Chapter 5: Ambush

Further down the river, Jack resurfaced, his head still flaming. Honestly, it was actually kind of a bet whether or not water would have some terrible effect on him while in this form, but luckily that bet won out in the end.

He had been swimming for a while now in order to stay well out of sight, so he planned on going home right away, but an explosion in the distance told him his night wasn't over just yet.

"Oh you've got to be shitting me, what now"? With that said, Jack ran over in the direction of the explosion. Going back out into the open at a time like this was risky, but he just felt that he needed to.

Over at the explosion itself, it was actually a convoy of emergency vehicles and the police heading for the hospital. The kids they had rescued earlier were inside ambulances, getting preliminary checks before being checked out more thoroughly at the hospital, where they would also be held until their parents arrive.

They never managed to get there though, as three assailants in all black bodysuits, with black motorcycle helmets attacked the convoy, blowing up most of the police cars and disabling the ones with the kids in them. Having stuck around just in case, Skylar and Ninja Warrior were on the front lines fighting the villains, who they believed to be reinforcements.

However, these guys were much more dangerous than the ones earlier. The one Ninja fought was dodging most of his slashes, and blocking the others with armored plating on his forearms. And he wasn't even that fast or strong either, but rather very highly skilled, filling in the physical difference with pure experience.

Skylar had a similar problem, but she was at least able to keep an advantage by staying above and barraging with feathers, all of which were smoothly dodged. "Who are these guys?! I had a feeling this wasn't a two bit scheme, but this is just unreal!"

The third was occupied by the investigator, but she could only do so much against an absolute pro of hand to hand combat. She put up a good fight, matching each punch and kick well like something out of a martial arts movie, but when she tried to get off a shot of her pistol, it was quickly knocked out of her hands.

As if an invisible cue was given, the three attackers started using their quirks for the first time in the fight. Ninja Warrior's enemy took off their helmet, revealing a man in his late 20's, with dead eyes that held no life or emotion in them.

Opening his mouth, a sharp tongue shot out, surprising Ninja and clipping him on the cheek. His enemy kept attacking him however, forcing him to stay on the move at high speeds. This only made the poison act faster, and he dropped to the ground paralyzed.

"Watch out, these guys are smart!" Pissed he was taken down this way, he could only watch as his enemy walked away.

Around the same time, Skylar was dodging through the air as her opponent swung around with stretchy arms, only to be blindsided by one stretching around behind her and knocking her to the ground, pinning her.

Watching all her allies be taken down one by one, the investigator could only feel frustrated as her enemy didn't even need to use their quirk, which she had seen when they were first attacked, but slowly wore her down and began to land solid hits.

A punch cracked across her face and dropped her to the ground. The three figures backed up together, and in sync turned to the disabled vehicles where the kids were.

"Don't you dare!" Enraged, Skylar forced herself off the ground and flew forward at low altitude, flipping around to attack with her talons. This only led the third member to grab a piece of rubble on the ground, make it glow, and throw it at her.

Having not seen it earlier, Skylar was cautious and just dodged but the investigator yelled "It'll explode!" With a quick reaction time, Skylar closed her wings around her, and the explosion went off, sending her across the street and crashing through the glass window of a store.

Her wings were a solid defense, but she was still quite hurt and covered in cuts and bruises. Despite this, she still attempted to stand back up, refusing to let those kids get taken again.

As she looked back up, she was greeted by another piece of glowing rubble coming her away. Ninja Warrior tried his best to move, screaming, "No!"

Even in the investigator wanted to move, she not only couldn't make it, but couldn't do anything, only able to watch as the terrible event happened in slow motion. Only for her eyes to move away as something sped into her peripheral vision.

Just in time, Jack landed right in front of Skylar and tanked the blast head on with his arms crossed in front, smoke covering his form as everyone held their breaths.

In shock, they all felt shock as both arms were blown off, and he stood there motionlessly. Skylar nearly cried at the sight, knowing this was done for her sake. "I'm so sorry."

Ninja Warrior was absolutely furious at this point, slowly starting to stand through the paralysis by sheer will alone. Casually, Jack looked back and tried to smile, albeit failing horribly. "Don't worry about it."

Before she could question his meaning, both blown off arms flew back into place and reattached themselves cleanly, sleeves too. Skylar sighed in relief, knowing he did this because he had regeneration.

"Oh shit, I can regenerate that well? Awesome." And her jaw immediately dropped once more.

"YOU DIDN'T KNOW?! You jumped in front of an explosion and you didn't know you'd be okay?!" She screamed this at him, and he laughed, something creepy sounding with his deeper voice.

"Did I have to? But, enough of that, I need to take care of this." Turning his attention to the three assailants, no, with their skill they'd be aptly named assassins. Something that unsettled Jack greatly, is that they had no smell of sin, which he called bullshit on after all this.

'How do they have no sin with all these people killed? Hell, the only thing that's ever had no sin is children, and these are grown ass adults.' While he was unnerved greatly, Jack had no choice but to step forward and fight.

Watching this all play out from a safe distance, was the news, who had followed behind the police despite being told to leave them alone. "The vigilante from earlier appears to have returned to save the heroes and children, despite fleeing from captivity earlier. But can he really take on villains of this level?"

'Rule 1 of group fights, weaklings first.' With that, Jack focused the man with the poisoned tongue. Rather than using it right away, the man first fought him in hand to hand combat.

Having fought for the past week now, Jack had a bit of skill under his belt, but not enough to win head on. Each punch was skillfully redirected, each kick ducked or dodge. Every failed attack was met with a counter, that didn't deal major damage but still knocked him off rhythm just a little bit to ensure the next attack also failed.

Finally, the enemy tried to use his poison tongue, shooting it like a bullet out into Jack's chest. To everyone's horror, the tongue actually came straight out the other side...with no blood on it.

While he could shoot the tongue out fast, retrieving it was relatively slow so Jack grabbed it and pulled him inward. Once catching his enemy in a bearhug, he forced him to look into his flaming eyes.

And much like he had feared, he saw nothing. Not only were the eyes blank and deep like a pit, but there was nothing in there. These men didn't just trick his scent, they had committed no sin. And Jack, as of right now relied on sin as his permission to kill, a confirmation of whether they were scum or not.

That was how he had managed to kill so easily, without being haunted or losing sleep. And now he had to make the choice to kill or not without any proper indication. Deciding to leave this for later, Jack used his strength to flip the enemy upside down, leap high into the air, and drive him into the ground.

This hurt like crazy, even to the skilled fighter who had angled himself to receive minimum damage, and put him out of commission. Before he could think, a stretchy arm punched across his flaming head, and out of sheer reaction he breathed fire and lit their suit on fire.

Snapping the arm back, the assassin patted it to put it out, unpanicked. As Jack readied himself to fight the other two, their heads snapped up as if picking up a message, and nodded. The explosive one did what he does best, and made an explosive.

Running at him, Jack tried to prevent him but he threw it on the ground and blew it up, knocking Jack back. Once the smoke dissipated, the two were gone.

"And I thought my ninja vanishes were cool."

Whether they had ran away, or used some kind of ability to escaped, none of them knew for sure, though the first speculation was a teleportation quirk. Sitting back against a flipped over car, Jack sighed out loud.

He had realized the hard way that while he doesn't get physically exhausted, he absolutely does mentally. Snapping himself to attention, he moved over to Skylar and helped her up, propping her on his shoulder as he walked her over to the other two and the ambulances.

"Thanks again for the assist." She beamed at him, having made a decision after watching him fight the same fight she did today.

"Ya know, I wasn't even thinking about the fact that I owed you one, but we'll just count me as paying that. Sound good?" He looked over at her, and this time she could just imagine the smile on his face.

"You missed a perfectly good opportunity for a princess carry. No wonder you aren't a hero." Ninja Warrior stumbled over as well, his normally high energy dropped down to just normal energy. If he wasn't partially paralyzed he might have gestured disappointment.

"Please, if I thought a mug like mine could get a girl I totally would have." It was rare for Jack to take a moment to joke around these days, and he had to admit he certainly missed it.

Getting up off the ground, the investigator spit out a question that she had held for a while now. "Why didn't you use your Penance Stare to kill him?"

Jack stopped in his tracks. "My what now?"

"It's the name we use to call the thing you do, where you kill your victim by showing him all of the sins and pain he committed. Not that I'm complaining but why didn't you do it to this one when you clearly took the pose?"

Putting two and two together, a lightbulb appeared above the two heroes' heads as they realized that's what he did earlier to the man that controlled the ground.

"Dude, that's metal as hell." Despite not approving of the action, Ninja Warrior had to admit that killing by giving penance was a hell of a way to do it.

"He didn't have any."

This time it was their turn to halt in surprise.

"He didn't have any sin."

"Wait, he murdered how many of my men and had no sin? What kind of nonsense is that?" The investigator responded incredulously.

"I have no idea. The only other people I know that don't have sin are children, and that's because they don't regard their actions with good or evil until later- oh fuck no."

If he had normal eyes, they'd be wide open now in realization as Jack put two and two together.

They looked at him quizzically , so he used a rhetorical question to prove a point. "What do you think they were gonna do with four year old children who had probably all just awakened their quirks?"

The first to get it was the investigator, who covered her mouth in horror. "No. No that can't be."

Needing one final nudge, Jack put the nail in the coffin. "What if those three had no sin like children, because they were still children."

Skylar grew sick to her stomach at this thought. Their cold, calculative movements. The dead, unfeeling face of the one that took his helmet off. And the dozens of kids they had just saved, who almost faced the same fate.

"I have no idea how, but having seen from the sins of the guy earlier that he had done this quite a few times before, and I know it's probably true. There's a mastermind receiving the kids and doing this to them. And I'm gonna find him."

Stepping forward, the investigator looked him in the eye. "And what will you do then?"

"He'll see each and every year he stole from these kids, flash before his eyes." With that, he handed Skylar to an approaching paramedic and walked away wordlessly, unpursued by either of the three.

Not only would they be unable to catch him, but right now none of them actually wanted to. At least for today, in the investigator's case. "Lyn."

Jack turned around as she said this. "My name, is investigator Lyn. Remember it. It'll be awkward catching you later if you don't."

Now that he had been given a name, he only felt it fair to give his own. And given how much he loved riding that motorcycle earlier, he knew exactly what it would be. "Ghost Rider."

And once more, he walked away, to the backdrop of Ninja Warrior saying "Oh that's so fucking cool!" Jack's figure faded as he walked through the flames and into a back alley. And of course, the news caught this whole thing on tape, as no one bothered to pay attention to them given the night they had had.