A/N: Ace makes a brief appearance here, but it's 100% guarantee that he will be the main focus of chapter three! Sorry for the late post, everyone! But I usually don't update until I reach a set number of reviews and feedback. Thank you for your patience, nonetheless! I appreciate your time and consideration! Please, enjoy.

Chapter 2: Home

The first time I'd looked at a newspaper, I tore it to pieces before burning what was left with my eyes. I'd been in a diner at the time and was immediately asked to leave. I hadn't minded, the paper upset me more than some waitresses' paranoia.

There had been this photo of me from a recent battle, maybe a month or two prior to my alleged 'disappearance'. I looked proud, hands on my hips, cocky grin wide and expressing despite Blossom nagging me from the sidelines. And the title of some ignorant journalist's piece of assumed fiction, in bold on the third page, read 'Missing Puff Spotted In New Valla'. And the distressing part, dismissing the shitty photograph, was the nine paragraphs of conspiracies and accusations this guy had written, ending with 'cont. on page 28'.

And on that page, six more.

So I ripped it up and cooked it, and left the diner hungry.

I never so much as glanced at another news article after that. I ignored the stories on the television, avoided the numerous stares and whispers of confusion when I walked into a public place undisguised. I left Townsville behind, I dropped the past entirely despite how often it was shoved right back into my face. I felt successful after my first year on the road. I felt empowered and independent, as if I were finally free of the threat that was the past. I had this boundless feeling; nothing could stop me.

I ended up in a city on the West coast, having traveled from one end of the country to the next aimlessly. People would look and point when I flew, take pictures and wave and throw things. I decided to walk, soon after someone had the nerve to shoot at me with an actual gun. The bastard.

I think they called it San Mollie. Pretty sure. There'd been this bank robbery nearby, so I intervened.

A man and his partner had taken hostages, held them as bullet coverage while attempting negotiations. The local heroes were preoccupied by a bomb threat downtown. I swept in, nearly beat both men to death and secured the area. Local law enforcement was furious. I was reprimanded and threatened by the SMPD before being asked to depart from their city. I doubt they could sue me. I had a grand and some clothes. I was frustrated.

I set up shoppe on the East Coast, in New Harlan, an indescribably large and grungy city. There were nice regions, such as Greens and Valley Hills, but I couldn't afford much in a city that overpriced on housing. I lived simple and rented out a single room apartment, paying second-hand rent to avoid identification and loans. I was working part-time at a local theater, frequenting this coffee shoppe a block down. I kicked ass consistently; I liked doing it, and I had experience in the field of bloody knuckles. People liked me in Harlan. They appreciated the 'female vigilante' sweeping their streets.

I assume no one really recognized me. Blossom was always the paparazzi's concern. Bubbles was second, I wasn't as feminine nor as alluring. I had too many muscles and not enough hair. I was the toughest fighter. So I stuck to what I knew.

It was my third year as a supposed 'unrecognized hero' that I'd heard anything of Townsville. That I'd heard about my sisters.

"Did you hear?" This woman at my usual coffee shoppe smiles, stirring creme into her drink and looking to the man beside her with a crooked smile.

I just wanted my tea and then to leave, but my instinctive curiosity had yet to fail me.

"Hear what? There's a lot going on lately." I hadn't known what he'd meant, considering the election and the plane crash in Hallsville.

"The Powerpuff girls are in town, negotiating something with the local heroes." Those words strike me. I feel nauseous, suddenly. I feel physically incapable and ill, my hands shake and I freeze.

"Speed and The Arrow?" I recall those two, seeing them patrolling in daylight. They were the first of few to appreciate my help in cutting back crime. Most heroes look at it as invading turf...it was nice to meet civilized individuals who were actually concerned for their city.

I watch this couple sip their coffee, oblivious to my identity and distracted by their conversation. They sit a table down, unpacking laptops and textbooks. She's wearing the local university colors and sporting the logo on her lanyard.

College kids. That girl reminds me of Blossom. The guy beside her, with his indoor sunglasses and snide smirk, reminds me of Ace. I call it coincidence, thinking of the two people I resent most in the world.

I'm shaking, still.

"Yea. I guess the Puffs need help? Townsville must be getting worse, or else they wouldn't have left it vulnerable." She sips her coffee, catching my eye and making a face.

I leave without my tea.

I leave everything I can't carry behind and fly to Townsville despite my intentions to leave the country. I fly home rather than listening to my gut and walking away. I just fly, because it feels right to defy my own agenda.

I should have just gone to Germany. I should have just dropped off in Russia or the UK.

But I didn't go. This was my last chance to see home. I figured it would be wrong of me to just pass it by and neglect what had raised me. Disown what had built and accepted me for so long. I never held prejudice against Townsville, or my family, or the people; I just wanted something different. I wanted somewhere that needed me. I wanted a brief taste of independence, and maybe more.

I got it. And I wasn't giving it up.

When I approach, I don't recognized it. I almost pass it, having noticed the structures of the inner city and recalling the familiar display. I humor myself and stop at the main freeway entrance, hardly busy despite the early hour. The welcome sign, once a perfect and unmarked reflection of the city, is painted over in black and tagged. I pause, because that graffiti is eerily familiar...so much that it weighs on me.

"T.G." It sounds stupid aloud, written in extravagant and empowering letters for everyone entering to gawk upon. It's a reminder, and a sign of dominance. I look closer at the suburbs, noticing the pollution stifling the homes and acting as a smoggy overcast. It hangs like death over the populace.

The tags are placed specifically, on walls and buildings and certain shoppes. They litter the community like production labels, tainting everything and labeling ownership. I'm indifferent, at first, but as I set my attention on a billboard, I feel almost haunted.

It's reformed into a reminder, sending a constant message to the residents and instilling fear. A man, decayed and rotting, hangs off the edge like a rag doll, swinging against the breeze. The board reads "We control you. -Triple G." In capitals, demanding obedience.

I feel sick, almost guilty.

The corpse dangling abroad is worn by weather, decomposed to dried meat on bone and an oddly textured skin. His hat, a businessman's fedora, is clearly stapled into his scalp. His hands are missing, eyes long gone from scavenging birds and clothes ripped and dried red. He moves with the wind again, and looked as though he should be creaking as he swings.

I don't want to see it.

But the people in the streets, walking or driving, look up and point at me as though a miracle. They awe at my presence, whispering among themselves like rodents. I spot an officer and fly closer, my intentions having been to question his lack of enforcement, until he aims a gun and yells out some incoherent threat. I'm swift to jump further into unreachable air space and observe from a distance.

I move on. I fly home without scrutinizing the city, noting the overgrowth that covers the south wall and curls over a rounded window of the house I'd grown in. That was my chore, before I'd left: cutting back the weeds. Maintaining the landscape.

The windows are barred with iron, crossing vertical and horizontal on all three. The farthest left is shattered, but not broken. The grass is shorter than expected, but yellowed in patches and dirt. Even the door is worn, donning an unsavory amount of overlaying graffiti that covers all reachable ends of the exterior.

"Puffs suck."

"Burn."

"Get out."

"One gone - two left."

I'm stunned halfway through my observation, listening as the door is opened with hesitation at a slow, abnormal pace. The Professor eases his way out, silent, gray and tense. He's so old, now. Three years and he's aged horribly. He looks tired, worn, beaten. He's not the same man, he's not even wearing his old lab coat.

He sees me, floating downwards and landing awkwardly with a tense expression. I try my best to smile, hands fisting at my sides despite our reunion. He falls to his knees instantaneously, car keys clattering against pavement and the meek beginnings of tears glossing his eyes. He looks to me solemnly, not with the surprise or eagerness I had predicted. His lips are curled downwards with wrinkles at the edges of unshaven skin. His teeth barred in genuine agony, cussing trough them as he cries. I'm confused. I step back out of shock.

"Buttercup." He mutters my name, stunned into some kind of trance. He reaches out, sobbing more and covering his face with two, roughened, calloused hands.

I tear up. Why wouldn't I? My father appears broken and pitiful...and I nearly lose myself in his grief. But I can't. I need answers. I'm the toughest fighter.

"What the hell's going on, Professor?" I have no time for the emotional reunion of maker and child. I push past my devastation, eying the car keys and picking them up. I hand them over, and he looks horrified.

"You think this is a joke." He mumbles it, shaking and leering back. His eyes narrow, nose pinching at the bridge with a look of upset confusion. He thinks I'm some punk, mocking him. Playing a heartless card and disguising myself as his misplaced daughter.

I don't know what to tell him. I have to be direct...I have to be plain, but my confusion interferes.

If I can't get a response I'll read that paper. But I'd rather not.

"Professor. It's really me. I can prove it, but you have to tell me what's going on...now." I speak, and it doesn't come out a strong as I had hoped. I'm still really uncertain. If I flew out like a coward now, no one would notice, and the Professor would consider it another rotten kid.

He opens his mouth to speak, but screaming and gunfire interrupts our heartfelt reunion. I hear crack after crack, listening to the bullets pierce flesh with sensitive hearing. The Professor doesn't been blink, but he groans. And he stands up, picks up his keys, and starts the car.

I fly in the direction of the assault, quick to interrupt the crime as soon as possible. The Professor had driven away.

There are men, with Gang Green, pointing their rifles at a group five blocks over. Two are dead, bleeding out onto their driveway and laying motionless. The one had no face, having been shot off and made into a gummy, blood-soaked mess. The other was a swollen pulp, bruised over every inch of his splotched, irritated skin. The front lawn of some civilian's home collects pools of blood, soaking in the visual agony of the situation. It reeks of death, and I fight off the need to gag.

The youngest girl screams, wails of desperation and sorrow echoing over a bitter, gross town that would not respond. Neighbors across the street shut their doors quickly, lowering the bars on their windows and closing themselves off from reality.

I beat the first until something snaps. He wails, then stops moving. His hair is greasy, face ridden with acne and bruises. Some dumb ass kid, ruining his life.

The second one shoots at me. He has some cheap black-market pistol he can't load properly. He spends four bullets, nailing me in the shoulder on the fifth. It bounces back. I barely felt it.

"You ain't no hero, broad." He yells, shaking. "You ain't no Puff."

I call him an idiot. And I think that's when he recognized the toughest fighter. As the terror of who he's messing with spreads over his face, he realizes I'm Buttercup. He recognizes this woman to be that little girl three years back, who'd apparently made the mistake of leaving. This entirely changed and developed individual as that child who'd kick ass every afternoon before lunch. That girl who mercilessly left Seduca maimed and incapable, who'd cut off the armed hand of Femme Fatale, aiming to kill. Who'd rip a lung from his chest in an instant.

He pops a final shot before pulling out a walky talkie, hands trembling at the forced glow I expelled from my eyes.

"Snake! Snake for the love of fuck it's a Puff! It's Buttercup!"

There's no response, initially. I stand there, waiting. Perhaps it was unwise, but I was genuinely curious, and I needed answers. Like a woman needs closure after the death of her son, I needed information. I wanted the truth, a sort of explanation. Before long I hear the drawn out hiss of a deeper voice, one I would never have guessed had the name not already been given. Snake was hit with puberty hard, apparently; I'm surprised he's still around.

"Then fuckin' sssshoot her, idiot."

I take another six bullets before knocking Snake's thug unconscious, snapping his arm and making enough noise to force backup to respond. And then I wait, because Snake always held a bad grudge, and he'd be here to act on his bitter need for revenge. The low man on Ace's piss-poor totem pole had crawled his way up from the dirt and ground, sending his own boys out to shoot at Puffs. I admit I'd been impressed.

The remainder of the group, having been antagonized, was now gone despite their fallen comrades. All having worn an odd shade of red, looking uniform. The neighborhood was barren of life, suddenly, and for a long moment I felt entirely alone. Waiting for some Gang Green scum to blitz attack me and fail. Like an idiot. But it all continued to bother me, this entire situation. The way death was a social norm now, so different. The way bodies hung from billboards, and officers turned a gun on heroes. The way fear had crept into the heart and soul of this useless city, stealing its moral and beating it into submission.

"Holy shit. Buttercup?" The familiarity of that voice is almost haunting. I resent that tone with a bloody fist and tense shoulders. I turn to confront him, mapping out my reaction with blazing eyes. I can feel the heat build behind my irises, ready to send him into the nine realms of hell and oblivion...until I see his face. And I realize, in that instant, that Ace maintains more power than I alone could ever impact.