superpierce: Oooh she just had to say that. Ya think people would when not tempt Murphy. Also who is Marie in the comics.
NeoNazo356: "Mari" is the superheroine Vixen, channeler of The Red.
Arnold (Guest): Arnold:Don't listen to the guy Feruna, he doesn't know an introductory paragraph if it bombed him from orbit. This chapter alluded to a person we all know... Venom Snake because of the ponytail.
NeoNazo356: Thanks for that. It's just a tad irritating to encounter people who don't even know what a paragraph is, let alone character exposition. And most of the people who gripe at me like that don't even have Profiles themselves, instead hiding behind a wall of anonymity, so it's not like they have any right to complain. Anyway, glad to see there are those willing to stick up for the merit I put into my work. Quality is my "secret recipe". That and just having a good time writing.
TIM (Guest): TIM:So, how do you plan for Mercer to meet his end? Will Virgil have his way with him?
NeoNazo356: One, that wording sounds really dirty, just thought I should point that out. Two, Virgil/Night Snake doesn't have anything capable of killing Mercer (short of a nuclear warhead), the same reason that many DEATHBATTLE fights end the way they do; because while one fighter is more-impressive, they lack the means to kill the other guy.
Supreme King of all Kings: You brought in, Ororo, Raven and Wakanda? You ma boi.
NeoNazo356: World building is something I enjoy the most about writing, but too many stories do too little to ADD ONTO the world they're working with, and instead leave it up to the Reader to fill in the gaps. That or they're too scared to "break canon", which is really fucking stupid because FanFiction is ALL ABOUT "breaking canon".
Since from as far back as the 2nd chapter I HINTED that this was going to have elements of Marvel, it's only natural to include Wakanda, especially because of how game-changing a country like that is. Also, I was largely inspired by the Black Panther motion comic by Marvel Knights Animation, which even now is still a favorite of mine.
*MOTORPHOBIA*
Bludhaven Back Streets
November 2, 22:16 EST
"WHY DO CARS HATE ME?!" Virgil screamed as he ran for his life from a driverless car intent on running him down, any form of backup nowhere to be found.
Now… You might be wondering just why Virgil is running for his life from a possessed automobile.
A black 1967 Chevy Impala to be specific.
Well, it all started a couple days ago…
*MOTORPHOBIA*
Moxxxi's Red Light
October 31, 16:16 EST
"I can't believe it. Ororo actually did it," Rina awed as she looked out the window that evening, not a cloud in the sky, whereas every weather report out there said it'd be quite the opposite.
"To be fair, her superhero name is Storm. Weather manipulation should be a given," Virgil hummed as he came down the stairs in his pilot suit, ready to head out once he got fitted in the T-45 Power Armor downstairs.
"Well, I know that, but just seeing it's a whole other level," she said as she adjusted her costume on her frame.
"Just don't say anything. Who knows what kind of trouble she could get in for changing the weather for non-villain-related reasons."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll keep it off the Twitter," Rina sighed. "Sis, you have the map?"
"Yes. I've refined the data we've collected the past few years and have an updated route-map for us to use," the genius answered as she adjusted her lab coat.
"PILLOWCASEEEEEEEEEES!" Tina cried holding large cloth bags in her hands, enough for everyone.
"So… Is there going to be enough battery power for the Power Armor?" Virgil asked. "I don't want my primary, only, power source to die halfway through the night."
"Don't worry, the battery's charged to capacity," Athena replied.
"Alright then…" Virgil said giving the map a once-over. "Uhhh… Athena?"
"Yes?"
"How the hell are we supposed to get to this part of town from here?" he asked jabbing the map with his finger, their intended starting point a long way from Moxxxi's Red Light. "Last I checked, the T-45 you made has a really shitty clip," he said thinking back to its lumbering strides that made it move just as fast as it looked. " . . . No offense."
"None taken," Athena waved off. "Anyway, I have a plan for that."
*MOTORPHOBIA*
" . . . Really?"
"What? The bus is perfectly viable."
"Athena. My costume weighs as much as a small car," Virgil said flatly. "There is no way the driver will let me on in this thing," he said imagining the shocks on aforementioned bus completely giving out the moment he put all of his weight onto it.
"The public transportation bureau doesn't have a weight limit on their busses per-passenger. They aren't allowed to discriminate anymore."
"Athena, I get that you're a genius and all, but this idea seems really stupid," Virgil said flatly. "You sure it isn't too late to go back home and change into my Vault 101 Security outfit?"
*Honk-Hissss*
"That would be a yes," Rina said flatly as the bus pulled up to them.
"That and with Roland's A-Team van getting some work done, we really don't have any other options," Athena clarified. "Unless you wanna be hitched to the back of a tow truck."
"Onward, mutha humpas!" Tina whooped as she scurried into the bus, a few of the costumed bus-goers panicking momentarily at her costume grenades.
God, Virgil hoped those grenades were fake.
"How the hell will I even fit through the door?" Virgil asked as he glanced between his shoulders, and then to the door of the bus.
"I recommend turning sideways," Athena hummed as she stepped on the bus.
Sighing tiredly at the lunacy of all this, Virgil put the T-45's helmet on his head, synching it into place before stepping up into the bus, his helmet barely scraping against the doorframe. And of course, just like he speculated would happen, the bus sagged the moment both feet were in the bus.
Of course, credit where credit was due, the buss' shocks managed to hold out.
Though the bus was rear-heavy for the whole trip, the rear fender making the occasional *SCREECH*ing noise as it trailed sparks behind it.
*MOTORPHOBIA*
Ignoring the heated glare of the bus driver as he dismounted, the shocks hissing in protest, the Power Armor-clad Virgil and company managed to make it to the better part of town without any major issues.
As for where they'd dismounted, the vernacular that real-estate hawkers used would describe the neighborhood they were in as "an ethnically undifferentiated upscale neighborhood".
In layman's terms; everyone was invited to live there, but you had to show a fat wallet at the door.
While less-congested than the areas with a notably higher population density, it was home to many affluent families with ludicrous amounts of money to burn, and thus hand out better candy in greater quantities. Of course, the efforts the trick-or-treaters went to showed in the higher-end costumes than what you could buy at the local Walmart for twenty bucks. Most-notably were the number of superhero-inspired costumes with as many twists and gimmicks as you'd see at Comic Con.
In a way, the T-45 Power Armor was relatively "invisible".
"Well… That could've gone worse, I'll admit," Virgil hummed as the bus pulled away, the teen pulling the helmet over his head.
"Yeah, though the public transportation bureau might put out an APB for your super-suit," Rina hummed. "You did probably cause a couple-hundred in damages to their shocks."
"So… Remind me again why I had to wear this?" Virgil asked gesturing to himself as much as his armor's limited articulation would allow.
"Whoa! Amazing!"
"So cool!"
"Did you make that yourself?"
"The media exposure," Athena said as they were suddenly surrounded by awe-struck onlookers, all of them gaping openly at the immaculate work that went into designing the 1:1 scale T-45 Power Armor.
"Uh… What?" Virgil whispered as quietly as he could, while still being loud enough for his speaker's volume filter to pick up on.
"I do a bit of custom work for cosplayers on the side, and getting my name out there like this is just free advertising," the genius girl replied with a wink. "Right this way people! Flash photography is encouraged! Come on now, don't be shy!"
"What're you doing, 'Thena?! We're going to miss out on the candy!" Tina cried manically.
"Rina, go take care of this. Virgil and I will be with you in a bit," Athena said with a wave of her hand.
"Heh. Should've known you had a field day in mind," Rina chuckled, the dark-haired girl dragging Tiny Tina along while Athena continued to present the 1:1 T-45 like a shiny new sports car.
'Thank god these lenses are polarized,' Virgil thought to himself as his lenses were assaulted with flashes from both cameras and phones alike, flexing and posing at Athena's prompting much to the awe of the audience as the armor continued to follow his movements.
*MOTORPHOBIA*
"So in the end, you didn't actually need me here for trick-or-treating? Just the suit?" Virgil asked a couple hours later, feeling like the fanfare had died off enough to bring the topic up.
"Sorry I didn't tell you," Athena apologized. "With how you're a male model and all, I thought maybe I couldn't afford your fees," she admitted bashfully.
"Hey, c'mon now, you know I'd do this for free if you asked."
" . . . Yeah, maybe I just wasn't thinking straight," the blond admitted. "I just… Seeing the T-45 sitting in the workshop for so long, gathering dust… It hurt a little, you know? Not being able to let it have its time in the sun. And I can't trust a complete stranger with this kind of tech, that's just asking for trouble."
"I see," Virgil nodded. "So… You think you handed out enough business cards?"
"Almost out," Athena said holding up a small box, only a few of her cards remaining. "Commissions really pick up right before Comic-Con, so getting word about the T-45 out there is really good for business. Even though I probably won't make a whole 'nother suit again, I can still make a pretty penny on peripheries."
"Like fake firearms and accessories?"
"Yeah, just like that," Athena said as she followed after her siblings, Rina and Tina gesturing to them to collect their own shares of candy.
With the T-45's slow clip, it was understandable, and thankfully the candy-givers realized that too with its lumbering movements.
" . . . Thank you. For agreeing to come along," Athena said after a few moments.
"Hey, I'm just happy to be included. And you're welcome," Virgil replied. The blinking of red and blue lights shining in his periphery, Virgil craned his head to the right, catching sight of a white-and-black patrol car slowly pulling up to them. "Crap, it's the cops."
"Stay cool, and just act casual," Athena soothed as the car flagged them down.
"Athena, I have more armor on my crotch than those two officers have on their entire bodies. How the hell am I supposed to act casual?"
"Shush, just stay cool!" Athena hissed as the window rolled down. "Officers! Hi! Fine evening we're having, huh?"
"Smooth," Virgil muttered, low-enough his suit's mic didn't broadcast.
"That's some pretty heavy-looking hardware you're sporting there. You aren't planning on getting into any trouble, are you?" the officer asked leaning out of his window, glancing warily at the hulking T-45.
"Of course not, officer, it's just a costume. And nothing else," Athena replied.
"Plus this thing can only run five miles an hour. Doubt I could get very far, even if I did cause any trouble," Virgil stated before realizing he'd said it loud-enough for the voice synthesizer to pick up and broadcast. 'Crap…'
"So… Is this thing bulletproof or what?" the officer asked.
"Hardly. It's just a highly-functioning costume I made for an enthusiast."
"Wait, you made this?" the officer in the passenger's seat gawped as he poked his head out the window, the driver pushing the younger man out of his personal space.
"Yes, sir. My client funneled a lot of money into it, but I lost contact with him most of the way through, so I decided to complete it on my own dime," Athena explained. When it came to cops, transparency was always a good policy to have, since "lying" to them could lead to some… unpleasantness.
"So then it's not a super suit?" the first officer asked.
"No, sir. Just a highly-functioning costume meant for an enthusiast," Athena repeated.
" . . . Well, alright then. Just don't cause any trouble. And make sure you're back home in time for curfew," the officer stated curtly.
"You got it, officer!" Athena said showing off her winning smile, the officer nodding in turn before driving off.
"What did he mean about a curfew?" Virgil asked once the car was out of earshot.
"What do you mean?" Athena asked quizzically.
"What I mean is, this is the first time I've heard about this. Is there something I need to know about?"
" . . . Oh crap, that's right! I forgot to tell you!" Athena gawped. "October thirty-first is the night that-"
*BANG*
"GET DOWN!" Virgil cried as the first gunshot rang out, wrapping his armored form around her as five more like-shots pierced the night air, but none hitting him. The gunshots were then punctuated by a loud *SCREEEEECH* followed by the *CRASH*CLANG* of something tall and metallic being knocked over and hitting the ground.
"Oh fuck that didn't work!" a voice cried from around the corner.
Moments later, a teenage girl clad in a white legless spandex outfit with pink accents bolted around the corner and down the street, a smoking gun in her hand. Her attire additionally consisted of matching sneakers and shin guards, a white mack with pink lenses leaving the bottom half of her face exposed, dark-orange ammo pouches on her body, a pink G-shaped belt buckle, and a blue-and-white plush penguin-shaped backpack.
"When future-me told me I'd live on in video games, toys, guest spots in other titles, fanart, fanfics, and roleplay Twitter accounts, this was not what I had in mind!" the costumed girl cried as she ran down the street towards them.
A few moments later and a black 1967 Chevy Impala peeled out around the corner, engine revving loudly as its headlights bore down on the white-and-pink-clad teen with no pants on. A loud roar sounding from behind a ruined grill, ruined like it'd run into a lamp post and kept on trucking, tires screeched as it burned rubber before driving at the girl who apparently shot it, as-evident by the bullet holes in its windshield.
"Oh crap! It's the Ghost Car!" Athena cried in shock. "Girls! Get inside! Quickly!" she shouted up at her siblings, the girls scrambling into the house they were trick-or-treating from.
"The what car?!" Virgil gawped from inside his helmet, the streets clearing out in a panic as people and candy alike scattered, the denizens and visitors of that neighborhood alike losing their collective shit..
"Ah! Hey! Don't come this way!" she then cried as the girl with no pants on suddenly ran their way.
"Come with me if you want to live!" the white-and-pink clad girl said in a frenzied voice as she grabbed Athena's wrist and dragged her into the nearest open door she could find. "Virgil! Don't let your initial love interest be killed so early in the story's run! Do something!" she then called over her shoulder.
"What? How do you know my-"
Before he could finish his thought, a loud *HOOOOOOONK* echoed through his helmet's speakers as the ghost car bore down on him, the twin windows of his helmet's visor filled with a blinding light before he was suddenly run into with a loud *CRASH*, the air briefly leaving his lungs at the impact.
His body tossed around inside the armor as his costume rattled, metal and concrete alike screeched in protest as the soles of his Power Armor were worn away, leaving grooves and slivers of metal in the sidewalk, and then the asphalt as the Ghost Car peeled right.
Eyes going wide as he saw no driver in the car that hit him, getting his wits about him, he articulated his hands and dug mechanical figures into the hood of the car that slammed into his midsection, only for his stomach to sink as the feet of his Power Armor suddenly exploded into shards around the ankles, the ankles too biting into the street causing sparks and the cold autumn breeze to dance up his legs as he lost two literal feet.
Eventually, the Ghost Car's charge stopped, tires squealing as the T-45 finally soaked up its inertia, though not without great cost to itself as-evident by the caved-in chest plate and hydraulics screaming in protest.
The Ghost Car suddenly pulling back, without any literal feet to stand on, Virgil landed flat on his face with a hearty *CRASH*. Angling his head as up as high as his helmet allowed, Virgil was face to face with the grill of the driverless car that slammed into him. Much to the teen's shock and horror, the grill of the ghost car actually began to regenerate.
Well, "regenerate" might not've been the correct word. It was more like all the damage done to it was being rewound, the concaved grill and hood pushing outward until it was pristine, the crack in the windshield and chipped paint returning to normal as though by magic. Within moments the Ghost Car had returned to showroom condition, engine revving with a renewed, angry fervor.
'Run down to death by a haunted car wearing a trashcan with legs. This just had to be the way I sent out,' Virgil grumbled to himself as he tried to rise, only for his hydraulics to fail him, the rear hatch refusing to open.
Resigning himself to his face, instead, the Ghost Car backed off. Making a three-point turn before peeling off down the street, seemingly losing interest in its initial target, it turned a corner and vanished from sight, the only evidence it was there the ruined street it'd left in is wake.
"Virgil! Virgil are you okay!" Athena cried running up to him, worriedly fretting over him.
"Athena…" Virgil croaked out of his suit's speakers, the only part of it that was still working. "I've fallen and I can't get up."
*MOTORPHOBIA*
"So… Anyone got a giant can-opener?" an emergency relief worker asked as he and his peers stood over the prone Virgil a while later.
"I take it the jaws of life are out?" another asked.
"Not when there's someone inside this thing," a third stated. "And you say you made this yourself?"
"From scratch!" Athena said proudly.
"Can you guys hurry up and pop this thing open? I really have to go to the bathroom," Virgil said flatly, his helmet now off. With most of the armor's hydraulics completely shot, so too went the AC, and it got really stuffy in there.
Now he knew how Ross' Hulkbuster pilots felt.
"Right, right…" Athena said going for the valve-shaped handle on his back and attempting to give it a twist, only for the hatch not to budge. " . . . Crap. That hit you took must've warped the frame."
"Yeah, no shit," Rina said bluntly, sitting on a nearby bench, waiting for the fanfare to end so he could go home.
"Can't you just pry this thing open with a crowbar?" Virgil asked.
"Well, I couuuld, but…" Athena trailed off worriedly.
"What are you more-worried about? Having intact parts you can salvage for something? Or having a clean suit you don't have to scrub urine stains out of?" Virgil said flatly.
"Yellow water, incoming!" Tina yelled uncouthly.
"Okay maybe getting you out of a damaged suit is more-important than salvage," Athena admitted, realizing her bottom line wasn't as important as getting a prospective boyfriend out of a suit that could very well be pinching something important and cutting off blood flow. " . . . Is anything getting pinched in there?"
"Well, for one I can't feel my legs."
*GASP*
"Though that's probably because they fell asleep ten minutes ago," he continued flatly, wiggling his toes through the now-visible hole where the feet used to be attached at the ankles.
"Oh thank god…" the blond sighed. " . . . Gentleman," she said turning to the gathered emergency relief workers. "I should have more-surgical tools in my workshop I can use to get him out of there. Can you leave this to me?"
" . . . As long as he's fine with it," the first said turning to Virgil.
"Yeah, sure, hitch me up to the back of a tow truck and get me home or whatever. Just hurry up so I can go pee," he said flatly, his patience beginning to wear thin.
He'd seen and done a lot of shit, but ghost cars…?
Yeah, he was not prepared for that, emotionally or physically.
*MOTORPHOBIA*
"BATHROOOOOOOOM!" Virgil screamed, running back into Moxxxi's Red Light the literal instant he regained a modicum of freedom from the utterly wrecked T-45 Power Armor.
"Well, that's gonna be hard to salvage," Brick hummed as he and Athena stared at the warped, empty shell that had once been so-impressive a mere half-hour before.
"Thanks for helping carry it into the shop," Athena thanked.
"No problem," Brick shrugged, finding carrying a suit of powered armor -and pilot to boot- as-easily as throwing a sack of potatoes over the shoulder.
"So… Any idea why the Ghost Car was in an area it shouldn't have been?" Athena asked.
"Eh, you'd have to ask Roland about that," Brick shrugged. "He's usually better about this sort of stuff."
"I see," Athena hummed. "Given he almost got run over by a possessed Chevy Impala, I guess Virgil is owed an adequate explanation."
*MOTORPHOBIA*
"So, now that I've sufficiently gone to the bathroom, I'm just going to come out and say it. WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!"
"Swear jar!"
"Tina not now!"
"Yes, well, I suppose I do owe you an explanation," Athena acquiesced. "The Ghost Car has been a part of Bludhaven's culture for so long, I guess I forgot that not-everyone would be used to the idea."
"Yeah, no shit," Virgil said rolling his shoulder, an ice pack held to the other. "So… I take it all those stories I heard before weren't just an elaborate hoax?"
"That's how it might seem to outsiders, but no, the Ghost Car is a real thing," Athena replied. "Of course, if you want the lore, you'll have to wait until Roland and Lilith come back. They know more about the Ghost Car than I do."
"I see," Virgil nodded. "Well, if you'll excuse me then, I'm going to soak in some hot water. After almost getting run over, my aching muscles need it."
*MOTORPHOBIA*
"So… About that Ghost Car…" Virgil hummed at dinner that evening, their meal supplemented by some of the candy they'd been able to get door-to-door before their evening turned completely pear-shaped.
"Yes, I heard what happened," Roland nodded.
"You and Athena are exploding on Twitter," Lilith hummed looking up from her phone, flipping through pictures of them in-costume taken on the street. In some of them Virgil had his helmet on, in others it was tucked under his arm. However most-impressive was the snapshot taken from a window of the T-45 intercepting a possessed car.
Like a real superhero. -the texts went on to say.
"Yeah, suffice it to say, I was not prepared for that," Virgil groaned. "So… Athena said you could give me the down-low?"
"Yeah, I guess you're owed that," Lilith hummed. "I guess the best place to begin would be the beginning."
"Yeah, no shit."
"Swear jar!"
"Tina you swear just as much as anyone!"
"It happened back in 1986 back when Lew Maxon was incarcerated and it finally stuck," Lilith began, talking around Virgil and Tina's little back-and-forth. "While the big bosses of organized crime fought over territory in the ensuing power vacuum, their control over the smaller gangs weakened and they spread like wildfire across the east coast. Many people were caught in the crossfire, none more tragic than the Ghost Car's original owner," she said pausing for a few moments, nursing her drink before continuing. "Many years ago there was a young mechanic who fell in love with a street racer. The mechanic got his education, started a successful motor business, and even gained custody of his younger brother from his drunk parents, which was good timing because the mechanic's parents died a week later in a car accident. Then… came the Halloween night where everything fell apart. Two gangs wearing costumes got into a violent gang war, with an unknown vigilante making the situation even worse. The guy, the girl, and the little brother were all killed in the crossfire. Forced to watch his loved ones die, the mechanic's soul became infused with his beloved car, which would later be captured by a different gang and fully restored three years later."
"Hold on, how does anyone know any of this?" Virgil asked incredulously.
"To be fair, the whole soul-thing is just a bit of exposition that gets thrown around to make it more palatable, but the backstory of the mechanic and his car was able to be gleamed because the Ghost Car's license plate wasn't really changed," Lilith answered. "Anyway, on the Halloween of 1989, after being restored by, ironically, a criminal gang, the Ghost Car tore out of its garage, driverless for the first time, and went on a rampage. The first of many."
"So… if this haunted Chevy Impala has been going around and killing people every Halloween, that'd mean it's been trucking for… two decades!" Virgil gaped in shock.
"What makes it worse is that on-average, thirty people are killed annually. Supposedly, the same number of people involved in the initial incident that created the Ghost Car," Roland elaborated.
"Holy crap, that's around five-hundred seventy people!"
"To be fair, the majority that are killed are criminals, with only a few bystanders getting caught up in it," Athena stated. "That's part of why the police instigate a curfew. To keep the body count of non-criminals to a minimum."
"So… it's over then?"
"Not quite," Moxxi hummed. "The Ghost Car's hunting season starts on October 31st, Halloween, and ends the minute November 2nd, All Souls Day, becomes November 3rd."
"So you're saying the body-count could reach six-hundred by the 3rd of next month?"
"Looks like it," Roland hummed.
"Well how come no-one's taken this thing down? Wouldn't three days be plenty of time?"
"Not quite. There's more supernatural BS at work here than just a possessed car with a taste for criminal blood running people over," Mordecai interjected. "The Ghost Car only appears at night, and it disappears in the morning. The times are never exact, mainly because no-one's actually seen it appear, but since witnesses have seen it disappear "into thin air" on the third, it's safe to assume it "vanishes" whenever it isn't hunting, so there's a limited window of opportunity."
"In the past, like with the GCPD in Gotham, the police in Bludhaven were too-corrupt to do anything about it. That all changed when Raul Creed became police commissioner," Moxxi stated. "In 2004, Creed supposedly hired magicians to place magical wards on the more-heavily occupied parts of the city, while banning trick-or-treaters to others, even organizing mass trick-or-treating venues at schools and youth centers to keep people off the streets. Since then, the only victims have been either criminals, or those that directly antagonized the Ghost Car."
"Hold on, if trick-or-treating is banned, what were we doing out there on that street with all those people?"
"Door-to-door trick-or-treating was only banned in the areas that the Ghost Car frequented the most before the wards were put in place," Athena answered.
"I see…" Virgil nodded. "To be honest, I'm a bit surprised to hear that you believe in magic."
"While there might not be any scientific evidence supporting the existence of magic, there really isn't anything rebuking its existence completely either," the genius replied. "A prevailing theory is that Dr. Fate uses super-science and calls it magic, but the technology gradient wasn't anywhere near-high-enough for that to definitively be the case back then. Maybe by today's standards, but not during World War Two."
"So I take it he couldn't get the magic-users he hired to ward all of Bludhaven?" he went on to ask.
"To be fair, the whole magic thing is just hearsay. City hall neither confirms nor denies what was done, but it can't be argued that the money Creed shell out, out of his own pocket no less, was well-spent," Athena explained. "The reason that things like magic and wards are the prevailing theory for why the collateral damage has been kept to a minimum since five years ago, was because the British occultist John Constantine was sighted around Bludhaven putting weird markings on certain walls and roads."
"If I had to guess, I'd say one of those wards was disturbed, possibly by a graffiti artist, hence why you had your run-in with the Ghost Car in an area it'd been kept away from for the last five years," Roland hummed.
"Constantine… Why does that name sound familiar?" Virgil asked aloud.
"Well, originally he was the lead of an English punk rock band called Mucous Membrane, but the thing that really made him famous was what happened at Newcastle."
"Newcastle… Newcastle… Newcastle… Wait, I remember now," Virgil said after a pause. "I saw a special about it on TV once. Something about a demon attack at one of his concerts, a mass slaughter, and a ton of dead Satanists with a little girl never found; or something."
"That's the one," Athena replied. "While there were survivors' testimonies about a massive demon being the thing that tore apart all those people, a lot of outsiders tried to put the blame on Constantine, or just punk rock in general. However, when his DNA screening revealed neither the X-Gene or Meta-Gene in his makeup, he was ruled out as a suspect since he lacked the biological tools required to rip people apart like that. Doubly-so because of the absence of anything that could be used as a weapon for that kind of carnage."
"Little Tina saw that special once and couldn't eat meat for a month," Rina hummed. "We certainly didn't have a problem making her eat her veggies after that episode, but going full-on vegan made dinner prep a little more difficult, so it was more of a Pyrrhic victory than anything."
"Huh…" Virgil hummed. "So, is there some kind of bounty on this Ghost Car, or…"
"The current bounty is around three-hundred grand, with ten grand being added each year," Roland answered, Virgil letting out a whistle. "It may seem like a lot of money, but considering how much damage it costs the city after All Souls Day is done, it's actually a sound investment to get rid of such a big problem."
"And superheroes haven't gotten involved because…?"
"They've either been too busy, or don't want to associate with anything that has a price tag attached to it," Lilith answered. "Hasn't stopped its fair share of no-name vigilantes from trying to make a name for themselves, but most of them wind up as roadkill or crippled for life, so…"
"Right, so we won't be seeing any Capes flying around," Virgil nodded as he picked at his food. " . . . So are you guys going to go after the Ghost Car? Three-hundred grand is a lot of money."
"Actually, we've been thinking of doing something a little different this year," Lilith hummed, giving him an appraising eye.
" . . . Why is everyone looking at me-ohhh shit."
To Be Continued…