In a particularly busy street in the middle of District 7, a purse was snatched from the air by a flying winged man.
"Hey, somebody stop that bastard! He got my purse!"
"What are we supposed to do at that point lady, fly up there?"
"Dammit you're fucking useless! Will someone get my purse?"
"I'll get it," a voice quickly rushed past the crowd, and left just as quick.
"Was that-"
"Can someone else help get my purse? I'll pay a hefty price for it if returned!" The victim yelled out, but no one stirred.
"Where did you last see the thief last ma'am?" The woman jumped as she turned around to see a pigtailed girl, wearing the Tokiwadai uniform, and a green-white armband on her sleeve.
"Oh, you must be Judgement! Well, the thief... um, how do I explain it?"
"Just try to remember what happened and tell me calmly-"
"Oh right, they swooped down from the sky and snatched my purse. Nearly dislocated my shoulder, that bastard did."
"Swooped down... that all?"
"Uh, yes?"
"Okay then maam, please follow me to the AntiSkill office, and wait for me to come over with her purse." Kuroko Shirai said as she grabbed the woman's hand.
"Oh wait, that Spiderman guy is going after the thief by the way. Should I like, wait for him? Or we wait for him?"
"..."
"Uh, miss?"
"Let's just go over there, I'll deal with it," Kuroko replied before teleporting them away from the street.
XxX
Kamijou perched himself onto a high-rise building, scouting around to search for the Flying Thief.
30 minutes have passed since the thief's last snatch-and-fly, and it's starting to bear down on his nerves as he continues to listen to his Instinct to try and search for the flying thief.
Instinct...
For some reason his mind flashed back to that moment a week ago with the long-haired girl at the alley.
He still couldn't get her out his mind, and it bothered him. The girl was cute, but not anything noteworthy apart from that. And her Electromaster powers weren't anything to brag about. She might be Level 3 with that power, due to her needing physical contact to use it. So why?
Why did she set off his Instinct at that moment?
The last time something significant set the Instinct off was that highway battle just a couple days ago (Kamijou was amazed that only 2 days have passed since) and during a certain day before that when he...
He... met someone. He thinks. He doesn't know.
"My head's going crazy, tingling non-stop," Kamijou said clutching his head. He didn't know why, but the smell of honey lemon lingered in his memory.
Shaking off his head, he decides to quit his patrol and swing off in search of other things to do.
Until his Instinct blared and guided him to his left, sending him towards there swinging away to where trouble brewed.
As he got there, there was someone on the ground, who was crawling up before running after the flying indigo man that was quickly getting away. The pair of large blue wings and the jets in his feet stuck out like a sore thumb in the urban landscape. Kamijou swung after the blue thief, quickly gaining speed with each swing, getting closer and closer to the currently flying thief until he was on top of the guy. He fired a line at their back, and grabbed the line with both hands, prepping himself for the bumpy ride.
"Oh, rotten luck," were his last words before he felt his arms sprain from the force of the thief's flight.
Travelling at plane-like speeds, Kamijou felt the wind push back onto his face, nearly suffocating the red vigilante. He had no clue if the line would hold, but he had to try something and stop this bastard's flight somehow. Sticking his right arm behind him he fired a web line, and forced his wrist to fire as much web as possible to stop the man from getting away.
His shoulders nearly dislocated from the force, both arms gripping weblines attached to different things.
"Hey, what the-? No one should be able to pin me in midair so how did-" the thief turned around to look at the red man, giving Kamijou a clear view of the guy he's been chasing for 30 minutes.
With his voice he sounds like someone in his early 20s, but it might be due to the helmet muffling his voice; his entire body is covered in a protective indigo-colored exoskeleton with blue highlights which vaguely resembles a beetle, with the same pair of wings to finish the whole look.
"Hey what gives!? Ain't you supposed to go around and kick some muggers in their teeth for messing with some poor schmucks?"
"First off that's a highly reductive view of what it is I usually do I mean I do help out with giving directions to tourists and old people, actually now that I think about it there seems to be a lotta old people around hereSHIT" Kamijou exclaimed the last one as he felt the line attached to the beetle thief snap, causing him to fall in midair.
"Smell ya later bugboy, know that the Beetle just suckered you hard! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
"...I should probably do something with the talking," Kamijou said as he recovered with a simple webline, and swung after the thief. It didn't really take that long for him to find the guy, only taking a couple seconds. He fired another line again, but a bird flying into his face made the line land on the beetle thief's foot.
The thief noticed his feet shift slightly, looking over behind him. He saw the Spiderman flying behind him, holding on for dear life with the only webline.
"Oh great, I got spider under my boot." With a barrel roll he whipped the webline into a building. Kamijou felt the line tug him into the building, and the pain caused by the collision nearly made him let go of the line. However he endured it; it wasn't as bad as the times he'd get kicked in the ribs by numerous thugs, a wall collsion he can deal with.
Unfortunately for him the Beetle would continue doing this a couple more times than he'd like to.
Into lightpoles, the ground, several cleaner robots, tables, chairs, benches, rooftops, the sides of buildings and skyscrapers, a couple wind turbines, cars, trucks, trees, benches, park fountains, glass windows, plexiglass windows, duraglass windows, opaque windows, storefronts, even the drinking fountain across the road, among so many others.
Kamijou felt his entire body feel numb from the pain, he could barely move his hands.
He felt the line lurch forward as he was launched forward into a window at the 5th floor of a building, loudly crashing into the room with bits of glass joining into the rather messy collision.
"Yep, I'm gonna be feeling that in the morning," Kamijou groaned as he resisted the urge to lie down and rest. It'd be idiotic for him to do so. But he really, really, really really really really really really really, REALLY didn't want to continue the chase. He wants to go back home and rest a bit before going back to boring old school, dealing with boring old classes and not-so-boring classmates.
'...It'd be better to leave this to the professionals Kamijou-san,' he went to convince himself, yet he still went to walk over to the hole he crashed from. Ignoring the looks he was getting from the people huddling over the corner to his side he went over to leapt off, ignoring (or trying to) the numbing sensation already settling in his hands, arms, and the rest of his body.
He gotta find this bastard, and quick.
It took him a while, but Kamijou found the bastard once again, this time he struck again by snatching another purse.
Kamijou moved in, about to jump the dude, but stopped as he realized something.
He crouched as low as he could, and watched the thief get farther and farther away from the scene.
Kamijou knew the person down there wanted his wallet back, but he didn't want a repeat of what had happened a while ago.
His first time dealing with someone like this and he flubbed it so hard. He hoped no one was recording him at the time, the shame would be too much for him to handle.
Recalling where the thief went he swung forward into a building, and jumped as he somersaulted over a drone, nearly bumping into it.
"Someone should be careful flying those things around here," Kamijou quipped while swinging away to the thief's direction.
Down on the ground, Kuroko Shirai talked with the victim, a middle-aged greying man wearing a light blue polo shirt, red necktie, black slacks and leather shoes, typical white collar attire; his briefcase was fully open, piles of paper splayed across the ground.
"I was just minding my business, got my wallet out to check everything in it when some flying bug man swooped in and stole my wallet. He went over that way, and I need my wallet now because most of my monthly salary is in there and I just got mine."
"Rest assured sir this won't be a problem, I'll get your wallet back, along with a couple others."
"Others? You mean I ain't the only one who got robbed? Oh man, what an unlucky day."
"Though most of them are purses, you could've avoided this by not taking out your wallet in the middle of the road."
"I know, I'm stupid. Guess I got too excited on checking in my salary, but that's no excuse. Just please, get my wallet back. There's also some sentimental stuff there in my wallet, money aside, and I'd be damned to Hell forever if anything were to happen to those."
"No worries sir, I'm on the way. Just come with me to the station, and we'll be able to give you the wallet quickly there instead of having you wait out here," Kuroko said to the man, grabbing his hand and setting coordinates in her head.
'You better do something about this Spiderman, or I'll be in big trouble.' Kuroko thought as she and the man teleported off.
XxX
Kamijou landed on a nearby building and perched himself to the edge of its roof, watching the beetle man land his suit on the entrance of a seemingly abandoned warehouse.
The sun was starting to set, and darkness set in as Kamijou squinted his eyes hoping to get a better look at the location. Large building, with four windows at the front. There might be a couple windows at the top of the hideout, but Kamijou didn't want to bet his luck on it; very few warehouses in this district have sunroofs.
He needed to get a better look, so he crawled down the building he was on, and crouched over the hideout, to the side.
It was a very quiet place, disconcertingly so. Perfect for thieves to stash out to, as any noise outside their usual spot would be grounds for them to scatter and disappear.
It should be noted however, that most of these ideas he got from cheesy crime dramas he watches on TV.
So Kamijou was careful not to make any noise, so that the beetle thief won't make a getaway. He crawled up the wall, slowly but surely getting up to the roof after 3 minutes. As he got there, he saw several sunroofs scattered across the warehouse.
At least this made it easy for him.
He placed his hands on a nearby sunroof, and with great effort ripped the whole thing off its edges. He set it down near him slowly, making sure not to make any noise, and set a line to the edge of the hole he made before rappling down the line upside down.
During his early experimentation with his powers he found out that hanging in midair upside down wasn't uncomfortable, in fact he felt it was natural of him to do so. The spider bite might've not just given him these powers, but also some spider-like characteristics, as he recalled some of the spiders he saw at school peer down at him on sheer surfaces, their eyes staring soullessly.
Kamijou shook his head, and took note of his Instinct, looking around to see where the hell the thief was.
He turned his body around, and felt his right side struck by a fast moving projectile, sending him a couple meters away from his original position. He struck the wall with so much force he crashed through the whole structure, nearly knocking him unconscious.
He groaned as he turned to his side, getting up slowly and feeling something in his stomach churn. Opening up his mask halfway he coughed out his saliva, and a few splashes of blood mixed in.
"Damn rotten luck," he said to himself, propping himself up to his knees as he !!! took a breather-
He leapt to the side, ignoring the stinging pain in his stomach. He barrel-rolled, rolled on the ground, leapt to the side, and somersaulted (his broken ribs did not appreciate that) away to a nearby corner, the sound of gunfire polluting the quiet atmosphere of the wide lot.
"I'm definitely not having a great night right now."
Kamijou leaned away from the corner where the gunman was firing from, wincing as small pieces of debris from the wall pelted his face. He looked up, and started climbing the building, scaling it amidst the noise.
The gunfire stopped right as he reached the top, and Kamijou watched the criminal, wearing his Beetle Powered Suit step out of the shadows. Colored purple, and looked surprisingly advanced in spite of being a self-made creation. Kamijou figured the man was smart enough to make this type of tech; there wasn't a shortage of inventors here in Academy City, which begged the question as to why he decided to rob people of their valuables, of all things to spend time with.
The man let forth a hand, and something returned to his wrist with a click and a hiss. He then flexed and clenched his hand, feeling satisfied to himself. Kamijou then saw some smoke emitting from their wrist; Kamijou quickly moved back as the Beetle went over to his direction, and winced once more as a loud, cracking noise erupted from the rooftop's edge.
"Great, a wrist gun," Kamijou said. There were plans before to remove the need for larger, specialized weaponry for military grade Powered Suits and install wrist mounted firearms into the (at the time) newest batch of Powered Suits, but it was considered too time consuming, expensive, and potentially dangerous.
After all, no one wants to have their hand explode when their main gun (whether unlikely or not) blew their hand up now, would they?
But the Beetle had one, and Kamijou had to expect he had two on his person. He thought of something to do to deal with that problem amidst the armored criminal's taunts and insults as he kept firing his guns.
Then an idea came to him.
He had to time this right, otherwise he might end up riddled with bullets. He knew how fast he was, but doubted if he was able to outrun bullets. And with the pain in his side, and the blurring of his vision it seemed he was reaching down the end of his remaining non-existent luck.
But he took one deep breath, and waited.
And waited.
Then, the gunfire stopped once more.
With great speed, Kamijou ignored the pain in his side once again as he leapt off the building, and in half a single second fired four shots of webbing at the gunman, nailing both the guns and his legs. He rolled on the ground as he landed, clutching his side in the process.
He walked over to the Beetle's position, and chuckled slightly from the sight of a squirming, cursing purple-armored criminal.
"...Took you long enough."
"Yeah well, the guy you're after's rather slippery. Glad I had you on the case," Kuroko Shirai greeted the red clad vigilante. He could only groan and shake his head.
"Well, at least I got him. By the way the stuff he stole are in that warehouse to my right. Along with the tech he used to steal them."
"Thanks a lot Redhead. Couldn't have done it without you," with a deceptively cheery tone Kuroko went over to the house, practically skipping with glee.
"Girls. Am I right?" The Beetle snidely remarked.
"Shut it. You're under arrest, or citizen's arrest, for that matter. You've caused me a lotta headache, and I'm this close to beating you to a pulp."
The armored thief then wisely decided to keep his mouth shut.
A first time facing off against a flying criminal, and Kamijou barely managed it.
God, he needed a break. He went and sat on a nearby wall, catching his breath.
It was a very, very very very, VERY long day for the unlucky boy.
XxX
After taking the stolen wallets into a separate bag, and securing the suspect she pressed a button which instantly contacted AntiSkill with a brief message and coordinates for officers to go to. It would take at least 15 minutes for them to come in so Kuroko went and took out a small snack bar and orange juice packet from her pockets. Taking a bite from her bar and a small sip from the packet she yawned as she waited for AntiSkill to arrive. She checked her phone for the time.
6:25 pm.
She pocketed her phone and went back to waiting. 15 minutes.
"Haaaaaaaaaaaah, I wanna go home and fall into Sissy's firm embrace. But I have so much paperwork to do," she groaned and squirmed in place.
She looked over to where the suspect was restrained, a large cocoon that seemed quite difficult, if not impossible to break out of.
Then she turned to the vigilante's direction, seeing him with his hood down (she realized she hasn't seen him like that) and looked to be dozed off. She went back to snacking on her food, taking another bite and sip.
...Then she went and teleported to Redhead's side, looking over the mask he was currently wearing.
'I'm kinda curious as to what he looks like,' Kuroko thought. She peered over her back, seeing the thief still restrained to the side.
"A peek wouldn't hurt anyone," she muttered to herself. She hovered her hand over the mask's hem below the neck, and lightly grabbed it with her fingers. She lightly pulled it up, seeing the man's tan skin as she raised it up more.
Then suddenly she stopped.
...She didn't know why she felt a bad taste in her mouth doing this, but she decided this was far enough, pulled down the hem, and shook him awake.
"H-Hhn? Don't worry about it sensei, I'll get it done in no time..."
"Hey now, get up."
"Hrkkk! Wha-he-huh!? What, I'm up, I'm up! What- oh it's just you," the man yawned. "AntiSkill around?"
"Nah, they're still 14 minutes away. Anyway, here are some bars and juice packs for you," she held out a couple foodstuffs for the man to take. He took the raisin-peanut butter flavored bar and apple juice packet, and went to snacking.
"..."
"..."
"..."
"You look like you got something on your mind."
"Huh? Oh, um paperwork and all. You know..."
"That bad?"
"Well the guy you caught, with your help nonetheless, stole 500 purses, 1,056 purses and 58 backpacks. Laptops, jewelry, the works, and I'm pretty sure this bastards gone and sold some of them in the illegal market. So I have a lot to write up for today, including the potential damages and losses."
"Sounds rough." Internally Kamijou was shocked by the scale of the Beetle's crimes (he can't believe he just said that).
"I don't know, it could be worse."
"What could be worse than tha- you know what don't answer that. I don't wish to know."
Kuroko chuckled at his remark.
"...Why do you do it?"
"Hmm?"
"Your... thing. Why do you do it, risk your life every day? What's your play in this?"
"I don't need a reason to help people. I just do it, simple as that."
"That simple? I find it hard to believe."
"Yeah well, what's it to you? Why do you want to know?"
"...Never mind. You gotta leave before they get here, it's been 5 minutes."
"Really? Oh crap I gotta go! Thanks for the food by the way."
"No problem," she watched him scramble up to his feet, and waved goodbye to her as he ran off.
Kuroko only sighed, "I'm gonna get in trouble someday. I hope Yomikawa-sensei's lenient."
Today went and came, but not after a series of eventful, and uneventful moments happened to three certain individuals.
After all, there was never a dull day in Academy City.
XxX
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Sincerely,
Komigakuo.