Flashback
"What do you want, now?"
"I have another job for you," he said without any anger in his tone, he knew that she is still searching for the girls from the incident with ABB behind his back. When he told her to stop all actions from locating them the next day, she was surprised but agreed. He grew suspicious and was about to force her to tell him why, but he was terrified when she appeared from a doorway in his base and told him to leave her alone.
He knew that she knew something or someone scared him bad enough about the girls to let the matter drop. He threatend her and she stopped for a little bit. He still kept someone on the look out where she goes, just in case.
His Tattletale knew who held the power in their relationship, but reminding her with little actions in her life helped to reinforce that knowledge. "There is a stockpile in a warehouse on Label and Dreason. You will hit the place in Four days time and clear it out; I don't care what you do with the money or weapons, only that they are no longer in their hands for them to use it."
"That's a little deep in the Empire territory, do they have any cape support on-site and do you know how much it has inside?" No arguing so far. That was not a good sign, usually he would have to pursuade her to take on a job he wanted them to do. He knew she knew that it bothered him a little but he ignored it and continued on.
"The normal guard rotation doesn't contain any capes, but it's a slight possibility. If any Empire capes do show up, burn the warehouse and extract your team. I'll have the incendiaries delivered tomorrow.''
''I don't know boss, the rest of the team might not agree to do the plan. I need to give them something for them to be on board.'' Lisa said nonchanlantly as she looked at her nails hoping he'll take the bait.
''I'll give you double the money what you get from the warehouse. That would be more than satisfactory, right Tattletale?'' He warned her.
She flinched slightly and agreed, ''Ok, send me the coordinates and it'll be done in a flash.'' Before she could hang up, Coil had one last thing to say, ''Oh and one more thing, if you try to play me like that agian... well you know what would happen.''
She clamped down on her power before it could tell her what his unspoken threat meant, ''O-O-Of couse, boss. S-Sorry, it won't happen again.'' He said nothing and ended the call.
Lisa just knew the raid would be a disaster. The Empire had multiple capes going around through their territory trying to find the capes. It would take more than four days to plan adequately. Plans required time and effort, especially when you wanted to stay alive against Hookwolf and Stormtiger. You needed to scout the location, record guard schedules, know where the capes might patrol next.
How would she expain this to her team, she didn't know. She looked up at the ceiling and groaned out, ''I should have moved on to after robbing a few people. But nooo, I had to see that cute dress on sale with the matching shoes.'' She sighed massaging her head, ''Fuck my life."
Flashback Ends
''Move to the left, now!'' Tattletale screamed at her teammates. Not a moment later, a rebar smashed down the ground where Bitch, Regent and angelica. He just laughed and waved at Rune taunting her before he disappeared in Grue's power, ''You missed me! Now you gotta kiss me, not!''
Rune's response was to stomp her foot on the manhole as she waved her hand as a piece of rubble moved away from her and was thrown to his last location. ''Haha, that kid is so dead when you get your hands on him.'' Storm Tiger laughed a little when she missed. Grue used his powers and hid the group from view for a little bit. They can generally tell where they would go next as the cloud is being formed infront of the undersiders. Stormtiger threw some wind blades in their general directions, herding them into a smaller field for Rune.
"Don't taunt the cape that can kill us, I want to get out of here alive!" Brian shouted back as Butus jerked to one side, avoiding a trash can launched his way by Rune. It was suposed to be easy run, get in, take out the guards and take the money and get the fuck out.
Brian threw up an even denser cloud of darkness over the street as all three of Bitch's dogs abruptly switched directions, heading for the alleyway on the left. They stayed still, holding their breaths as they watched the Empire capes flew past them. They moved on silently the oppisite direction where they were going.
"I thought you said there wasn't going to be Cape support!" Grue yelled at Lisa as they relaxed for a moment. The two capes paused for a moment when they saw the Undersiders were no longer where they expected as the cloud started to get smaller and lighter the farhter they went. They frowned and turned back around.
Ring, Ring
Stormtiger ansered a call from one of the underpowered mooks. ''They spotted the retreating dogs with four teenagers riding them going North-West of our current location.'' Rune nodded and they took off in hot pursuit again.
"I said there shouldn't be any!" Tattletale swore as a particularly hard landing sent a blunted spike into her stomach, knocking the wind out of her as Judas dodged a molotav cocktail being thrown from an Empire thug. "And they wouldn't have even been there if they hadn't been picking up the cash, which I couldn't have known about!"
"We would have, if we'd had more time! It's your job to know these things."
"Take it up with the boss then!"
"You know I love it when mommy and daddy fight and all." Regent drawled, flicking a hand out as the gangbanger's arm twitched as he tried to shoot at them, and a hit the floor next to one of his buddies foot instead of them. "but couldn't you have your sexual charged fight later? I think I'm losing alot of blood.''
"What?!'' Both Grue and tattletale shouted and saw him moving his hand away from his side and showed them his hand clean with no blood. They breathed out in relief and Regent laughed, ''Sike! Made you look.''
"If we make it out of this alive, so help me Regent. I'll throw up a cloud around them and we split up and go through the alleyway. Bitch's dogs are more maneuverable than they are and harder to catch on foot. We all throw the cash in a safe place and when the heat dies down we'll come back for iit later. Meet up at the fallback point once you done that."
"That'd probably work, but we might not need to." Lisa said, a confused tone slipping into her voice.
"Why?" Bitch asked.
Lisa just pointed and they all turned to look. There, moving away from the Undersiders, the gang members stopped as smoke went up from the lead car causing the rest to stop as well. They can see a blurry figure moving away from one of the cars, forcing the gang to fight.
"What the hell?" Lisa squinted, letting her power loose for a moment, needing the information. ''They're fighting someone else… possibly a cape." She mused aloud before she stopped her power. She started to feel a migrain coming on, hopefully she doesn't have to use her powers anymore tonight.
"Someone else? The Pretectorate? Another cape?" Even through the concealing helmet, she could tell Grue was frowning by his body language.
"No, but we need to get out of here, now. Like right now!" Tattletale turned to him, her expression serious. "Because if they're going after that cape, then we have a chance to get out of here alive. We need to take care of our wounds Grue and I don't know about you but I don't want to stay when more Empire capes arrives ."
''But the cape..." Grue hesitated as he winced in pain and touched his ribs thinking, 'She's right. We're no match for them. I can't die and leave my sister alone.'' He looked back at the area the cape left, 'Sorry.' Grue nodded and they left the area.
Stormtiger and Rune arrived at the scene where a new cape is beating their members. The cape is moving so fast, it's hard to tell where they would go next. ''How is this possible? They are knocking them out so fast none of the 21 guys can even shoot at them without shooting themselves." Rune said shocked.
''Stay back Rune and give me support when you see an opening." Stomtiger said and she nodded. He jumped down to the street and saw that the cape finally stopped moving. He finally got a good look at her.
It's a black haired woman with a chignon hairstyle with bangs on the sides of her face, she has a masquerade mask with bat wings going up and backward covering her upper face but leaves her glossy red lips free. She is wearing a long dress covers her shoulders almost fully and flows down into a draped neckline which shows some cleavage, with a black lace long sleeve asymmetric high low dress and a pair of lace-up heels. She started to walk towards him slowly, in a sensual way as the moon's light is shining down at her.
He tried to focus to create some wind claws but he can't help but be memorized by her otherworldly beauty. He's just standing there waiting for her. As the female cape put a hand to his chest and moved it up slowly to his neck, he moaned softly. He could see her eyes turn red and for a moment he felt fear, but it quickly went away.
Leadrieth scoffed lightly in her head as she easily charmed this guy. Her opinion on these 'capes' lowered significantly. Hopefully the other capes would be at least a little more challenging, but she's not hopeful. ''Tell me handsome, why are you chasing those kids for?'' She asked curiously.
He sneered, ''Those kids stole tens of thousands in drugs and cash from us. We need to get it back or if we can't then, we have to make them an example why you don't steal from the empire.''
Leadrieth smiled which showed some fangs when she heard they have so much cash. She was about to ask him where they went, but she was forced to jump back as a piece of rubble fell down where she last was.
Rune went down towards Stomtiger as he fell to one knee. ''Urgh, my head. Why did I tell her that?''
''Are you ok, Stormtiger?'' Rune asked as she kept one eye on the female cape and put one hand on his shoulder.
''No, she has some kind of master power. Be careful and go back up in the sky.'' He said as he created some wind claws. Rune nodded and flew up but not before touching a manhole cover and some rubble as she went up to the sky.
Leadrieth is just standing there bored as she looked at them for a second before she looked down at herself in a nearby window and thought, 'I wonder if Neo would like my 'costume'? Should I change it to a more revealing one when I go back? Would he blush beet red and pass out or would he want to ravish me? Ooh I can't wait to find out.' She looked at the Empire capes, considering to ending it fast or having some fun with these lowly creatures.
She dodged his blasts with seemingly little effort, dancing around the ground in such smooth motions, it's like she knew where his and Runes attacks would land before they do. He tried his best to turn the strange cape into little pieces and failed miserably. Her smile started to unnerve him, because he knew that smile. He had seen its like before on the faces of Hookwolf and Cricket when they are in the fighting ring. Predators that were playing with their prey.
And he was definitely feeling like prey. The woman is faster than Velocity. When they had come across the speedster in the past, his movement was nothing more than a long line of blur in his eyes, but that cape, he just blink his eyes and she's gone. He couldn't even get a porper 'grip' on her. It's like jello to her, since she is easily pushes past the air pressure between them.
He apparently wasn't the only one feeling spooked by the girl, and Rune had moved from targeted blasts to wide bursts of objects around her trying to get a good hit to stop her. He tensed his muscles and waited for that split second timing where she can't see him, then he made his wind sharper and sharper. Waves of compressed air smashed into their target and wiped the strange smile right off her face, just in time for Rune to send a trash can down into her stomach, pinning her to the ground.
"Thanks" Aiden grunted as she darted over to him, leaving the rest of her stuff to put more pressure on the cape. She ignored him in favor of grabbing his arm and pulling him on the manhole lid with her.
"Come on!" Rune said urgently, tugging harder forcefully pulled him on.
"The fuck!? The bitch is-"
"Still present, and starting to get more than a bit irritated by your last attack. You ruined my costume by putting trash on it." The voice froze the blood in their veins. He was no stranger to violence; you didn't survive Brockton Bay and run with the Empire for years without a strong stomach, and he knew she was dangerous in her own right, but he also held tight to the same finely-honed survival instincts that he'd developed in those same battles and it told him to run.
Every muscle in Rune's body was rigid as she let go of Stormtiger and slowly, rigidly turned her head, getting her first really good look at the woman as she pulled the objects off of her. And, she realized, she's beautiful. Even the frown on her face didn't diminish her beauty as she crushed the metalic container, that just made the calm voice that much worse, especially as she could almost feel the hunger in those red eyes. She gripped her robes, trying to wipe her sweat from her palms. She was about to give up when Stormtiger did something stupid.
"And I'd expect some ugly nobody like you to know how bad an idea pissing off the Empire is! You'll wish you would have minded your own business, when we're done with you. You and anyone close to you will be a reminder of why nobody fucks with E88." He blustered, as though she couldn't smell the fear coming off them both in waves. At least the one with the robe was reacting appropriately to the situation. Instead of blustering she'd tried to make her escape by pushing him towards her. Unfortunately for her, Stormtiger was unaccountably cocky and she moved fast enough to push her off the covering.
"To be fair, you tried to kill me first. All I wanted to know is why you were chasing those kids. I would have left, right after." Leadrieth replied, voice going silky as she watched the vein pulse just under the skin of his neck. She wanted so badly to taste the blood she could smell from here, to quench the fire running through her veins… but she already fed on Neo's blood, and she didn't want their bllod in her.
She grabbed his neck when he was pushed towards her and smacked his face hard enough to knock him out and sped fast enough to pull the girl off of her board. ''Now little girl, you'll tell me everything I want to know about this city, ok? I'll let you and your little friend go." She said as blood drained from Rune's face. She nodded so fast her hood started to fall off.
Approaching the house, I saw that the lights were on and his car is here. 'So he actually came home early today. I wonder how long before he has to go back to the office.' I thought as I went up the stairs skipping the rotten step. As I slid my key into the door, and a moment later I stepped into the living room, he called out, ''Taylor, is that you?''
''Yeah dad, it's me. I'm back from visiting Neo at his house. Did you know that he was recently released from the hospital?''
''No I didnt.'' Danny shook his head, surprised.
''Yeah, me neither. I looked like a big fool when I asked to see him and was told he was left out of the hospital yesterday. The nurse gave me a pitying look and told me he left yesterday. When I went to his house to give him a piece of my mind, I realized I never gave him my house number and I forgot to give it to him, again. Other than that we talked a bit and he's fine, just tired.''
He nodded and they lasped in silence for a little bit. He asked Taylor, ''So, do the girls still bully you in the school?''
''No they don't. They just leave me alone.'' I said happy but a little suspicious too. Last time that happened, they locked me in the locker. I kept an eye on them, but they do nothing.
That's good. Will you tell me if they start again?'' He asked.
''Yeah, I'll do that.'' I agreed.
''What do you want for dinner? I was thinking of some chinese food.''
''Yeah, that sounds good. Thanks, I'll be in my room doing homework.'' Taylor left the living room as she went to her room. She turned on the computer, waiting for it to slowly turn on. She needs to look up on more information about the capes in the bay if she wanted to be a hero. Hopefully tomorrow will be better. She went to her bed and covered her head with a pillow. ''Ahhh... shit shit. Why did I do that?! I scared him. I almost made him piss his pant's. I'll make it up to him tomorrow, hopefully he'll forgive me.''