A Shock For the Gangs Chapter 2 (Original chapter Chapter 19)
It was several days later that New Wave heard more about InFamous from the PRT and Protectorate. Apparently she (Vicky was certain InFamous was female) had fought Lung to a standstill and retreat before Armsmaster had stepped in and made a mess of things with his lack of social skills.
"I really have to wonder why that man is in charge of the Protectorate ENE." Lady Photon grumbled to her husband as they went on patrol for the first time in a long while.
"He has the seniority, dear." Manpower replied soothingly. He knew what a trigger button Armsmaster was for his wife. The man had all the social grace and sense of a drunken bull in a glass manufactory and had stated before that New Wave would be better suited to joining the Protectorate than remain 'an out of date and ineffective independent team.'
He had said that while obliviously being within Lady Photon's hearing and she had torn a strip off him for a good ten minutes. After that, the usual liaison between the Protectorate and New Wave on the side of the Protectorate was Miss Militia, who the entire team liked and respected.
"He threatened to have her arrested for use of excessive force. Against Lung." The informal leader of New Wave said in incredulous anger, "He beat down every member of the Protectorate at once when he arrived in Brockton Bay. He fought Leviathan to a standstill in Kyushu. What kind of stupid idiot would claim excessive force against someone who is just half-a-step away from an S-Class Designation and doesn't get one solely for the fact that he might be useful against an Endbringer if one attacks the Bay?"
"He's also a lazy bastard." Her husband pointed out.
That startled a laugh out of Lady Photon as she glided sedately next to him. "Yes, he is. Still, I wonder what Armsmaster was thinking?"
"About a girl who was strong enough to fight Lung and force him to retreat?" Manpower snorted, "He was thinking about recruiting her for the Wards before she either got herself killed, got forced into the gangs or worse, from his perspective, made a large enough name of herself to gather Rogues and Independents into a team similar to New Wave."
Lady Photon had to admit that he was likely right. In Brockton Bay, Independent Heroes rarely lasted longer than three months after the first ninety days of their careers, either dying, retiring or joining a gang or the Wards after that. Very, very few managed to survive longer than the three month average.
What she didn't like was the way the PRT essentially emotionally blackmailed parents into signing their kids into the Wards. Yes, it was dangerous and yes, they needed a place to practice using their powers, especially the Brutes, Blasters and Shakers, but the way the PRT went about it left a fairly sour taste in Lady Photon's mouth.
"What's that?" Manpower asked, pointing at some blue sparks that flashed across the street they were on.
Lady Photon flew up and narrowed her eyes. A person seemed to be surfing or skating along the power lines. The blue flashes were sparks kicked up as a result of their power. The quick flashes of light they cast also revealed yellow and black clothes that could be the type used by motorcycle riders.
"Looks like it's the girl of the moment." She told her husband, "Shall we introduce ourselves?"
"That would be best, I think." Her husband agreed, "The last thing we need is for her to think we're all like Armsmaster."
So, with Lady Photon giving Manpower a lift, they followed the person they presumed to be InFamous as she seemed to head straight towards the docks area of the Bay. It was true that a lot of crime happened there, but why go there specifically, especially after taking down Lung?
A memory struck her, of Carol telling her about the disdainful attitude that InFamous seemed to have regarding the ineffectiveness of both the Protectorate and New Wave in regards to fighting crime. Was she deliberately making a point here? By going out and finding criminals as often as was possible, she was trying to make the Protectorate look bad. Could that be her goal?
Dismissing those concerns, Lady Photon continued to follow their quarry.
The girl eventually jumped off the power cables and onto a roof, floating via some sort of Electrokinetic flight via her hands. She crept over to peek around the sign on the building (it was a diner of some sort) and at the E88 gangers knocking over an electronics store.
"How did she know?" Manpower wondered softly.
"No clue." Lady Photon replied, "Let's see what she does."
It didn't take long for the new Cape to make her move. She leapt into the air, electric arcs forming around her, and slammed into the ground, sending off a large wave of electricity from her body that sent the thugs sprawling and, interestingly enough, attached some sort of electric restraints to their arms and ankles that effectively magnetised them to whatever they landed on, leading to one skinhead being stuck to a wall upside-down, while another landed on his back with his ankles next to his head.
It looked rather uncomfortable.
"CAPE!" someone hollered, as if it wasn't obvious, and five more skinheads charged out of the shop, having presumably dropped whatever loot they had been about to steal. They drew pistols and started to shoot at InFamous, but she blocked the bullets with a shield of electricity.
'Some solid Shaker powers there." Manpower opined as Lady Photon dropped him to the ground carefully.
The heroine nodded absently. She was the epitome of the flying Blaster/Shaker, being able to shield and harm in equal measure. Laserdream and Shielder, her children, each specialised in one or two areas of that. Laserdream was an excellent flying Blaster, while Shielder's skills with the defensive powers was far better. In the case of InFamous, it seemed that she had excellent Blaster and Shaker powers and fairly poor flying abilities, the lightning bolt she hurtled at one skinhead proving the Blaster part.
With a pushing motion, InFamous sent the last four skinheads flying with a one-directional variant of the shockwave she used previously, which also had the binding effect the first shockwave had. Unlike the first one though, this one also seemed to slow down the skinheads as they fell.
InFamous looked down at the bound E88 thugs and nodded before stating to systematically search them for cash, drugs and weapons. She took the money, left the drugs and guns, but took the knives.
"Hello!" Manpower said as he strode out into the street after jumping down from the building he was on. InFamous looked up in surprise.
"Manpower." She nodded politely, "You aren't here to pull an Armsmaster are you?"
"What exactly did he do?" Lady Photon asked as she floated down to hover next to her husband.
"Lady Photon." InFamous sounded a bit awed at this point, but seemed to shake it off. "He basically tried to blackmail me into joining the Wards, saying that I could have killed Lung with the amount of electricity I was using against him and that I needed to learn control."
"Urgh." The leader of New Wave groaned, "He cannot be serious!"
"That's pretty much what I said too." The Electrokinetic snorted, "I used to look up to him. Please tell me Miss Militia isn't like that?"
"Thank heavens, no she isn't." Manpower chuckled, "She's the primary liaison between New Wave and the PRT/Protectorate. She's a nice person, as well as being a sensible professional."
"Thank god." InFamous muttered, "So, how can I help you? I assume you didn't track me down to hear how much of a social incompetent Armsmaster is."
"An official welcome from New Wave." Lady Photon replied smoothly, "And apologies for Glory Girl's actions when last you met. She is…impetuous, to put it mildly."
"That's one way to put it." InFamous chuckled, "I don't mind, really. Compared to Armsmaster, Glory Girl doesn't even rate a decimal point on the asshole scale."
"Thank you." Lady Photon said with a nod.
"The reason why we wanted to meet you is that New Wave makes a habit of greeting any new Independent Capes to offer aid and advice." Manpower explained, "No offense, but new Parahumans generally don't know about the Unwritten Rules or how things are done in regards to phoning in captured criminals."
"No offense taken." The Electrokinetic replied with a shrug, "I haven't heard of the Unwritten Rules, but they have been alluded to by a couple of people, villains I've fought or met; Rune two nights ago and someone from the Undersiders…Tattletale, I think she said her name was."
"So…you fought Rune and talked to Tattletale?" Manpower hazarded.
"Yup. The big three gangs are my targets." InFamous nodded her masked head, "The little ones like Über and L33t, the Undersiders and Faultline's Crew are chump-change by comparison. I'll move on to them once the big three are dealt with…if they deserve it."
"If they deserve it?" Lady Photon asked archly.
InFamous shrugged. "I'm a solo vigilante, with limited ability under law to persecute criminals. I checked the newspaper archives, both physical and online and discovered that the PRT has a habit of using the times vigilantes go over the set limits to conscript them into the Wards or the Protectorate. I don't wanna be a part of the Protectorate, so I'm limited to catching criminals in the act -like this sorry lot- or helping out either New Wave or the Protectorate on join ops, which is rarer than hens' teeth."
Lady Photon, despite herself, had to smile in approval. This girl had done her research and was doing everything she could to avoid being drafted by the PRT like so many Independents were. She hated hearing about it happening in other cities, aside from cases like Shadow Stalker, who needed to be leashed.
That brought up another question. "Why, may I ask, are you so determined to remain unaffiliated with either the PRT or us? I know what you told Glory Girl, but is that all there is to it?"
"What, bitterness?" the yellow and black wearing Cape said knowingly, "No, that isn't all. The main thing is, the PRT and New Wave are known qualities. The gangs know you all, know your powersets and can, generally speaking, predict how each one of you will react. Me? I'm an unknown. They don't know me, can't predict me, not yet anyway. What the gangs don't know, they'll fear. What they fear, they'll either slip up and make mistakes to avoid or go out of their way to find me. Better them coming for me than a poor black or Jewish family who can't protect themselves, at least in the case of the E88."
There was a moment of silence as the two New Wave Parahumans absorbed the fact that InFamous was allowing herself to essentially become a lightning rod for the attention of the gangs and their Capes in order to draw even a small amount of heat from the civilians of the city.
"That's…" Lady Photon started hesitantly.
"Suicidal? Foolish? Hare-brained? All of the above?" InFamous asked wryly, "I know that. Still, it's the right choice to make. And the right choice is seldom an easy path. I don't plan on letting myself get killed though, don't worry on that account. Fight smarter, not harder."
Lady Photon remained quiet as Manpower gave InFamous the basic rundown about the Unwritten Rules, lost in thought.
'A girl, who looks to be of similar age to Amy, is making such a rash and suicidal decision.' She thought as Manpower and InFamous debated, 'What can I do? She's made it clear that she doesn't want help from us…'
An idea struck her. The reason why InFamous felt she had to do this was because, from her perspective, New Wave and the Protectorate didn't do enough. The PRT kept the Wards to Publicity Patrols on the relatively crime-free areas of the city, such as the Broadwalk, while the Protectorate kept to the same schedules and rarely deviated from them.
On the other hand, New Wave had been in decline since the death of Fleur and the departure thereafter of Lightstar. Panacea and Glory Girl had been the most active members, but as Panacea was a non-combatant, it left Glory Girl to wave the flag. Brandish buried herself in her work as a lawyer, Flashbang was clinically depressed, Laserdream preferred to go to college than fight crime and Shielder worked best in a group of at least two thanks to the way his powers had panned out. As for her and her husband…Lady Photon admitted to herself that something had broken inside when Fleur had been murdered. She had spent less and less time in costume, with Manpower following her lead, until she rarely became Lady Photon more than once a month.
Now a powerful and promising girl was risking her life, for what reason Lady Photon didn't know, but she knew one thing; Sarah Pelham had been unable to do anything to save Fleur. This time though, she could at least help InFamous before she did something stupid. Indirectly, of course, as the girl would likely be wary of any perceived attempts to get her to join a group. Getting the rest of New Wave to start patrolling on a regular basis again would be a good start.
"So then," she said lightly once her husband and the other Cape finished talking, "Do you mind if we accompany you on your patrol? If we can give a report to Miss Militia that you have no control problems, it would go a ways to defanging anything that Armsmaster might be stirring up with the PRT."
InFamous' body language let off a surprised reaction. "Um…sure. That would be nice. Thanks."
"Very good." The leader of New Wave smiled, "Let's be off then."
OK, so I've started writing these again. Celebrate and all that jazz. For those of you wondering where my update of Swordsaint has gotten off to, it was partially corrupted and had to be deleted in the same incident that affected my Naruto Gamer story. I've made sure it cannot happen again, so have no fears!