Detonation 5-6
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"Why do they make us get out in the back alleyways?" I gave the nearby dumpster a wary look. You could practically see the smell coming coming off that thing.
"We'll have you ever seen a group of heroes arrive and pile out of a van?" Assault laughed. "More soccer practice than heroic, y'know?"
Alice snorted.
"Looks clear." Battery reported. "Let's go."
I rolled my eyes and followed Alice. I mean who ever heard of sneaking into public view?
"Streets are still pretty deserted." I noted.
"Well we are in the industrial district of the Docks and most of the ABB are in custody or in hiding." Battery returned.
"Or dead." Alice pointed out.
"Unfortunately." Assualt said. "But yes, thank you."
Alice frowned, "Yeah, inappropriate, sorry." And she genuinely sounded it.
"Wasn't your old hide out near here?" I asked her.
Alice gave me a side ways look. "What you mean?"
Right. Nothing about Tattletale.
"So what are we doing in the docks?" I changed the subject as hard as I could.
Assualt rubbed at his chin. "There have been reports of missing people in this area."
"Not really a reason to call the Capes." Alice said dryly. "What's weird about it?"
"Each person that has gone missing had been replaced by seemingly random objects." Assault shook his head in disbelief at his own words.
"What?" I asked.
"There has only been one witness to it but a man disappeared from his home to be replaced with a newspaper bin." Assault tried to demonstrate with is hands but it was more confusing than helpful. "Happened right in front of his wife in the other room."
"That's pretty weird." I agreed.
"Sounds like power bullshit to me."
Battery's response was habit at this point, "language."
As was Alice's, "Yeah, sorry."
"Crimes by capes." Assault gestured at our group. "So here we are."
Alice snorted. "What are they hoping one of us will get abducted?" Then she groaned. "They want me to use my powers to play detective?"
"Bingo."
"Ugh, I knew getting out in costume would be a hassle." Alice leaned against me. "Carry me?"
I bumped her back onto her own feet. "We don't even know where we are going."
"They're taking us to the mailbox guy's house." Alice rolled her hand as if it was obvious.
"Newspaper bin." Battery corrected.
"Whatever."
"Okay but I don't know where it is." I pointed out.
"Annnnd you can't go out without your mentors." Assault reminded.
"Look at you being Mr. responsible." Alice joked.
Assualt beamed at Battery.
"Yeah go ahead and ruin the moment." Battery returned his prideful smile with a roll of her eyes.
A few blocks, one speeding van, and an actual request to Assault and Battery for an autograph later, we stood outside a building at the edge of the residential district once claimed by the ABB.
"Hmm." Alice pulled the brim of her hat down to fiddle with the goggles before sliding them on. "Notice the only windows face away from the rest of the neighborhood."
I gave her a sideways glance. I was used to being left on the dusty wayside of the tails of thought. "Which means?"
She shrugged. "Dunno yet." She looked all around the front of the building and up and down the street.
"Shall we head inside?" Assault asked.
"Wisp and I will stay out here." Battery said. "I don't know if we will find anything but we should look up and down the street and check the roof access too."
"Good idea." Alice mumbled as she started up at the building.
"Come on Wisp we have some work to do."
.
"Find anything?" Battery asked when Assualt and Alice eventually emerged from the house.
Alice shrugged. "The guy was below average height, above average weight, and in the middle for everything else. He and his wife weren't living pay check to paycheck but it was close so we can rule out ransom. The guy works cleanup for the city and his wife works in the kitchen of the diner up the street. Really just some guy."
"What about the newsbin?" I asked.
"Beat up and covered with graffiti and old flyers. Probably hasn't been used for newspapers in years."
"We think we found where it came from." Battery turned to look across the street.
Alice perked up. "Really?"
We lead her over to the discolored mark on the side walk we found.
"Looks to be the right size." Alice turned to look back at the building. "Wrong angle to be able to see into the room from here…ugh I hate trying to figure out power shit."
Battery sighed.
"Sorry," Alice responded automatically.
"What do you mean?" I asked her.
Alice sighed. "I mean it's obvious that the news bin replaced dudeman."
"Duncan." Assualt supplied.
"That's what I said," Alice continued. "But we don't know if Dudeman popped up here." She gestured to the spot on the sidewalk. "If he popped up somewhere else, or if he got shunted into another reality or something."
"Huh." This was way over my head already.
"Then there is the whole where was the cape thing?" Alice threw her hands up in the air. "Do they need to replace the person they disappeared? Do they need line of sight? Is the replacement thing a quirk of the power, and intended feature, or some stupid idea to throw a off?"
Oh boy.
"There are too many factors and not enou-" she cut herself off looking at the street drain. "Huh, would you look at that." Ah bent down and fished a shoe out of the street drain with the end of her umbrella. "I guess dudeman-"
"Duncan."
"-was here after all." She finished dropping the shoe to the side walk.
"How do you know it's his?" Battery asked.
"The other one was squashed under the mailbox."
"News bin."
"Well that's one question answered." She tapped a finger to her chin. "Maybe two. From the point of arrival to here, and the fact he lost a shoe… I think dudeman was for sure abducted. First out of his house and then again from right here into a vehicle. Likely a van or maybe a small box truck."
"This is going to give me a headache." Assault groaned.
"Join the club" Alice's voice was dry. "This is going to bother me for days if we can't figure it out."
"Let's do another sweep of the area to see if something else jumps out at you." Battery suggested.
"I hope not." Alice snarled back. "I hate surprises."
Battery gave her a look.
"I know. I know." Alice quelled. "Not what you meant."
We walked the street again but found nothing.
"Well," Alice said after a second lap around the area. "I don't know about you guys, but I have no id-"
I turned to look back to see what could cut Alice off mid sentence.
Only Alice wasn't there. Instead the was a plastic drum partially filled with water.
"Fuck." Assualt whirled around.
Ice flooded my veins.
Alice. Some one took her.
"Did you see anything?" Battery hissed as she and Assualt faced opposite directions.
"Dammit, no!" He growled. "Wisp get cover."
I was still staring at the water barrel. They took Alice. Lisa. They took Lisa.
Fire replaced the ice in my veins and I blasted the fucking water barrel.
They took Lisa.
"Did you hear that?" Battery snapped.
"No. Which direction?" Assault turned slightly to keep Battery in his peripheral vision.
"Up the street. Around the corner I think." Battery poised to move. "We need to move together."
I focused on the corner of the roof at the intersection and teleported. Turning to get my bearing I saw a van peeling away from the curb and heading away. Something bright and blue on the street.
Her umbrella.
The Van.
There was no time to fill in Assault and Battery. The Van was already veering around the next corner. I judged the rooftops hastily and jumped. Sighted in on the van and the available building and jumped again. And again. And again.
The bastard was weaving through traffic and city blocks in a clear attempt to loose me. And with the growing strain on my powers it was going to work.
Unless.
I crouched and judged my timing before I teleported onto the hood of the van just as it slowed to make a turn onto the next street. For an instant I saw the driver. Man wearing a vest with netting and a ski mask. Another just like the first in the passenger seat. But my focus was on the interior of the rear of the van where three men stood over a bound Alice.
Then the laws of physics caught up to reality and I was slammed into the windshield and thrown off to the side as the vehicle made the turn.
It hurt.
It hurt a lot. I tried to stand but one of my legs wasn't working right.
But I'd had a worse day in a bank seemingly so long ago now. So I gritted my teeth and focused on the back of the van.
Physics again slammed me around as I popped into existence within the van with zero velocity and the vans at whatever was just beyond fuck that hurts point I need a vacation. Luckily this time there were other bodies to help absorb the impact. There was a lot of cursing and thrashing as four people tried to shrug off sudden acceleration/deceleration and right themselves. Lisa yelling about something I wasn't in a position to listen to. I just focused on getting close enough to Lisa. I managed to wrap an arm over her torso and get a boot in the face at the same time. Without a destination in mind I clung to Lisa and teleported.
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We landed on my bed, this time with Lisa on top. And I screamed, or tried to as her weight on my chest knocked the wind out of me. My body cramped up all at once and with the damage it had already suffered….. well this one was going to be on my personal highlights reel for pain for sure.
Lisa rolled off and with her hands and feet bound was unable to stop before she fell onto the floor with a thud and groan of impact. "Tay?" She groaned. "You okay?"
"Ow." I groaned back.
"Yeah." She agreed. "Anything serious?"
"Ow." Was all I could manage.
"Yeah you take a minute." I could hear her shuffling around on the floor before snap and a clear sigh of relief. "Thank god they didn't have time to check my coat sleeves too well." Her hand clutching the now severed zip ties appeared over the edge of the bed as she used it for support to stand.
I grunted in an acknowledgment that she said something. I was trying to to ignore the rather odd and intensely growing pain from my knee. Doubly so now that I could see the shape wasn't right.
"Damn." Lisa looked over my leg. "Dislocation or a break, I can't tell and I don't want to move it to find out."
"Good idea." I gritted out.
She gave me a sympathetic look. "Where's your phone?"
"Inside pocket. Coat." I made an experimental move of my leg and hissed at the spike in pain.
"Don't move it." Lisa rummaged through my coat until she found the right pocket. "We need a pick up fast."
"That bad?" I took my eyes off my knee to look at her face.
She fiddled with my phone already knowing my password and tilted her head at the far wall.
"Bitch" was carved into the wall a couple of time in various sizes. Didn't have to think too hard about who did that.
"That can't be good."
"Understatement." Lisa put the phone to her ear. "No it's Alice. Yes she is here with- I'm fine but she is hurt. He knee looks broken or dislocated. Her house. I don't think so. I'd would appreciate that. Don't know the cape but I think I know who was behind the idea." She shivered. "She is awake. I'll figure something out till you get here. Got it." She hung up the phone. "Well good news is we don't have to wait long."
"Bad news?" I asked.
She waved at the wall. "Someone doesn't like you."
"Obviously."
Lisa rolled her eyes. "Bad news, I'm pretty sure that was a plan made up by Coil."
Oh.
"Yeah, so if he knows I'm alive then he likely knows about us. He's a bastard like that. So then he knows your house is near the docks. Which makes this a possible target." Lisa started pacing as she went down the rabbit hole of her power. "And that asshole with the switching power is out there so we have to deal with the possibility of him popping up."
"Lisa." I tried to interrupt.
"I think his powers are sight based. I mean he wasn't the at the van when he switched me and it looked like they were using plastic barrels with water. Maybe there is size or weight component to it? Ugh it for sure line of sight though."
"Lisa!" I tried again.
"If it is line of sight then we should be okay here from the asshole in the red mask. Your bedroom window faces the back yard and there isn't likely to be anything of the right size to teleport someone into the house. I'm sure it's a switching power." She glanced at the window. "But if I'm wrong. Or if the guy doesn't need line-"
"LISA!"
She stopped and knelt next to the bed. "Sorry."
"S'fine." I grabbed her hand. "I know you are worried but it's just my knee. I'll be fine."
"I know."
"And if I had to I could probably teleport us again."
"No, you could hurt your self." She squeezed my hand. "I know you strained your power to get us here."
"Kinda." I admitted. "Though I didn't pick here."
That drew a smile from her. "Couldn't wait to get me in your bed again huh?"
I snorted at the memory of the last time.
"It will be fine." I assured her.
"I know." She reaffirmed. "Assualt said they would come here directly and that the van was on the way."
"See."
"I know." She insisted. "Excuse me for worrying about you."
"Help me pull my mask off." I said. "It's not very comfortable lying down."
"You should probably leave it on." She said but helped me anyway.
"Someone is going to have to carry me out of here." I admitted. "Pretty easy to put two and two together. Willow Wisp being carried out of Taylor Hebert's house?"
Lisa grimaced. "Yeah but it's the principle of it. Besides do you want to hear Piggot's speech about it again?"
It was my turn to grimace. "No."
"Then I guess you will just have to put it back on when we leave."
"Why help me take it off then?"
She smiled at me in a way that made my heart flutter. "To thank you for saving me." She leaned across me, careful not to jostle me and placed a brief ghost of a kiss on my lips.
I grabbed the front of her costume and pulled her down further and claimed her lips. She let out a brief snort of a laugh through our kiss and leaned in further until I lay back fully on the bed.
I shifted my leg without thinking an the spike of pain shot through the hormones and emotion to remind me of my injury. I hissed onto her lips.
She pulled away equal parts worried and disappointed. "If only you hadn't got yourself banged up I could have made it a thank you you wouldn't forget."
"Promises, promises." I returned.
"A promise indeed." She licked her lips.
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End chapter
Author's Note: posted from my phone so please forgive the random auto correct errors.
I had been planning the "Almost abducted Lisa" scene pretty much since Arc 2. I like how it went writing it but let me know if it reads well. I feel like I'm getting more biased as the work gets longer.
On another note. I've put in for a spot over on AO3 and waiting my turn for an account creation. So we will see how that goes.
And lastly, but most greatly heartfelt. Thank you guys. Really. This year…this year has broke me. But not destroyed me. I have largely to thank kind words from perfect strangers (such as yourselves) that have come at the right time to pull me out of my funk. There are no words, in any sequence, than can adequately explain how much that means. If you know, then you know. Thank you all and Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!