32 Interlude: A Jack's Job is Never Done

Salt Lake City, Utah

March 9th, 2010

///

Swerving around yet another chunk of broken road, Jack's sleek, high-tech motorbike purrs as she brings it to a stop, still a short distance from entering the city proper.

It's not something she didn't expect coming here, she thinks to herself while dismounting. The city was recently the victim of an Endbringer attack, just two days ago for that matter. She doesn't bother to remove her sleek and solid black helmet. It is much sturdier than a typical helmet, so it might come in handy soon. Plus it matches her skin-tight, deceptively durable black and red leather suit that doesn't leave a single inch of skin exposed.

Considering the eponymous lake, Leviathan would have likely caused more damage, but the 'middle child' of those monsters only ever attacks coasts.

Even then, comparing the damage is like trying to comfort someone who's hand has been cut off that at least they didn't lose the entire arm. Because the rest of the arm doesn't really serve much purpose with the hand not being there.

She doesn't really know where she's going with that example. The point is, Behemoth or Leviathan, the end result is hardly different for the people in the city.

Reaching over her bike, she pulls off a high-quality, tall but thin equipment bag that was hanging on the side and shoulders it in one smooth movement before turning and walking deeper into the city.

Her bike hums into motion behind her, and she knows that it is going to start searching for a clearer path into the city for when she leaves.

As she passes into the city, she mostly ignores the ruined streets, broken buildings and piles of rubble. Instead, she focuses on finding any signs of life, as the streets are unusually empty, even for a city recently attacked by an Endbringer.

Salt Lake City had a population nearing two hundred thousand after all, even if half of them died there should still be people out and about, whether they be wandering aimlessly or trying to mend their broken lives.

Instead, the streets are unusually quiet.

She figures that's a good thing. 

Well, a good thing for her, since she's here to do her job, but it's probably not great for the residents.

Luckily, as she gets closer to the centre of the city, she starts to hear plenty of voices, hundreds of them at least, all screaming and shouting and crying. Looks like she has a direction now.

"How upsetting," she mutters to herself with a sigh, knowing that she's probably not going to get any sleep tonight. She's honestly not sure if it's a good thing or a bad thing that she's not so desensitised to human suffering that she can still get effected by it.

Well, not that her feelings will stop her from doing her job as efficiently as possible.

Though, this time it just so happens that her job and her morals are aligning for once, but she's not sure that's something to celebrate considering the situation at hand.

Even through inner turmoil, her pace doesn't change as she calmly walks towards what is no doubt a monument to human suffering. She has long since learnt to divorce her emotions from her body. Her power actually helped in that endeavour.

Not in any literal sense, just that it helped her with visualisation. If she visualises her power as a physical representation of her emotions, then not only is it easier to control her body, but it also helped her master the use of her power.

She doesn't have a lot of things to be proud of in life, but if there is one thing that she is proud of, it's her mastery over her own power.

Precision trumps strength, and precision backed by strength can trump anything. That is a lesson she learnt from the only person she fears more than her boss, and it is a lesson she has engraved into her very being.

After all, it's one thing to simply be told some advice, but it's a whole other thing to witness the effects of that advice. All she had to do was look at what That Woman accomplished with just a combination of power and precision.

She's snapped out of her thoughts when a teenage girl practically flies around a corner just ahead of her, sprinting like her life depends on it. Which it probably does, considering the stream of blood slowly dying her right arm red.

The teen doesn't even seem to notice Jack, so intent on running away, until they are only a dozen or so paces apart.

Jack goes to speak, but the girl beats her to it.

"RUN!!" The teen screams, "RUN AWAY!!"

However, instead of running, Jack just smiles. Not that the girl can see it.

This seems convenient to her, because if this girl is escaping, then it's likely that one of her targets will chase, allowing her to get rid of one of them without having to deal with being outnumbered.

Well, not that she's worried about their numbers in the first place, else she'd have brought reinforcements.

Right as the girl is about to pass her, Jack lashes out with an arm, gabbing hold of the girl's good arm and bringing her to a halt. She has to use a brief application of power to keep the girl's arm from getting dislocated, but going by the terror stricken expression they're wearing, she doesn't think the kid noticed enough to be thankful of her consideration.

God, now she's starting to think like Queen. The girl is obviously not going to be focused on pointless discrepancies like that right now.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING LET ME-" The girl is cut off by Jack bringing them close together and hugging the kid's face into her shoulder.

"Calm down kid, I'm here to help and I promise I'm stronger than whoever's chasing you, so just take a deep breath, steady yourself and stay behind me. No one will hurt you anymore, you're safe."

She's no psychologist, but Queen made her watch some fireman TV show thing, so she's just mirroring how those guys dealt with panicking people. Thankfully it seems to have worked at least a little, as the girl seems far less hysterical than moments ago, though calling her calm would be a gross overestimation.

"W-who're you? A-are you a Hero? I thought all the Heroes- I mean- I'm sorry- I don't-"

"It's okay," she stresses her words to get through the girl's panic, "I'm from out of town, but I came here specifically to help. I wouldn't have done that if I wasn't confident I could succeed, so just focus on your breathing for now."

She was going to ask the girl about who was chasing her, but not only can she make an educated guess, but she also simply doesn't need any more information than what she has, so she'd rather just let the kid take a breather.

Silently she watches the kid breathe for maybe twenty seconds before the silence of the street is broken once more by another figure turning the same corner. Only this teenage girl actually does come flying into their street.

The newest arrival is drenched in even more blood than the girl behind her, but Jack gets the feeling that none of it is their own. They are dressed in what looks like some kind of aviation suit, only without any kind of helmet, allowing Jack to see the deranged, bloodthirsty grim etched onto an otherwise conventionally attractive blonde girl's face.

Jack hears the teen behind her's breath hitch at the new arrival and squeezes their hand before moving to properly stand between the two girls. Meanwhile, the new arrival waves her hand in the direction she is moving, whereupon a thin, translucent barrier forms that rapidly brings her momentum to a halt once she passes through it.

Another barrier appears beneath their feet as they drop to the ground, resulting in a smooth landing.

"Yohoo, is that a Cape you've found Clarissa?~" The now-named Clarissa whimpers, a soft sob leaving her, "you got a name, Miss Motorcycle Helmet?"

"I do," is Jack's simple response.

Unsurprisingly, the deranged girl doesn't like her succinct answer. "So you're gonna be like that, are you?" The psychopath growls out 'threateningly', "you better fuckin' introduce yourself properly or you won't like the consequences."

Jesus Christ what is this kid, the Young Mistress of Heaven or something? Jack doesn't doubt for a moment that they were a part of their school's drama club. Most capes are pretty eccentric people as a general rule, but seriously, there are limits.

Stoically, Jack does an impressive job avoiding voicing any of those thoughts. "I go by Jack. And you?"

"Jack? What, like The Ripper? Or like Jack Slash?"

"Like the playing card one rank below Queen."

"What a fuckin' nerdy name. Could have at least pretended the inspirating was something cool."

"The name is more of a position than a title, so it would be counter-intuitive for it to be personal."

"What?" Jack very carefully doesn't physically react to the girl's incomprehension at the idea of organisational titles. To make a comparison, Jack is no different from titles like Sergeant or Major. "Y'know what, never mind, I don't care. I am Houston!" She declares as if her name should impress anyone, "and if you come with me without putting up a struggle, I pinkie promise not to hurt Clarissa."

Jack has never seen anybody so utterly fail to lie convincingly than right now, and she has to remind herself that she is dealing with a teenager, no matter how superpowered.

Still, the little psycho's voice has this whining, spoilt, holier-than-thou kind of tilt to it and it's starting to grate on her. She already knows who the girl is anyway, so really there's no reason to continue to subject herself to such an annoying voice.

With one hand still on her bag's strap and the other hanging limply at her side after she let go of Clarissa, Jack makes sure her voice projects without shouting, something made easier by how empty the streets are. "I propose a counteroffer."

While the girl is still processing her words and before she or anyone else can physically react, a thin wave of deep red energy bursts out of Jack's chest like a solar flare, travelling the distance to the psycho in the blink of an eye and splitting her cleanly in two down the middle and leaving a faint red afterimage in it's trail.

The energy hangs in the air for a moment, two points of contact remaining on Jack's body like an arc of electricity, before the arc splits at it's farthest end causing the two remaining lines of energy to rapidly fade away.

Jack summarily ignores the fresh corpse as it crumples to the ground in two halves in favour of turning to face Clarissa.

"I assume the rest of them are all in the centre of town?" Jack asks and Clarissa manages to nod dumbly. "In that case, using me as a shield is no longer your safest bet, so run along now. Find somewhere to hide for the next half hour or so. This won't take long."

She doesn't bother waiting for a response before starting to head towards the sound of screams once more, only to be surprised when Clarissa runs to catch up with her instead of running away.

They walk in silence for a while. Clarissa gives the body of Psycho-Girl a wide berth but otherwise seems content to stay as close as she can to Jack without actively touching her. Finding the silence a little bit awkward, Jack decides to ask a question that has been bothering her.

"Her, Clarissa right?" Clarissa nods, "how come you didn't think I was one of them when you saw me?"

Clarissa hesitates for a moment, though not because she doesn't want to answer, she's just understandably a bit emotionally unstable right now. "I c-counted them. A-and there's o-only s'posed to be nine of them, r-right?"

Clarissa's words impress her. She wouldn't have figured the teen would have the presence of mind to keep track of them in this situation.

And indeed she is right. There are never more than nine members in the Slaughterhouse.

The Slaughterhouse Nine. Founded by King in 1986, they swiftly became the most prominent band of roving serial killers the nation, or even the world, had ever seen. Their members would shift constantly, as they were killed frequently, but occasionally an exceptionally powerful member would join them and manage to survive the years.

Then another, then another, until the member list eventually stopped fluctuating so often because each member was powerful enough to survive their, 'high risk lifestyle', shall we say. That roster of serial killers soon became a symbol of terror, unstoppable in their might and unmatched in their cruelty.

For years, they were considered unbeatable, unstoppable monsters just one step below the Endbringers. If anything, people would have preferred to face down Behemoth or Leviathan than the Slaughterhouse. Their strength and infamy was so great that it was thought the only way to deal with them was to run away.

That lasted until they ran into an even bigger Monster.

The First Clown, and her more immediately relevant title, The Slaughterer of Nine, or Ninth Slaughter, as she's heard some people call her instead.

Either way, the point remains the same. The Fake Endbringer brought an End to the Nine. So one has to wonder, if the Nine are dead, then who the hell is the target of her mission?

Well, it turns out insanity is contagious or something, because the group she's here to kill has had the wonderful idea of taking over the Nine's legacy and attempting to rebuild the most horrific band of murderers ever known.

However, there is one thing this Neo-9 is missing if they want to properly fill the boots they claim to stand in.

Power.

As evidenced by the cooling corpse behind her, while these psychopaths might have all the sadistic, murderous intent necessary, they completely lack the power to back up their actions.

Frankly, the only reason they've survived nearly half a year now is by striking targets of opportunity only. Such as a small city that just got hit by Behemoth.

Their leader also appears to be quite wily, but she's not worried. Not when she already has a grasp on all their powers.

First, Houston, the corpse. Her power let her make metaphysical launchpads anywhere around her pointed in any direction. If used with actual skill, it could have been a very impressive power. In fact, if not for the detestable personality the power was attached to, Jack would have been fully willing to recruit and train the girl to work under her.

As for the rest of them, their powers aren't necessarily weak, but their application could certainly use work. Frankly if her own subordinates showed such a lack of mastery over their own abilities, she would make them learn.

So lost in her musings, they arrive at the centre of town in what felt like no time at all, and the sight that greets them all but assures the already present worry that she won't be getting any sleep tonight. 

For that matter, she might as well write off the entire week. 

In front of her, the centre of the city has been reduced to an enormous crater, no doubt the result of Behemoth considering how the rock making up the crater shows signs of having been melted.

Inside of the crater, she watches as hundreds, maybe even a thousand people frantically tear into each other with reckless abandon, madness clear in their eyes and actions. But if the sight of men women and children tearing each other limb from limb, ripping out organs and slipping in pools of blood wasn't bad enough, she can also see what seems to be a number of small orgies taking place dotted about throughout the carnage.

No doubt this is the result of Lover, a Master who's power lets her turn even a light fear into overwhelming adoration, or the opposite, turning even light attraction into overwhelming fear.

She should be priority number two then, for the sake of all the innocents.

However, before she can start properly looking for the members of Neo-9, she finds herself involuntarily turning away from the sight before her and to the side.

It takes her a moment to clear her head, but since she already knows their powers, it's not all too difficult for her to recognise what is happening to her.

Wind. He is a Stranger and his power forces people to avoid letting him into their line of sight, though evidently it doesn't try to hard to make the feeling natural.

"Well well well, what do we have here? I thought all the capes already-"

He doesn't get to finish his sentence as an arc of red bursts from her body in a wide, horizontal line that bisects him at his chest, cutting through his lungs and ribs as if they were made of butter.

It doesn't matter if she can't aim properly at you, area of effect attacks exist for a reason. Dumbass.

With Clarissa still sticking to her side like a lost duckling, Jack goes to continue her observation, only to be interrupted once again, this time by a much louder, manlier voice.

"Everybody stop!!!" They command, and thus everybody stops.

Not that the speaker is a Master, but everyone in the bowl is too full of adoration or fear to do anything but obey.

From the centre of the bowl walks the only group of people not shaking with barely supressed emotion.

The crowd parts like the red sea as six people approach.

The one in the lead is naturally the leader, and also the most offensive of them all. As if piggybacking off the reputation the Nine spent decades building up wasn't bad enough, he has the gall to call himself Cry and dress himself in a striped black and white prisoner outfit.

If the allusion to The Slaughterer's name and earlier costume wasn't blatant enough, he uses his Changer power to generate a number of powerful tentacles from his body in a poor imitation of Her own power.

Truly, he is an insulting sight.

Flipping a cutthroat razor open in a lazy gesture, the man gives her a smirk that she is sure he believes to be suave. "Well now," he drawls out, "aren't you a sight to behold. I don't suppose I could learn the name of who killed Wind so callously?~"

Jack tries to flex her power but finds it refusing to obey her as it always has. normally such a thing would cause her no small amount of discomfort, but it's nothing she didn't expect.

With her helmet coving her face, she doesn't have to be subtle when she turns her glare to the simpering man standing to the side and a step behind Cry.

Given the creative name Glare, he just so happens to be priority number one and also the primary purpose behind her personal presence here.

Turning her eyes back to Cry, she speaks up before the silence gets awkward. "I go by Jack. And you?"

"Jack, huh?" His tone is pondering and he rests the blunt edge of his knife on his chin as if deep in thought. "Where do I recognise that name from, I wonder?"

"Jack Slash, perhaps?" A voice trying too hard to be seductive suggests. That would be Lover then.

Where Cry at least can act the part well enough, Lover just looks like a cheap prostitute pretending to be high class in the hopes of getting better clients. God she just hates all of these walking examples of room temperature IQ.

"Hmm, no, I don't think that's it." He shakes his head exaggeratedly, "well whatever, it hardly matters. What does matter however, is the unjust, unkind, and wholly unnecessary death of our dear companion!"

All six of them chuckle at the proclamation, proving what she already knew, that none of them actually give a shit about Wind's death.

"I say, such a grievous crime deserves some punishment, no?"

Shaking her head at the production he is making out of this, Jack decides to stop humouring idiocy and just do her job. She's not here to chat after all.

The only issue is that there is not a lot she can realistically do with Glare shutting off her power. Granted, she's still confident she could kill them all even without any powers, but that would be a pain in the ass to do and undoubtably leave her with a bunch of bruises and cuts that she doesn't want to deal with.

Frankly speaking, it would be embarrassing if she so much as got a speck of dust on her clothes fighting these rejects. She is the sword of the most influential Gang Lord in the country, expecting anything less than perfection would just be insulting.

With that in mind, she turns her back to the murderers without a worry, knowing that none of their powers can take advantage of her inattention, and grabs hold of Clarissa by her upper arms.

"If I give you my word that no harm will come to you, would you mind assisting me for a moment?" She asks, and the steel of determination that enters Clarissa's eyes catches her off guard for a moment.

But she supposes it makes sense. The girl has watched these guys torture everyone she's ever known. She would probably be willing to help even without the guarantee of safety.

Throwing those thoughts aside, Jack takes a deep breath and holds it, hearing but ignoring the sound of heavy footfalls closing in.

Time to get to work.

With supernatural speed, thanks to bodily enhancements rather than a power that Glare could cancel, she spins around, bringing Clarissa with her until the younger girl is held perfectly between herself and Glare.

With line of sight broken, her power returns to her, blooming into her awareness with comfortable familiarity.

Only a mere couple of steps away from them Stomper advances on her position. His power grants him complete invulnerability to any damage by transferring any force he receives into the ground below him.

With that in mind, Jack gathers up her energy and hammers it into his face in a thick beam.

Naturally, it does no damage to him, and it hardly even causes the ground to crack, since she put no real power behind the attack. What it does do is splash off of his form like water against a rock, resulting in a solid wall of red splitting in all directions around him.

With line of sight now blocked by something other than a human shield, Jack quickly places Clarissa on her feet and nudges the teen to get behind her, something she seems quite happy to do.

At the same time, Jack pumps out some more energy and forms a solid red, mirror-like barrier just in time for the energy of her initial attack to fade away.

With line of sight taken care of, she directs more of her energy to the charging wall of steroid infusions, only this time instead of a thick beam, she sends arcs of energy so thin they appear wispy, as if they will fade in a light breeze.

However looks can be deceiving. Something Stomper learns just before he can enter arm's reach of her, when her energy neatly and with surgical precision cuts into the ground just below his feet.

So accurate is her precision that the layer of stone left on the soles of his feet can barely even be seen as her energy lifts him into the air. With a dismissive effort of will, three monomolecular lines of energy lance up from her back just in time for Stomper's momentum to carry him through them.

A bright, metallic red parasol forms in her free hand just in time to save herself and Clarissa from being showered in gore, but she hardly pays that any attention as she finally lets go of her equipment bag in order to reach into a pocket and pull out an obviously Tinker-Tech device.

Just from looking at it, you wouldn't be able to guess what it does, but it is clearly Sci-Fi in nature. A push of a button and an absent flick of the wrist sends the device hurtling into the air, clicking and whirring.

She waits a moment for the device to fly over the barrier separating her from Glare, and lets out a smile when she hears the accompanying sounds of distress.

That little device was designed by her boss himself, with a little help from the Clown known as Vendor. Its purpose is quite simple. When activated, it releases a flash of light that is capable of temporarily disabling powers.

Naturally there are plenty of limitations. For one, the range is limited, but more crippling is that it only actually works on powers that are based on sight. Technically it can work on any power that is actively being used to observe the flash, but realistically it only functions against line of sight based powers.

Such as a power that can disable other powers, for instance.

Dropping the solid mirror and dispelling the parasol now that it has stopped raining blood, Jack takes in how much the varying expressions have changed since thirty seconds ago.

Lover still seems unconcerned, but she's a human Master so an exaggerated sense of self-confidence isn't unexpected. Glare is clutching his eyes in pain, no doubt experiencing the devices nasty side effects.

Ripper seems unreasonably excited for the situation, Queer seems worried, and Cry himself is looking significantly less confident, though he hides it well, even if it hurts to admit that.

"Well I can't say I expected that," Cry states, sounding far less concerned than he is feeling. "What brings a girl like you to a place like this I wonder, Red Death?"

Jack pauses mid-stride at the title, both because she doesn't like it and because she didn't expect him to recognise her.

Curiosity getting the better of her, she decides to ask. "You know me?"

"Not as well as I'd like, but you're hardly lacking in fame. I've heard plenty of tales of The Red Hearts' Chief Enforcer and I must say, you're even more impressive than the rumours give you credit."

"How charming," Jack responds, voice dry as the desert, "unfortunately, you can't talk your way out of this."

"Are you sure? Because as it happens, I have a lot of hostages. Now, normally I wouldn't try such a tactic against a Villain such as you, but with how defensive you've been of the little duckling behind you, I get the feeling you're not so cold hearted, hm?"

"You're not wrong," she easily admits, having long come to terms with the fact that she simply can't keep her morals while she works. She can only acknowledge her morals on her own time. She can cry to herself for all this pointless death when she goes to bed. "it would be a lie to say I don't care. But my feelings do not matter. I am here to do my job, not engage in frivolity. I don't get paid for my empathy."

"Oh but convictions can often fall short in the moment," Lover's overly suggestive voice sounds out, and Jack feels a faint pressure on her mind that swiftly fades into a dull throb that she can easily ignore.

"Perhaps when a Master is involved, but I happen to be immune." Her boss and his little girlfriend have done extensive work on all the higher ups in Red Heart, and those upgrades naturally include an anti-Master device.

Even if that wasn't the case, her power would hardly do anything. The only person she actively fears is her boss, but he also saved her, so she feels plenty of affection for him too. So her power would just sort of do nothing at all.

"Even if you are immune," Lover continues, sounding very annoyed, "you're not the only person here, are you?"

With her words as prompting, Jack turns to see Clarissa staring up at her with naked terror, and considering the power at play, she doesn't doubt that Clarissa is feeling rather devoted to the killers in front of her right now, a thought that is proven with Lover's following words.

"Girl, kill her."

Clarissa jumps to follow the command, but it barely takes even the slightest bit of effort for her energy to crash into the girl and wrap tight around her body before pinning her to the ground.

Turning her gaze back upon the wannabe Villains, Jack swats aside the approaching Ripper with an almost bored movement of her energy. His power lets him rip people's faces off with a touch and graft them onto his own body.

Like this, any damage that he takes is transferred to the still living bodies of his victims. Were she a hero, this would cause her to hesitate in attacking him. But she is resolved to kill them, even if she has to cut through innocent lives to do so.

Still, it will take time to cut through his extra lives, so she ignores him for now. It's not like he has enhanced strength after all, and she hit him quite hard.

"I don't suppose we could negotiate?" She doesn't bother to respond, causing Cry to let out a sigh. "Very well then. Queer, help me out would you?"

The final member present finally moves, his posture showing the kind of absentmindedness rarely seen in anyone who isn't high. If she's remembering right, he escaped from a Parahuman Asylum not that long ago.

His is a Breaker power that allows him to transmute his entire body into anything that he is touching. Originally this was only the case for physical elements, but at some point during his stay in the Asylum, he figured out how to be more esoteric in his power usage.

Something that she can see clear as day as the man slowly unravels into a silhouette of pure white light that doesn't hesitate to charge her down with incredible speed. He knows from experience and a deep instinct that he cannot be harmed in this form, not even from laser and energy based attacks. 

Unfortunately for him, he is not nearly as fast as the light he is now made up of should be, and more importantly for someone so clearly confident in their survivability...

A thin flare of red dances from Jack's body that Queer ignores entirely, only for his body to fall apart without reattaching. He falls to the ground in two halves just like so many others, his body undoing it's transformation in death.

...Her energy can touch anything.

If he was surprised by the death of his companion, Cry doesn't show it. Instead he simply launches five powerful tentacles at her like spears.

Now, she could cut each tentacle to ribbons in the same time it takes to blink, but there is still one more member missing. Voyeur, and she has no idea why their naming sense is so weird. 

Voyeur's power is twofold. He can fly, but only vertically, so it's more accurate to call it hovering really. But his main power is a precise laser attack that grows exponentially more powerful the more distance it covers.

Presumably, Voyeur is in the sky somewhere waiting for an opening, and presumably Cry knows this and understands that it's his only chance at surviving. Thus, Cry is trying to give Voyeur an opening.

Which is exactly what she wants, because she has no idea where the sniper is.

So she does not cut the approaching tentacles to ribbons as she could. Instead she only demolishes one, parries two to the side and dodges the final two with a step and a twist that leaves her somewhat off balance.

Goosebumps spread along her body as a sense of danger fills her mind, but she remains perfectly calm as she plants a foot and twists to the side just in time to watch a thin laser dig a furrow into the ground past her.

Turning her twist into a full spin, she unslings her shoulder bag and reduces it to scrap cloth with her power to reveal what she has been carrying this whole time.

By the time she finishes her spin on one knee, she has a thick, high-tech sniper rifle shouldered and is tracing the angle of the missed laser through her scope.

A grin stretches across her lips when the only person here that posed any kind of threat to her enters her crosshairs. "Found you~."

A brief high pitched hum fills the air before the crack of the sound barrier being broken tries it's best to deafen them.

She watches through her scope as Voyeur's head is reduced to a fine red mist before focusing back on the 'fight' around her. Resting her gun on her shoulder pointed to the sky, Jack stands back up and takes a moment to absorb the expressions of Cry and Lover.

She doesn't say anything, no snide comment or mocking insult. She doesn't make any grand gesture or anything like that. Instead, a red flare of energy simple bursts free from her body. The line of energy spasms like a child's scribbles when Cry attempts to block it, resulting in his tentacles being cut into pieces so fine they float on the wind.

Resignation enters Cry's expression for the briefest moments before her energy straightens back out and cuts through his legs at the thigh, continuing behind him to remove Lover's head from her neck.

Not wanting to listen to his moaning, Jack carefully controls her energy into his ear canals, and with an incredibly precise flex of will, knocks him unconscious.

With a dismissive thought she remembers Ripper and sends her energy lashing out at him, cutting through his neck over and over again until the thing finally detaches once he runs out of spare lives.

Finally, Jack lets out a deep breath.

Mission accomplished.

Pulling out her phone she checks the time. Twenty seven minutes. That's how long this whole thing lasted.

She did say she wouldn't take longer than half an hour, so she's glad she kept her word. It would be embarrassing otherwise.

Especially since she's on a schedule. For all they clearly thought highly of themselves, this whole thing has just been little more than an errand for her. Two hours of work is hardly a full day, and most of that time was just spent getting here in the first place.

She still has an appointment to get to in a little bit. She is to give a man called Balminder Wahala an offer he can't refuse. In a more literal sense than just an enticing one. Joker requires his knowledge, and his inventory would be a nice bonus too.

As if summoned by her thoughts, a low purr fills the air as her bike pulls into the area from around a corner with slightly less debris than everywhere else.

The bike comes to a stop right in front of her, and she quickly sets about resting her gun against it before pulling another bag of its side.

However she is interrupted in her actions.

"U-um!" A highly nervous voice exclaims behind her, and when she turns she sees Clarissa standing there, her hands nervously twiddling together in front of her. And for perhaps the first time since they met, Jack actually looks at her.

She is a brunette, her shirt is torn, dirty and half soaked in blood, but beyond that she can tell it's some name brand. She's wearing tight jeans with numerous holes in them, only some of which are there for style reasons. Her shoes are a nice, if scuffed, pair of runners and Jack can see the remnants of a faint dusting of makeup on her face, with her nails painted a green that matches her eyes.

"What is it?" She asks the girl.

"Um. Well- It's just, I've kind of- I mean, I think- everyone. All m-my f-f-friends, a-a-and my family. They're all, they- I don't-" Clarissa pauses her triad to take a deep breath and steel her nerves, "...Sorry, what I mean to say is, if you're willing, or- or if it's not a bother or something-"

"Just spit it out already, Girl."

"Right, sorry, it's just-" She bites her tongue when Jack glares at her, clearly reading the expression through her body language rather than her helmet. "Pleasetakemewithyou!"

Jack takes a second to parse through the girl's vomited words, and she feels a peculiar expression form on her face when she does.

"Girl, don't say stupid things. You've just lost everyone important to you and now you're latching on to me because I saved your life. And in case you missed it, I'm a Villain, a criminal who makes a business out of murder. You've shown enough intelligence that I'd be willing to consider hiring you, but you are nowhere near the level emotional stability I require of my subordinates right now."

Turning her back to the girl, Jack returns to opening her new bag, pulling out the entrance to a camping tent that quickly unfolds itself.

"I can handle myself! I can do this! I swear! I can handle-"

"Shut up."

Sighing to herself, Jack starts undoing the zip of the tent 'door', and when she pulls it open, instead of simply showing her what is behind it, she is greeted by the sight of a dimply lit warehouse.

Fast Travel's portals sure make logistics a whole lot easier, especially with an organisation as large as theirs. She couldn't imagine how any large clandestine organisation could function without portable portals.

Sighing once more, Jack turns back to Clarissa. "Look, I wasn't lying when I said I'd be willing to hire you- But!" She quickly adds to curtail the girl's sudden excitement, "but I have minimum requirements that you don't meet. I don't really have an age requirement, so being a kid isn't an issue, but I do have a maturity and emotional stability requirement that basically has the same effect of keeping kids like you from getting hired."

Clarissa deflates slightly while Jack takes a moment to let her bike drive itself through the portal.

"If you want to work for me, then get therapy. The Heroes will likely be here soon with the police and PRT. Ask about for some therapists, it will be covered by the PRT so don't worry about affording it. Attend and engage with said therapists, then, once your therapist can honestly tell you that you are emotionally stable, if you still want to work for me, go find any Last Laugh Arcade and tell the staff that Jack is covering your tab. Deal?"

Clarissa dons an unnecessarily serious expression and nods resolutely, which honestly just makes Jack want to sigh again.

"I won't let you down!"

"Sure sure, tell it to your therapist."

With those parting words, she straps her gun over her shoulder and steps through the portal, dragging two prisoners with chains of red, uncaring as they drag on the floor. A faint wisp of energy is all that remains behind and that too fades away after dusting the tent flap behind her, leaving nothing behind of her presence in the area other than the destruction caused.

...It's not like she can bring the portal through the portal after all.

She just hopes that kid actually listens to her and goes to therapy. Lord knows teenagers love to ignore good advice.

Depositing her gun on a random table for a moment, Jack points her palms to the sky and enters a back bending stretch, releasing the position after a moment with a soft sigh.

Well, that's one errand done. Now where the fuck is Balminder hiding?

///

A/N: He~llo! Dear readers!

Man, it's almost like my passion has reawakened or something. This chap is nearly 7k words long and I actually wasn't thinking about deadlines or word count or anything while writing it, I was just doing it for fun like way back in the day when I started Murder Wizard. Just with better grammar lol.

Anyway yeah, Jack was always supposed to be an important character but I accidentally forgot to give her much of any screentime, so now you get a nearly double length chapter of just her being a badass and getting plenty of depth added to her.

And I'll reiterate cuz it's important and I feel stupid for forgetting about it, but Jack was literally always supposed to be the most important character in Red Heart other than James, the fact that I ignored her so much kinda pisses me off but in a way that I'm laughin' 'bout it yk?

Anywho, hope you enjoyed reading this chap as much as I enjoyed writing it :) 

P.S. It wasn't even painful to come up with 9 whole ass new powers for once, tho it's still kinda sad to have to put so much time in coming up with 9 interesting powers just so they can last a scene each lmao.