered, meeting the friendly gaze of Naja.

"Ah, you must be Angelica Dalin. You can sit down. There's some snacks here so we can take our time while the rest of the team is out on a mission."

Nodding silently, Angelica pushed the bottom of her skirt to stay smoothly underneath her as she sat down. She had brought papers in her backpack but had forgotten them as soon as she entered, and she wasn't sure where to start.

"Alright, I can see you're nervous so let's start with an easy question", said Naja. "Why do you want to join the young bloods?"

What Naja had believed to be an easy question somehow made things even harder. The room was filled with a deafening silence as Angelica tried to get her thoughts to come out as words. Eventually, she began. "I want to, uh, I want to join because..." Taking a deep breathe to calm her nerves, Angelica made the decision there to tell the full reason. After all, if she couldn't trust Naja, why would she be here?

"I don't have many memories beyond that of this last year. I was found just walking, barefoot and dehydrated outside of the city. A kind family adopted me, and I've been their child ever since. However, recently, just this past summer, two related memories returned. One is..." Angelica turned a deep shade of scarlet as she forced the uncertain night out of her head. "Unimportant in the details. The second...might be difficult to believe. For now, I...I would like you to keep this a secret, if you can. You can ask Beve-Voice to confirm if you'd like, or The Calculator if you know him. I was...I was at the party, a little over twenty years ago. I was friends with all of them, and after saving as many as I could I...I died there."

Having finally informed someone other than Steven a weight seemed to be taken from her chest, and she breathed easy. "After that, I knew what I had to do. The Wonder Warriors, my friends, they fought to the end to save people. The other me did. And it would be an insult to their memory, to everyone's sacrifice, if I didn't. So please, let me join. I can fly, I can carry people, I can heal people, and with some training I believe I can fight. If you would have me, I would be honored to continue my friends' dream by joining their legacy, the Young Bloods."

[Bentus]

The Marvelous Girl Squad!

---

October 6th
Zark was here >:3, so was Tomia!
Alexis’ laboratory was always balanced on a knife’s edge between organised chaos, and total anarchy. Half-completed projects in various states of repair and completion were dotted around the room, with some having been scavenged for parts to support their neighbours while others looked like they were ready to go. For the young genius, she’d always felt at home when she was surrounded by the scattered electronics and components of her various mechanical contraptions. The pins and wires, motors and encoders, had always just clicked in her head, and she’d come to almost prefer the haphazard state of her lab to the eerie cleanliness of the alternative. Seated at one of her workbenches, Alexis hummed quietly to herself as she carefully positioned her soldering iron under a magnifying glass. She moved the metal tool with a practiced ease and precision that betrayed both a natural talent and countless hours of experience. A thin trickle of smoke began to rise from the circuit board as the conductive wiring began to melt itself in place, bringing a thin smile to Alexis’ focused features. This would be the culmination of her night’s work, and it was hardly an easy task to thread the proverbial needle before her, but she just needed to keep her hands steady for a little while longer.

And then suddenly, at perhaps the most inopportune moment imaginable, a door was thrown open from outside. Storming into the room, Yoshiro groaned as she made a bee-line towards her friend’s empty couch. Ignoring the clutter, the frustrated girl threw herself into the cushions before burying her face into a soft pillow and half-screaming into it in an effort to vent her emotions. Eventually, she needed to stop in order to take a breath, and Yoshiro slowly turned to whine towards the other girl. “Lexi, what on Earth am I doing?”

“Stripping humanity of a massive breakthrough like Edison did with Tesla, if this fried circuit board is any indication.” The petite blonde girl grumbled as she angrily tossed the ruined product into a nearby nigh-overflowing recycling bin, resolving to try again tomorrow, and then turned to glare at Yoshiro. She was unable to hold her glare for more than a few seconds, however, and eventually relented, letting out a sigh.

“Whatever. It’s not the end of the world.” She spoke, looking around and spotting her trusty portable cooler a few tables over. Walking up to it, she picked up a pair of sodas and then headed back to the sofa, plopping down next to the japanese girl and handing her a can. “What’s wrong, Sister Psyche?”

Begrudgingly reaching out to take hold of the offered soda can, Yoshiro had sunk into the couch as if she were trying to entirely bury herself inside of it. She let out a pained groan from the cushion, her voice muffled slightly as she responded. “Na-uh, it’s totally the end of the world.”

Slowly turning her head so that she could frown directly at her friend, she seemed to have entirely missed Alexis’ initial barbed comment, wrapped up as she was in her own tumbling thoughts and worries. Taking a breath, Yoshiro tried to explain her discovery and found that the words just came tumbling out at once.

“I was working on this lab report, which is taking forever since that goth chick - you know the new tar hero from school? - was made my lab partner and isn’t doing any of the work. It was taking forever, and then I remembered some stuff that we’d done in class last year that could help. So, I started looking everywhere in my room for my notes, but it turns out I’d left them in Red’s when we were dating.” Yoshiro’s frown deepened as she remembered entering the boy’s room. “He wasn’t there, but I managed to get in anyway. And then on his desk I found this.” Lifting up her free hand, Yoshiro presented the image of a smiling Red and some mysterious girl to Alexis.

“I know that I’m overreacting, and she’s probably just a friend that he ran into, but...what if she’s not? We’re meant to just be taking a break! He’s not meant to just go out there and start seeing someone else like that.” Yoshiro explained, knowing that she was blowing her little discovery way out of the water but having been unable to talk her own twisting emotions down. Biting her lip, she continued. “Lexi, what if this wasn’t such a good idea? I was so pissed at him, and Red has always been so obtuse sometimes, but I thought that he might have...you know...changed by now. Or at least have tried to get me back, or something.” Pausing, Yoshiro felt a hand of fear beginning to grip at her chest. “If he’s just moving on, I have to just go and tell him how I feel, and that I’m sorry for pushing him away, and -”

“Woah woah woah, gonna ask you to step on the brakes there, Yoshi girl, let’s not make any hasty assumptions or decisions here, alright? Take a step back - figuratively speaking - breathe deep, calm your pretty little head and let’s take it from the top, okay?” The young genius spoke. She’d been content to patiently sip on her can of soda while letting her friend vent to her heart’s content, but it quickly became apparent Yoshiro was about to plunge down a slippery slope and as her friend and leadership figure, it was her responsibility to prevent that.

“First of all, if you’re having trouble with chem, you can just come down here and ask for a little help, I’ve got a lot more free time now that the fairies are around.” She gestured to the corner of the lab, where the small robotic fliers were hard at work putting together some sort of monster engine for her pet project. “Or hit up Mars. I’m sure he’d be willing to lend a hand too if you explain the issue.” She said with a shrug.

“As for our resident ex-con, let me see that picture again.” She requested. The telepath obliged, holding up the picture closer for her to see but still holding onto it. Raising an eyebrow, Alexis easily plucked it out of her hand, ignoring her friend’s protests, and looked at it very carefully. “Yeah… think whatever you will about Red, Yoshi, but these two are clearly fourteen, maybe fifteen. So I think your suspicion is a liiittle bit misplaced.”

The genius girl handed the picture back and then placed a hand on Yoshiro’s shoulder. “But you’ve clearly got a lot going on even discounting that, so I know exactly what you need.”

After her cryptic statement, Alexis gave Yoshi her half-finished soda and ran off to the back of the laboratory. She emerged a few minutes later, phone in hand and wearing a colorful blouse and a short denim skirt instead of her work clothes - her characteristic red glasses were now on her face as well. Upon arriving at her friend’s side, she immediately pulled the japanese girl to her feet and began dragging her towards the elevator.

“W-wait! Where are we going?” Yoshiro questioned, alarmed.

“Don’t worry about it.” Alexis replied. “Just trust me on this one.”

---

Not long after having left Wonder Tower, Yoshiro and Alexis found themselves sitting together at a table inside an ice cream parlor by the pier, which the blonde girl had discovered during her cherished first date with Angelica. Speaking of the Ice Queen, she was there too, along with the rest of their squad. Alexis had lured them out here under the pretense of participating in a team-building exercise, sending them a text telling them to dress casual and meet her by the pier. And, just as planned, Angelica, Viviana, and even their new member Makenzie had showed up. Of course, she had to explain what was really going on as soon as they showed up, but she wasn’t lying entirely, was she?

As the young genius shoved a spoonful of her rocky road ice cream into her mouth and savored the cool treat, she looked at each of her subordinates in the eye. “See, there’s nothing better to deepen the bonds of friendship that tie us together than having some ice cream and hanging out as a team. Am I right, or am I right?” She asked with a bright smile on her face.

“Y-yeah, of course you are. When are you ever wrong, Lexi?”

A faint smile appeared on Yoshiro’s features in response to her friend’s enthusiasm, but she continued to idly poke at her ice cream with her spoon. The treat was slowly melting under the Californian sun. She knew that Alexis really was trying to help her feel better, but her stomach continued to twist itself into knots until she didn’t feel hungry at all. Sighing quietly to herself, she recalled the squad leader’s earlier comments and how easily she’d dismissed the photo. She felt embarrassed and silly for bringing it to her, having been called out like she’d been. She tried to convince herself that Alexis was right, that she was just blowing things all out of proportion, but she would have seen the photo earlier if it had been an old keepsake. The writing on the back was new, and not in Red’s handwriting, and that caused a nervous grip to tighten around Yoshiro’s chest.

“We gotta focus on cheering you up, Yoshi!” cheered Viv swallowing a spoonful of mint chocolate chip ice cream into her mouth, “Think of this like group therapy. Except it's just you spilling your guts. All your deepest darkest thoughts and feelings about your romantic life. While eating ice cream to juxtapose it!”

The brunette was sitting next to the psychic and was leaning on the table with her elbows. She flipped her braid of hair while munching on the ice cream and her puffy beige jacket sort of made her look like a sack of hay. She poked at her cheek with her spoon and bit her lip as she delved into thought.

“So yeah from the looks of it the pic is just old,” observed Viviana, “But me and Casi sorta went through something similar a while back if so I understand what you’re feeling.”

“Besides, Red is an idiot if he thinks he can do better with some girl with his past.” Angelica added as she ate from her cookie dough ice cream. “But, if you want me to beat him up at any point just say the word.” She added half jokingly.

Yoshiro couldn’t stop a laugh from escaping from her lips at Viv’s typically over-excited response. Despite her best efforts to maintain a gloomy attitude, her friends’ words did succeed in bringing a faint - but genuine - smile onto her features. Turning towards Angelica, Yoshiro responded only half-jokingly.

“Thanks for the offer, Angie. I’ll keep that in mind.” Pausing, the girl’s brow furrowed slightly, and she shifted nervously in her seat as she turned back towards the brunette tearing through her ice cream. She didn’t want to pry into the other girl’s personal life, but she couldn’t help but feel a nagging curiosity at her words. “Wait, Viv. What did you mean by you and Casi going through something similar? You guys always seem so happy together, despite…” Yoshiro’s voice trailed off slightly as she tried to think of a diplomatic way to continue. Rubbing her head nervously, she offered Viv an apologetic smile. “...you know, Casimir being Casimir.”

“Very funny,” said Viviana rolling her eyes with an amused grin, “Well it's not a hundred percent similar or not even seventy-five. Maybe just sixty to seventy. Anyway I mean that we sorta almost broke up like a year ago. I know it was soooooo long ago.”

Viviana paused for a second to take another spoonful and seemed slightly apprehensive, “It was sort of over finding out he had been a superhero for almost a year back in our hometown and the guy just kept getting so hurt. It just took a lot out of him protecting our town early on and I just felt like he didn’t trust me. To like confide in and stuff.”

“But it's all good now. Honestly we were both pretty dumb over it,” said Viviana before wiping her mouth a napkin, “Okay, it doesnt sound that similar anymore now that I said it outloud so let’s go with fifty percent.”

“Zero percent, one hundred percent, doesn’t matter. It just goes to show you that you gotta be smart in how you deal with this sort of thing.” Alexis remarked after hearing Viviana's story - she had been surprised to hear that she and Casimir had gone through such a rocky phase in the past, but then, she supposed there was a lot she still didn’t know about her teammates. It also served as a stark reminder of how recent her own relationship was and all the things that could happen in a year or more, but she pushed the thought from her head as quickly as it came. It was time to help out Yoshiro, not worry about some nonsense.

“But I guess there might be some other lesson in there. What did you guys do to make up, Vivi?” She asked the brunette.

“Well we didn’t make up till a few weeks later but we just went to go meet up at our town’s pier during a festival. We talked about stuff and this and that. Getting all emotional before deciding what we needed to sort out and talk about to move on. Then uhm,” Viviana coughed into her sleeve a bit as her cheeks flushed slightly, “Aaaanyways, I don’t think there’s a specific thing you do to make up. I think the important part was to give time to heal especially if you were harsh to each other. So it's all about time and getting out of the moment.”

Angelica turned to their newest member, Makenzie, who seemed mostly to be keeping to herself. “What about you Makenzie? Do you have any thoughts here?” She asked, trying to help her feel included in the team bonding session.

Yoshiro rolled her eyes as Viviana dejectedly admitted that her past experience maybe wasn’t as relevant as she’d first implied. Grinning despite herself at her friend’s usual over-the-top eagerness to help, she was about to half-jokingly point out that she doubted that she could work things out quite so easily when Angelica suddenly turned to get the input of the silent figure sitting beside her. Immediately, Yoshiro felt a flood of colour rush to her cheeks. Oh my god, I totally forgot that she was here.

“NO!” She called out, louder than she’d intended. Even though they’d been in the same squad for a while, Yoshi had been forced to sit out their missions ever since Mackenzie had joined them. She still didn’t feel like she really knew the girl, and she could only imagine what kind of an impression she was getting from all this. Silently cursing herself as she felt her embarrassment only increase as gazes turned back towards her, Yoshiro desperately tried to blurt out some kind of explanation. “I-I mean I don’t want to just spring this whole thing on you when you’re new. And maybe I’m really just over-reacting anyway. Not that I wouldn’t value your advice or anything. Heck, you probably still haven’t really met Red, what with him keeping to himself all the time recently.” Her voice trailing off, Yoshiro winced as she realised that her rambling wasn’t making things any better. Trying to think quickly, she glanced around the table for some way to change the conversation. “How’s everyone’s ice cream? Good, right?” Smiling sheepishly, Yoshiro’s cheeks were still flushed with embarrassment as she made a show of lifting a spoon of vanilla to her mouth.

“It’s horrifically delicious,” swooned Viviana as she was halfway through hers but her glee was replaced with a cautious determination, “But you know, wouldn’t knowing what you think on how we think about what you said that you said be more important than ice cream. It’s not gonna do us a whole lot of good without some feedback from our patient.”

Makenzie was in a slight social panic when Angelica asked her if she had any contributions. She had been listening lightly to what was going on, but she was obviously not yet ingratiated with the team enough that she had an opinion on the relationship between Yoshi and Red. Neither could she snake her way out by feigning complete ignorance.

Crapbaskets. Think of something. Everyone’s looking-

Suddenly Makenzie’s inner awkward monologue was cut like a knife by the sudden ‘NO!’. The seasoned ninja was about as stunned as if someone had detonated a flash bomb in her face. She was grateful, when Yoshi explained, that she didn’t have to contribute in this delicate and awkward situation. It was still a bit weirdly insistent.

“Yeah no, I don’t really have a take on all this. Sorry.” Makenzie replied, going for honesty. “I mean, I did meet Red. We did some sparring in the training room for a bit until we were both too tired to continue. We might be making a regular thing out of it.”

She frowned, as if disappointed. “I didn’t get to know him very well at all though.” She muttered.

There was an uneasy silence after Makenzie’s words, with a few of the other girl’s exchanging glances at the unexpected revelation. Red wasn’t really the type to go out of his way to involve others in his close circle of training buddies, especially recently. Let alone someone new and with the open intention of making it a ‘regular thing’. However, before anyone else could speak, Yoshiro waved a hand dismissively as if to clear the air.

“Yeah, that sounds like him. You beat him though, right?” She stated, offering the new girl a friendly wink as she spoke, even while masking the shifting emotions in her chest. She knew it was stupid, and that her mind was making connections that just weren’t there, but first the picture and now this? Trying to distract her own train of thought as much as to break the awkward pause, Yoshiro continued. “But I don’t know guys.” Hesitating, she recalled her earlier discussion with Alexis, when she’d first vented freely on her frustrations with her boyfriend and the pair of them had come up with a plan. “It’s just, I thought that taking a break would snap him out of this cycle that he’s been in, you know? Make him try and change a bit to help things work. But instead I feel like he’s just leaving me behind.”

“I don’t know, Yoshi-girl, I don’t think I’ve got a solution for you but what I do know is that you sound like someone who is about to make a decision out of despair and not because it’s the best for you.” Alexis finally spoke up again after taking another spoonful of her rocky road. She had kept her cool throughout all the chaos and awkwardness, but now she felt it was her turn to speak up again. “Like, come on, look at yourself, girl. You’re cute, smart, you’re fun to be around, you’re kind to everyone and you’re super dedicated. You’re an amazing catch and I’m sure he’ll realize that eventually and pull himself together to win you back.” She assured her friend.

“And if not…” The blonde girl continued after a pause. “Well, then that’s his loss, Yoshi. Not yours.”

“Alexis is right.” Angelica said, speaking up after mostly being quiet. “Don’t let your feelings for him allow you to settle. You deserve to be really happy, anything else is crap.” She said bluntly. “Trust me, it's worth the wait too.”

At the last comment, Alexis leaned over and gave her girlfriend a quick peck on the cheek, grinning as she turned back to look at Yoshi.

Viviana was quietly collecting all the leftover ice cream with her spoon slightly annoyed Yoshi had ignored her once the little info about Makenzie and Red dropped but it wasn’t worth getting into a fuss over, “Ya know, if you want a distraction from worrying about Red there’s that gala the team was invited to. You guys got the message right? Anyway, maybe with what Angie said you could meet someone who could turn out better than Red.”

Offering the cute couple a grin, Yoshiro was thankful for her friends’ efforts to cheer her up. Though even as she put on a smile, a hint of doubt still crept into her eyes as she felt her stomach twisting in her gut. When Viv pointed out that the gala might be a good chance for her to relax a bit, Yoshiro found herself thinking the idea over. She’d be lying if she said that she wasn’t excited for the event. The dance blew prom out of the water, and when else would she get a chance to go to a real ball - and as an honoured guest, no less? But at the same time, Viv’s last comment only deepened the pit in Yoshi’s stomach.

“You know what, you’re right Viv.” Yoshi eventually declared, nodding her head as she seemed to make up her own mind. “Why do I care what he thinks, right? I shouldn’t stop enjoying myself just because he’s moping over himself all of a sudden!” Finishing her ice cream with a renewed determination and conviction, Yoshiro was nevertheless trying to convince herself more than anyone else. Yeah, who needs guys, anyway. She quietly thought to herself, just as an idea popped into her head. “Hey, have you guys ever had boba?”

[Aidannadia]

October 4th

Aleta signed a poster for a fan as she made her way to the smoothie place in the mall. She’d texted Renata from the Tower the day before about the good news, but she supposed this sort of thing needed to be discussed in person. She looked forward to spending time with her friend again though; it’d been much too long since the pair of them had had the time to catch up.

“Heeeeeey, Rennaaa~” Aleta said as she entered the smoothie place.

Renata had arrived to the shop a few minutes earlier and had already seized one of the tables for her and her friend - as soon as she saw that the blonde finally stepped inside, she waved to get her attention.

“Hope you’re not signing off as a member of the team already,” the pink-haired girl commented, referring to the fan Aleta signed off to a few seconds earlier, with a smile on her face. “I don’t know if we’ve made it official yet.”

“I’m sure Auntie and Naja are still jabbering over the details of the contract, but not to worry. I signed as the illustrious Paragon.” She put her hand up in the air as if to block some invisible shining light from her eyes, smiling cheekily as she did so.

“But enough about work. I wanna hear about the new boo now that Icky has split?” Aleta raised an eyebrow. “I mean, I have half a mind to listen to the newest rumors of a fling between you and Nightshade with the relative lack of options among your… little friends.”

“Uh, you mean-” Renata spoke with little thought put into her words, then stopped, her voice cracked, and she began to mumble:

“W-what, rumors?!.. Where are you even getting these rumors from, I never even heard anything about this...” She sighed, buried her face deep into her hands and let out an exasperated, defeated “Nooo...”

Aleta giggled. “Just a few posts on a message board somewhere. Nothing to worry about, darling. The press gets one pick of a couple of heroes standing together and suddenly their dating. I mean, I won’t tell you all the things I’ve seen about Shitstain and I online. You’d think they’d at least show some decency. I don’t know; I might be in the market for a partner just to steer things away from that direction at this point.” Aleta poked her tongue against the inside of her cheek in thought for a moment, then shrugged. “Let’s get smoothies.”

Aleta stood and walked over to the smoothie stand, and then said words Renata had never heard her say, “This one’s on me. I’d like the kale-spinach-spirulina chocolate coffee and she’ll take something fruity… you like Mango,” She called back to her friend then turned back to the cashier. “I think it’s called Tropical Sunrise or something.”

“Yeah, sure. Tropical Sunrise.” Renata blurbed out in a single breath. It wasn’t her absolute favorite, but she didn’t hate it for sure, and Al picked it out for her, so who was she to say no. While waiting for the bartender to swiftly prepare their drinks, the pink-haired girl leaned on the bar, continuing their conversation:

“Come ooon, you can’t go around calling Nightshade a shitstain. At least you can wipe and clean away one of those two, the other just sticks no matter how annoying he gets.”

“Nah, Nightshade is Blueberry. Shitstain is the one with the power kinda like mine. I actually forget his real hero name if I’ma be real. But really, Nightshade is that bad? I’d figured he’d be sorta like.. I don’t know… Cool?”

“Psh. Nah, he’s not a shitstain. Doesn’t mean I have to like him.”

Renata’s eyes darted to the ceiling, mulling over Aleta’s explanation of what she meant. “Sludge. You mean Sludge. Which, come to think of it, doesn’t sound appetizing either… It’s weird, I haven’t seen you and him mentioned in the same sentence on the web all that often - but I have seen a post asking who would win between you two in a fight. So, what’s your expert analysis?”

“Well, it’s a question of utility versus power. Supposedly, Sludge’s power is biological in nature, so it could do something I’m not anticipating, but otherwise I’ve got his best in pure kick-assery from street-fighting from the last few months. I’ll remind you; I took on the Goat.” Aleta said confidently, actually beaming with excitement at the prospect. “I’ve got to tell you about that fight sometime. Dude is a grade A moron.” Or was. They still haven’t found a body among the wreckage I suppose.

“I’ll give you that… but I don’t doubt Sludge would give me a far different answer if I asked him.” Renata calmly rebutted, smiling, and turned to see that their smoothies had already been prepared a few moments ago and were now standing right next to her elbow. She swiftly snatched up the mango one and began to make her way towards their table, with Aleta in tow. “Wow, so we’re going to be on the same team from now on… Really, all I need now is it get Icarus to sign on and I’ll have my entire circle of friends under one roof.”

“So that’s still a thing? You and Icarus? I mean... “ Aleta tiptoed around the subject carefully, knowing full well of Renata’s sharp tongue. “Distance is hard, right?”

“What? Of course we’re still a thing, what are you implying?” the pink-haired girl replied after a few seconds of glaring at her friend frozen. After sitting down by the table and taking a sip from her mango smoothie, she folded her arms, her eyes wandering off to the side.

“Yeah, it’s not easy… but, I mean, we keep in touch. And we got to meet each other during the Tournament, anyway - not on the best terms, if you watched it, but still. What, were you thinking that we’re over just because he’s in LA? It’s not even that far away...”

Aleta shrugged. “I mean I wouldn’t stay with someone that far away but then again I don’t think boyfriend-girlfriend stuff hits me like it does for you too.” She shifted uncomfortably. “I mean, I’m not someone to get tied down like that anyway. That’s like… a big commitment. I dunno if it’s something I can really understand.” Aleta sipped her smoothie.

“But more power to you if you trust him.”

“So skipping the first day of school like hot stuff huh?” Aleta said, quickly changing the subject. “I grabbed some of my papers from the other day. Figured you might need them.” She rummaged around in her leather jacket pocket and pulled out a crudely folded stack of pages and placed them on the table.

“Oh, thanks… you really didn’t have to, though.” Renata muttered, but picked up the papers to glance through them regardless. It was even a little surprising to see that Aleta was starting to take notes more scrupulously during class. The pink-haired girl continue after placing the stack back on the center of the table:

“I didn’t skip it in its entirety. I just excused myself out of the last few lessons so I could get back to Wonder Tower. They just happened to be the ones which we have together, you know...”

Aleta shrugged and pulled the stack of papers back into its shadowy den of her jacket pocket. “Well you missed the commotion at lunch. Shi’s pretty cool, huh?”

“Cool.” Renata repeated the word Aleta used, her thoughts drifting towards the scuffle and eventually reconciliation she managed with Shi. She hadn’t heard of any commotion in the school cafeteria nor did she want to imagine the destructive potential of Aleta and Shi’s personalities clashing, but the mere mention did bring up those memories. “If you think about the powers she has, I’d say she’s a lot more hot than-”

The pink-haired girl froze, buried her face into her hands a second time, and groaned. “Nooo… please, Al, that’s not what I meant, it sounded differently in my head...”

Aleta raised her eyebrows. “Damn. You’re just digging this hole deeper for yourself aren’t ya?”

“Yeah… mierda…” Renata muttered, lamenting, and growled a little. “There’s probably a reason why Father said that my one and biggest fault was acting before I think… Thank god I at least said it without anyone else to overhear it.”

“Well, your secret is safe with me.” Aleta giggled in a teasing fashion. Renata’s face was, however, clearly not amused.

“That would leave me more worried than anything...” she replied and leaned back in her chair, getting back to what they were talking about at the start. “But, really, it’s gonna be a little weird to have you on the team, at least for a while… especially since I didn’t even know you wanted to join. I’d have guessed the complete opposite if you asked me even a week ago.”

Aleta raised her hands to either side of herself and explained. “You could say it was a deal with the devil. Despite registering as a hero, my vigilante days can’t be overlooked, so it was either the Yeebees or I move to another city, and while New York is fun and all, I guess I’d rather stay somewhere where I actually know some people.”

It was a little more complicated than that of course, but explaining the intricacy of her auntie and her’s new relationship would be a hassle.

“Really?” Renata blurbed, raising her brow. That… didn’t explain anything. If anything, it made her think Aleta was deliberately trying to hide something about her decision. No names mentioned, describing the sequence of events in abstracts and metaphors… The pink-haired girl leaned on her hand and continued:

“Come on, you could get into more details than that, that’s rather dry! Your secrets are safe with me too, you know.”

“Well…” Aleta took a deep breath in, sipped her smootthie and sighed. “My mother was the hero Paragon, as you might know from my debut interviews. Her closest confidante was my Auntie. My auntie agreed to help me defeat the Goat and in return I must register as a hero and maintain a public image. Something about branding for the company.” Aleta waved it off like it wasn’t a concern.

“Similar to other vigilantes like Frostbite and Blackout, I had to join a team to keep from prison time after going straight. Therefore, the Youngbloods are a natural choice for a variety of reasons.”

“I see...” Renata muttered under her breath, took a sip from her smoothie and pulled out her phone to start navigating to her messages - with Aleta, specifically.

“Are you happy with that? Your words felt a lot more… dramatic when we last messaged each other.”

Aleta scratched the back of her head nervously. “That was after the Goat decked me. My first loss, but I’m stronger now. I bested him. This deal… it protects me.”

Renata raised her eyebrow, but opted to not poke that particular piece of the story any further, especially when it was rather obvious that Aleta was still weighed down by it somewhat. Instead, after taking another gulp from her smoothie, she opted to bring up something else:

“So what was up with that Goat that made him so frightening to you, anyway? I mean, it’s a goat… man. What can he even do, spit on people?”

Aleta rolled up her sleeve and showed Renata a deep purple bruise that stained her arm. “He’s strong. Stronger than your Draquinni teammate. I… Auntie had to develop a special polymer from my pitch to actually withstand his strength. It was unreal.” Aleta’s eyes looked off in the distance, still haunted by the beating she’d suffered.

“But I beat him. I got him to collapse a building on the both of us, and I’m the one that walked away. I won because of Auntie.” Aleta was still uneasy about something regarding her Aunt’s warehouse, but she put those thoughts to the side. She needed to trust her new partner if they were going to work together.

“...really?” Renata certainly didn’t find it easy to believe that someone with a name as ridiculous as “the Goat” could be that much of a threat. Pitch wasn’t even any pushover, either, she held her own somewhat during their battle against that vampire member of the Cabal - and yet this villain managed to push her into doing something this drastic. Pitch appeared genuine, however, so she didn’t question it - she just sipped her smoothie again and continued:

“They found him under the building, right?”

Aleta sipped her drink, a loud noise signaling that she was on empty.. “If they have, I haven’t been told.” The teenager shrugged, masking her anxiety around the subject. Had he escaped? Had they found him? Were the rumors of a government experiment true?

“So they didn’t.” Renata blurbed and put down her cup - much like Aleta’s, it was pretty much empty at this point. “You know that trope in movies where the villain supposedly dies crushed under a building and then suddenly appears in the sequel? Yeah, that’s the vibes I’m getting here...”

Aleta looked uneasy about the prospect. “I’d prefer that to finding his corpse in the rubble. Would hurt my image too bad.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m not saying he should be dead, nothing deserves that...” Renata immediately began to explain herself. “Just, you know, I think it would have been for the best if you weren’t the only one who walked away there, and someone locked that guy up. At least then you’d know where to look for him next time.”

“Right…” Aleta shifted again, partly ignoring what Renata was trying to get at, thinking again about the state of the warehouse she had leveled. Why was Auntie hoarding Warwolf tech? I thought The Demeter Project was about charity.

“But, well, you know, I suppose I shouldn’t be the one lecturing you about what a hero should do in what situation and whatnot. Can’t exactly claim to be the one more knowledgeable in that, after all...” Renata muttered under her breath when it became clear that Aleta was too lost in her thoughts to continue, her fingers instinctively fiddled with the empty mug to busy themselves with. It did make her ask something else, however:

“Feeling better now that he’s gone?”

Aleta snapped out of her silence. “Def. You wanna walk around the mall a little bit more?”

“I mean, unless you want to stay here and start chewing on your mug, I don’t see why not...”

Aleta giggled. “Tempting, I’ll admit. Come on, let’s go.”