44

Date

2011 February 5th - Saturday - Earth Bet Time

Vicky was humming to herself while she was floating between Amy and Taylor. It was a beautiful February day; she was having fun with her sister and her new friend. Sure, Taylor was more than likely a parahuman, but according to her research, no new parahumans have appeared in Brockton Bay recently, so she was going to give her a chance as a hero.

They had fun. The window shopping spree always made her happy, and Taylor's presence managed to galvanize Amy enough to take part in it somewhat. The lunch was the usual, as there weren't many excellent restaurants that they could afford with their pocket money. However, the movie was interesting, and it was nice to see Amy enjoying herself for once.

Taylor was almost the same as Amy. Reluctant to speak up, but if you managed to find a topic that she liked, she could talk your ears off. Despite that, Vicky enjoyed spending time with the slightly younger girl. She was super smart, and her wit matched Amy while not in acidity in strength.

Mostly she hoped Taylor would become Amy's friend too because her sister needed more friends. Sadly, she saw that the entire time they spent on the Boardwalk Amy was giving Taylor suspicious glances as if making sure that Taylor had used no parahuman power.

Maybe with time, she would let up?

She hoped so.

They were currently escorting Taylor to the bus stop before flying home.

She was looking around, wondering where all the people were, when an explosion shook the air.

She instantly looked up in the direction of the sounds, watching as several nearby tops of the buildings were falling towards the ground.

Taking a fast look around, she saw Amy was already at the bus stop, while Taylor was standing between them.

Making a split-second decision, she pushed Taylor rather hard out from under the falling blocks of cement. She would apologize later if that hurt the girl, but for now, she had to get to Amy.

She was, however, stopped when a big cement block slammed in front of her.

Not being able to stop herself in time, she slammed into it with full speed.

Amy was taking a look at the bus schedule, wondering how long they would need to wait with Taylor for the bus. Because while Taylor was probably a parahuman, you just don't leave a young girl in Brockton Bay alone. Bad things happened that way.

Despite still being suspicious of the black-haired girl, she enjoyed herself. Having somebody who appreciated her comments about the ludicrous clothes Vicky tried on (no matter how good she looked in them) and somebody who had the brain capacity to talk about topics beyond boys, clothing, and makeup.

She was about to call out to Taylor, to ask which bus she needed when she heard the explosion.

She could only watch as in the next second Vicky punched Taylor into the building out of the way of falling debris, only to be stopped by a giant cement block failing between them.

She barely had time to blink in surprise when she heard movement behind her. She turned, still worried about Vicky, only to come eye to eye with a rather big gun.

Click.

The gun was in the hand of a person dressed in disgusting shabby clothes, their entire body radiating stench.

She was pretty sure he was a Merchant.

The man gave her a tight and grim smile, while a giant truck carrying other Merchants drove around the fallen debris and through the rising dust field.

"Well, that's not good."

Taylor was despite her expectations was having a great day. Vicky was funny, and despite her whole dumb cheerleader attitude and aura, was rather smart enough to keep up with any topic. She was also really knowledgeable about parahumans, which she wasn't shy about showcasing.

Amy was the polar opposite of her sister, withdrawn, sour with a barbed wire for a tongue, but she had to admit, some of her comments were insanely funny.

She felt that after this day she and Vicky were definitely friends, and Amy could be called a strong acquaintance.

Maybe.

The girl was hard to read.

Despite having her power on, and constantly monitoring the surrounding area, the explosion over them came as an enormous surprise, just as the fact that Vicky punched her towards the building they were walking next to.

She landed in an alcove and took her a second to realize what happened. She covered in instinct as the cement blocks reached the ground, wondering what the hell happened.

Actively concentrating on her senses, she watched as the surroundings appeared in total clarity in her mind.

The roofs of several buildings were lying on the ground in pieces, blocking the street one way and leaving a gap on the other way, but they were boxed in.

Though, how they expected to keep Vicky here with her flying, she didn't know.

However, the next second she watched as a person dressed like a bum approached Amy and raised a gun.

Oh. That way.

However, the man was weird. He was dressed as a Merchant, but Taylor could sense high-tech body armor under the disgusting clothing and an earpiece in his ear.

She watched as the truck carrying the other Merchants, probably remnants of the gang, arrived and she wanted nothing more to smash them to pieces, but she knew, thanks to her training, that one never went in hot into a hostage situation.

Instead, she spoke up. "Admin, costume!"

The next second she was wearing her gray costume with the mask.

"Good luck, Taylor."

Date

2011 February 5th - Saturday - Earth Bet Time

"Okay, people! What the fuck is happening?" yelled out Emily as she strode into the room filled with monitors and people sitting in front of them, gazing at the screen.

"Director," came a reply from Renick. "Empire capes are fighting with Merchants who are supported by Trainwreck. Oni Lee is fighting Armsmaster. He was on patrol when Merchant members had a fight with ABB members. Unfortunately, before he could break up the fight, Oni Lee showed up and began a bombing run on him."

She took a deep breath, cursed this thrice forsaken city, then spoke. "Keep Assault and Battery at the HQ. Have them sit on the Wards." as she was talking, several people were already forwarding her orders. "Velocity is out of town on vacation, so he is out. Tell Miss Militia to join a team of agents and prepare to assist Armsmaster. Triumph and Dauntless should be heading towards the Empire-Merchant fight."

"Understood. Should they try to take them out?" asked Renick while taking notes.

"How are the civilian casualties?" she asked instead of replying to the question. She waited a few seconds but didn't receive an answer. She looked up with a frown from the screen she was currently looking at. "Well?"

Renick answered with an embarrassed face. "None."

"What?"

"None, Director. Neither battlefield had any of them."

"That's…" she hesitated before continuing, aware of the ramifications. "Unusual."

"Yes, Director."

"So this all was planned for some reason."

Nobody voiced their agreement, but they didn't need to.

"Any idea what was the goal?"

People looked at each other with confused faces. Emily just sighed.

"Think people. Anything important happening today? Anybody important visiting a city?"

There was a few seconds of silence, only broken by people typing on their keyboard.

"No events today, Director." Spoke up one of the analysts.

"No VIPs either." Added another.

"Very well." She pointed to the previous two agents. "You too, continuously monitor social media and other channels for important events." The two agents nodded in understanding and hunkered back down to their screens. "Now connect me to Armsmaster. And somebody get me an eye on Lung."

She was immediately given a headset, and she took a seat, glad to be resting a little. The room around her continued their chaotic activity.

There was a harsh static before she could hear Armsmaster's calm and measured voice.

"This is Armsmaster."

"Armsmaster, this is the Director. Sitrep!"

There was a few seconds of silence, and she could hear several explosions. She had to admire the sound quality coming through the headset. He obviously did splendid work on it.

"No civilians. Oni Lee is armed with Tinker tech grenades. I recognize them. ToyBox sourced."

"Understood," she answered, noted the details down, then continued. "Health?"

"I'm at 90%. Mostly stamina. Armor is intact. Oni Lee is too fast to land a hit."

"Gang members?"

"Two sides. One ABB. Other Empire. But I don't think…" there was a giant crash and a weird sound as if the air was sucked out of an area before the hero continued. "Implosion bomb. I think the Empire side was fake. They were too good."

"Are they still there?" She then turned to the agent standing next to her at the ready. "Where are Miss Militia and her team?"

"One second, Director." Replied the agent who immediately began frantically swiping on the tablet she was holding. "ETA two minutes."

She nodded and turned her attention back to Armsmaster.

"… only the ABB left. Oni Lee hasn't disengaged yet. Wait…"

"What? What happened? Armsmaster!" she exclaimed.

Then the only thing she could hear was the sound of extreme and brutally efficient violence.

"Director. Dragon is here. ABB members are down and Oni Lee is unconscious."

"What?"

Triumph scowled and took the binocular back from Dauntless and watched as the battle between the Empire and the Merchants was flowing.

Although the battle was rather intense, it was obvious the Empire capes were playing with the Merchants, stalling for some reason.

Trainwreck and several Tinker tech vehicles armed with steampunk cannons supported the Merchants.

On the Empire side, Krieg, Stormtiger, Alabaster, Crusader, and Cricket were holding the front at an old brick building.

"Why are they stalling?" asked one of the agents.

"They probably have something in the building they need. More than likely it takes some time to move it." answered another agent lying on the ground, watching the fight through the scope of his gun.

"We could ambush that…"

"Hookwolf and the others are not here, so they are probably protecting it. We don't have enough firepower to take them out," replied Dauntless.

"Daniels, anything from HQ?" spoke up softly Triumph while still watching the events below.

The agent replied immediately. "The order is still to hold unless civvies are in danger."

He scowled in frustration, but the agent continued talking.

"However, good news. Armsmaster and Dragon took out Oni Lee. So we will have backup."

"Fuck." exclaimed Dauntless.

"What?" asked Daniels in surprise.

"That will piss off Lung."

"Shit."

There was a brief pause while all of them contemplated Lung going on a rampage, before Triumph, who was still keeping an eye on the fight, spoke up.

"Something is happening."

"What?" asked Dauntless while all of them crowded to the edge to watch it.

"They are positioning Trainwreck."

One agent exclaimed softly. "They are setting up a kill zone."

They watched in fascination as the Empire capes and gang members manipulated Trainwreck to a place before Crusader's ghosts surged forward to restrain him.

Trainwreck struggled for a few seconds before everyone heard the sound of a gunshot.

The next second, Trainwreck stopped, and in slow motion fell backward.

The heroes and agents watched, horrified, as blood leaked out of the helmet of the villainous cape.

The Merchant gang members, seeing their nominal leader falling, abandoned their weapons and began to run away.

The Nazis took a few potshots, hitting a few limbs, but otherwise didn't follow them.

The Empire capes looked up at them, smirked and Alabaster gave them a finger, then all of them walked into the building.

Dauntless sighed in defeat. "Report it."

Emily sighed for the hundredth time today. She watched as the situation room buzzed like a beehive as people ran around to organize the capture of Oni Lee and the few dozen gangsters that Dragon captured.

They had to put them on a truck heading to another city immediately because both the PRT and BBPD cells were full of the previous captures.

It was really a weird problem to have.

She was about to contact Dauntless for an update when one of her aides came up to her with a white face, holding a tablet tightly.

She had a sinking feeling watching the aide come closer.

"What is it, Johnson?"

The aide didn't answer, just gave her the tablet.

She took a deep breath, steeled herself, and looked at it.

Several people looked up, hearing the Director curse like a sailor.

The tablet was showing a less than legal but not illegal streaming site, where on the screen, according to the site, she could watch live as Mush and his cohorts taunted Glory Girl while holding a rather big gun to the head of Panacea.

"Where is this?" she asked in a whisper, not taking her eyes off the video.

"Near Boardwalk, there were some explosions, but nobody was hurt."

"And… why is that, this is the first time I'm hearing of this?"

The aide turned even whiter.

"The report came in, was acknowledged by us, then deleted. Automatically."

She looked up from the stream where Mush, encased in some kind of metal debris, was swaggering in front of the impotently raging Glory Girl, then looked in the aide's eyes.

"What did you say?"

"We checked, and somebody added a rule to the filters that filtered out every report or mention about this event."

She closed her eyes and counted to ten.

"Highest M/S protocols. Lock down everything. And get back Armsmaster and Dragon to the HQ. NOW!" she yelled at the terrified aide, then sank back into her chair, while klaxons began to sound in the building.

"Someone call New Wave." she threw it out absentmindedly while turning her attention back to the tablet.

Unfortunately, there was no sound, but she could make some educated guesses.

She watched as the man holding a gun began to gesture at Panacea, herding her to the Truck.

However, while she watched as Mush said something to Glory Girl that even more enraged the girl, something happened.

A new parahuman, dressed in gray, appeared in the middle of that clusterfuck.