5.5 Riot
"Wasn't me," I said handing Madison back her phone.
"It had to be you," she shot back. "There is no one else it could have been."
I wiggled the phone until Madison took it. "I didn't even get to touch him," I said. "He came down and fought me for like one, two minutes tops and then left. I didn't get a single hit on him."
"Uh huh," she said. "Sure he wasn't—how did you put it? Just a little bit enthralled?"
"That's..."
Dread filled me. I had looked into his eyes. Had I said something to him he took literally? I was just venting anger, but I might have told him to go fuck himself or something. Shit, that's what happened to Canary wasn't it?
"Oops," I said.
Faultline and Madison groaned. "Fuck T," Faultline said. "Did Eidolon really die because of an oops?"
I ran my hand through my hair. "Y-Yeah, maybe. If I said it was an accident... well, that doesn't make it any better."
Madison gestured to Faultline and me, holding out her phone. We huddled around it as a video played. It was taken from extremely far away but it showed what looked like Eidolon on a rooftop. One second he was standing there and another his head was blown clean off and his body fell over. The quality was too bad to make out the specifics.
But it kind of looked like suicide by that grapeshot thing of his.
"That was horrible," Faultline said.
Madison nodded and put her phone away. "I'm guessing our beloved master over here accidentally told him to go kill himself. Do I have that right?"
I nodded.
The Triumvariate had come to try to delay me from curing the people of this city. Alexandria found herself locked back in time and Eidolon lost his life for it. But their sacrifices weren't even for the best of this city because I still can't fucking cure anybody. Those damn protesters are stopping me.
Well, they're stopping anybody from getting to me. They're making their own heroes' sacrifice in vain. Idiots. They're like children, throwing a tantrum because other people are different than they are.
I took a step back from Madison and Faultline, but they noticed. "T, what are you doing?" Faultline asked.
I bit my lip. "Faultline," I said. "I'm going to break up this protest."
"There will be consequences."
"Won't there always?"
I extended my wings and launched myself up over the tank that was between us and the mob. I aimed right for the center and landed as the group desperately got out of my way. The protesters immediately went quiet as I stood up and extended my wings. They slowly backed
away.
"Eidolon is dead," I said loudly. There were some gasps. "And Alexandria is down. I'm giving you three seconds. Run."
They were deeer in headlights. Madison was better at human psychology than I was so she could predict what would happen. I couldn't though. I just counted. One.
Two.
Three.
And they were still standing, waiting to see what would happen. But there was only one thing I could do. I was someone who followed up on threats. I picked a target from the crowd and charged towards him.
As soon as I did people started running. The college-aged kid I had in my sights couldn't escape and I easily grabbed him by the shoulder—and the person next to him with my other hand—and threw them both to the ground.
"Congratulations, you're cured." I shouted and reached out for someone else. I'd only had to grab about five people before the protesters had run for the hills.
Once they were scared off I went back to my tent, again, and waited for someone else to come looking for my help. Madison and Faultline insisted that what I did was a bad move, but it sure fucking worked.
They hadn't said anything at first, just milled about securing the area and whatnot. But after an hour of very few people stopping by to get cured I had a better understanding what they meant by consequences.
I had scared people away. I sighed but otherwise accepted it. Besides the idiots who brought it on themselves I still wanted it to be voluntary. Even if not doing it was a stupid idiot decision that only idiots would make. If their desire to live wasn't strong enough to deal with that little display they had no business with me.
Plus, some people still came. But now they were almost exclusively red-tattoos. I'm guessing these people were already loyal to me for some reason or other. A couple of them even said how badass I was for breaking up the group.
But they were in the minority.
"Now they're protesting outside our building," Madison said. She looked at a security camera feed on her phone. I glanced over and saw the group of people outside HFC.
"Do they know no one's there?"
"I think they do, which is why they're protesting over there and not over here."
One of the cameras suddenly went offline.
"I mean rioting," Madison said. "Did I say protesting? I meant rioting."
I groaned but turned my attention back to the person who wanted me to save their life. Some things took priority over a bunch of angry people throwing stuff and causing property damage.
Madison sat next to me watching the cameras. "To my understanding, riots happen when there is a reasonable expectation that no one will be caught or arrested. If five or six people light a police car on fire they go to jail for a long time. If two hundred people are lighting cars on fire, are they all going to be arrested? What about two thousand? The individualism is stripped and they become part of a mob. Suddenly they aren't responsible for their actions anymore."
"Fascinating," I said. "Is there a point?"
"The PRT came, the Protectorate came and then the Triumvariate came," Madison said. "And they lost. Almost immediately at that."
She paused.
"Suspiciously immediately... but let's not think about that for now. The point is that the only people in a position to enforce the law right now are us." Madison hit something on her phone to switch cameras. "If we don't stop this it will grow."
"We don't have the manpower."
"We have the equipment though," Madison said. "You put this city to sleep once. We can do it again."
"Is it too much to ask to set up camp here in this park and have people come to me if they want to get this tattoo off their body?" I asked. "That's all I wanted to do."
Madison rolled her eyes. "Apparently it is."
By noon I'm pretty sure I still hadn't actually cured more than five hundred people. Which was a pretty good turn out considering the situation, I guess, but it wasn't close to helping the eighty thousand people left in this city.
Madison kept her eyes on the news but they kept going back and fourth between Eidolon's death, Alexandria being frozen again and the riots. As predicted the riots weren't showing any sign of slowing.
"It's spreading," she reported. "I think the news reporting Eidolon's death was the spark."
They hadn't broke into the HFC building yet though. That place was basically a giant concrete slab so I'm not sure what they would have done. There were two doors and they were reinforced to withstand parahumans trying to break in.
Eventually they gave up on our building and instead turned their attention to the only target a mob could actually do anything against. People who had taken the red cure.
I shouldn't have been surprised. I crumpled my hand into a fist. Fucking cowards.
"Fine. Do it," I told Madison.
"Do it?"
"We'll stop the riots. We'll use the paralytic, time stopping, anything we have to." I growled. "The people in this city are acting like a pack of wild dogs. So let's treat them as such."
My generous offer to heal people had dried up around person number six hundred. It'd been half an hour without anyone showing. This city was going to die in two days and the people weren't even willing to save themselves. They were going to make sure Brockton Bay died. After all, the alternative would be letting me actually do something helpful.
And if Brockton Bay ever had a driving goal it was to personally screw me over.
I ordered the tanks to roll out, the jeeps to patrol and everyone to stop anyone from doing anything. "We're taking over the city," I said on the radio. "I've had enough. Martial law time."
My earlier comment was still valid. We didn't have the numbers to enforce much. It meant "martial law" was going to be more "flooding the streets with tear gas and paralytic until people learned to stay in their fucking houses.
If letting the people come to me was a problem, I would lock them all in their homes and go to them.
I flew towards the larger group of rioters who were lighting cars on fire and looting stores downtown. They scattered when they saw me but it didn't help them. I found someone to go for and tackled them to the ground. I had to remember to hold back since he wasn't a parahuman.
With my hand on their neck they were cured, but I wasn't sure the extent of the enthrallment from contact. It hadn't been overwhelming. Madison and Faultline weren't falling over me like the regular thralls were.
Without a better plan I spun my victim around and looked at him in the eyes. "Go home," I ordered. Then I got off him and moved on to someone else. I still hadn't learned how temporary "temporary" was, but my eyes were the strongest tool in my arsenal.
After a couple of those I took back to the sky. The organized riot had splintered into lots of different groups at my attack, but the people seemed to want to reform into mobs. That made sense if Madison's theory was right. They could justify their actions if they were in a mob. When they were alone they would no longer be faceless.
I attacked one of the other cells like I had before and it broke up even more.
It shouldn't have been surprising when Legend showed up again. He announced his presence with another laser beam slicing through my wings. I still don't have a counter to that ability of his. Once I fell to the ground he shot me again.
Legend would be difficult. He was long-range which meant it would be hard to look him in the eye and command him that way. And I couldn't close the distance without getting blown up by his lasers.
For now I ran away, Legend trailing me from the air. He fired laser after laser, half of them I dodged and the other half usually clipped a wing. I eventually smashed into the nearest bar I could find to get out of his line of sight.
Turns out it was the Palanquin. I ran to the phone and called Madison's cell.
"Er, hello?" Madison asked.
"It's me again," I said. "Legend's back, want to try this again?"
"Gladly. Try not to move too far away from our favorite drinking hole."
A laser crashed through the roof and burrowed into the floor, lighting the wooden bar on fire. Shit, sorry about your place Faultline. I tried to stay away from the hole in the roof so Legend couldn't see me, but five more lasers crashed into the building completely wiping it off the map.
He's not fucking around.
I smiled. This might work. The Palanquin was quickly falling apart so I found a nice corner to hide in and let it. The ceiling was the first to fall and the walls came down with it, burying me in rubble.
Would Legend believe that I had snuck out? I couldn't see through the smoke of the fire and the dust that was kicked up, but I stayed still under the chunk of ceiling that rested on my back. Right now I was buying time until Madison got here.
It took a lot longer for the dust to settle than I would have thought. But eventually it did and Legend plopped himself down in the middle of the smoldering wreckage that used to be the Palanquin.
This was a perfect opportunity to try to get close to him. He probably knew that. It had to have been bait.
I decided to do nothing and wait for Madison to do her thing.
After about twenty seconds Legend shot back up into the air. I guess my ploy didn't keep him distracted for long. Without an earpiece I had no idea if Madison was already here or not waiting to make her move.
I should keep Legend sufficiently distracted, so I burst through the rubble, extended my wings and jumped into the air. I made it about ten feet before my wings were removed from my body and I fell back down in the usual manner.
Then I took off on foot, trying to put some buildings between Legend and me.
One of his lasers appeared next to the wall and smashed into the concrete two feet in front of me. Fuck, I guess those can go through walls.
I kept my eye on the sky and waited for Legend to appear overhead. Then I tried to turn down an alleyway but his aim was good enough to have his lasers follow me. He missed though. Even if his lasers could change direction in mid-air his line of sight couldn't.
By varying my speed I could at least not have my head ripped off every few seconds.
"Come on Legend," I shouted. "You don't want to do this."
I wasn't met with a response. I remember sitting side-by-side with him the day we announced a truce. Somehow I should have seen this would be our future again. Heroes and villains didn't have any hope of ever getting along.
If Legend taught me anything it's that my biggest weakness was I'm entirely close-combat. This was making me target practice for him.
I slid around the side of the same building to get out of his line of sight but it hardly worked, he was faster than me.
I dashed across the street, taking a hit in the leg, and smashed through the window of some clothing store. The last one had been the Palanquin, but this had no affiliation with me at all. Would Legend incinerate this one too?
The answer was yes, yes he would.
Was he trying to teach me not to go into any buildings? That he would blow away anything I tried to use for cover? I could see that. I was only causing more property damage by using it in combat.
I grabbed a piece of rubble and chucked it at Legend. It was decimated by the lasers before getting twenty feet in the air.
In the distance I saw Madison appear in the middle of the air, then vanish and appear higher up. I dashed to the left to grab Legend's attention and as expected a laser smashed through me, detaching my legs from the rest of my body. I fell to the ground and waited for it to reform.
I had missed the moment of truth, but when I stood up again and extended my wings another laser hadn't come. He just hung in mid-air.
Good job, Madison.
She appeared a minute later clutching her arm.
"Good job, Madison."
"Thanks. Broke my fucking arm though," she said. "The bastard made sure he was more than a hundred meters in the air at all times. Except for that trap at the Palanquin. Eventually I had to go up there myself."
"And then you fell back down?" I asked.
"A little ways," she said. "I moved myself back to the ground. But I retain momentum and gravity pulls pretty quickly."
The two of us looked at Legend in the air. Fucking hells that was all three of them. And two of them with the same trick. "I can't believe that worked," I said.
Madison clutched her arm and winced. "I suspect," she said, "that they had a plan involving all three of them. Legend and Eidolon watched for me from the sky and kept careful track of their and my positions while Alexandria went down and distracted you."
"Wouldn't it be smarter to get me into the air and fight hundreds of meters in the air? Out of your reach?"
The sound of an explosion made us both spin on our feet. A column of smoke started rising somewhere in the distance. "Ugh," Madison groaned. "Rioters. Anyways if the three of them had hung out in the air it wouldn't have gotten in your way. They had to come down and beat you. So they controlled it." She shrugged. "Poorly."
I took a look at her arm. "Do you still have some healing?"
She shook her head. "I don't think so. I can't feel it fixing itself."
So it lasted about six hours. Good to know. "Do you want me to touch you again?"
"Please. Who knows when the powers will shut off."
I grabbed Madison's good arm for a second and then let go. It was weird how easy it was.
Instead of leaving Madison told me about the situation. As planned, HFC was out in force trying to enforce some notion of martial law. The riots only fueled their intensity at that, evidenced by the explosion we'd just heard.
I took to the sky and Madison teleported towards the explosion we'd just heard. Madison beat me and was standing on top of a building. I landed down in the street in the middle of a ring of rioters. An HFC vehicle was completely totaled and on fire. Someone had hit it with a mine of some sort.
Somebody shot me. I turned slowly towards the shot and saw one of the rioters holding a pistol.
"Don't you get I'm trying to help this city?" I shouted.
"Fuck you, devil," the man shouted and unloaded the entire clip into me. After a bunch of shots I finally heard their gun start clicking, in which I charged and grabbed him by the throat.
I just tossed him aside. About half of the rioters started running and half took up baseball bats and tried to actually fight me. At least they were coming after me instead of going after the red tattoos.
Each person who attacked me I casually grabbed by their arm or head or leg and tossed away, curing them in the process. The enthrallment wasn't quick-acting, nor was the fast healing, so they would get up again and resume their attack.
I had to start breaking legs, which was really easy for me. That kept them down for good and their inherited healing would fix it eventually. Or at least mitigate any serious damage from it.
"Why the fuck would you see this city dead?" I shouted as I smashed someone in the shin. They crumpled in front of me and I kicked them to the side. "You're all a bunch of murderers."
"I'd rather die than be a slave," someone shouted and charged at me. I punched them in the stomach and then tossed them away. Unlike with Glory Girl I had to hold back all of my strikes so not to kill them. I had learned that lesson with Bitch.
There were only three people left now in any fighting condition. And of those three, the best weapon one of them had was a crowbar.
"You can't honestly think that," I said. "Death is preferable to me?"
The man raised his crowbar. But before he could attack there was a blinding gold light that appeared in the sky. It shot across like a shooting star and crashed right into the pavement beside us.
I got a good look at it.
Scion.
He looked at me, the expression on his face unreadable. I heard the others flee, but kept my eyes trained on Scion.
This wasn't fair.
The world really was out to kill this city. Even Scion, the paragon of all that was good and right in this world, was standing against me to let this city die in the name of justice.
He took a step towards me and brought his fist down, smashing me into the ground.
