A/N: Now it starts getting interesting! And, I put in another one of the actual LU characters! But first, some news on my updating. I'm going back to school tomorrow, ;~; so I will not have as much time to type. On top of that, I have Driver's Ed three days a week after school. I already have the next chapter typed up, I'm just not going to post it yet. It'll be up in a couple of days (probably Wednesday,) I just don't want to leave the people who read this hanging for a week. Once Driver's Ed is done (February,) then I'll probably have rapid speed updating again. Anyways, enjoy this chapter!

DISCLAIMER: I still don't own anything, and I don't know how to change that.

Ch. 2 Developments…

Sive's POV

I finished the apple just before reaching my destination. I tossed it in a nearby dumpster, and rounded the corner to the wide riverside alley. It wasn't particularly nice there; the dumpsters were overflowing, the river wasn't exactly clean, and the concrete street could do with a repair in places, but it was a nice play area for the neighborhood kids. I could hear a group of them playing across the street behind me, but I was focused on the guy I was supposed to meet there.

There was a game of street hockey about to go on in front of me. After a quick count, I realized that one team was short a player, so they were stalling until someone else showed up. The captain of the short team looked around and saw me. He smiled and started walking up to me. He was a very tall, Hispanic boy of about 18. I never actually asked him his age before, but I figured we were about the same age.

"Hey, Perra!" he yelled to me, with a very heavy Spanish accent. He was the only one who was allowed to call me that; anyone else who tried quickly learned not to do it again.

"Hey, Rio!" I yelled back. He was the one I was meeting. He was my closest friend in the district, and he didn't care that I was an anthro, which wasn't common for that area. Anthros around there were typically worse convicts than the non-anthros, so I was hardly ever looked at nicely.

He asked me to meet him there to be there for a gang face off. When I say "gang," I mean street hockey gang. They were really teams; we just called them gangs to be funny. We were all friends in reality; it was just fun to say 'You goin' to the gang meeting tonight?' and watch the reactions of the people around you.

"Sorry, Coyote, but you came for nothing!" jeered the other gang leader, a light skinned Hispanic with a leather jacket and spiky black hair. Everyone called him Leto; he wouldn't tell anyone his real name.

Almost all of my friends around there were Hispanic. They either called me by name, or called me 'Coyote.' I was technically only 75% percent coyote, but it didn't really matter.

"Well, we are short a player..." stated Rio. He turned to me and asked, "Hey, are you up for a game, Sive?"

"Sure, Rio," I responded. "Let's show these guys who's boss."

A collective "Ohhhh!" sounded, and with that, the game began. None of us could afford rollerblades, so we just ran around. We had old tarps on trash cans for nets, and a few of the other players had nailed pieces of wood together for sticks. I borrowed one of Rio's extras. We did have an actual street hockey ball, though, and one of Leto's guys had a watch, so we did have an accurately timed game.

With 10 minutes to go, the score was 7-6, with Leto's guys in the lead. "Ohh, we're winning!" Leto yelled right after they scored the goal that put them in the lead. Leto was playing goalie. "Way to show us who's boss, Perra!"

That's it, I thought. This guy's goin' down.

When the "puck" dropped, I was first to get it. I hit it between the guy in front of me's legs, sidestepped around him, gave a hard shoulder to the guy who tried taking the ball on the other side of the first guy, and slapshot it right at Leto. It hit him square in the family jewels, fell to the ground, and bounced into the goal. Leto fell a split second after that.

The alley erupted in a mixture of cheers, laughter, and pained 'Ohh"s from some of the guys looking at Leto. Everyone who was officially in a gang was a guy. I, however, was not officially in a gang, although Rio had asked me multiple times to join. I just laughed and cheered with the rest of Rio's gang. I had just broken the tie, but with 9 minutes left, anything could still happen.

Just then I heard Rio yell, "Oh, man! Hey, Sive, it's Dumb and Dumber!"

I looked behind me, and sure enough, there were two of my least favorite people in the world about 20 yards away, and running right for us. Dumb and Dumber were my nicknames for them; I knew their real names; I just chose not to use them.

"Aww, shi- Sorry, guys! Gotta go!" I yelled as I dropped Rio's stick and took off in the other direction. I heard pained yells from Dumb and Dumber as they passed the guys, and I could only imagine how hard the gangs were hitting them with their sticks. I could still hear them yelling at the two after I rounded the corner. I laughed when I heard Rio yell, "Don't make us run after you!" I knew that they wouldn't go after them unless I really got into trouble, but it was nice of Rio to say so, anyways. They knew I hardly ever got into trouble with those two, though; I was way too smart for them.

Thanks for holding them up, guys, I thought as I ran down the street. I looked back and saw Dumb and Dumber about 40 yards behind me. Wow, they really held them up.

I turned another corner, and then another, and another, until I thought I lost them. I stopped to catch my breath and looked behind me; I didn't see anyone. I chuckled and turned back around, and somehow Dumb and Dumber were standing 10 feet in front of me.

"AHH! How do you guys keep on doing that?" I yelled in exasperation, backing away from them.

"That's none of your business," said Dumber, the bigger of the two. They were in identical grey suits with black ties and shoes. Dumb was a short ginger man, whereas Dumber was a tall, built man with brown hair.

"Now are you gonna come wit' us dis time," began Dumb, with his heavy New York accent, "Or are we gonna have tah do dis da hard way?" He asked the exact same question every single time we met, which was about twice a month. I always gave him the same answer, but it seemed as if he always expected me to say something different.

"Well, you know me," I replied as I turned around and darted away.

I heard Dumb curse behind me as they started to follow. I wasn't worried about them catching me, though; they'd been trying to catch me for years. Obviously, they hadn't ever succeeded.

I turned a corner and now I was in a busy area of the district. There were people all over the place, and thanks to my small size, I was able to weave around them easily. Dumber was too big to do this, so I quickly left him behind. Dumb was small enough to do this, but short legs can only carry you so fast, and it wasn't long before he was a ways behind me, too.

I darted into an alleyway, one that was a dead end. I did this purposely. Dumb and Dumber don't know what I can do, only that I can do something. Something that helps me get away from them every time...

I ran right for the wall, concentrated, and ran right through it and out the other side. To Dumb and Dumber, who were too far behind to see what I did, I had disappeared. On the other side, I turned off my powers and continued running, not looking where I was going, and BAM! I had run into something, or someone. That someone would have to be built like a brick wall, though, I thought, 'Cuz they didn't move an inch!

"Owww," I moaned, rubbing my head. I ran into whatever it was headfirst, and that had really hurt.

I looked up and realized that it was a someone... Someone tall, wearing a long cloak, and staring at me...

xoxoxoxox

Mallory Mastermind was sitting in her base trying, and failing, to come up with a new approach to defeating the Loonatics. She had been in hiding for months, staying underground, building new weapons with the limited supplies she had, desperately trying to think of a plan.

"If I don't come up with something to get rid of them soon, I'm going to snap," Mastermind mumbled to herself.

"I may be able to help you with that," said a deep male voice behind her.

She jumped from surprise and turned around. On the computer screen behind her was the silhouette of a large man with tall ears. Another dog I have to deal with? thought Mastermind.

"Who are you, and why are you on my monitor?" asked Mastermind in a sickly sweet voice.

"I won't tell you who I am just yet. I'm on your monitor by hacking my way in. Terribly sorry for that, by the way," replied the man on the screen.

"How did you manage to do that? I have a very complicated system. No one has got in yet, and believe me when I say that many have tried." Like a certain dog I know… she thought to herself.

"Well, when you have an entire IT department working on something for two and a half straight months, you usually get where you want to go," the man on the screen said smugly.

"You have my attention," stated a slightly impressed Mastermind.

"Good," said the man on the screen. Mastermind could tell he was smirking, even though she couldn't see it. "I have a proposition for you. It would involve you doing a little work, but it would end with me getting what I want, and you getting what you want. The destruction of a certain team of superheroes, perhaps?"

I like the sound of this already, thought Mastermind. "Please, go on," she said.

A/N: Who's the person in the cloak? Who's the guy on the screen? Why are those two guys after Sive? Who do they work for? Why am I asking you all these questions? ...This is what happens when I stay up late to finish a chapter. XD Some of these questions will be answered in the next chapter... Not all, but some... R&R!