"Why the hell are we just standing around like a bunch of morons while the Undersiders are in the bank?" Kid Win grumbled. The Tinker was floating on his hoverboard with his laser pistol out. Arrayed around him, spaced out, were the rest of the Brockton Bay Wards.

"Because the Youth Guard are a bunch of douche bags." Clockblocker answered flippantly.

"Cut the chatter people." Aegis said firmly, "The Undersiders are known as the Masters of Escape, so we have to be on our guard or they will get away."

"Aegis, your costume is way too tight." Clockblocker complained.

"Shut up, Clock." Aegis growled.

"Gallant, is that Glory Girl up there?" Vista asked, pointing at the white-clad figure standing atop the bank's roof.

"What the…oh, Vicky." The armoured hero groaned, pulled out a cell phone and hit a speed dial. After rapidly talking for a minute, he hung up and reported, "Apparently Panacea is in the bank. Glory Girl won't leave while she's in danger."

"Oh, for the love of…!" Aegis groaned, "This cannot get any more complicated."

"Are things usually like this?" Browbeat asked. The point-blank telekinetic was the newest addition to the roster and was a true-blue greenhorn. Still, it was better to have him along than Shadow Stalker, who had a serious hate-on for Grue, the leader of the Undersiders.

"Aegis to Control, ETA to the arrival of the Protectorate?" Aegis asked, ignoring the rookie.

"ETA is fifteen minutes, Aegis." The person taking his request replied, "Sit tight and await Protectorate and PRT reinforcements."

"Roger that, Control." Aegis sighed. Sometimes, the Youth Guard's determination to keep the Wards from being child soldiers made their job harder than it needed to be. Who knows what the Undersiders were doing with all the free time that they were being handed here?

When the bank doors slammed open and darkness descended around Vista and Clockblocker, Aegis groaned again. Now he knew what they were up to; they were devising a plan.

Third-Person POV

Three monstrous dogs bounded out of the bank and leapt upon the person wearing Clockblocker's uniform, tearing into him with ravening fangs. The person who usually dealt with such things, Vista was cut off in the cloud of darkness that was Grue's creation.

Sprinting out on the heels of the dogs were Hellhound and Grue. The female Parahuman went to stand near her dogs, while Grue leapt into his darkness. The next person to come out caught the attention of Kid Win and Gallant.

It was a person wearing shining green armour made out of an opaque green glass-like substance. In one hand, a spear was clutched, tipped with what looked like a huge diamond. In the other, he held a shield made of what looked like onyx.

"Who the hell is that?" Kid Win wondered.

"Must be a new member." Gallant replied, "Oh crap! He's looking towards you!"

Indeed, the figure had turned to look at Kid Win and was brandishing his spear at him. Gallant's jaw dropped as several spheres of diamond appeared in front of the man and flew at his Tinker teammate. Kid Win dodged them and tried to shoot them down with his laser, but the spheres absorbed his energy and fired it back at him, destroying his hoverboard.

"Shit!" Gallant cursed and blasted the man with his Blaster ability, but a wall of crystal appeared in mid-air to block it. A Geokinetic? A Crystallokinetic? Something like that.

With a seemingly negligent wave of his weapon, the armoured figure sent a wave of crystal spikes erupting out of the ground at him, forcing the armoured empath to dodge to the side, only to be suddenly stricken by a spasm in his legs, allowing the crystal guy to wrap Gallant in rock-hard crystal.

Kid Win, in the meanwhile, had been dodging the attacking spheres of diamond and making a mental note to invest in some non-laser Tinkertech weaponry, especially some close combat weaponry. Eventually, his luck ran out and they wrapped him up in a glittering cocoon from neck to feet.

"Let GO of my boyfriend!" Glory Girl snarled as she sped down towards the armoured figure.

Looking up at Glory girl, the unknown Cape leapt to the side at the last moment and Glory Girl punched the ground, causing a small earthquake. Seemingly out of nowhere, a pair of crystalline wings erupted from the figure's back and took them to the sky, pursued by Glory Girl.

"Let's go while Glory Hole is occupied by Alexandrite!" a purple and black clad girl said as she hurried a white-clad figure out of the bank. Grue emerged from his cloud of darkness and dispelled it, revealing the frozen figures of Vista and Clockblocker. He had somehow tricked the time stopper to use his striker ability on both Vista and himself at the same time.

"Can she handle her, Tattletale?" he asked in his echoing voice.

The one called Tattletale gave a vulpine smirk. "Oh yes."

Above the fleeing villains, Alexandrite was blasting the Alexandria package with a barrage of crystal shards. Every few seconds, Glory Girl dodged the attacks for a period of time before renewing her assault.

"I see." A female voice came from the armoured figure of Alexandrite, surprising Glory Girl, "You aren't a real Alexandria package; you have a forcefield that wraps around your body to grant you your invulnerability and strength. The flight part of your powers is independent of that; otherwise you would plummet like a stone every time I overpowered your barrier. A pseudo-Alexandria type, eh?"

Victoria Dallon frowned. No villain had ever seen through her forcefield before, but she wasn't concerned about it. She was not someone to let such a thing get to her.

"So what if you know about my forcefield?" Glory Girl challenged, "You can't beat me even if you know!"

"I wonder about that?" the figure said, "Allow me to introduce myself; I am Alexandrite and you are about to lose."

"You named yourself after Alexandria?" Glory Girl asked with a frown.

"No, after the precious gem." Alexandrite replied irritably. She broke her spear in half and used her power to transform the separate halves into diamond swords.

"Do you really think swords can do anything to me?" Glory Girl taunted.

"Ones that are as sharp as a razor's edge and harder than steel, yes." Alexandrite replied as she pointed her weapons at her opponent, "Now be ready!"

"Bring it, bitch!" Glory Girl sneered.

"No, Bitch is my teammate." Alexandrite mocked her back before flapping her wings and bombarding her with more crystal shards as a distraction so she could make a sneak attack, slamming both swords into the hero's side and sending her flying, then following up with a kick that made the teen Parahuman scream with pain as she was sent tumbling to the ground.

Fortunately for Glory Girl, her forcefield kicked in before impact and she was saved from further injury when she struck the ground, although it did create a crater on the asphalt of the road. Alexandrite covered the helpless heroine's body in a thick layer of crystal, three times the thickness of Gallant's prison, before taking flight once again, speeding out of sight on her diamond wings.

Later

Undersiders Base

"Whoo! That was awesome!" Alec cheered as he took his mask off.

"We actually kicked the Wards' asses." Brian shook his head in disbelief.

"We caught them off guard." Lisa corrected them, "They won't underestimate us a second time. Plus, they now know some information about us. Well, about you, Rachel and Taylor at least. Alec and I kept inside the bank for the most part. Alec only interfered with Taylor's fight with Gallant and that was through a window, so they should have almost no information on us."

"I'm going to feed my dogs." Rachel grunted and led Angelica, Judas and Brutus to their kennels.

"I hope Taylor got away from Glory Girl." Brian said with a concerned look on his face.

"I did." the girl of the moment answered, strolling into the loft wearing a black hoodie, blue jeans and trainers. No signs remained of the villain Alexandrite.

"I take it you made sure to eliminate all traces of your crystal?" Lisa asked knowingly.

"Yup. Flew into the sewer and triggered the dissolving effect." Taylor confirmed as she sat next to Alec, "Every trace of my crystals within a kilometre should be gone. Glory Girl's gonna be pissed when she gets over that concussion I gave her."

"Hmm...a faux-Alexandria-type, eh?" Lisa mused, "Well, she'll be over any injury by now; Panacea is her sister, after all."

"Point." Taylor nodded, "So what now? Celebrate?"

"Hell yeah!" Alec said, "Pizza?"

"No Alec!" Brian replied automatically, "We get pizza all the time. How about Chinese or Indian?"

The rest of the time in the loft was spent arguing about what to order for dinner.

Not one of my better ones, I must admit. As Taylor said above, Alexandrite is a type of gemstone. Named after Tsar Alexander the Second, for those who are interested.

Note: Alexandrite's default crystals are alexandrite and diamond. Other crystals can be made, but takes concentration to create.

Shaker: 6 (Able to create crystalline formations at will within twenty metres of herself. The formations can be any shape and size she desires from orbs to swords to humanoid golems. She can emit a special pulse to shatter any of her own creations within a kilometre of her current position.)

Striker: 4 (Able to enhance her strikes with the ability to cover the enemy in a layer of crystal to impede their movements and bind them. Can also cover hands in spikes to increase punching power.)

Mover: 2 (Able to grow wings to fly with, as well as using platforms of crystal to hover on.)

Blaster: 6 (Able to fire a ray that can crystallise anyone or anything it strikes. Also able to fire crystals from any crystalline surface in close proximity to her body.)

Breaker/Brute: 3 (Able to shift into a body completely made out of crystals. Should the body become damaged, healing via crystal absorption is possible. Treated as being (Brute: 3) while in this form due to enhanced strength and resilience.)