Chapter 26: Finally, a Totally Normal Chapter in Which Nothing of Any Significance Happens at All.
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Chapter 26: Finally, a Totally Normal Chapter in Which Nothing of Any Significance Happens at All.
January 7, 2010, Thursday. Brockton Bay, Dave's Apartment.
Dave woke up again, performed his morning routine, started water boiling for tea, poured orange juice, and set a bagel in the toaster.
Hmm. Maybe if I…? Dave thought, as he tried to do a handstand, failed, and settled for 'sitting' cross-legged upside down with his head on the ground.
Nope, still can't read it. Dave though as he tried looking at things upside down.
"Oh, you fixed it! I can read that one Daf!" Dave said happily.
"Oh, so you're right," Dave said as he returned right-side up. "It was those little black spots you get in your vision when blood rushes around in your body sometimes."
As Dave fished his bagel out of the toaster and spread cream cheese on it, he looked through the detective menu and saw an unusual option.
"Ooh, an upgrade option!" He found that it would let him take a dingus, and upgrade it to a Maxwell, while still having it be dingus, or Dingus. The upgrade claimed it also made the cat's name be a Schrodinger's name, where it was simultaneously 'dingus' and 'Dingus'.
Dave immediately used his first, and currently only, Detective credit to buy that. Then he whipped out his rainbow dingus, which began purring as he stroked it on the head, while he started to eat his breakfast.
Dave decided today would be the day, that he went out on his first solo patrol. While his Earth Bet common sense insisted that this was what heroes were supposed to do, he felt like it probably wasn't very effective at stopping crime if heroes only went out during the daytime. But who was he to go against the wisdom of the people of Earth Bet, it was their lives at stake after all, surely they had thought everything through to the best of their abilities, right?
He started off by finding an isolated area, where he changed from his civilian form into his Scyther form, he had to work on that False False Swipe after all; maybe he should just call it Swipe when he actually gets it though, False False Swipe is kind of a mouthful after all.
For now, he equipped a brand-new item, bought another brand-new item, and, having spent all of his current detective credits, sent off a message to Sarah saying he was going on a solo patrol.
Then, he took off, and began to look for trouble.
Vista
Well this is a shitty situation, she thought to herself. Facing down Hookwolf, alone in an alleyway, already wounded. And to make things worse, the wound was bad enough that it disturbed her concentration to the point that all of her changes to the local space had come undone. Not to mention, her comm was damaged in the initial ambush, so nobody even knew what was happening, and there was no hope of backup… at least on her side; Hooky might have already called his buddies.
Before either her or Hookwolf could decide on their next move, something fell directly between them and they both looked at it.
"Is… that a grenade?" She asked herself, only for it to explode and knock her back nearly a dozen feet, and doing the same to Hookwolf despite his mass of metal.
Then, a green bug man with knives for arms fell from the sky, directly onto Hookwolf, and exploded.
"Halt!" A male voice barked out. "You are under arrest for sexual assault of a minor, as well as regular assault of a minor!"
She blanked out. What? But, this was just a normal fight? What's going on?
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Hookwolf growled. "I haven't seen you before. You one of them Case somethings? The monsters? You think you can convince me to hand myself over on false charges like a fucking dumbass?"
"No," the bug-man thing that was probably a Case 53 hero said. "I believe you are not holding any bladed weapons, the only blades nearby are a part of your body due to your power, and a preteen girl's shirt is ripped open, with her chest spilling blood. Meaning, your body came into contact with a preteen girl's naked chest against her will. Your attack on her was legally considered assault from the beginning. Breasts are legally considered sexual characteristics, and touching them is already considered sexual harassment. Touching a sexual characteristic during an assault changes the assault to legally be considered sexual assault."
Huh, that actually kinda makes sense.
"Therefore," the bug-man continued, "you are a dirty pedophile like the human Master Victor."
"THIS WAS A WARRIOR'S FIGHT!" Hookwolf roared.
The bug-man looked doubtful, "You realize bragging about fighting a preteen ward cosplayer doesn't get you free drinks at a pub right?"
"SHE'S THE REAL DEAL YOU MORON!" Hookwolf roared again.
The bug-man shook his head with exasperation. "How stupid are you? Do you seriously think, that the Protectorate, would let a Shaker nine, go out on her own, and not even give her a single weapon? Not a knife, or pepper spray, or a taser, or a gun, in a city filled with kidnappers and pedophiles like you? You seriously expect anyone to be so incredibly moronic that they would believe the Protectorate could possibly be that absurdly stupid? Anyone that actually believed that would need to be studied for the new and interesting problems with their brain, to think an organization like the Protectorate could be that stupid and shortsighted."
Well, when you put it like that… Vista thought.
"I am a benevolent opponent mister Hookwolf, I will give you a chance to run away." The bug-man finished.
"Why would I do that?" Hookwolf asked ferociously.
"Well for starters, I already sent up a flare before we started talking, along with calling for backup from other Heroes."
"That just means I have to kill you and the brat before anyone gets here!" Hookwolf declared as he charged at the bug-man.
The bug-man just shot him with a pistol he was suddenly holding. Wait, how is he holding that anyway with his arms like that?
Then, as soon as the bullet hit Hookwolf, Hookwolf just froze, completely still.
"That'll only hold him for a few seconds, here lass, take this and run quickly so he doesn't have an extra target." The bug-man said as he tossed her a… color-shifting cat?
"It'll heal you and anyone else in proximity to it, but it takes a while, go, before I need to waste more of my freeze bullets." The bug-man said, before shooting Hookwolf with the pistol again, somehow timing the bullet to hit at the exact moment after Hookwolf started moving.
Vista had to fight herself between her desire to stay and fight and help and her training to not get in the way after being injured, but she managed to start limping to the edge of the alley, when Hookwolf unfroze again.
The bug-man shot Hookwolf again, then tossed the gun aside. Presumably it was out of bullets. Then he pulled out a slightly different pistol, this one a little bigger, and shot Hookwolf with it. Hookwolf instantly caught on fire, not that much seemed to change for the remaining few seconds he was frozen.
"Ahh! You think a little fire can hurt me? I FOUGHT LUNG!" Hookwolf screamed.
"It was worth a try; besides, I find it's quite hard to see and fight while on fire," the bug-man said calmly.
Wait, does that mean he has experience with fighting while on fire? This guy is so cool.
Then, the bug-man pulled out what Vista thought of when she thought of a gun in Brockton Bay. A two-handed automatic rifle of some sort, that shot a hail of bullets, all of which hit right Hookwolf right in the face.
"Tch, so his power gives him the reflexes to shield his eyes huh? I can't exactly bring out a sniper here to try and outspeed his power's reflexes. Maybe the nostrils?" The bug-man, who was at this point obviously a Tinker muttered.
Then, just as the fire around Hookwolf died down, the bug-man shot him again with the fire gun, before pulling out a handheld device of some sort, and after pressing a few buttons on it, the bug-man suddenly shrunk to maybe a fourth or a fifth of his original size.
I see, he made himself a smaller target. Also, clearly a Tinker. Wait, does what he said mean that he actually hit Hookwolf's eyes with multiple bullets from an automatic weapon, while Hookwolf was moving and on fire? So cool— Fuck! Vista's train of thought was cut off as a loose piece of brick got flung into her leg and cut open. It must have gone flying from Hookwolf's hooks flailing around.
She was near the edge of the alley, but she was a lot slower now with her leg injured. The cat purred suddenly, and while she didn't feel any more mobile, she felt a lot less at risk of dying from bleeding out to her chest wound. Fuck, what am I gonna say about this? She thought, as the battle went on behind her.
"STAY STILL!" Hookwolf screamed.
"I don't think I will," the bug-man said, acting like a kung-fu master, but actually real instead of being in a movie.
"I warn you," the bug-man said, "this weapon is extremely lethal, and I have yet to test it against a Brute, it may actually kill you if you don't back away now."
"Hah," Hookwolf sneered. "So you're just like the rest of the heroes, SOFT!" he screamed the last word as he attacked again.
The bug-man seemed to brandish his knife-arms, one if which seemed a little longer than before, though she had a hard time telling with all the fire and the bug-man being so much smaller than before, though he seemed faster.
The bug man's knife arm thing met Hookwolf's metal, and sheared off a huge chunk of it.
"Hmm, I wasn't expecting that." The bug-man admitted. "I thought it would just kill you after I hit any part of your body with it enough times, probably four or five times."
What kind of hilariously lethal weapon did this Tinker build? How come I've never heard of a Case 53 Tinker like this? The way he moves means he must be extremely experienced, and he must have been active long enough to build all this stuff.
For some reason, Hookwolf reacted strangely to something that shouldn't have actually harmed him.
"Oh?" the bug-man seemed to have noticed as well. "I see, while it isn't what I hoped for, it seems it is more than enough to kill you. Perhaps you have a weakspot? Yes, that would make sense. Some kind of internal organ? Not the brain, you didn't care about your face being hit, a core of some sort perhaps?"
Hookwolf attacked even harder and more viciously than before, with the Bug-Man dancing around the attacks using his small size to his advantage. He even seemed to almost double-jump a few times, perhaps his wings were fully functional instead of decorative like she had thought considering their size?
"I see I was right, so you have a core that I can hit, and you believe it will be damaged or destroyed by my Knife if it hits." The bug-man observed, still as calm as before.
"Just need to take out the threat and the witness," Hookwolf growled.
"Witness?" The bug-man turned, and saw her. "What? I told you to—" he got cut off as a blade went straight through his entire chest, before he sort-of glitched out and his body reappeared slightly outside of where the blade had pierced him.
"Leave!" The bug-man shouted at her.
I'm going as fast as I can. She thought as she continued limping. These fucking Brockton alleys were obviously designed by city planners high off their minds. Who needs an alley this long? Wait, I'm a fucking moron. I can make it shorter with my power. Is this what blood loss does to my ability to think?
As she began spreading her power through the alley to make it shorter, she saw the bug-man take another chunk off of Hookwolf's side.
Hookwolf, just dissolved from his wolf form and turned into a sea of hooks. Since when can he do that? She thought incredulously.
The bug-man just began methodically taking swings at various chunks of the massive wave of hooks that took up an entire chunk of the alley.
Then the bug-man just set the entire thing on fire again with another bullet from the fire gun, then fired it straight up where the bullet turned into a flare after it broke above the buildings.
"Shit," Hookwolf said after seeing the flare go up, before grabbing one of the sheared off parts of his body and hurling it straight at her.
"Shit," she said, as she desperately warped space to make the massive object miss her. She could tell she wasn't going to make it in time though.
"Shit," the bug-man said while giving her a big smile, as the mass of blades that were meant for her hit him, and he fell to the ground in a massive pool of blood and returned to his original size.
"WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?" Hookwolf screamed as soon as the bug-man's body dropped. He flailed around a bit and began shrinking.
"I got him, I know I did. I think I got the girl too." Hookwolf muttered, even though she should be rather obvious and directly within line of sight to the mass of hooks that was slowly turning into a man.
"Shit, how the fuck did he blind me?" Hookwolf said, as he slowly dragged himself out of the alley.
Vista couldn't believe her luck. Hookwolf was somehow blinded? Wait, that smile. She remembered the bug-man's final smile as he repeated her and Hookwolf's swear. He knew it would happen, he somehow blinded Hookwolf before he died. She thought as she finally got out of the alley, only to encounter Lady Photon.
Lady Photon took one look at her and the rainbow cat in her arms and said "I see you encountered Trouble." As she scooped Vista up on to her forcefield and began flying away.
"Wait, there was a hero back there, a Case 53 Tinker, he saved my life from Hookwolf, we should retrieve his body." She weakly protested as the forcefield wrapped her wounds.
"Yes, that would have been Trouble, did he give you the cat?" Lady Photon asked as the city sped by them even faster. "And no, it is far more important we get you to where you can safely be healed. I am taking you straight to my home, Panacea is already there and there are some of Trouble's Healing Stations as well."
Oh I see, the Case 53's Cape name was Trouble. He sure gave Hookwolf a lot of that. Which was probably the idea. Wait, shit, did she just say Trouble's Healing Stations? Did I just get a fucking HEALING Tinker killed saving my ass?
Doing her best not to dwell on that, she answered Lady Photon. "He said the cat would slowly heal me, and everyone around me, but he emphasized it was slow." She said as she pet the rainbow cat again and it purred.
"I see, that was the cat he offered Miss Militia as a token of love if I recall."
Fuck, as if I couldn't feel any worse. Did I just get Miss Militia's boyfriend killed too? Although, I wonder if that means… Vista did her best not to think about her mentor—and closest thing to a real mother figure she had—doing the horizontal tango with the bug-man from before.
"She rejected of course after she found out how young he was," Lady Photon said, as if hearing that the person she got killed was young and promising was that much better.
Lady Photon landed in front of the Pelham house just then. Shit, I must have lost a lot of blood, I'm almost certain that Lady Photon isn't that fast. Just how much did I miss?
Lady Photon protectively placed her arms over Vista's chest and helped her hold the rainbow cat as they went in the door.
"So, what happ—" Vicky cut off when she saw her. "Little V!" Vista shrunk into Lady Photon's arms further at her friend seeing her like this, weak and vulnerable, the opposite of how she wanted to be seen.
Flashbang and Manpower looked over and saw her with Lady Photon's arms around her chest. Their eyes darted to the blood covering her and the torn shreds of her costume's shirt.
"We'll leave, you handle this." Manpower said immediately after tightening his fist, before he and Flashbang immediately left, they brought along Eric with them out of the room.
They exited just as a Vicky-rocket reached Vista and grappled her into a tight hug, while the rainbow cat smoothly slid out from between them onto Vista's shoulder.
"Little V!" Vicky repeated with her head on top of Vista's.
Amy, in her Panacea robes quickly dragged Vista out from the crushing hug. "She has a chest wound Vicky, don't crush her so I can start working on it. What…" Amy trailed off.
Lady Photon spoke upon seeing Amy's confusion. "From what I gather, Vista was fighting Hookwolf and Trouble intervened. Trouble gave her the cat and claimed it would slowly heal her and everyone in an area around it over time, but with an emphasis on slow."
"So, you met Trouble," Vicky began, maybe trying to distract her, from what though? Oh right, what Trouble said when he first landed, I guess it does look like that from the outside. So that's why Manpower and Flashbang left, and brought Eric with them. "What did you think? I knew he was strong and getting stronger, but I didn't realize he could handle Hookwolf yet. Pretty impressive for such a fresh trigger right?" Vicky said as Amy quieted in concentration.
Fuck! I thought he was an experienced Cape from another city. Did I seriously get him killed saving my ass? It sounds like he was a fresh trigger with a ton of potential, able to HEAL, friends with the people I care about and look up to, and based on what Vicky said, a Tinker only barely into their craft with a ton of future strength that I got cut off. Fuck! Vista began to wallow in misery at Vicky's words as the cat continued purring and her wounds began to close thanks to Amy's healing.
"Yes, he was… the coolest Hero I've ever seen," Vista admitted, not seeing the weird look on Amy, Vicky and Lady Photon's faces.
"I'm… I'm sorry Big V," Vista began. "I… your friend got killed saving me because I didn't run away from the fight fast enough. I was light-headed but wanted to help, but couldn't think straight enough to actually do anything to help and just ended up being a distraction that let Hookwolf get him." She admitted, crying a little. She hated crying, it made her feel weak and childish.
"Oh, well—"
There was a knock on the door. "Is Vista decent?" Manpower's voice came through.
There was a look of realization on Vicky's face, and she checked the clock for some reason. She quickly threw a towel that was already nearby, though Vista wasn't sure why they had towels in the living room, around Vista's chest, before calling, "she is now!"
The door opened, and in walked… the bug-man? Or Trouble Vista supposed.
He was just as cool as before as he walked in and said, "Oh, I see you are being healed. You can continue stroking my dingus even after you are done if you want."
Wait a second… What?
Author's Note: If you aren't familiar with the Yogscast Guarantee ™, well, if you read the last Author's Note then this chapter, you should have a pretty good idea of what it entails. So, how did the fight scene go? It was my first ever real action scene, but I hope it was at least a little better than the first 'fight scene' where Dave and Neil bowled over five drugged up thugs. There were quite a few things going on in the fight that Vista didn't necessarily understand, though I hope most of you understood what was happening. If not, don't worry, there will be an After-Action-Report type thing next chapter, made easier by something from right after the stuff with Faultline's Crew. I will award a Terrorist Point to the first person to correctly guess what I am referring to.
Also, we got to see Dave's 'cool side' in this chapter, so that's pretty neat. I liked showing off the extent of his Combat Thinker power from the Old Man, as well as its limitations. He doesn't actually have enough firepower yet to seriously harm any high-level brutes though, so he wasn't able to actually beat Hookwolf in a straight fight yet.
January 7, 2010, Thursday. Brockton Bay, Dave's Apartment.
Dave woke up again, performed his morning routine, started water boiling for tea, poured orange juice, and set a bagel in the toaster.
| Hi Dave! |
| There isn't a ton to say this time, you had some good growth in your soul yesterday. You had a couple questions about soul growth, and I'll tell you, you're on the right track, but aren't quite there yet, there is more to it than what you've come up with. The process of asking and trying to figure out this kind of thing is actually also great for the growth of your soul… so, uh, I'm not gonna tell you what you're missing. That would just lessen your growth. As much as I hate that trope about people not telling other people important things, there's not really any significant downsides to not telling you everything immediately when you have already figured out as much as you have. There's no harm in confirming things for you, so I can make myself feel better about being less like that stupid trope by telling you what you have correct though. Ahem. Your 'False False Swipe' is coming along nicely still, though it's not quite done yet. I saw you've noticed the new items in your traitor menu and have been stocking them up, so that's good. Anyways, new role! Time to roll for your role! Not really, I already did that, I spent the entire time you were sleeping installing the new role. That's basically why you still sleep instead of being a 'Noctis Cape' as the local humans call them. Anyways… again… your new role is… Detective! Yay. You do of course get a DNA scanner, and you do get a new one every round (so, every ten minutes, like usual), and they stack in your inventory like other things. They work just like in the game, so you know what to do there. You get the normal Detective power of checking bodies, and you will find out their name, their closest game Role equivalent if applicable and their 'alignment' if not, their occupation, what killed them, exactly how long ago they died down to the second, and who they saw last. You also get the Detective buy menu! Which is the buy menu with nonlethal options! Making your whole False False Swipe thing less important anyway! Yay! After I put in all that damn work in the background! Oh yes. You can also toggle the big blue box with a white D in it above your head, choosing to let either everyone see it or nobody see it. |
Hmm. Maybe if I…? Dave thought, as he tried to do a handstand, failed, and settled for 'sitting' cross-legged upside down with his head on the ground.
Nope, still can't read it. Dave though as he tried looking at things upside down.
"Oh, you fixed it! I can read that one Daf!" Dave said happily.
| THERE'S NOTHING FUCKING IN THAT ONE!! |
"Oh, so you're right," Dave said as he returned right-side up. "It was those little black spots you get in your vision when blood rushes around in your body sometimes."
As Dave fished his bagel out of the toaster and spread cream cheese on it, he looked through the detective menu and saw an unusual option.
"Ooh, an upgrade option!" He found that it would let him take a dingus, and upgrade it to a Maxwell, while still having it be dingus, or Dingus. The upgrade claimed it also made the cat's name be a Schrodinger's name, where it was simultaneously 'dingus' and 'Dingus'.
Dave immediately used his first, and currently only, Detective credit to buy that. Then he whipped out his rainbow dingus, which began purring as he stroked it on the head, while he started to eat his breakfast.
Dave decided today would be the day, that he went out on his first solo patrol. While his Earth Bet common sense insisted that this was what heroes were supposed to do, he felt like it probably wasn't very effective at stopping crime if heroes only went out during the daytime. But who was he to go against the wisdom of the people of Earth Bet, it was their lives at stake after all, surely they had thought everything through to the best of their abilities, right?
He started off by finding an isolated area, where he changed from his civilian form into his Scyther form, he had to work on that False False Swipe after all; maybe he should just call it Swipe when he actually gets it though, False False Swipe is kind of a mouthful after all.
For now, he equipped a brand-new item, bought another brand-new item, and, having spent all of his current detective credits, sent off a message to Sarah saying he was going on a solo patrol.
Then, he took off, and began to look for trouble.
Vista
Well this is a shitty situation, she thought to herself. Facing down Hookwolf, alone in an alleyway, already wounded. And to make things worse, the wound was bad enough that it disturbed her concentration to the point that all of her changes to the local space had come undone. Not to mention, her comm was damaged in the initial ambush, so nobody even knew what was happening, and there was no hope of backup… at least on her side; Hooky might have already called his buddies.
Before either her or Hookwolf could decide on their next move, something fell directly between them and they both looked at it.
"Is… that a grenade?" She asked herself, only for it to explode and knock her back nearly a dozen feet, and doing the same to Hookwolf despite his mass of metal.
Then, a green bug man with knives for arms fell from the sky, directly onto Hookwolf, and exploded.
"Halt!" A male voice barked out. "You are under arrest for sexual assault of a minor, as well as regular assault of a minor!"
She blanked out. What? But, this was just a normal fight? What's going on?
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Hookwolf growled. "I haven't seen you before. You one of them Case somethings? The monsters? You think you can convince me to hand myself over on false charges like a fucking dumbass?"
"No," the bug-man thing that was probably a Case 53 hero said. "I believe you are not holding any bladed weapons, the only blades nearby are a part of your body due to your power, and a preteen girl's shirt is ripped open, with her chest spilling blood. Meaning, your body came into contact with a preteen girl's naked chest against her will. Your attack on her was legally considered assault from the beginning. Breasts are legally considered sexual characteristics, and touching them is already considered sexual harassment. Touching a sexual characteristic during an assault changes the assault to legally be considered sexual assault."
Huh, that actually kinda makes sense.
"Therefore," the bug-man continued, "you are a dirty pedophile like the human Master Victor."
"THIS WAS A WARRIOR'S FIGHT!" Hookwolf roared.
The bug-man looked doubtful, "You realize bragging about fighting a preteen ward cosplayer doesn't get you free drinks at a pub right?"
"SHE'S THE REAL DEAL YOU MORON!" Hookwolf roared again.
The bug-man shook his head with exasperation. "How stupid are you? Do you seriously think, that the Protectorate, would let a Shaker nine, go out on her own, and not even give her a single weapon? Not a knife, or pepper spray, or a taser, or a gun, in a city filled with kidnappers and pedophiles like you? You seriously expect anyone to be so incredibly moronic that they would believe the Protectorate could possibly be that absurdly stupid? Anyone that actually believed that would need to be studied for the new and interesting problems with their brain, to think an organization like the Protectorate could be that stupid and shortsighted."
Well, when you put it like that… Vista thought.
"I am a benevolent opponent mister Hookwolf, I will give you a chance to run away." The bug-man finished.
"Why would I do that?" Hookwolf asked ferociously.
"Well for starters, I already sent up a flare before we started talking, along with calling for backup from other Heroes."
"That just means I have to kill you and the brat before anyone gets here!" Hookwolf declared as he charged at the bug-man.
The bug-man just shot him with a pistol he was suddenly holding. Wait, how is he holding that anyway with his arms like that?
Then, as soon as the bullet hit Hookwolf, Hookwolf just froze, completely still.
"That'll only hold him for a few seconds, here lass, take this and run quickly so he doesn't have an extra target." The bug-man said as he tossed her a… color-shifting cat?
"It'll heal you and anyone else in proximity to it, but it takes a while, go, before I need to waste more of my freeze bullets." The bug-man said, before shooting Hookwolf with the pistol again, somehow timing the bullet to hit at the exact moment after Hookwolf started moving.
Vista had to fight herself between her desire to stay and fight and help and her training to not get in the way after being injured, but she managed to start limping to the edge of the alley, when Hookwolf unfroze again.
The bug-man shot Hookwolf again, then tossed the gun aside. Presumably it was out of bullets. Then he pulled out a slightly different pistol, this one a little bigger, and shot Hookwolf with it. Hookwolf instantly caught on fire, not that much seemed to change for the remaining few seconds he was frozen.
"Ahh! You think a little fire can hurt me? I FOUGHT LUNG!" Hookwolf screamed.
"It was worth a try; besides, I find it's quite hard to see and fight while on fire," the bug-man said calmly.
Wait, does that mean he has experience with fighting while on fire? This guy is so cool.
Then, the bug-man pulled out what Vista thought of when she thought of a gun in Brockton Bay. A two-handed automatic rifle of some sort, that shot a hail of bullets, all of which hit right Hookwolf right in the face.
"Tch, so his power gives him the reflexes to shield his eyes huh? I can't exactly bring out a sniper here to try and outspeed his power's reflexes. Maybe the nostrils?" The bug-man, who was at this point obviously a Tinker muttered.
Then, just as the fire around Hookwolf died down, the bug-man shot him again with the fire gun, before pulling out a handheld device of some sort, and after pressing a few buttons on it, the bug-man suddenly shrunk to maybe a fourth or a fifth of his original size.
I see, he made himself a smaller target. Also, clearly a Tinker. Wait, does what he said mean that he actually hit Hookwolf's eyes with multiple bullets from an automatic weapon, while Hookwolf was moving and on fire? So cool— Fuck! Vista's train of thought was cut off as a loose piece of brick got flung into her leg and cut open. It must have gone flying from Hookwolf's hooks flailing around.
She was near the edge of the alley, but she was a lot slower now with her leg injured. The cat purred suddenly, and while she didn't feel any more mobile, she felt a lot less at risk of dying from bleeding out to her chest wound. Fuck, what am I gonna say about this? She thought, as the battle went on behind her.
"STAY STILL!" Hookwolf screamed.
"I don't think I will," the bug-man said, acting like a kung-fu master, but actually real instead of being in a movie.
"I warn you," the bug-man said, "this weapon is extremely lethal, and I have yet to test it against a Brute, it may actually kill you if you don't back away now."
"Hah," Hookwolf sneered. "So you're just like the rest of the heroes, SOFT!" he screamed the last word as he attacked again.
The bug-man seemed to brandish his knife-arms, one if which seemed a little longer than before, though she had a hard time telling with all the fire and the bug-man being so much smaller than before, though he seemed faster.
The bug man's knife arm thing met Hookwolf's metal, and sheared off a huge chunk of it.
"Hmm, I wasn't expecting that." The bug-man admitted. "I thought it would just kill you after I hit any part of your body with it enough times, probably four or five times."
What kind of hilariously lethal weapon did this Tinker build? How come I've never heard of a Case 53 Tinker like this? The way he moves means he must be extremely experienced, and he must have been active long enough to build all this stuff.
For some reason, Hookwolf reacted strangely to something that shouldn't have actually harmed him.
"Oh?" the bug-man seemed to have noticed as well. "I see, while it isn't what I hoped for, it seems it is more than enough to kill you. Perhaps you have a weakspot? Yes, that would make sense. Some kind of internal organ? Not the brain, you didn't care about your face being hit, a core of some sort perhaps?"
Hookwolf attacked even harder and more viciously than before, with the Bug-Man dancing around the attacks using his small size to his advantage. He even seemed to almost double-jump a few times, perhaps his wings were fully functional instead of decorative like she had thought considering their size?
"I see I was right, so you have a core that I can hit, and you believe it will be damaged or destroyed by my Knife if it hits." The bug-man observed, still as calm as before.
"Just need to take out the threat and the witness," Hookwolf growled.
"Witness?" The bug-man turned, and saw her. "What? I told you to—" he got cut off as a blade went straight through his entire chest, before he sort-of glitched out and his body reappeared slightly outside of where the blade had pierced him.
"Leave!" The bug-man shouted at her.
I'm going as fast as I can. She thought as she continued limping. These fucking Brockton alleys were obviously designed by city planners high off their minds. Who needs an alley this long? Wait, I'm a fucking moron. I can make it shorter with my power. Is this what blood loss does to my ability to think?
As she began spreading her power through the alley to make it shorter, she saw the bug-man take another chunk off of Hookwolf's side.
Hookwolf, just dissolved from his wolf form and turned into a sea of hooks. Since when can he do that? She thought incredulously.
The bug-man just began methodically taking swings at various chunks of the massive wave of hooks that took up an entire chunk of the alley.
Then the bug-man just set the entire thing on fire again with another bullet from the fire gun, then fired it straight up where the bullet turned into a flare after it broke above the buildings.
"Shit," Hookwolf said after seeing the flare go up, before grabbing one of the sheared off parts of his body and hurling it straight at her.
"Shit," she said, as she desperately warped space to make the massive object miss her. She could tell she wasn't going to make it in time though.
"Shit," the bug-man said while giving her a big smile, as the mass of blades that were meant for her hit him, and he fell to the ground in a massive pool of blood and returned to his original size.
"WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?" Hookwolf screamed as soon as the bug-man's body dropped. He flailed around a bit and began shrinking.
"I got him, I know I did. I think I got the girl too." Hookwolf muttered, even though she should be rather obvious and directly within line of sight to the mass of hooks that was slowly turning into a man.
"Shit, how the fuck did he blind me?" Hookwolf said, as he slowly dragged himself out of the alley.
Vista couldn't believe her luck. Hookwolf was somehow blinded? Wait, that smile. She remembered the bug-man's final smile as he repeated her and Hookwolf's swear. He knew it would happen, he somehow blinded Hookwolf before he died. She thought as she finally got out of the alley, only to encounter Lady Photon.
Lady Photon took one look at her and the rainbow cat in her arms and said "I see you encountered Trouble." As she scooped Vista up on to her forcefield and began flying away.
"Wait, there was a hero back there, a Case 53 Tinker, he saved my life from Hookwolf, we should retrieve his body." She weakly protested as the forcefield wrapped her wounds.
"Yes, that would have been Trouble, did he give you the cat?" Lady Photon asked as the city sped by them even faster. "And no, it is far more important we get you to where you can safely be healed. I am taking you straight to my home, Panacea is already there and there are some of Trouble's Healing Stations as well."
Oh I see, the Case 53's Cape name was Trouble. He sure gave Hookwolf a lot of that. Which was probably the idea. Wait, shit, did she just say Trouble's Healing Stations? Did I just get a fucking HEALING Tinker killed saving my ass?
Doing her best not to dwell on that, she answered Lady Photon. "He said the cat would slowly heal me, and everyone around me, but he emphasized it was slow." She said as she pet the rainbow cat again and it purred.
"I see, that was the cat he offered Miss Militia as a token of love if I recall."
Fuck, as if I couldn't feel any worse. Did I just get Miss Militia's boyfriend killed too? Although, I wonder if that means… Vista did her best not to think about her mentor—and closest thing to a real mother figure she had—doing the horizontal tango with the bug-man from before.
"She rejected of course after she found out how young he was," Lady Photon said, as if hearing that the person she got killed was young and promising was that much better.
Lady Photon landed in front of the Pelham house just then. Shit, I must have lost a lot of blood, I'm almost certain that Lady Photon isn't that fast. Just how much did I miss?
Lady Photon protectively placed her arms over Vista's chest and helped her hold the rainbow cat as they went in the door.
"So, what happ—" Vicky cut off when she saw her. "Little V!" Vista shrunk into Lady Photon's arms further at her friend seeing her like this, weak and vulnerable, the opposite of how she wanted to be seen.
Flashbang and Manpower looked over and saw her with Lady Photon's arms around her chest. Their eyes darted to the blood covering her and the torn shreds of her costume's shirt.
"We'll leave, you handle this." Manpower said immediately after tightening his fist, before he and Flashbang immediately left, they brought along Eric with them out of the room.
They exited just as a Vicky-rocket reached Vista and grappled her into a tight hug, while the rainbow cat smoothly slid out from between them onto Vista's shoulder.
"Little V!" Vicky repeated with her head on top of Vista's.
Amy, in her Panacea robes quickly dragged Vista out from the crushing hug. "She has a chest wound Vicky, don't crush her so I can start working on it. What…" Amy trailed off.
Lady Photon spoke upon seeing Amy's confusion. "From what I gather, Vista was fighting Hookwolf and Trouble intervened. Trouble gave her the cat and claimed it would slowly heal her and everyone in an area around it over time, but with an emphasis on slow."
"So, you met Trouble," Vicky began, maybe trying to distract her, from what though? Oh right, what Trouble said when he first landed, I guess it does look like that from the outside. So that's why Manpower and Flashbang left, and brought Eric with them. "What did you think? I knew he was strong and getting stronger, but I didn't realize he could handle Hookwolf yet. Pretty impressive for such a fresh trigger right?" Vicky said as Amy quieted in concentration.
Fuck! I thought he was an experienced Cape from another city. Did I seriously get him killed saving my ass? It sounds like he was a fresh trigger with a ton of potential, able to HEAL, friends with the people I care about and look up to, and based on what Vicky said, a Tinker only barely into their craft with a ton of future strength that I got cut off. Fuck! Vista began to wallow in misery at Vicky's words as the cat continued purring and her wounds began to close thanks to Amy's healing.
"Yes, he was… the coolest Hero I've ever seen," Vista admitted, not seeing the weird look on Amy, Vicky and Lady Photon's faces.
"I'm… I'm sorry Big V," Vista began. "I… your friend got killed saving me because I didn't run away from the fight fast enough. I was light-headed but wanted to help, but couldn't think straight enough to actually do anything to help and just ended up being a distraction that let Hookwolf get him." She admitted, crying a little. She hated crying, it made her feel weak and childish.
"Oh, well—"
There was a knock on the door. "Is Vista decent?" Manpower's voice came through.
There was a look of realization on Vicky's face, and she checked the clock for some reason. She quickly threw a towel that was already nearby, though Vista wasn't sure why they had towels in the living room, around Vista's chest, before calling, "she is now!"
The door opened, and in walked… the bug-man? Or Trouble Vista supposed.
He was just as cool as before as he walked in and said, "Oh, I see you are being healed. You can continue stroking my dingus even after you are done if you want."
Wait a second… What?
Author's Note: If you aren't familiar with the Yogscast Guarantee ™, well, if you read the last Author's Note then this chapter, you should have a pretty good idea of what it entails. So, how did the fight scene go? It was my first ever real action scene, but I hope it was at least a little better than the first 'fight scene' where Dave and Neil bowled over five drugged up thugs. There were quite a few things going on in the fight that Vista didn't necessarily understand, though I hope most of you understood what was happening. If not, don't worry, there will be an After-Action-Report type thing next chapter, made easier by something from right after the stuff with Faultline's Crew. I will award a Terrorist Point to the first person to correctly guess what I am referring to.
Also, we got to see Dave's 'cool side' in this chapter, so that's pretty neat. I liked showing off the extent of his Combat Thinker power from the Old Man, as well as its limitations. He doesn't actually have enough firepower yet to seriously harm any high-level brutes though, so he wasn't able to actually beat Hookwolf in a straight fight yet.