The ramifications of Clopin's kidnapping are starting to unfold, as well as another plot from Doctor Scratch. This leads to the appearance of a new "enemy" that isn't looking to be all that heroic.
Clopin had been kidnapped for several days now, and it had put the entire team on edge. While no news had been shared to the public just yet, it was only a matter of time before that came out and caused even more unneeded chaos. It didn't help that they didn't know who exactly took him.
"Mr. Vantas, I would appreciate it if you didn't sleep through my class today."
Karkat was startled at the interruption, causing some laughter to go across the classroom. He would've been embarrassed, but his exhaustion made it hard to even register his current situation. Then again, Lancer's class always had that effect on him.
"Dude, maybe you should just skip the rest of today's periods. You look like shit." Sollux narrowed his eyes at the other boy, frowning. "I thought ghost attacks were at an all-time low for the week. What the hell have you been doing?"
"Patrolling and doing some extra stuff for the Far Frozen. Frostbite is looking for more ways to make me powerful." Karkat muttered back, desperately trying to focus. It was a miracle his grades were keeping up as is. "He's literally coming up with domains for me to conquer for the future."
"Does that mean we need to start up a war council?" Aradia was completely on board. She'd been researching Genghis Khan since she was five, so she was sure she'd have a leg up as a general. "I call dibs on having my own territory if that's the case."
Karkat rolled his eyes. Admittedly, he wouldn't have gotten much sleep anyway since his insomnia was acting up. Leads on Clopin were getting cold and the only idea he had was that either Dualscar or Scratch took him. The ecto-guns certainly made it look more like the latter, though.
"Find anything on Cronus yet?" Karkat was at least hoping for some headway at that end. "If we can get some kind of headway against Oberon for once, I'd appreciate it."
"Surprisingly, yes. He's apparently struck it out as a musician or something." Sollux looked over some of his album lists discretely, frowning. "Not a good one, but high profile enough. Maybe he's keeping plenty of eyes on him so his dad can't kidnap him?"
"That or Oberon just doesn't care. It's not like he's going to tell anyone about the ghost powers situation." Aradia got a notification from her phone, causing her to look at it and frown. "The police are calling a press conference today. I have a feeling we know what they're going to talk about."
Fuck. That was exactly what Karkat was afraid of. There was no telling what kind of shitshow would happen later when that news was sent out. Their only solace was whether Clopin appeared back in public or not, if only to collect his sons.
"I'm not getting chatter from the safehouse they put the Makara's in either. Though, if I hear the word motherfucker one more time, I might lose it." Sollux sighed. "Their security detail, however, isn't very adept in tech. It's almost too easy to hack into it."
Karkat raised an eyebrow. "Easy enough that I could hack into it?"
"Now don't get crazy."
SLAM!
The three, as well as the rest of the classroom, went dead silent as the door to the room was opened, a heavily breathing Trizza being the culprit behind the noise. She didn't bother giving an excuse to the startled Lancer, moving to her seat carefully.
"Nice of you join us, Tethis." Aradia shot out, deciding to throw caution to the wind. "Decided to take the long way here today instead."
"Alarm didn't go off this morning." Trizza didn't even look her way, looking almost delirious. The eyebags showed that it wasn't only physical exhaustion. "Had to hurry over here. Didn't have enough gas, so I ran."
Aradia failed to make a smart comment back, just watching Trizza walk away before giving her friends a concerned look. "Not even one insult back. That's probably not good."
"I though her family got that defense contract from the GIW." It had been the one thing to save the Tethis's company, but Karkat knew it hadn't been a popular decision by many in Amity Park. "That whole crisis should be over with by now."
"Maybe she knows about Clopin? There's a good chance the police said something since he held her and her dad hostage." Sollux figured that was logical. It wasn't like the town wasn't getting traumatized by something new every week, them included. "Thought it would make her snap more, though."
"Whatever. Maybe put Axion Labs as something to look into at a later date." Karkat would've been more concerned, but out of the two of them, he was considerably more exhausted than Tethis was. "…I haven't heard from Feferi and Kanaya yet today. Are they still dealing with the others?"
"They were able to get a day off from school because of 'community service,' which is not something I thought was a thing." Aradia figured it was because they were rich (Feferi) and actually well behaved (Kanaya). "You think we can convince someone to do that for us too."
"AA," Sollux stated slowly. "No one will let you do that since you last decided to do some 'community service.'"
"Aw, why not?"
"You ruined that birthday party at that seniors center." Karkat raised a hand to stop her from interrupting. "I get that old lady was being racist and threw holy water at me, but you aren't allowed back there for good reason."
"Hey, I got that case thrown out, so it isn't on my record."
As the argument continued, Karkat rolled his eyes. He really hoped the others were having a much easier time with it.
"Terezi, as I keep on telling you, you can't just bite people if they upset you."
"I respectfully disagree."
Kanaya had been discussing this hypothetical with the ghost for about ten minutes now, and she was considering just bringing out the chainsaw. Terezi certainly had the talent to tick people off, seconded only to Vriska.
"Hey, you think I can sneak up on stage and liven up this place?"
…Except that Vriska was more likely to cause trouble.
"Don't." Feferi never realized her patience could be tested so much. Outside of eating misery, Aranea must be some form of saint to deal with this every day. "I'm starting to realize why Karkat said to never leave you alone."
"Hey, I'd be totally fine on my own! I've been in the human world longer than I've ever been in the Ghost Zone." Vriska fingers itched for her guitar, even if it wasn't on her right now. She didn't do well in crowds, but she did great in front of them. "Besides, you let Nepeta and Tavros do whatever they want."
"They understand the meaning of laying low and not causing a scene." Kanaya did take some satisfaction from her offended expression. "Something you and Terezi need to learn since both of you are more eccentric."
"That's a nice way to say that we're not well socialized, but I'll accept that." Terezi held a finger up to Kanaya's face with a serious look. "But to get it straight; I'm the only eccentric one. Vriska is just an attention whore."
"I literally feed off attention. It's like a medical condition, I can't help it." Vriska said defensively. "Besides, why the hell do we have to be here for this? I should technically be far away from the police."
"To be honest? It's just so we can keep an eye on the drama." Feferi knew that sounded bad, but it was for a good purpose. "If the police decided to say something about Clopin- more specifically that he's gone- we should probably be on the ground floor for it. Besides, you exploit luck, right? Is that what Light Aspects do? Because if you could get a good outcome to this…"
"I can't actually make things go in my favor. They usually just do until it's the worst time for it fall flat." Vriska didn't know how it worked for her or Aranea. One day, she's riding high on human emotion, and the next, Karkat beats her down onto her stage. "I'm not doing a ritual to get control of it either."
"…now that you mentioned it, I do have to ask; why haven't we tried for a ritual yet?" Kanaya wasn't sure about much when it came to the Aspects, other than them being useful. "Feferi and I could use the boost in power considering we're going to be a part of this."
"I'd like a costume too. You guys get a ghost form and Karkat gets a superhero costume, so we should come up with some too." Feferi had been thinking about that for a while too. "If Sollux and Aradia get better with theirs, we can probably form a little Justice League…"
"Yeah, before you two go a little nuts, I do have to inform you we still don't know what the full effects for humans are still." Terezi interjected. "It's either Sollux and Aradia are already at the peak of their power, or they're going to go nuts later. Up in the air for Karkles too."
That was the only real downside to it, really. Of course, the thought was still tantalizing, especially since the point was still true. Though, that would have to wait for another time, especially if they were getting desperate. But they hadn't reached that point. Not yet at least.
The screech of a microphone being messed with caused the conversation to die, prompting them to check the stage. The grave face of the old police chief was the first thing to greet them. Already a bad sign, and the small crowd that had formed seemed to realize this.
"I see that many of you are here with questions," the man stated carefully. "And I'm afraid we have little answers thus far, despite our best efforts."
That wasn't off to a great start, and the crowd was starting to get restless. As the chief continued to speak, barely adding anything that wasn't publicly available. Vriska leaned over to the others, a quip at the ready.
It was with a cough that it was interrupted, her breath coming out like it was the middle of winter.
"…Well, shit." Vriska gave the others a deadpan look. "Told you my luck runs out quick."
The roar of a tiger could be heard cutting through the presentation, and it was followed by one landing right onto the stage. Glowing white and looking worse for wear, it screamed loudly as every officer opened fire on it. The bullets didn't do much good, only causing it to get angrier as it swiped at the police chief, missing by inches.
"Fuck, we might have to deal with this ourselves." Terezi wasn't sure if she wanted to do away with her disguise already, but Karkat was still at school. "Nepeta might be able to get that thing away without a fight if we distract-"
A loud shot of an ecto-gun interrupted all though, landing close enough to the ghost tiger before it could actually land a hit on one of the officers. There was a pregnant pause as the ghosts in attendance looked at Feferi and Kanaya, who raised their hands.
"I haven't even turned mine on yet."
"I was reaching for my chainsaw."
It made sense as a few more shots rained down from the sky, a blur of silver moving past stopping in a jerking motion before moving back in for another round. The ghost tiger jumped at the blur before it was hit twice by a few shots. Its fur burned from the shots instantly.
"That's not one of us." Vriska knew it wasn't otherwise they'd get more than an earful from Nepeta or Tavros if any ghost animals were harmed too badly. "Who the fuck is that?"
The blur stopped long enough for everyone to get a closer look. A figure in a red clad jumpsuit and helmet with a black visor moved one of her guns to the side as she continued to fire with the other. Pulling out a sphere, she pressed a button on it before throwing it straight at the tiger. Expanding into a net, the tiger was taken down.
The huntress moved subtly so that the hover board moved down, snatching the net before anyone could so much as blink. Some of the officers present raised their guns on instinct, causing her to raise one of her own, a warped voice coming out.
"Don't."
The command was punctuated by the figure zooming off, ghost in hand. The few people that stayed behind to watch made sure to try and take videos before she could get out of sight. The tiger's roar was the last thing people heard.
The group, with hands still on their weapons, felt a little part of them die inside as they watched the birth of another vigilante form right in front of their eyes.
Miles away from the scene, the vigilante felt the very same.
Scratch kept a close eye on all of the screens in front of him, switching his attention every few seconds. Containing a mix of scenery in Amity Park and the Infinite Realms, his mind absorbed all of the information presented to him with little difficulty.
A gift, he figured. He'd never be able to do this without these blessings he earned since his first walk into the Infinite Realms.
He remembered the day fondly, despite his initial feelings on the dimension's existence. Spades had shown him up that day, shoving him into a brand-new world and into the waiting arms of his Lord. He'd been angry at the time before he caught sight of the tomb.
His Lord had reached out to him that day. He reached into his mind with promises of knowledge, something a scientist like himself was greatly interested in. Lord English had a plethora of it, and he promised him everything if he was able to get to his tomb again and plunder its treasures for himself.
It's just too bad that Spades refused to give him access to plans for the portal. Despite the fact he could find and maintain natural portals, it would be convenient to have a porta-portal on hand. He'd have to change that sooner rather than later.
The sound of engines brought him out of his thoughts. Tethis was on time, as he expected.
"A fucking tiger." Trizza dropped said animal into one of the cages, slamming it shut before facing him fully. "You realize that's a little overkill, right?"
"Only slightly. It's not the first time a ghostly predator has attacked the town, however, and this makes sure we have all eyes on you." Scratch looked briefly to one of Amity Park's more popular social media pages. "You're already trending. It's not a highly creative moniker, but the Red Huntress seems to be the first name people have come up with."
"Great. Now I'm a costumed freak." Trizza wanted to trend for a lot of varied reasons. She didn't want to be associated with the likes of Phantom, though. "What's even the point of this? As far as anyone knows, I'm just some nutjob in tights."
"It's actually fairly simple if you think about it for more than moment." Scratch stated condescendingly, knowing that Tethis wouldn't strike at him for it. "Depending on how well you do, you'll be a perfect addition to the GIW. Albeit you'll be known as an independent contractor."
Really, it was all simple propaganda. If the "Red Huntress" proved competent enough as a ghost hunter, her joining the GIW would be a way to give them credibility. Considering the townsfolk were resistant to their efforts- especially with their derisive nickname for the "Guys In White"- it would hopefully break the ice.
"That's nice and all, but I'm pretty sure nobody likes a government stooge." Trizza huffed. The suit did make her feel powerful and all, but that didn't mean much. "What insurance do I get if one of these demonstrations go wrong then?"
"Then we'll have to bail you out." Scratch shrugged. "If you end up defeated in battle, we'll be ready to rescue you. There will be a dramatic moment where you're officially recruited, meaning we still get an up in our public image."
Of course, that's if she proved to be easy to control. The more defiant she acted, the more likely that a ghost attack gone awry would end with her being tragically taken down in the heat of battle. It'd be a blow to the community to see one of their own having their life tragically cut short because the GIW couldn't run their operations. Ultimately, there'd be no way for him to lose in this situation.
Trizza wouldn't see it coming if she kept acting so ungrateful. But he had time to see which way the dice would roll until then.
"Whatever. Better have some backup if Phantom rolls around." Trizza inspected one of her weapons thoughtfully. "…What do I do with that guy? He's at the scene of most of the real attacks. What happens if he shows up at the staged ones?"
Scratch looked at her briefly. She was making this a moral dilemma judging from the look on her face. Can't have that.
"Then if you're able to land a particularly fortuitous shot," stated Scratch. "You'll probably never have to worry about money again."
And that was the only thing he said that was the complete truth.
Sorry for the long break everyone. I've been going through a lot of different things lately and haven't had the time to really get back into writing for fun in a while. Work essentially went through a difficulty spike and I recently had to deal with a loss in the family, so it killed a lot of project progression for a while. I figured publishing this should get it rolling again. Hope you guys enjoy it at least.
