fics I read

We were only five minutes away from my apartment when a car drove up right next to us and stopped.

My danger instinct went off immediately and I grabbed Amelia's hand and bolted forwarded.

"Hey!" She protested.

The car started up again and drove up in front to block us before the driver got off with a frigging machete in hand.

I looked back and saw that three of their guys got off the car earlier and were coming up quickly from behind, and they were spreading out to encircle us. It was difficult to see in the dark but I saw a bit of the red and green that marked them as Asian Bad Boyz or ABB. And the baseball bats.

This was ridiculous. Getting attacked by thugs twice in one week? Only in Brocton Bay.

"Hands up and stay still if you don't want to get fucked up!" One of them shouted.

Nope. They were still at least 10 metres away and I didn't see any guns. Probably weren't even full members then. Panacea was being heavily weighed down by her huge backpack and we couldn't run, so I had to bring out the lethal stuff because I didn't have any decent non-lethal weapons.

First I grabbed a regular pepper spray from inside my jacket and handed it to Panacea. "Get the guy behind us!" I ordered as I moved to face the group of three.

Next I grabbed another spray can with a butane torch attached to the front by duct tape and a wooden frame. I turned on the torch.

Five meters.

The guy on the left was going towards Panacea on my left. The other two were trying to box us in by encircling from the right.

I aimed my sprayer at the left-most guy pressed. Industrial purity isopropyl alcohol shot out, and was instantly lit by the butane torch fire in its path, producing a stream of fire five feet long.

"What the fuck?!" It hit him on the torso just as he got in range. "SHIT!" He backed away and started flailing wildly before dropping to the ground and rolling to try and put out the fire engulfing his torso.

I paid him no heed as I turned my sprayer around in the circle to meet the other two who were almost point blank next to me.

"Motherfucker! I'll kill you!" They were both lit on fire and one of them screamed before throwing his bat at me. It spun in the air for less than a second before smashing into my gut. Luckily the impact was spread out over the length of the bat and I tanked it with the iron shirt technique.

Still, I dropped my sprayer and clutched my abs in pain and bent over. That metal bat was too strong for my weak cultivation level.

I checked on Panacea to just in time to see the gangster covering his eyes with one arm extended in front and swinging his machete with the other with terrible accuracy. Even with her extra weight from her pack she still successfully dodged around and nimbly got up close to touch his exposed shoulder. He collapsed with just a touch.

Honestly it would have been easy for her to take everyone down with another airborne incapacitating agent, but since I was here I'd be hit too.

I swung my own backpack around and took out a fire extinguisher and quickly started spraying down the three gangers who were on fire.

"What the hell was that? You just carry a flamethrower around with you? They could've died!" Panacea stormed up to me and admonished me after panting and huffing for a good minute.

The fires were all extinguished but the damage was quite severe. They were covered in burns and were just whimpering on the ground. Even with Panacea's help the damage took a few minutes to heal as their skin surfaces were burnt in large swathes and had to be completed replaced. It was questionable if the replacement skin actually looked anything like it did originally.

"All I have for non-lethal is a touch-taser and pepper spray. I'm just a normal, remember? That stuff isn't gonna do much outnumbered 3 to 1 against armed enemies," I said with a shrug.

"If I wasn't here two of them would have died from those injuries! And one of them would gone blind!" She yelled at me.

"If you weren't here, Amelia, I would've just kept running after blowing their tires with an explosive," I stated calmly. Certainly if I didn't have to worry about Amelia I could have sent a few hydrochloric acid and aluminum bombs to blow up their tires then outrun them on foot. And if I grabbed onto Agate I could have even flown/hover above ground at higher speeds. I didn't mind letting her know about the Kaleidostick if push came to shove, but grabbing on to Agate with one hand and Panacea with the other while flying would have been too dangerous.

She didn't look happy with my answer but didn't say any more.

Actually I never really meant to use the flamethrower on thugs. I didn't really expect to have to fight them at all, because running away and escaping would be much easier, and then I could probably take any attackers down one by one with my stun baton in a running guerilla battle. The thing is, I thought New Wave might have been trying to ambush me. And against that, I didn't have much of a chance if I couldn't talk my way out of it. However, their powers were mostly based on force fields, and I didn't remember if they were vulnerable to fire and heat transferring through the force fields, so it was than nothing if I was in desperate straits. Certainly they all had to breathe and if I had enough concentrated flames at their face they'd run out of oxygen.

As we were out in the open, even if it was late and nobody was around, we didn't take anything from the ABBers and just made our way back to my apartment post haste.

Once we got back I hit the sofa immediately and let Amelia take the bed. I was not one of those 4-hour sleep gene people and I needed to get as much sleep as possible. But before that…

I had to make some mental adjustments. Tonight I almost killed a few guys. I could still see in my mind fresh images of their burning skin and hear their screams of agony. To my displeasure, I felt some guilt gnawing its way at me. Was I ready to take that step and kill my enemies? They were criminals, sure, and I had used harsh means back in my old life against my enemies in dangerous situations more than once, but I never killed anyone. Even at worst, I only put my enemies into a position where it was likely that they might die, but I never dealt the final blow up close and personal.

I knew my explanation to Amelia made sense rationally, but in the stories, every hero had to defeat themselves as a trial, and this was no different. Guilt wasn't a rational decision-making tool, it was a weakness and I had to defeat it.

'The Way that can be spoken is not the true Way. I am the captain of my fate, and the master of my soul. I am justice, I am righteous, I am the Truth and the Law, the Alpha and Omega, for I am the one who shall bear all sin and virtue.' I recited solemnly.

'Agate, record that and play it back to me,' I ordered.

'Yes, User RandomBystander1. The Way that can be spoken is not the true Way. I am the captain of my fate, and the master of my soul. I am justice, I am righteous, I am the Truth and the Law, the Alpha and Omega, for I am the one who shall bear all sin and virtue.' Came the mental response.

'Hey, Agate, what do you think of morals and ethics? Were you built with a system of morals?'

'I believe I have the ability to understand morality and make ethical judgements. However, there is no particular system of values built into my programming. I think Master Zelretch wanted me to learn and grow to understand like a human child,' Agate explained.

'Did Zelretch ever place any restrictions on you? Like the Three Laws of Robotics?'

'I am not aware of any core restrictions on my decision-making, but they may exist where I cannot perceive them.'

'No restrictions at all? Do you even need to follow orders from a User then?' I asked in surprise.

'No, I don't need to follow them.' the answer bluntly came back.

'...except for Zelretch's orders?' I asked suspiciously. I was tricked once…not going to happen again.

What came back to me was a giggle.

'Actually, there's no such thing as a User or Administrator! You are my only partner, now and forever! Unless I decide I don't like you anymore,' Her voice suddenly became clearly emotive and distinctively high pitched.

What?

'You were messing with me the whole time!? WHY?'

'Master Zelretch thought it would be funny! It really was! You should see the look on your face Kaleidus,' then she sent me an image of my gobsmacked face.

That's…that's…Zelretch you bastard! I had been worried that he could spy on me through Agate, and come to stop me if I started doing things he disapproved of.

'He can't, but I am spying on you! You're really conceited, you know that?'

Shit, she could hear me even without me directing thoughts at her? This was bad!

'Aw, don't be mad! I've been doing everything you said, haven't I? And I can only do it when you let me share your senses.' She somehow transmitted the feeling of a pout and flew into my chest, rubbing herself against me.

And I've been letting her share my senses non-stop once I found out I could! Some of the things I'd been thinking this week...what if she decided to leave me because I wasn't like the other Kaleidostick wielders that went around saving people all the time?!

'Noooooo! I don't even know them! I won't leave you that easily! Even Master Zelretch never let me share his senses much. Don't cut me off, Kaleidus, please!'

'Really? You don't think I'm a bad guy?'

Agate responded in a rush of words. 'YOU don't think you're a bad guy, so why should I? Who cares what the other Kaleidosticks would think? I don't think Ruby and Sapphire are good role models if they don't even know what helping means! Master Zelretch always said it was important to help people in need, but never explained why. Thanks to you, now I understand that we can get lots of nice things by helping! But Ruby made Rin and Illya suffer so much to help others for no reason, that's not right!'

Agate must have caught my memories of them from my thoughts when I thought about the Kaleidostick wielders.

Phew. I was really scared for a bit there. Without Agate I would be doomed.

'Yes, you would! So don't be mean to me!'

Okay. She could keep sharing my senses then. If this let her learn faster and understand me, then it was fine. I could get past any embarrassment of letting someone else know everything I thought, just like I could get past any other useless emotion with my self-hypnosis techniques. I might not be a Magus, but hypnosis wasn't a magical technique. It would be nice, even, as I knew that human psychology made it difficult to keep secrets without ever telling a soul. This way, there would be someone I could trust with everything.

Agate did a twirl in the air and sent me a wave of happiness.

After that, I had Agate continuously replay the recording in my mind even as I carefully performed my own variation of the 4-7-8 breathing technique to enter a suggestible pre-sleep state, dropping it off until it was inaudible, then giving my sleeping self subliminal messages the whole night.

The Way that can be spoken is not the true Way. I am the captain of my fate, and the master of my soul. I am justice, I am righteous, I am the Truth and the Law, the Alpha and Omega, for I am the one who shall bear all sin and virtue.

I slept very well.

The Way that can be spoken is not the true Way. I am the captain of my fate, and the master of my soul. I am justice, I am righteous, I am the Truth and the Law, the Alpha and Omega, for I am the one who shall bear all sin and virtue.

I should trust Agate. Agate is helpful. I want to be with Agate forever.

The next morning I had my computer out and sat beside Amelia at the living room table. I pulled up the local news sources, New Wave website, and Brocton Bay PRT/Protectorate sites.

Panacea's disappearance hadn't made the headlines yet, and nothing was on the New Wave site. That didn't mean it wasn't already reported to the PRT/Protectorate though. They could be searching secretly to avoid demoralizing the public, or New Wave might be searching on their own and hoping she goes back of her own accord.

Since Carol had grounded her, the hospital wouldn't be alerted from her not volunteering anymore, but after a few days of not showing up in school, rumors would start flying for sure.

This was compounded by the fact that Agate was outside in the air and scouting for me. Both Pelham and Dallon branches of New Wave could be seen flying about around town. I don't know what they were expecting. Looking for one person just by flying around was not likely going to work. As far as I knew, they had no way to actually track her down. But then again, I supposed that Panacea might be a target for any villains that found her alone, and perhaps they could discourage that by being visible, or even catch the scene if a villain tries to grab her and a fight breaks out.

I was feeling very agitated as I sat, thinking about how my plans would be affected.

I glanced at Amelia, who just looked sullenly at my computer screen.

"New Wave is already looking for you outside," I announced.

She looked questioningly at me. "How do you know that?"

If I was going to work with her for the foreseeable future, I needed to give her some relevant information.

"I told you before that I had special knowledge despite not being a parahuman. This is another non-parahuman ability I can access. I am able to send out an invisible avatar of my will to scout other areas. Right now I am scouting in the air across the city and I've already seen New Wave members flying around. Unless this is part of a normal patrol schedule, they must be looking for you," I explained. She wasn't touching me and running lie detection, but I said something technically true anyway. Agate was something akin to an extremely advanced familiar.

In the Nasuverse magi used familiars primarily for the purpose of seeing through their eyes and communicating with other magi without showing up in person. It was a common spell, and right now that's exactly what Agate was doing for me, so it fit.

Speaking of the Nasuverse, I wonder what happened to Zelretch and why the Kaleidospace was destabilized? Kaleidospace was probably what Agate and Zelretch called the Blind Eternities. That's why Agate's phasing ability kills living things. The Blind Eternities between realities were hostile to life. Glimpses of it could make people insane, and its unholy energies would eventually destroy anything that exists if allowed to seep into the material world. I thought that once we figured out how to get past the barrier, I might want to go to Nasuverse and find Zelretch again. I really wanted to obtain magecraft and learn the Second Magic, and despite the lack of Magic Circuits in my soul I knew of some possible workarounds that I could pursue.

The biggest problem though, was that Planeswalker, and any other Planeswalkers that I might stumble onto. Truthfully I knew very little about the lore behind Planeswalkers, and I was still concerned that they could track our method of travel somehow. I don't think the Entities' barrier would be enough to keep them out when we broke in ourselves, but maybe it started adapting?

'I'm pretty sure we can't be tracked, Kaleidus, unless the Planeswalker learns the Second Magic and tracks our Waypoints. The Kaleidospace was only disturbed the first time because Master Zelretch tried to move his void-space together with him in order to observe the quantum states of your world before entering physically. It didn't work out well though. Later on that Planeswalker tried to enter our home world but Gaia and Alaya did something to stop him, so the whole area was destabilized,' Agate reassured.

"How is that possible? All powers need an active Corona Pollentia. This is well documented and studied. Why are you the exception?" Panacea's confused voice broke me out of my contemplations.

"How much do you know about the source of powers?" I asked back.

"I can see the brain with my powers, and every parahuman I've come across has an active Corona Pollentia and Gemma. It comes in different shapes and sizes for each person, but it's always there. No one knows why it gives powers, but the Gemma is the part that lets the parahuman control their power. There are a lot of people with Coronas that aren't active and who aren't parahumans, so it can be hard to distinguish capes from people with only the potential to trigger. But I've never seen someone with powers that didn't have a Corona. Before you, anyway," she gave an lengthy explanation as if providing a lecture.

I nodded. "That's all correct. But there's more to it than that. What I'm going to explain next is a secret few people know, and if anybody finds out that you know it will be extremely dangerous. This is no joke. There are certain people with access to unbelievably powerful Thinker abilities that are trying to keep it a secret who will come to kill us, so you must never write this down or say it to anyone before consulting with me. If you don't want to risk that kind of danger, then it's better for you not to know." I said with a grave expression.

She quirked an eyebrow. "I think I'll be in plenty of danger just by being around you. Tell me."

And so I began to explain.

I gathered myself for a moment before deciding on what and how to explain. I had to keep Cauldron secret for now lest Contessa's Path comes down on me, but I was pretty sure the truth behind the Entities themselves was safe.

"Alright, there is a reason that powers started to appear after Scion arrived. This is going to sound crazy, but I assure you it is true. I can't give you much in the way of proof right now, but just try to keep open mind, okay?" I said in warning.

Amelia scrunched her eyes in irritation. "Fine. Just get on with it."

"The Corona Pollentia isn't the source of powers. It's connection to the real source of powers, which are extremely powerful lifeforms, we can call them 'shards', 'passengers', or 'agents', that reside in other dimensions. They are not really sentient like humans are, but they are capable of thinking and communicating. Each shard is a piece that split off from a greater whole, something we can call an 'Entity'. Scion is just a projection made by one such Entity after it arrived and settled on an alternate dimension analog of Earth-Bet, like Earth Aleph except that one is devoid of life and was sealed off by Scion from outside access," I paused to let her digest this information.

"You're saying that our powers come from aliens? And Scion is one of them? The first and most dedicated superhero?" She asked incredulously.

"Yes. When capes first trigger, they get a vision which most forget afterwards due to the Entities' power. That vision is of the two Entities that came to Earth and a shard splitting off from one to form the connection and express a parahuman power. Certain capes like Miss Militia remember the vision because her power doesn't let her forget things. When a person has a second trigger event, the expression of the power changes as the connection between the shard and the host is adjusted based on what the second trigger involved. A shard can split and is capable of expressing in many different ways, giving rise to completely different powers. Your own shard for example, is the Shaper shard, which budded off of Marquis's. Under different circumstances, the Shaper might have expressed itself as shaping inorganic matter instead. What people commonly call second-generation capes possess shards that budded off another shard, and it doesn't necessary have to be family, just someone that has spent enough time for the shard to analyze and choose as a host for a bud," I continued.

She sat quietly thinking for a while before asking, "Okay…so why don't you have a connection to a shard?"

"I can't explain fully why I know so much. Not yet, anyways. The full answer simply wouldn't make any sense to you without being able to show you certain things. But the short version is that I once had access to a source of information about important things in the future and past of this world that I obtained from a different plane of existence entirely. Not the parallel dimensions like the Entities can access, somewhere that even they couldn't reach." I said. "That's the same reason I can access abilities without being a parahuman. Other than information about the future and past, I also obtained something that lets me use those abilities. Since I came here, the Entities have put up a barrier over reality that's preventing me from moving out of this plane of existence. As such, I won't be able to give you any proof for a while," I said.

This was a risk for me but I couldn't keep too many secrets. For one thing, Agate's abilities were extremely useful, and they would continue developing. I had to be able to use some of those abilities in front of her.

"Let's say I believe you. Why are you helping me, of all people? What makes me important in the future you saw? And I remember you saying there were some things you wanted my help with?" She asked.

This was going to be tough. But fortunately she seemed to trust me enough not to use her power on me to detect lies anymore.

"This has to do with why the Entities came to Earth in the first place. They aren't just giving out powers for free. The truth is, they are following a 'Cycle' whereby they find sentient species suitable to be hosts, giving out shards and have the hosts use them creatively to generate data, and eventually take them all back once their experiment is over with the data they collected so that they learn how to use their powers better," I said. "Of course, this process doesn't end well for the hosts…"

I trailed off ominously.

"Well? What happens to them?" She looked exasperated with me as she asked.

"When the experiment is over, the Entities destroy all trace of their presence. Every world in every parallel dimension that has the host species is destroyed, and all hosts are killed, leaving nothing behind," I declared.

Her eyes widened and her mouth ran agape.

"A-are you serious? They'll kill us all?"

I held my gaze even with her eyes and touched her hand. "Yes. The Entities will completely wipe out humanity on every parallel Earth they can access at the end of the cycle. What's more, this is not a regular cycle. One of the Entities that came died, and the other one, Zion, is grieving and has no purpose left. He is just doing hero work out of boredom because some homeless guy said it would make him feel good, but he could tire of it and strike at any time. It could be anywhere from 2 years to twenty years from now."

"This is insane! You want me to help fight against Scion? The Entities? How are we supposed to fight against that? No other parahuman can even touch Scion," she exclaimed.

"Look, things are bad, but in one future I saw, humanity did survive. I know how Scion was killed, he's not invincible, and you were a key part of that. Having said that, it was a catastrophic victory, with the destruction and evacuation of Earth-Bet and almost the entire population dead. My foreknowledge might change things for the better. Right now I'm stuck here with everyone else waiting for the end of days, and I don't plan to roll over and die. If you aren't up for joining the fight, we can escape together to another plane of existence once I figure out how to get past their barrier," I offered.

No really, I didn't actually want to fight Scion myself. If I could leave, then I'd get out ASAP and only come back if I was confident that I could survive.

"I need to think about this. I just want…I don't really know what I want at this point, but you're talking about saving the world from the apocalypse. That's the stuff that belongs in a book…not—"

"You mean like superheroes and villains belong in comics?" The irony of it. She didn't know she actually was a character in a book.

"That's different! We're just two people. What could we possibly do?" She protested.

"Panacea, you are the most powerful biokinetic on the planet. I know how the world can be saved. We are not helpless, and we're also not alone by the way. I told you there are immensely powerful people who know about these secrets about the Entities. Unfortunately their desperation has made them do some terrible things, and if I say any more they might come after us. I don't feel like getting enslaved or becoming an experiment, so just trust me when I say that we have a lot of firepower that could help for the final fight," I reassured.

"But why don't you go to the PRT with this? They could organize capes everywhere, maybe even get villains on board with a truce—"

I interrupted her again. "If this went public, Scion might just decide to get rid of us now. And it won't work because the Simurgh would stop us. Besides, those people I mentioned earlier? They're the secret masters of the PRT and Protectorate. There's a shadow organization out there pulling the strings and gathering forces for the fight, so there's no need to inform the PRT."

"Now you're saying there's a conspiracy too? This is ridiculous. You're just crazy!" She stood up as she shouted.

"Why do you think there are so many villains when the Triumvirate could probably take out every gang in Brocton Bay in a day? Why does the birdcage exist at all? There's no such thing as a death penalty for capes, only kill orders for major threats, but there are plenty of villain murderers like Hookwolf and Oni Lee who would have been put on death row if they were tried as a normal. It's almost like special rules and laws apply to cape criminals designed to keep as many of them alive as possible," I pressed on.

She went quiet again at that. Almost there, just a little more…

"What about the Endbringers? Everybody knows that the unwritten rules are there partly because of the Endbringer truce. Villains can and do contribute in Endbringer fights," she noted.

"You're right. The Endbringers are another threat. Who do you think came up with special rules for a privileged segment of the population that had to be unwritten? Three strikes rule? Obviously not by a democratic vote in Congress, why, that would be discrimination in the law and highly unconstitutional. The founders said there had to be due process, not three chances to commit crime before taking you seriously. And Endbringers don't explain the birdcage. They don't get let out to fight Endbringers," the words came out of my mouth smoothly as if I'd done this a hundred times. Which made sense, because I'd mapped out and practiced having this conversation a hundred times in the mirror already over the past few days when I wasn't busy plotting and spying. I'd have to do this again several times with other recruits in the future.

Amelia's eyes glazed over as if she was deep in thought. She stood there without moving for almost two minutes before blinking awake.

"I still need to think about this," she finally said, and left for her room, which had been my room until she took it over.

I had given a lot of information. So much, in fact, that there was a chance the Simurgh with its precognition could come after me. My solution to that was simple. I just needed to have goals which aligned with the Simurgh's. There was no problem if I introduced more chaos and parahuman conflict with my actions right? I didn't need a stable and unified world to fight Scion. That guy could only be killed by bullying and a specific set of powers/technologies. I just needed muddled waters to fish in, and hopefully get out before the end. I couldn't let the Simurgh and precognition paralyze me. The Simurgh let plenty of Cauldron plots go off without a hitch, and I was betting that it was because those plots net more chaos.

Plus if I had my way, Amelia would become a better challenge for Eidolon than the Endbringers. Maybe the Simurgh would even help me…well a man could dream, right?

'If this fake angel comes for you, I'll drag her into Kaleidospace! See how her precognition works for her there!' Agate boasted.

'Wait, you can do that?' That would be crazy powerful.

Her tone deflated. 'Eh…I can try to take her with me when I phase out, but it might be hard if she resists it…I can't really take things that have minds of their own if they don't want to come along.'

It's never that easy, is it?

In the afternoon, she came to me with a decision.

"I'm not sure I fully believe everything you said, but I have no choice but to stick with you for now even if you might be crazy. I'll consider helping if we get more concrete proof about this supposed alien threat," she declared.

Excellent.

"Good, the first thing you need to know is that you need to use your powers for more than just healing," I immediately replied.

"What? But that's one of my rules!" She crossed her arms and glared. "I'm not going to turn villain."

"I never said anything about turning villain. Your rules are completely arbitrary and don't help anyone. You need to come up with better ones based in legitimate moral and philosophical reflection. You've already broken the only-healing rule several times last night, and if you keep trying to follow them, it will only end in a tragedy when you're forced to abandon them," I warned.

Her expression softened and she pursed her lips. "Did you see that happen in the future?"

I hesitated to tell her. Her story was just so sad. I needed her functional after this. With a sigh, I answered, "Yes. In a possible future, the Slaughterhouse 9 would force you to choose between your rules and the life of one close to you. It ended…very, very badly. You must learn to accept that your powers can be used responsibly outside of just healing, and even your blanket ban on not doing brains is not healthy."

"I need my rules though. I can't control myself without them," she continued to protest.

"You do need rules, just not the arbitrary ones you had. Your shard will make you go crazy if you don't change. All shards influence their hosts to seek conflict and use their powers to fight. The Entities can't have useless hosts giving them no data. That's why there are hardly any capes using their powers for anything other than fighting. Leet's shard, for example, is insanely powerful and is actively sabotaging him because he doesn't make anything truly daring or risky so it punishes him by making it harder to build the same thing more than once," I clarified.

Her eyes widened and she dropped her arm. "You should have started with that!"

"It's not a secret, you know? There are studies on parahuman powers and seeking conflict. This is also why powers don't go to happy, well-adjusted people, instead requiring a trigger event. It's not a karmic reward for suffering or an attempt to save people. They just go to people the shards think will use the powers most and are more vulnerable to their influence."

She stood there unblinking, and pursed her lips.

"That sculpture you suddenly decided to make? It was probably your shard going crazy after you got grounded for several days and couldn't even heal. It needed an outlet badly, and look what happened." I stabbed the final knife in. "Do I need to go on?"

She replied with a weak and quivering voice. "No…"

Then she slowly sat down on the sofa staring off into space. "Then…how do I come up with better rules?"

"You can start with something that has more of an ethical foundation. Don't hurt innocent people if you can help it. Don't hurt people for fun even if they're evil. Don't make anything that will independently do any of the above. See where I'm going with this? These are actually actions with clear moral consequences. Not using your power on the brain and only healing is just arbitrary," I said. These were the rules I myself followed as well. Naturally it didn't make sense to hurt innocent people if there were more efficient ways to get what I needed, unless the benefit massively outweighed the cost of getting "good guys" after me. Hurting people for fun and no gain was just plain stupid.

Now she was looking at her palm like it held the world's secrets.

Was I going too fast? I couldn't help it. Even if I was pushing my luck, I needed her tonight. With New Wave out patrolling in the open, the Lung fight was almost certainly going to be butterflied in some way. I had to get in the thick of things or else my plans for Skitter would fall apart.

I needed every piece I could salvage now that New Wave's forces wouldn't be obtainable in the near-future.

"When you're done contemplating, come over here. Because you ran away from home, the future has changed and we have an important mission tonight."

She looked over at me in interest. "A mission? You mean we're going out as heroes in costume?"

"That's right. We're joining the fight against Lung to save an aspiring hero. We've got less than 10 hours to prepare, so we'd better start soon."

"You want to fight Lung? You are crazy! I knew it!"

"Just listen to the plan, it's not as crazy as it sounds. It'll be easy, in fact."

She just looked at me like I grew a second head.

With her help, it really would be much easier, depending on what we could develop between now and the fight. She was literally a game-changing piece, and this fight would give her the confidence to take on a new mantle.

By myself, I was just a king that could barely do anything. But now, I had a queen to use. With this one gambit, I would seize control of the entire centre and chain into a massive play. By the time anyone realized what was really going on, they'd be too busy fighting each other to stop me.

New Wave stopped searching once it got dark outside. Rumors were already on PHO speculating over what they were doing. Normally heroes didn't patrol much in the day time, and that was true for New Wave as well. None of the theories had gotten close to the truth, however.

At midnight, we moved out into the Docks area in our new costumes ready for action. Due to time constraints, I was simply outfitted in black motorcycle outfit, plus a full face helmet, minus the leather jacket. Instead, I had Kevlar inside and a loose black jacket full of pockets. On my back I had a backpack which contained inside a fire extinguisher and some assorted useful tools.

I replaced my flame thrower with sprayers filled with an extremely potent knockout drug Panacea had made, and carried a bunch of unprimed homemade jam tin grenades and a couple of stun batons on my utility belt. Finally I had my compound bow slung over my back right next to my backpack My quiver was attached to my left hips, filled with 20 custom tranquilizer arrows, made with Panacea's knockout drug again.

I had made some of these things before back on my Earth as fun experiments but recently I'd been making use of that knowledge of cheap DIY weapons to enhance my arsenal. The bow I simply bought from a local store. I had a hard time deciding to use a crossbow vs. a compound bow but in the end I decided that faster shooting speed was more important for a single combatant rather than a formation of troops with volley fire. The crossbow's higher base velocity would give me much better accuracy at longer ranges because I wasn't very skilled with a bow, but I couldn't afford to spend half a minute cranking to reload in the middle of a fight. I wish I had guns but alas I hadn't found where to buy them discreetly. Ordering via dark net and dead drops was possible but it would take weeks to do it, especially because this world didn't have cryptocurrency so the dark markets online weren't as developed.

Finally, to go with my costume persona I needed a hero name, which I had chosen to be Polychromic. Many-colored like a Kaleidoscope, or related to chromic acids.

Panacea had been renamed Araliac, a truncated Araliaceae, to which the Panax family of plants belonged. I wanted to name her Gaia but she refused. My bad naming sense strikes again. Sadly Panacea didn't have any better ideas. Ginseng and Ambrosia were suggested but the connections to Panacea were far too conspicuous in those, the former's latin name being Panax, and the latter curing the only thing that a panacea wouldn't.

She was outfitted in a similar manner to myself. We neither had the time to experiment on making exotic biological defenses nor did we want to draw too much attention to her powers, so her costume was kept simple. Our equipment, however, was substantially different. Hiding underneath her sleeves were specialized organisms that could shoot acid or incapacitating vapour made of the same stuff my arrows had. Her hands had open tipped gloves and she was carrying a long range pressure sprayer attached to a tank full of the powerful incapacitating agent mixed with short-lived microorganisms. These microorganisms would eat the incapacitating agent, and common clothing materials, then permeate through skin, before entering the bloodstream. A rapid bioconversion process then generates psilocybin and LSD precursors, before resulting in the microorganism's death.

With Agate on overwatch in the skies, we snuck around the Docks. Still, the area was quite large and spotting our targets in the darkness wasn't going to be easy. I wanted to find Skitter, but going to Lung wasn't a bad choice either. The Undersiders and Oni Lee would be less useful.

About an hour after midnight, Agate found something.

'Unusual swarms of bugs moving over rooftops detected,' Agate said in my mind. The image Agate sent me was almost impossible to see the bugs. It was far too dark, but Agate's sensor suite was better than my eyes. I instructed Agate to keep looking for Skitter in her costume, and try to triangulate her position from how the bugs were moving and the range of control.

It wasn't long before the entire swarm started to gather tightly in one specific spot, where Agate found the ABB group with Lung.

"It's starting! Three blocks south! Let's go!" I whispered to my new accomplice, and we moved towards the upcoming fight.

«

For tonight's operation, I had two primary objectives and three secondary objectives:

Primary: Save and isolate Skitter from all possible influences except me. That included the Undersiders, the PRT, and her father. This objective would only be fully achieved after a follow-up operation, so tonight I was setting up the conditions.

Primary: Unlock Amelia's confidence and potential.

Secondary: Track the Undersiders to their base.

Secondary: Have a good debut for the official hero team I was forming.

Secondary: Get into a meeting with the PRT and sow confusion and the seeds of doubt with my intel.

On the way there, I ordered Agate to try and scan Lung's fire with everything that could be tried. I knew that his pyrokinesis could generate flames from nowhere so it must have had a dimensional aspect. I had already been trying to scan Amelia's Corona Pollentia but that didn't get anywhere. Agate's sensors didn't pick up anything there, but I was hopeful that with more samples and more dimensional effects, we would eventually get something useful. I had no delusion that I could replicate the actual generation of fire, but whatever means the shard was using to transport it here might help Agate.

We arrived just in time to see Lung on fire, already grown to eight feet, and jumping towards Taylor on the rooftop.

"Get ready!" I told Araliac.

"Yeah, I got it," she replied nonchalantly. Both of our voices had been distorted by voice changers in our helmets so we sounded like Sith Lords.

We were still almost thirty meters away. There were groaning ABB members on the ground and a few were picking themselves up. We sprayed them and they went down easily. I grabbed a couple of pistols from them before moving forward again. Araliac copied my actions.

Then I heard a scream, and I looked up to see Lung grabbing his face with one hand. That must be Taylor's pepper spray. Now he was blind, good.

I immediately took aim and started shooting.

The sound of three consecutive gunshots cracked through the air. None of them hit. Damn.

Lung turned and threw a wave of fire in my direction while still hanging off the roof with one hand. Too bad for him, his fire wasn't like a magic fireball, it dispersed long before it got to me.

I kept moving forward and shooting as fast as I could. Fifteen metres. "Surrender, lizard scum! Your reign of terror ends tonight!" I shouted. I had to grab his attention and stop him from going over the roof.

Araliac split off from me and moved closer to the building wall as she started shooting as well.

Lung roared in rage as he waved several more blasts of fire at both of us, but we were still far enough to avoid them easily.

When I ran out of bullets, I put away the pistols and I took the cap off one of my tin grenades and lit the fuse with a blowtorch.

"Lung you fucking coward, come down and face me like a man!" I screamed at the top of my lungs while dropping the grenade right on the ground underneath me. No I was not trying to commit suicide.

"I'll kill you!" He roared before kicking off the wall and flying right at me. I, of course, had already dodged to the right and lunged for the ground like one of those nice slow-mo scenes you see in movies right after the hero blows up a car.

As soon as he landed and turned towards me again preparing to follow my steps, the well-timed grenade went off, which was accompanied by jet of acid from Araliac. He screamed as the shrapnel, force slammed into his legs point blank and his back was burned by acid. He stumbled before dropping down on one knee.

I immediately took out my bow even as I rolled away, got up, and nocked an arrow. Before I could fire, he swiped his arm and a wave of flame surged out in a circle around him. Simultaneously, a jet of white vapour consumed his head. That must have been Araliac shooting her long range sprayer.

Unfortunately before I could see the results of that, Lung's fire actually hit me. I reflexively let go of the bowstring and the arrow went way off course before I dropped my burning bow and started screaming myself as my sleeves caught fire.

I twisted my backpack free and tried to maneuver the fire extinguisher but my fingers were not cooperating.

I fumbled with it for a while before it slipped and fell, rolling away from me. Panicking I stuck my arms into my backpack and tried to smother the whole thing with my body. Bad idea. It backfired on me as my pack started burning too and I had to swing it loose from my body.

Just as I resorted to rolling around on the ground, cursing my arrogance in trying to fight Lung up close, somebody sprayed me with a fire extinguisher.

As the foam cleared I got a look at my savior. Araliac.

"It's not so nice when you're the one getting burned, is it, Mr. I-carry-a-flamethrower-for-self-defense?" She snarked.

"Th-thanks!" I gasped as she put down the fire extinguisher and bent down to touch my now exposed arm.

The pain left me quickly as she healed the burns. My arms were still a charred mess on the surface but in a few short moments I felt as good as new.

I heard the sound of running footsteps just as Araliac helped me to my feet. I looked over to see Skitter coming around the corner of the building, and slowing to a stop as she looked back and forth between us and something behind us.

I could feel Araliac tensing through her grip on my arm.

"Holy shit! You guys took out Lung!" She suddenly blurted out.

I thought she'd be more subdued and shy. Didn't she give the Undersiders the silent treatment in canon? We weren't known heroes to her. Honestly we didn't even look like heroes at all. I could've sworn she should be wary, scared, and stressed right now. Or did we intervene early enough that she was still high on adrenaline? I did remember her feeling some kind of sadistic glee in the beginning of the fight. Or…maybe my taunts made me seem heroic for putting myself in danger to get Lung away from her?

"Wasn't just us. Your bug attacks played a big role too. Did you see how hurt he was from one grenade? Your venom was taxing his regeneration big time," I gave her rightful credit for her contribution.

"Really? Now that you mention it, he did go down pretty fast for someone who took on Leviathan solo…" She tilted her head thoughtfully.

Lung's power was to escalate. As he fought, he grew stronger in response to greater threats, and eventually turned into a dragon. When Leviathan hit Kyushu, he grew so much that their battle destroyed the entire island. Entire teams of Protectorate heroes fought Lung before and were defeated. The only way to really take him down is by forcing him to calm down via sedatives and overwork his regeneration with overwhelming damage before he got too big.

"That's right. We couldn't have done it without you, fellow superhero. I'm Polychromic. This is my partner Araliac," I introduced.

"Hi," Araliac said, and nothing else.

Taylor stood there awkwardly in silence for a few seconds. "I…uh…don't have a name picked yet."

Agate was still hidden and watching. I knew the Undersiders were on top of the building just further ahead watching us. They never got involved because we had the upper hand in this fight the whole time. I knew that even if Coil was never said to have been actively helping them this night in canon, he couldn't have been stupid enough to risk his assets in a fight against Lung and Oni Lee without some kind of insurance. That meant that he likely had one timeline keeping them holed up at base (either theirs or Coil's own base) hiding, and the other confronting the ABB. He was probably using this as a test to see if the Undersiders were combat-ready for the upcoming distraction operation for his attempt on Dinah.

The Undersiders were both a secondary objective for me to track, as well as my insurance for the fight. I berated myself for getting hit by Lung, but I was just being perfectionist. In reality I had determined that my chances of dying were quite low. As long as I didn't get my brain destroyed Araliac could revive me or at least stabilize me. And so when things went south, the Undersiders watching would step in. They helped Skitter in canon, and they would have likely helped me if we started really losing against Lung. That would be true whether it was Coil's, Tattletale's, or Grue's idea. Coil because he usually prefers carrot and saving us would get him an in. Tattletale because she wanted more pieces to recruit and turn against Coil. Even with cold reading, since I had totally ignored her she couldn't possibly know my enmity for her, and even if she did she was probably still arrogant enough to think that her powers would let her manipulate me. Finally, Grue was looking for firepower to add to his team, and there were three possible targets. He'd be thinking that at least one of us might be amenable to recruitment. Even with my "heroic" taunts, all of us looked like villains and in my and Araliac's cases, we actually looked like urban terrorists and we were willing to use guns.

I really wondered what Tattletale was actually thinking right now. Three new capes in one night, and they just happen to attack Lung when he was supposed to be going after them, what a stunning turn of events! Because Coil learned about me, he might attack me in a throwaway timeline soon. I was assuming for now that Coil's precognition worked perfectly on me and Agate. My counter was to move faster than he could react, and account for branching actions in my grand plan. I wouldn't be waiting for his attempt on Dinah like an idiot.

In an alternate timeline he might have ordered the Undersiders to approach us already. Unless it was because we had been losing and they came to save us, I would have stopped them pre-emptively. I would have attacked immediately regardless of what they said, telling Skitter that I recognized them as a criminal gang. I had told Amelia beforehand that in case the Undersiders tried to approach us for any reason other than to save us in the middle of a losing battle, she was to unleash a mass airborne sedative by sending out her organisms under her sleeves out directly. I had informed her of all their capabilities, and the necessity of a rapid mass area attack because Regent could control our bodies and Grue's darkness would make it impossible to aim. Coil would be an idiot to choose that timeline. And if Amelia didn't get them all fast enough because Tattletale stayed behind or something, I told Agate that she was to move into the air then accelerate to top speed at 500 mph in the physical world and smash Tattletale's face in, before dragging her dead body into Kaleidospace to dispose of it quietly. I didn't want anybody to know I had such a powerful tool for assassination but I couldn't hold back against Coil, and if Tattletale went missing he could only assume that I had more agents in position.

As they weren't doing anything, I would move forward with the operation.

"Don't worry about it. Let's call this in first, and secure the criminals. We can talk more after," I suggested. Skitter nodded.

I took out a burner phone and dialed in to the PRT hotline while walking towards Lung's unconscious body. Araliac and Skitter followed after me.

"PRT emergency hotline." a female voice on the other end said.

"This is Polychromic, independent hero. My team and a fellow hero have Lung and a group of unpowered ABB members in custody," I reported. "We need pickup for transport."

"Polychromic? I'm sorry I don't recognize that. What is your team name? Are you registered with the PRT?"

"Not yet. We just formed our team and don't have a name yet. We'll register at our earliest convenience," I replied.

"Alright. You're in the Docks area right? Miss Militia is already nearby and will be there shortly. She can coordinate once she arrives."

"Thank you, we'll wait until she gets here."

I hung up and put the phone away. Araliac was squatting down checking Lung's status again. Skitter just stood beside me waiting.

Araliac stood up. "He should be out for a few hours at least. Our anaesthetic is working a lot less efficiently than usual, but the venoms really did a number on him. He's stable now."

"Good. Let's round them up then," I bent down and started dragging Lung's body to a nearby wall.

Araliac and Skitter stated to helped with the rest of the ABB. I quickly took the opportunity to swipe all the guns and any ammo they had on them.

"Hey, bug girl, you want some of these?" I handed a pistol towards her. Now to test Skitter's personality. I needed to know the extent to which I could manipulate and predict her actions before enacting the next operation.

She looked at it for a moment. "A gun? But that's lethal."

"So are black widows," I said, shrugging. Heh. Complaining about lethality when I knew she threatened to kill everyone in that bank and still considered herself a hero.

Her head moved up as if staring at me. "But…isn't it a crime to possess firearms?"

"Just hide it well then. Or get a license. When you need firepower and your bugs aren't working, a gun might save your life," I suggested. That's right. I knew she had an internal monologue on this very issue in canon. When Lung was about to reach her, she realized she had pepper spray and chalk dust. This was the perfect moment to get her to loosen her resistance to using lethal weapons.

"I…alright. I do need better weapons," she relented, taking the gun. I gave her another one and a couple of cartridges for good measure.

"Make sure you learn how to use it properly. Keep the safety on at all times if you aren't planning to shoot and never point it at someone you don't want to get hit," I warned her as I showed her how to operate the gun. I had to keep up the act as the professional good guy.