by Louis IX
Check first chapter for disclaimer and global warnings. Not owning any right over console games or characters, here.
Super Smash Sis Brawl''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The Supposedly Contaminated Locker"Everything alright in there, Tay-Tay?" came the mocking voice of Emma, behind the locked locker door – locked or not, I wouldn't know, as there was no mean to open it from the inside anyways. They would not truly lock me in there, would they?
"LET ME OUT!" I tried to screech, only for some garbled words to escape my mouth. I had smelled the horrid scent when I had approached my locker, you see, and seeing the Trio's smirks beforehand, I hadn't wanted to get further in. But Sophia had grabbed me, and knocked me against the walls a few times, enough to split my lips, perhaps dislodge a tooth or three, and stagger me enough that I couldn't really resist when she ended up pushing me in my locker. They hadn't wanted their "prank" to misfire, had they?
"You're in your place, now." growled Sophia, the sound really close, and I tried to bang the door facing me. When she stopped speaking, I almost smiled… only for her to kick the door with all her might. It dented inside, hitting me again and pushing me further inside. "Don't you dare move away." she finished.
"See you tomorrow, Taylor." came Madison's voice, getting away. "Or never, preferably."
I tried to push the door again, but I had no leverage. The space was small already, and they had had to fold my feeble and unresisting body to fit me there already. I couldn't even breathe properly – not that I would, given the stench of the mulch I was in. I was alternating between trying to vomit again, and hyperventilating. And I'm sure that I was already burning from inside. "Please… help me…" I breathed as I was passing out.
I awoke later and was disoriented. What had happened? Memories came forward slowly, and I remember having been pushed inside a cramped locker… and I was still in there. However, it reeked much less, and I was much less uncomfortable, despite taking all the possible space inside the rectangular container.
All the space.
I tried to feel the thing around me, and quickly realized that I had absolutely no mean to move. My body seemed to have expanded to encompass the whole locker. I was also numb in places, and itching like mad in others. Remembering the refuse at my feet, I jumped to the conclusion that I had been feasted upon by the insects and germs there, and that I was already dying. I panicked, again, and took a deep breath (an action that, for some reason, I now could take), and screamed.
"LET ME OUT!"
The door rattled. Nearby windows shattered. And I felt a hand grasping my neck from behind and pulling. In the direction of the wall behind me. And through it. Into the bathroom that was behind the lockers' wall.
"Shut it, Hebert!" Sophia's angry voice sounded, before gasping. "What? What are you? Where is she?"
I was hyperventilating, again, but I now had enough space around me to really really fill my lungs… or what counted as lungs, now. With Sophia facing me, she ended up caught in the massive draft, and I swallowed her whole. Yes, because despite being slightly smaller than her, now, I was now a ball of pink flesh with an enormous mouth… and a bottomless pit for a stomach.
That's when I saw myself in the mirror, and I freaked out again. I had big eyes and small arms and legs, and despite being able to move them quickly, I couldn't reach around my own body despite it being quite malleable. In fact, as I tried to jump to see myself better (I was smaller than my earlier self after all), I hit myself on the counter… with no visible effect. And as I was still hyperventilating as I jumped, I also realized that I could jump higher by taking a breath mid-jump.
The door opened, and Madison entered. But instead of snarling at me, she smiled widely. "Kirby!" she exclaimed, lunging to hug me. I sidestepped her quickly, my nimble feet moving me away from her grasping arms, and she hit her head on the counter. I could see her bag, on her shoulder, and noticed the similarities between the video game character she loved so much… and me.
I was Kirby. Damn. How was that possible?
My mind cleared a bit and I realized that I was probably a parahuman, now. But was I a Case 53 with a strange body, or a Changer? Since it was rumoured that the 53s lose their memory, I must be the latter, which meant that I could revert to my normal form, right?
Could I still be myself? I tried, but something in my stomach prevented me from doing so. Right. Sophia. Or, if my newly-cleared mind would imply: Shadow Stalker. After all, no normal human could have reached and pulled me through a wall. The only cape I knew with that kind of power was a Ward. Wasn't that grand, to have authority figures betray you so deeply?
I knew I couldn't get outside as Kirby, especially as there was enough noise in the corridor for me to realize that my last scream must have put the school in alarm, evacuating the students. I had to get rid of what was in my stomach. But how could I vomit on command? It wasn't like my new arm was long enough to reach inside my new mouth…
Oh. Right. I could spit her. And as I did so, aiming at the nearest stall, I realized that my stomach didn't contain only the black parahuman. I hadn't realized before, but my locker hadn't smelled that badly, after I passed out (and it wasn't only because I didn't have a nose anymore). Kirby (and me, now) must have a stomach of steel, because I had swallowed everything that was in the locker. And now, every bit of refuse was spat out at Sophia, covering her whole.
Only then was I able to reform my body as Taylor Hebert, whereupon I retched again (on an empty stomach) and hurried away, following the students' stampede. I didn't see Emma anywhere… and I didn't particularly care.
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The News in the Wards' Room"Welcome to Brockton Bay's evening newscast, I'm Tom Tomson Jr." the talking head said. "Without further ado, let's head to Winslow, with our intrepid reporter on site. What happened, Veronica?"
"Yes, Tom. This morning, as classes were underway, a scream was reported, so loud that it broke nearby windows. People thought the Slaughterhouse was in town, and the alarm was sounded for an evacuation."
"Was it? The Nine, I mean. Are there casualties?" Tom asked in a casual way – he was a professional… and also knew the answers already.
"No. Shatterbird's ability is rumoured to cover much more than a few windows. But there were several people wounded in the stampede. Two girls were trampled and suffer a few broken bones among them. A young man was pushed by the crowd against the door leading outside before it could be unlatched. Several students were found unconscious on site, but there was merely the case of head-butting against each other, mostly. Or walls. And there might have been a broken pipe in a girl's bathroom, as one girl came out covered in filth. She was thought as bleeding, too, but it was only tampons – that's why we always tell girls not to throw tampons into the toilet bowls, you know?"
"Yeah. Right." Tom squirmed, as he didn't seem at ease with the subject. "No parahuman involvement, then, Veronica?"
"Apparently not, although the PRT has come on site to check. The boy pressed against the door might have unlocked it with the use of a newly-discovered parahuman power, but we don't know more about this. And there was a happenstance when a girl was discovered inside a giant marshmallow."
"A… what?"
"Yes, apparently, and the PRT confirms, a student had had what they call a Trigger Event, and became a parahuman to escape being trampled to death herself, by surrounding herself with a thick layer of protecting sugary fluffness. Reports indicate it's peach-flavoured."
The screen went dark right before the remote was thrown at it. "I don't even like peaches!" exclaimed Emma Barnes, newly inducted Ward.
"You have it nice and comfy." grumbled Sophia, sitting uncomfortably on the sofa, near her. "I'm allergic to tampons, now."
"What? What are you… using, now?"
"Pads. It irks like nothing else, and it's much too visible in costume. And little Piggy doesn't want me to call PR for a change in costume, just for this."
Emma stayed silent for a while, remembering what her own nightmare with the PR department. And Legal, too. "What happened to Taylor?" she asked in the end.
"Told you she was a pink ball." Sophia said, before smirking. "Like you."
"What?" Emma screeched. "Like me? How dare you!" she exclaimed, before squinting at her partner. A gesture, and marshmallow was summoned again, in a ball around Sophia. "There! See who's the pink ball, now."
Normally, Sophia could have phased through matter to escape the ball. For some reason, she couldn't, now, and had to eat peach-flavoured confectionary for a while before she could breathe normally again.
And she didn't like peach either.
Meanwhile, Vista had scowled at the two and picked the remote through the use of her power. The thing was protected with a silicone sleeve so that it wouldn't break the television when Emma inevitably threw it at the screen, like she seemed to do quite often – it didn't take more than one hour to get the feeling that the new Ward was going to be as insufferable as Shadow Stalker… in a brand new way. Joy.
It wasn't only because of her many temper tantrums: it was also because she was friendly with Shadow Stalker, and considered, like her, the others as beneath her.
She clicked the button to display the news again.
"-office, and the police has nothing more to say about that." a reporter was saying from an unremarkable street.
"Thank you, Alfred." Tom Tomson Jr said. "And now, our daily dose of heroism. Maria?"
"Oh no…" Dennis moaned, slapping his forehead. "Here we come."
"Indeed, Tom." the other talking head intervened. "We have received a memo from the PRT telling about two new heroes joining the Wards: Peach, and Browbeat."
"Hm." Browbeat hummed. Not talkative, he had said nothing until then, and didn't seem to want to expand on his expectoration.
"Given that some people spy on others, there already are messages on PHO about Über and Leet wanting to crash the two new heroes' introduction." Maria continued speaking. "According to them, Peach is already the name of a game character, much like Mario and Luigi."
"How do they know Mario and Luigi?" Emma asked, straightening up suddenly.
"You're joking!" Dennis exclaimed, turning his head towards her so fast that it was stuck there for several seconds. And as the rest of his body followed suit, he was facing her, but looking to the side, a strange view indeed. "You know two guys named Mario and Luigi?" he asked. "Plumbers? With overalls?"
"Well… they do plumbing, yes, but also the dishes, and serve. And not always in overalls." she replied, ignoring the many ways her answer could be understood. "They are two young men working at the Italian restaurant my family uses to go to. Them and their cousin-"
"Wario?"
"No, Leonardo. Why?"
"And let me guess, Leonardo, he likes pizza?"
"Well… yes."
"Is he… a turtle?"
"A what?"
"Yes! A teenage mutant ninja turtle?" Dennis' laugh, strained as it was (because of his cricked neck), was enough to have him suddenly encased in peachy goodness. "Thanks!"
"Anyways, those two are complete nerds and I want nothing to do with them." Emma said, sitting back with her arms folded.
"Mario and Luigi?"
"No! Über and Leet!"
"Guys!" Vista interrupted. Her power allowing her to shorten the distance between her ears and the telly, she could follow the news despite the noise around her. "Listen to this!"
Tom Tomson Jr was quite pale as he read from his teleprompter in a trembling voice – not so professional, then. And the screen was harbouring the famous "Breaking news" indicating somewhat happening right that moment. "-got confirmation that Lung is on rampage."
"WHAT!" was the collective word uttered by the Wards (or something similar, as Sophia swore).
"Here's the video." the talking head said, nodding as an embedded screen started to show what came out of a website, streaming live from someone with a phone (the feed was trembling, and sometimes moving). "We urge the people nearby not to stay around." Tom Tomson Jr said over the sound of an angry dragon. "Even if it seems that the Protectorate is already dealing with the threat. We can see Shadow Stalker engaging the villain."
"What?" the still-encased Breaker exclaimed. "How? I'm right here, you buffoon!"
But, truly, there was a shadowy figure passing through walls and dragons, and pelting this one with projectiles.
That's when Triumph entered the room, using his newly-given Protectorate status to bypass the alarm. "Does anyone know why Sophia is fighting Lung?" he asked, before doing a double-take when seeing the aforementioned girl sitting there, in a fluffy pink cloud. "What are you doing here?"
"You prefer me flash-fried by Lung?" Sophia snarked. "Besides, I don't have my power anymore."
"What? But…"
"I can't even get out of this, I had to chew peaches, and I don't even like peach!"
"You don't like me?" Emma asked, hurt.
"Not Peach-you, peach as in the peaches." Sophia replied before frowning. "Who chose "Peach" for your name anyways?"
"PR." Emma sulked – used to do temper tantrums in front of people, she couldn't deal with an administrative decision coming from on high.
Dennis, or Clockblocker, opened his mouth to add to the pun in progress, only for Sophia to scream suddenly, shake… and phase through the marshmallow. "Your powers returned, it seems." he deadpanned.
"Seems so." she replied wonderingly.
"But who's fighting Lung, then?" Triumph asked.
"Lung, it looks like." Vista replied, having ignored the commotion in order to focus on the television. Again.
"What?" the others asked, grouping in front of the screen. And, there really were two draconic shapes wreathed in flame, fighting each other.
"Oh my god, there's two of them." Kid Win said – used to Tinker, he had ignored much of the byplay until now.
"How is it possible?" Triumph asked himself…
…only for Vista to answer. "The feed's quality is bad, the guy is always moving and we don't see everything. But, at one moment, we have someone impersonating Shadow Stalker, and a minute later… Lung."
"A power copier?" Triumph asked.
"More like thief." Sophia grumbled, the rest of her sentence made of muttered threats upon the miscreant who had dared take her powers.
"If Lung's powers are stolen, how can we have two of them?" Dennis asked.
"When the two Lungs started fighting, one was smaller." Vista remarked, ignoring any anatomy joke that could be make about the Asian dragon's chosen name. "It quickly grew to the other's size. Now, they're roughly the same size, but only one is still growing."
"Power thief, except that Lung is stuck in dragon mode, and can't de-escalate?" Carlos asked. "That's… bad."
On the screen, the bigger dragon found himself at the stage where wings sprouted on its back. Apparently, that's what the cape wanted, as it stopped simply fighting and grasped its land-bound opponent before flying over the bay… and then into the ocean proper. Both flaming Lungs created quite a steam cloud when entering the deep water… and nothing more could be seen. Even with the professional quality of the feed – the news network had sent a chopper early on, and it had followed the flight over the Bay.
Protectorate heroes sent to stop the battle had had to turn to the other direction, back to the Rig, and then on a boat to check the depths of the ocean. Neither Lung resurfaced. And since it was known that Alexandria had had to rescue him when Kyushu sunk, and that he couldn't swim, it was established that Lung was dead.
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The Asian LieutenantsTaylor quickly realized that getting rid of Lung might have been an error – even if she hadn't meant to kill him: for her, and many children in the "First World", swimming lessons were mandatory and done in school, and she couldn't conceive of an adult unable to swim.
Despite the unfolding chaos, she also knew that she wouldn't have acted in any other way, given what she knew at that moment. She had simply reacted by instinct when she had heard him tell his goons to "shoot the children". He hadn't been speaking of pre-adolescent children, though: like when older people sometimes speak of people younger than themselves as "children", they have not been real children.
Those "children" were the Undersiders, a group of capes with enough wherewithal to steal from the dragon and get away with it… for a time. And then for good when Lung disappeared.
However, the "Dragon of Kyushu" had a mystique to him: unbeatable, he was the aegis under which the Asian gang was protected from the others. Not only that, but it was also the one under which all Asians were kept together. Remove this, and the Asians became easy targets for the other gangs… and they attacked each other, too.
Once again aiming at somewhat visible signs of commonality, Oni Lee reacted (a bit late, as was his habit) by taking the Japanese people under his wing.
Gathering people under a common banner was helped by the appearance of several parahumans, a few of them having triggered in their panic of being targeted next, after seeing their protector sunk.
Lung's other lieutenant, recruited recently, was named Bakuda and was a bomb Tinker. Her vaguely Chinese ancestry allowed her to recruit those identified as such under her banner. Like Oni Lee, she had been privy to some of Lung's inner monologues, and knew that the violent people had to be constrained in ordered gangs if one didn't want violence to erupt everywhere. That way, they would get to fight when their leaders ordered them too, and not before.
For her own second-in-command, she took another fresh trigger from the Winslow stampede: Carina. The girl was half-Chinese, half-Latino, and a ward of the State already because her mother, Lustrum, was in the Birdcage. Like other family ties, powers bred true, and Carina became a Master… of males. Or rather "male", singular. It had helped her when she had been pressed against a corridor wall because of the evacuation, and when she got the help of the biggest jock she could find to get out.
Like many, her power was strange. She could only master one subject at a time, and only by giving him "quests" (at the completion of which she'd offer "rewards"). She also had two secondary powers: one was Tinker, to craft those rewards (contrary to most, she couldn't Tinker for herself); the second was Changer, for when she didn't have a male to command. That allowed her to actually become one – she "simply" had a change of external appearance to appear as such, not a sudden growth in any indicator that would place her above other people. That also helped her understand the male point of view on current societal issues… and her "Woohoo I'm suddenly privileged!" died a short death.
At Winslow, Carina had a boyfriend, who was himself half-Chinese half-Japanese. Although he was already inducted in Oni Lee's gang, he was willing to continue their relationship as she wished (which meant part-time, now), sometimes helping as a link between the two gangs. Carina helped by Tinkering some equipment for him, most notably a shield and a sword.
And, of course, when he took the name Link and had to explain geek culture to her, she ended up choosing the cape name of Zelda.
Another new trigger was a rotund man with an already impressive reputation for being easy to anger (and ugly). Triggering with a specific fear in head, he became the second coming of Lung, in a way: able to grow larger and sturdier (and uglier), he was quite a Brute – although, thankfully, unable to put himself on fire. Initially named Bo and fan of a certain series of movies involving thrones, he called himself Bo-ser. Others called him Bozilla. He didn't gather people by race, though, preferring to live in his neighbourhood. Incidentally, since it was mostly populated by Vietnamese people, he ended up a de facto leader for them.
The other Asians who didn't want to identify as either Japanese or Chinese grouped themselves in another gang, led mainly by another duo of new capes, two Korean brothers named Kong. It happened to become their cape name too, as they had triggered into Changers, their secondary form being primates.
The elder became a Brute/Striker bigger than both normal humans and gorillas, with a Shaker secondary power that created small earthquakes when he struck the ground. The younger became a Blaster, his power allowing him to throw explosive bananas.
Yep, we're heading there.
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The Fractured CommunitiesThe Asian Bad Boys wasn't the only gang to splinter.
As a gang, the Merchants practically exploded. Skidmark had been on the path of the Protectorate heroes sent to deal with Lung, and hadn't been quite the opposition he dreamed himself to be.
Without him, the gang disintegrated even faster than the ABB. Mush was the second one to be apprehended, and the man was sent to the Parahuman Asylum because of psychological problems, as well as some issues with the tentacles he used to gather trash around his body. There, he met another tentacle-based cape, a Case 53 named Sveta. Apparently, they escaped together and live their own happily ever after, with many tentacled kids (don't ask).
Squealer and Trainwreck were then poached by the Empire, because of their pale skin, blue eyes, and dirty blond hair. Except they didn't like that and made it known. As a rot that contaminated the whole fruit, their vocal opposition to bringing in all the white people in opposition to all the other tones of skin succeeded… in rupturing the Empire into factions.
Like the ABB before them, the E88 was greatly reduced when the Russians left to create their own mafia, led by Trainwreck himself. The Case 53 had discovered his Slavic origin from other Russians in the Empire, who recognized his heavy accent and foreign expressions.
Trainwreck had taken advantage of his short stay in the (relatively) good graces of Kaiser to get himself access to good metal, and his prosthetics worked better than ever. He could even, now, pull his limbs into his round armour, becoming like a bowling ball – although he did not paint himself blue and did definitely not call himself Sonic.
He was assisted by another fresh trigger, named Siobhan. Haughty older sister of Rune, she already saw her racist family with an evil eye and wanted nothing to do with them or the previous Empire. Her power was the Tinkering of chemical fluids of all kinds, but, like all Tinkers, she was able to fabricate a power armour for herself, as well as a couple weapons – a cannon and a whip.
Given her specialty, she was able to create a solution in which nervous interfaces could be grown and cultivated, and used it to fill her armour, granting her better reflexes in it. To the point of preferring to live inside it rather than out. She was also able to grant Trainwreck the ultimate cyborg advance, in that he kept his brain in a vat of her liquid interface, inside a completely prosthetic body.
The white gang thus fractured, its other internal divisions became more visible. Sparked by whatever leaked from Earth Aleph, there were soon groups of various interests inside, aiming for further dismantling. Thus came the animal-driven portion, headed by Hookwolf (no, that wasn't animal welfare). He took with him those interested in fight clubs, like Stormtiger and Cricket.
And he still kept his dog fight ring, despite Bitch joining them: despite her will to save "all the dogs", at her debut, the girl had already been convinced (by Tattletale, of all people) that it wasn't feasible. All in all, she was all for Hookwolf's philosophy about Nature being about the survival of the fittest.
Yes, Bitch dumped the Undersiders. Devoid of their transportation and attack vectors, the others saw the writing on the wall. Regent left first, to join Über and Leet – he had done side jobs for them, and liked their gaming installation.
There, he found another acolyte, who introduced himself as Greg Veder, or "Ash", Pokemon trainer, and fresh trigger from Winslow. And, true, the boy was able to create projections from thrown cards. And thanks to Leet, he had a Pokeball to catch the creatures afterwards, storing them and their experience into a newly-printed card.
Rune, of all people, led a splinter geared towards female hegemony. With Fenja and Menja, she tried Lustrum's way again, only to be smacked down by Purity. Afterwards, she still worked for women, but with more attention to the whole society. Preferring that peaceful way, Purity joined.
Victor and Othala led another split of the Empire, made of those people whose sexuality wasn't tolerated by the Nazis. Their marriage had been decided by their family, and they only respected it in public. With their splinter group for gay rights, they could finally live their married life how they wanted: separately.
As for Kaiser and Alabaster, both opportunists, they tried several gangs before making their own, in which they were joined by those preferring business over anything else. Coil joined immediately, bringing Tattletale with him. And since the Travellers had no more use for him, he dismissed them, at which point they left the city.
Krieg and Crusader stayed with the core people of the original Empire: the fundamentally racist ones. And it irked them that several people with white skin, in their group, had a religion, culture, or nationality, that was frowned upon by their role models. Night and Fog having been on loan from the Gesellschaft (the Empire Eighty-Eight's mothership), they returned home when said Empire crumbled.
Squealer kept to her moving vehicles, and gathered the Gypsies around her. She wasn't seen much in town after that, preferring to travel around. Especially when the drugs stopped coming to her, making her move farther and farther to get her fix.
When the Merchants collapsed, Whirlygig tried to sell the suitcase she had been chained to, without success. Instead, she had been caught in a darkened street, killed, and the suitcase's content taken by several people.
Eventually drunk, the power-granting vials didn't work as intended, clearly: among the six people using them, two died, and two ended up with physical mutations that prevented them from functioning correctly… and died too, eventually.
Only the last two vials granted usable powers: the first one to disintegrate anything its user touches; the second to manifest wings to fly around, and deliver overpowered punches. After discovering their powers, the imbibers called themselves Scrub and Falcon, and decided to spring Skidmark out of prison – they knew the man had contacts to provide them with good booze. They then became Skidmark's lieutenants in the new Merchants' organization – which they insisted to call the Panthers, for some reason. Apparently, Skidmark had been visited by some people, during his stay, and had been swayed into preaching allegiance to a new credo.
Grue ended up joining the Panthers, because he didn't have much of a choice, with all those groups establishing monochromatic gangs. Still, once inside, he was enough of a voice of reason to convince the others not to engage in criminal activities. Illegal, perhaps, but not outright criminal. That allowed him enough leeway when everything would come to a head.
Seeing "her" city going from two gangs (and three minor ones) to twelve, Emily Piggot got an aneurism. It led the PRT leaderless for a while, and the Protectorate heroes didn't want to be slaughtered by putting themselves between groups that hated each other. That led some people to take a stand in its place, and propose a solution that allowed that hate to evaporate.
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The Introduction to the Future"Welcome… to the Arena!" Über's booming voice resonated in the large warehouse, and on the various screens the scene was transmitted to. "This is where battles will take place! And our first fight, tonight, is between Kaiser and Grue, on one side, and Alabaster and Skidmark, on the other. Yes, as you can see, the ex-Empire capes aren't happy about that, but they also didn't read the fine script when signing up for a fight. We keep the right to rearrange teams for a better spectacle.
"But first, a word from our sponsors. The Mayor Office of Brockton Bay wishes everyone a good fight, and reminds everyone that attacking with cape powers outside of designated time and areas is prohibited. The city will deal with grievance in the time-honoured political way, and will never accept violence. If your powers make you yearn for a fight, come here and you'll find it!
"Fortress Construction, now, wishes you a good fight too. They helped build this Arena with several layers of protection for the public, and our first battle tonight will help refine them and work out the kinks. Maybe later we'll add bleachers so that people could get closer to the action? Stay tuned for more!
"The Community Outreach Committee also wanted a word edgewise, and here it is: whichever your community is, whichever your leanings are, whoever you are, you are not alone. You can always find other people like you. You will also find that there are more people different from you than there are like you, and it is not a reason to be afraid of them. Peace and love, people. Peace and love.
"Wolf-and-Bitch's Pit has this to say: if you wanna fight, come to us too! That's all. Remember that any fighting club wanting official approval has to follow a few rules.
"The Protectorate has this to say: Brockton Bay is an interesting place to be, as other cities do things differently. If you are a cape and want to move somewhere else, call us to facilitate your installation wherever you go. And if you simply want to join a historically successful community of law-abiding capes, join us! Forget about those who left us for greener pastures! We have merchandizing! And Tinker budgets!
"That's all from the sponsors, and I'd like to thank our new mentor, Assault, for getting them all. Now, refereeing the battle is Tattletale, who will know everything you do before you even do it, so refrain from lethal move, people. And Panacea is on site to help, if needed.
"And now… Time… For… BATTLE!"
In the aisles beyond the Arena, Taylor watched the fight with interested eyes… and a nervous smile: afterwards, she was to step on the Arena herself, in a free-for-all bout against Peach, Zelda, and Samus (Siobhan's cape name). She couldn't wait.
And, yes, she took the name of Kirby.
Because… why not?
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
To be continued… or smashed downAuthor's Notes: Not sure what that would do to Scion. Or Endbringers – will she take Eidolon's power to control them? Also, I blame this ficlet on my kids, who got the SSBB disc out, dusted it off, and played during Christmas break. Joy. Also: yes, this one has started being written at Christmas. I have a dozen more chapters in various states of writing, right now.