Chapter 1
I woke up to the feeling of everything hurting. This was not a feeling I was used to. Not since before I had gotten my powers. After that, their passive effects had rendered me all but immune to physical pain. There had been one very brief instance after I got my powers that I was able to feel physical pain, but that had been thankfully brief and I refused to dwell on that day if I could help it.
I stretched, hearing several satisfying pops and opened my eyes to a night sky. So, I had been unconscious for a while, as my last memory had been daylight. The question, of course, was how long had that unconscious period had lasted. Equally important was where I was now. I had a third question that was more important than either, but I suspected that I wasn't going to find an answer to that, so it would have to wait, much as the idea galled me.
Sitting up drew a hiss as muscles in my back protested the movement. Damnit. What the hell had happened? I remembered seeing that swirling portal open and then it had leapt at me and after that, just pain before waking up just a moment ago. Ignoring the protests of my back and legs, I stood up, deciding not to dwell on that. I'd gotten a read on whatever that portal was, so maybe I could replicate it and get the hell away from wherever here was.
My attempts, however, produced only a brief crackle in the air before me and I sighed at the sight before it faded away. Of course it wasn't going to be that easy. Maybe there was some Protectorate chapter here and I could reach out to them, or even give…
I pushed that thought away, unfinished. Talking to him would be hard enough, given I had ignored contact with anyone after I left. Problems for later. Figure out where I am right now and what to do for tonight at least. Sleeping on rooftops wasn't really my thing, especially when I didn't know where I was. A coastal city, sure. But beyond that?
There was a group down the street a distance from me, a gathering, wearing red and green and the way they were massed suggested that it was not a friendly gathering. One of them was talking and I bent the flows of air as a medium, carrying his words to me as if I were standing right there being addressed directly.
"…the children, just shoot. Doesn't matter your aim, just shoot. You see one lying on the ground? Shoot the little bitch twice more to be sure. We give them no chances to be clever or lucky, understand?"
Children? I rolled the word around. These guys were going after children? What the fuck had I woken up to? And was I going to let it happen? The answers, in order: I don't fucking care and hell no.
I dusted the gravel from my pants and eyed the dirt staining them. With a flex of power, I extracted any foreign matter from my clothes and off my skin that I didn't want there, Much better. I felt somewhat better as I took a step off the edge of the roof and dropped, landing without damaging the ground and barely making a sound.
The gathering up ahead, however, noticed. Or at least the speaker did as I saw his head snap in my direction and a barked command set his followers spinning, guns at the ready.
The sound of guns going off splintered the relative quiet of the evening into nothing as they started shooting the same moment I turned and started walking toward them. I caught little flares as the bullets came into contact with my powers, stopping dead. I could have just rejected them, sending back along their path but I didn't want to risk something going askew and since I had no idea if anyone lived in the buildings around us, I stretched out farther than I usually did.
Every single bullet came to a dead stop, dropping to the ground around me in a steady metallic tinkling sound. I cut out the sound of their guns firing because really, that's such an unpleasant sound. My smile grew as I reached out and adjusted so the sound was dampened for the entire block. It took the men almost a minute before they realized that there wasn't any sound coming from their guns.
I kept walking forward and even clapped once. "Well, that was fantastically pointless."
"You're a cape," the leader said as the men stopped firing at a gesture from him. He stepped forward and the street light illuminated him and I felt my smile disappear at the familiar silver mask. One I hadn't seen in years. And one I shouldn't be seeing right now. What the hell was going on here?
"So, you're what, a Lung impersonator?" I asked as my answer.
Several of the men snorted and the figure seemed to find the question amusing. "I am Lung, foolish girl. And you have wasted enough of my time." Fire exploded outward, racing toward without any warning. Not that I needed any. Really. Pyrokinesis, against me? What a joke.
The fire boiled backwards and set the man ablaze, sending him staggering as his men fell back from the sudden bonfire in their midst. Several didn't make it and I couldn't find it in me to care in the slightest. Assholes had been planning to go after children for some reason, they deserved whatever they got.
The fire wreathing around the man exploded outward abruptly and he released a howl of rage. Was he growing?
"Huh, you really are trying to imitate Lung, I guess," I shrugged. "Oh well, I'm not really interested in playing around or letting you really get going if you are a true copy cat. Night night, faker."
One of my hands came up, then down and the not Lung was driven to the ground, the flames extinguishing as the ground around him cratered into a bowl shape. The Lung impersonator did not get up. I turned my head to look at the remaining group that were still standing or alive. A scuff of my shoe on the ground and several of the fallen bullets rocketed after, smacking into the men with enough force to put all of them out cold.
"Well, that was exciting, I guess," I murmured, looking around to make sure I hadn't missed anyone. I dug into my pocket and then sighed. Right. No phone either, because that would be too easy to be able to just call and find out where I was. I didn't know of any Lung impersonators, so that was kind of odd, but it takes all kinds, I guess?
The Lung impersonator didn't move as I jumped down to where he lay and nudged him with my foot. Good. If he really was a copycat, I didn't want him waking up and potentially ramping up. Burning the docks of one town down was enough. The thud of something heavy landing out of my range of sight, followed by two more identical sounds made me step forward, bouncing out of the hole to the sight of three gigantic figures and again, the feeling of familiarity nagged at me.
There were riders on all three of the giant beasts. One girl with a cheap plastic mask, two riding together, and a third that slid off slowly, holding his hands up. Black leathers and a motorcycle helmet with a stylized skull regarded me.
"You really saved us a lot of trou-" he began.
"Don't care," I said. "Who're you, anyway?" The pair on the third beast had hung back, mostly in shadow, but I thought the shape of one of them was familiar.
The man in black suddenly turned to look at me before pointing at one of the figures on the dogs, which moved forward slowly, "Introductions. That's Tattletale. I'm Grue. The girl with the dogs-" he pointed to the girl with the cheap mask. "-We call her Bitch, her preference, but in the interests of being P.G., the good guys and media decided to call her Hellhound instead. Last and certainly least, we have Regent."
"Fuck you, Grue," the one called Regent said.
I didn't say anything. Tattletale? Lisa? What the fuck- "Is this some sort of fucking joke?"
"Excuse me?" Grue asked.
"What the fuck, Lisa?" I asked, causing the blonde to visibly shift, startled. If it wasn't her, it was a damned convincing copy, even if she hadn't spoken yet.
"You've confused me with someone else. The name's Tattletale, like the man said" she said before Grue could speak. Her mouth opened as if she was going to say something else, but her head turned. "Grue. We've got incoming. We gotta scram."
Scram? She was going to run? "Oh hell no, you don't just roll up like this and then run off."
Grue had backed away, clearly uncomfortable and preparing in case of violence. "Sorry, Tattletale doesn't know you, like she said. Sorry for the confusion, but we'll be going." Darkness poured outward and I snarled. This trick?
"Wasting your time," I said, dispersing the shadows and leaving him taking a step back, also startled.
"Grue! We need to go, now!" The Lisa, or Lisa impersonator snapped. "We can't fight her and win and there's Protectorate inbound!"
"You can't fight me and win, true," I said. "You also can't get away." I cut the air flow to all four and the dogs before they could react. The one behind the girl that sounded like Lisa waved a scepter at me and I felt something ping my field, but it was rejected and the scepter clattered to the ground. The one called Bitch tried to do something, but all four dropped within seconds and I let the air flow return once they and the dogs were out.
Just in time for a motorcycle to roar up and a figure in silver & blue armor to step off and rise to his full armored height. A figure that I had not seen in years but I knew all too well.
What the fuck.
"We received reports of Lung and some sort of cape fight," he said cautiously. "Are you hurt, miss?"
"This is Brockton Bay, isn't it?" I asked quietly, staring around at the buildings. It was hard to tell, in the dark, but I hadn't I torn through this part of town fighting Crawler? Or against Leviathan? This street did nag at me, but it was a familiarity I had been trying to ignore. But with that armored figure standing about twenty feet away, I couldn't,
"Are you suffering from memory loss?" he asked. "And yes, it is. I'm Armsmaster, the head of the Protectorate stationed here."
"I know who you are," I said, feeling hollow. "You don't know who I am, though, do you?"
"I can't say we've met, no," he said, then his head shifted slightly. "Was there a cape fight? Did you see it?"
"You might say that," I said, waving a hand at the crater. "Someone claiming to be Lung is down there, and Tattletale and company are knocked out over there."
"Claiming to be Lung?" he repeated, glancing at the spot where I had dropped the copycat. "Why do you say that?"
"Because Lung's dead?" I asked. God, was it really Colin? Or just a convincing fake? Fuck. Can't have him be real. Because that would mean I've either time traveled or dropped into some weird alternate world. I'd rather just someone was screwing with my head.
It's pretty pathetic that I'd take this being some sort of elaborate mind game over either of those options. At least I can wake up from that and kick someone's ass.
"Lung's… dead?" he repeated my words again. "Miss, Lung was reported tonight as part of that cape fight and that's definitely Lung there. Are you sure you're feeling well and not suffering any memory less or a concussion?"
"No, I'm not feeling well, and no I'm not suffering either of those," I shook my head as I answered, waving a hand absently as I started walking. This was a waste of time. Not Lung, Not Lisa and this was definitely not Colin. "I'd call for back up. Tattletale and that bunch will probably wake up before the Lung impersonator does. Either way, they're all yours."
"Miss, you're a witness to this and there are dead people here too, I need to take a statement," he began.
"My statement, which you can record using the audio systems in your suit, is this: The Lung impersonator's down, so are those others. The Undersiders or whatever. I did it. The end. Have fun!"
He made several more attempts to get me to stop, but the priority of tending to all of the people I had knocked out apparently won out over harassing me. I was pretty sure I'd see him again though, and probably sooner than I liked. I kept walking though, and fished out my wallet, relieved to see that I had that at least. And enough actual cash on hand to afford a place to stay for tonight.
What I was going to do when that ran out, though, was a very good question. My credit cards and bank accounts were likely nonexistent, or unlikely to be of any help, depending on whichever situation I had found myself in. Shoving the wallet back in my pocket, I made a turn and kept walking, idly listening for the sound of not Armsmaster's motorcycle to come roaring after in pursuit.
What brought me to a halt, however, was when I happened to look up and saw a familiar house. It was exactly as I remembered it, complete with his truck sitting in the drive. I stood there for a moment, then pivoted on my heel and started walking in the opposite direction.
Whatever this was, that was not a road I was going down. Maybe I'll go harass the not Armsmaster. I could even join the Protectorate. Not really keen on the silly costume thing, still, but I suppose I could upset whatever mind game is being played here by doing the absolute most out of character for me stunts possible.
Hm… that isn't a bad idea, actually. But first…
The space before me didn't twist any further than it had before as I tried again to replicate that doorway. Right, so if that was a portal of some kind, then I'm in an alternate earth where everyone I knew that was dead isn't. Or this is all an elaborate mind-screw.
Everyone I knew that was dead isn't…
That thought made me stop in the middle of the street. That meant Jack and his merry band of fuckups might be here. Or impersonators of them. Whatever. That also meant...
I needed to find out what the date is supposed to be. Then I was going to see a man about a girl.
