The Devil in Brockton Bay

by Dovesnoze

Lucifer doesn't quite know what to do when he realised that his latest explosive mishap landed him in a place he doesn't recognise. It's alright though. Improvisation always was one of his strengths. He had Maze and his loyal Hellhound Cherona by his side. What could possibly go wrong? Blame SomeoneYouWontRemember for this one. Also: limiting characters to 4 is, well, limiting.

10. Chapter 9

Yo. It's me again, coming to you with a chapter to deliver. Fair warning: This one has some graphic depictions of gore, attempted murder, and some other good stuff to enjoy. If you are the squeamish type... Well, if you are squeamish, I really wonder how you landed in this fandom. Anyways, it's not a chapter for the faint of heart so keep that in mind.

I also cleaned up the first two chapters a bit. They should now flow a bit better and I think I've won the battle with formatting this time around. It's at least a draw, I promise!

And last but not least, I wanna say thank you for all the feedback. Special thanks to Kiradien who wrote the sweetest review I've gotten as of yet. I swear I didn't take it as a challenge. This chap was always gonna have a fair bit of escalation.

Now, Without further ado, please do enjoy your treat and leave some of your own behind!

~Vista/Missy Biron~

She lied awake and routinely ignored the angry screaming while hoping that they'd tire themselves out early tonight. She wanted to leave without running the risk of being caught because they wanted to include her in their unique family bonding. Guilt tripping, gas lighting, and blame shifting competitions.

To not lose her mind, she decided to think of better times to distract herself. What immediately came to her mind was the surprisingly great time she had with Chris over the past month.

They spent many an hour together and she couldn't help but smile to herself as she thought of how their more active, and secretive, collaboration came to be.

After she mentioned her observation that the best works he created all had exchangeable systems implemented, his face went slack for a long moment before a gleam of excitement lit up his eyes.

He impulsively grabbed her and laughed joyously as he hugged her close and danced through the room. Once he realised what he'd done, he let go of her while blushing and apologized, though she found it cute and let him know that she wasn't upset with a teasing smile.

He was embarrassed, but not enough to not thank her with deep and genuine gratitude for helping him find his specialty. As it turned out, she was right. Modularity was what he specialized in and the sheer scope of that was incredible.

She was present when he told Armsmaster and the man had an absolutely unholy gleam in his eyes. It was obvious that he was imagining just how far they could go if they combined their efforts.

Just thinking about it was a bit scary to be honest. Tinkers often created incredible pieces of tech on their lonesome, but once they found another of their kind and their specialties meshed well? Things went really crazy.

Modularity in combination with Efficiency and Miniaturization? That was one such case. The synergy was incredible. Add to that the fact that Dragon regularly collaborated with Armsmaster and the potential bullshittery went through the roof.

He later came clean that he heavily suspected that she was that new vigilante that made the rounds. Which she neither denied nor confirmed, making him grin wryly.

To be honest, him discovering her new secret identity was completely expected, and not just because she'd begun taking more of an active approach. Even before, when she mostly limited herself to passive interference, he likely had at least some suspicions.

Despite her non-answer, he offered to help her in secret. As it turned out, he too wanted to make a difference and equipping her with Tinker Tech that may save her life one day was a good way to achieve that in his opinion.

He also wanted to help her with her power experiments. In fact, he was almost begging to be included and she really wasn't against it as she could use his help. Especially his measuring instruments and the divergent way of thinking he had were majorly helpful.

Now, a month wasn't much time in between school, patrols, seminars, and everything else they were obligated to deal with but once they'd begun to seriously experiment with her new-found abilities and loosened limits, it was as if the floodgates were opened.

Creative juices flowed without end and the few hours of secret experimenting quickly became the most anticipated time of the day for her. It had the added benefit that she was actually less likely to be recognised since she was rapidly diversifying the way she used her abilities.

Something that made her power... happy? She faintly shrugged at the thought. She wasn't all that shocked that it had a mind of its own. There were moments in her 'career' as a Cape where she felt nudges and hints about how to do something she wanted to achieve.

She thought it was all just power based instincts but it seemed as if something was actually doing the nudging. After she met her dad, it became way more active, as if the way he split a Dimensional Axis apart awakened it.

Now it was a distinct presence in her head and she felt closer to it in a way. Not in terms of Space, but the connection seemed to have deepened. It definitely felt more intimate. And ever since she learned to do the same as her dad, it was almost eagerly encouraging her to test and expand the limits to push herself further.

Something she'd have done anyways since it was her dad who taught her and she wanted to make him proud. The first thing she did with her new-found skill was try to find the limit to how much space she could fit into them.

That was when she found that not every dimension was equal. It depended on which axis she split. Some were temporary. Those, she could create on the fly and they'd fade away soon. They were also quite fragile and couldn't hold or transport much.

Testing on those was over fairly quickly and it was an uncomplicated process. They only had a few vectors and couldn't be pushed nearly as far as the other kind. There were differences and she could enhance them a bit in different ways, but that was the gist of it.

For the other kind, the tests were still ongoing for the simple fact that she hadn't found the limits yet. For all intents and purposes, they seemed permanent. At least she thought they were because they grew more stable over time instead of the opposite.

She was limited in how many she could create and access at the same time, namely two and one respectively. Those two were a veritable playground for them. Well, one of them at least.

From what she understood, she split the axis of Time and Space for those. Time was mostly unresponsive and they didn't know what to do with it since time seemed to stop inside of it so they couldn't even measure anything.

The Space Dimension was the fun one. As of yet, she'd found several ways to influence the space within it. She could spread it out, stretch it, pinch it, shift it, twist it, and fill it with some kind of dense energy she was drawing in from... somewhere.

She flinched slightly under her cover at the thought of that. The discovery of it was an almost traumatic experience. The place where she found that energy was just outside of the generally acknowledged dimensions.

She lacked the words to describe where she was pulling it from, but she could actually kind of visit it at will. In her mind at least. The first time, she'd been guided by her power, infinitely far yet just around the five-dimensional corner where the boundaries were less than infinite and distance only had a secondary meaning at best.

Once there, she could reach... Beyond. Which she tentatively tried, and it hurt. A lot. The first time she pushed through that comparatively thin membrane that kept the foreign energy outside, it felt as if her head was about to melt away or burst apart from the strain.

She woke up, strangling a scream as she bled from her eyes, ears, and nostrils at the same time. It wasn't nearly as bad now but that first experience was terrifying.

The place itself was kind of a scary one too. It was a surreal space where dimensions folded into themselves naturally. Not just the three humanity has free access to, but higher dimensions that allowed for some truly wondrous geometric constructs that had her staring in partial comprehension for a long time.

She had a vague feeling that human minds weren't designed to be able to grasp anything above three dimensions beyond the theoretical aspect. Non-euclidean shapes that twisted space as well as minds were common here.

All she could feel when she reached there was a deep fascination and a faint longing to just stay and keep staring. Looking at the spot where the boundaries thinned for too long made her eyes bleed even now.

At least her brain didn't feel as if it was tickled by an insanely aggravating itch while splitting apart from the pain at the same time anymore. Despite all that being a giant, blood-red flag, she didn't stop regularly visiting the place.

Mainly because it also felt... nostalgic? As if she'd been there once and had just forgotten all about it. It was a strange feeling all around... As if she had amnesia and was just on the verge of regaining her memories only for them to slip away at the last moment...

Anyways, she didn't really have a way to actively use the energy she was drawing from there so she filled the dimensions she created with it instead. She felt she could push herself and draw it into this corner of reality, but she was hesitant to do so.

She had a feeling that something not-great would happen if she did and her power actually agreed with her on that front, so that was that.

As of yet, she could passively use it as fuel to change the vectors within her dimensions, which could have all kinds of effects. It was fun to play around with them to see what they could do.

They tried some things already and found ways to regulate temperature, gravity, and density of the atmosphere within, which seemed to have the earth's gas configuration as a default for some reason. Subconscious adjustment maybe?

She wouldn't have found out about all these things as quickly without the modular measurement drones Chris created from the remains of a few of Armsmaster's scrapped projects.

He was given those by the man as a gift for finding his specialty, along with some encouragement to experiment, lest he went crazy from the urges Tinkers had to deal with.

Chris said that there was some worry in his tone and that the encouragement sounded genuine, which was surprising. Her own experience with him told her he was... less than capable of emoting but it seemed that sometimes, he almost behaved like a human being...

Maybe those short moments of compassion were the reason why Dragon had the hots for him? She shook off those thoughts and focused on her own experiences.

As they experimented with her abilities, she found new and fun ways to use her discoveries. She could redistribute physical properties and invert minor dimensions by adjusting the vectors inside of them.

The fun part was that she kept them just out of the visible spectrum while giving them tangible substance in the third dimension, allowing her to essentially create invisible objects.

It was kinda hard to do at a distance as opposed to her usual powerset, but the strain was entirely worth it to see Nazis stumble over nothing again and again. Like a slap stick parody of the third Reich.

Their involuntary performances of comedy even managed to encourage some civilians to fight back at times, which made her grin victoriously. Getting enough confidence to stand up for yourself was the first step out of oppression and she was proud to have inspired some people to take it.

She also learned to connect one point with another through usage of unconventional multidimensional physics, which allowed her to do some really fun things. Especially since she certainly wasn't limited to three dimensions any longer, which meant that she could get really creative in the way she folded space.

She was only just starting out on that particular field of experimentation but already, she could do some nifty things.

Such as throwing in some tennis balls on one end, accelerating them thanks to artificially increased gravity inside, and letting them pop out of the end point like a demented ball throwing machine. Let's say, above a Nazi's head?

She still needed some physical plane to connect the opening to so it didn't work too well in open places with the exception being the Forbidden Technique as Chris called it.

It also took some trial and error to keep the speed at non-lethal levels, but that was alright. Experimenting was supposed to iron out little details like that after all. Her innocent smile when she told him that made Chris shudder which in turn made her grin.

There were limits to what she could do with this however. She couldn't make the openings much bigger than the tennis balls right now so she was limited to delivering small objects.

She also had to be careful how close to a person the opening was because except for herself, her Manton-Limit still applied in part. The best aspect of it was that she didn't need much time to prepare this, or rather, she cheated on that front.

Time to prepare her bigger moves was always one of her biggest limits besides her variation of the Manton-Limit but luckily, she now had access to a customizable dimension that she could prepare beforehand since it didn't just disappear once she made them.

It was extremely stable by now and was growing more so ever since she created it. This allowed her to prime and saturate it with enough Energy to change the vectors around on the fly.

She was also practicing specific settings to increase the speed with which she could deploy them when the situation demanded it, which was beginning to work really well.

She finally wasn't forced to stand still and concentrate for several minutes on end, which was great. Just as great as the fact that her... parents finally stopped screaming.

Of course that meant that cold silence consumed the house, but since she wouldn't spend much of the night here, she could live with that. She tacitly ignored how her stomach churned from the knowledge that there were only two possible extremes to the atmosphere in this hellhole she was forced to call home.

It was either charged from hot anger and rising tempers or it was ice cold from the cold indifference they showered each other with when they had no energy to clash for once. She hated this. And she hated even more the thought that this may have been her fault.

Maybe her supposed father found out that he wasn't in fact her father? He did find out that she slept with his brother after all... It didn't take much to become suspicious if your child is actually yours from that point. Maybe he got some of her hair and did a secret DNA test?... He did behave colder towards her recently...

She shook her head and concentrated on more important things. Such as locking her door for the night and being careful to not make any noise while changing from her pajamas into her vigilante gear. Complete with a new and improved mask.

Chris had come through again and managed to fit the entire mechanism for the binoculars into the dimensional expansion behind it. They experimented a bit with her minor dimensions and power interaction and found that if they were careful, it wasn't impossible to combine them with his tech.

As long as she regularly charged them, they were fairly stable too. Just not self-sufficient like the big ones. She was a bit worried about what would happen if she was caught moonlighting with his gear but he just shrugged and said her safety was more important than any punishment he'd get for that, which was really sweet of him.

'He's a great friend.' She once again affirmed with a smile as she put her last touches on her outfit. All of the Wards were. Except for Sophia. She was a Bitch with a capital B.

Chris seemed the only one to disregard her age and focus on her experience though. It was refreshing that he didn't argue against her actions but chose to try and make sure to help keep her safe instead. Shaking off those thoughts, she focused on what she was planning to do now.

The first point on her list was to visit her dad and if there was time afterwards, she'd try to squeeze in a patrol too. This was the night where the gangs would hit the streets again so law enforcement would have all their hands full. They'd need any help they could get.

She was determined to make a difference and this was a good chance to prove herself. She wanted to show that she was capable enough to be seen as an equal by the heroes of this city instead of being treated like a child who was playing adult games.

It wasn't even the need for recognition that drove her. At least it wasn't just that. She could admit some acknowledgement would be nice, but the main reason was that she could do so much good and all those limits were holdin her back.

Determined, she grabbed her very own self-made spatially extended satchel. She smiled faintly at the available space in the recently charged minor dimension. She expanded it again after the most recent breakthrough in the appliance of her powers.

She didn't have to worry about weight since whatever she stored inside actually slipped in between two of the three generally acknowledged dimensions. She could theoretically change it with her vectors but had no reason to as it was really convenient to have her satchel weigh basically nothing.

As of yet, she was the only one capable of using them like that as she had an instinctive grasp on what was in there and how to get it out. She supposed others with space based abilities may be able to use them too but she hadn't found anyone like that yet. Well, besides her dad at least and she didn't show him yet.

Until she figured out how to key in other people, this limited the utility for the people she wanted to share this with but at least no one could steal from her. Shelving those thoughts, she stepped up to the window and focused on the lens that would magnify her vision. She grinned as she felt it slot into place.

She calibrated it to her needs and used her now technologically enhanced sight to pinch and connect several roofs together which allowed her to walk only a few steps until she reached her usual starting point for patrols and outings as Horizon.

She let them snap back to normal a moment later and took a deep breath. She waited for a moment to reorient herself before zeroing in on her next target. Each jump took her far further than her usual range, but they took a bit more out of her too.

Still less than the several shorter range jumps in quick succession she'd need to get there by usual means though, and it was way faster too. She jumped a few times like that, thankful for the dark hiding the distortions her power caused.

Some people may wonder why the roof Suddenly shifted a bit, but she took care not to cause any permanent damage. Her thoughts were rudely interrupted when suddenly, she felt something rapidly approach her through the acute spatial awareness bubble that began developing after she began really pushing her power.

Instinctively, she tried to pull up the roof in the object's way but she was too slow. Her reaction time just wasn't quick enough. A bullet grazed her upper arm, making her hiss from the pain, before it impacted the wall behind her.

Several more followed but this time, she was prepared and none of them found their target, sailing into another dimension instead as she used the roof-shield's surface for the entrance.

The shooting stopped and there were some angry shouts. She used their momentary distraction to dive for cover. She quickly switched her magnifying module for the thermal sensor one and counted ten hostiles in relatively close proximity.

No doubt those were gang members of some kind. She cursed herself for being caught off guard like this despite knowing that crime would pick up rapidly again after tonight.

From her satchel, she retrieved the burner phone she always had on her person. She promised her dad to ask for help when possible after all. Her mind drew a blank when she called the PRT and it wouldn't even connect.

Frantically, she dialed the number for the Protectorate and found results to be the same. A call to the plain old police station sent her into a queue. 'Eh?... What the Hell is going on?!'

Her thoughts went unanswered but she couldn't afford to stay idle because of her confusion. Thinking quickly, she pushed her power and changed covers as overtly as possible by pinching space in between while being careful not to cause any visible distortions before shuffling over.

She needed some time to think on how to solve this, so she kept the connection open and pulled one of her new gadgets out of her satchel.

After activating it, she rolled it through her tunnel and jumped covers several more times, during which she racked her brain as to how she should resolve this situation. It was pretty clear that they weren't playing nice so she wouldn't either.

The shot that grazed her arm, which burned like a bitch by the way, could have just as likely hit her chest. A fatal injury was easily possible, accident or not. 'Well, that just means the kiddy gloves are off.' She thought determinedly as she made her decision.

She activated the voice module while she reached out with her power and began to work at the same time as the gadget went off. It played a relatively silent but high quality audio of a softly sobbing girl.

It was a realistic reaction for a kid who was in a firefight for the first time in her life and a good distraction to boot. As expected, several of the hostiles split off and took the bait. And they did so along the paths she had anticipated.

With a grin, she pushed her power. The ground surrounding them lurched upwards, throwing them off balance as dimensions changed in ways they couldn't comprehend. Concrete came alive under her influence as she formed it as if it were putty in her hands.

She had a deeper understanding of how that aspect of her power worked by now. It worked basically in the same way she influenced outer-dimensional vectors, just on a more instinctive basis.

Soon, they were encased in almost closed off swirls of concrete thick enough to keep them contained even if they decided to use high calibre weapons to shoot their way out.

She then stretched the space on the outside to increase the distance between them and the surroundings, allowing her powers to work without Manton-Limit as long as she stayed clear of the circles surrounding them.

Once she was done safely containing them, she took a small breath. She was already a bit exhausted from the jumps before so she wasn't at 100%, but she also wasn't tuckered really out. There was however a small but persistent headache building that wasn't entirely based on her power usage. What was going on? Why were the PRT and Protectorate lines dead at the same time?

She was furiously thinking on what she was supposed to do. Should she return home and sit out whatever was happening? Continue on to the Lux? Or should she change direction to the PRT HQ? No, that one was out. It was too far away to safely make it.

In the end, the decision was made for her when an incredibly fast projectile shot through her perception and cleanly passed through her shoulder. With a supreme effort, she pushed the scream that wanted to rip free from her throat down to a silent groan.

Her knees gave out and she almost collapsed from the pain, but she kept herself on her feet, if barely. Adrenaline was pumping through her and she followed her instincts by almost blindly pinching space and sidestepping behind a wall.

That did more harm than good however since a new arrival that just so bordered on her range of perception announced himself from the roof of the warehouse in front of her with a whistle and a cheerfully mocking voice. His appearance in the moonlight made her face go even paler beneath her mask.

"Gotcha! But seriously, you're one badass girly, aren'tcha? Man, I thought for sure that you'd cry your little eyes out after Joseph nailed that shot. He's our best beside Victor, you see. There was no doubt he'd hit the mark. But... you're tougher than you look. You didn't even go down."

The blonde, topless man who had jumped off the roof and was standing in the street a few meters away from her shrugged. He was wearing a rather detailed metal mask depicting a snarling wolf.

At around two meters in height, abound with firm muscles, he was a striking and intimidating figure even without engaging his powers. Once he did? Well, not without reason was he called one of the most dangerous Capes of the city.

'Hookwolf...' She thought and couldn't help but feel terror encroaching on her mind. Her vision flickered as panic and blood loss joined hands to try and make her lose consciousness. She fought back the feeling and glared at him.

She wouldn't give this ruthless nazi the satisfaction of collapsing in front of him. Not to mention that fainting now was a really bad idea. In the face of the nightmare that she seemed to be trapped in, she stood as tall as her body allowed her to.

This man was confirmed to have killed dozens of people, gang members and civilians alike. He was sentenced for the Birdcage and managed to escape transport twice already with the help of his Nazi friends.

Rumors had it that he was a single larger incident away from earning himself a Kill Order, but all those facts that shot through her mind were meaningless in the end. Letting terror consume her wouldn't change anything for the better. He must have seen the spatial distortions as she prepared her power because he began mocking her.

"Attempting to leave already? And here I went and wore my good mask just for you today. Well, I suppose for a young brat such as you, it's probably bedtime already... Though I suppose that powers kinda equalize that. If you put yourself out there you'll have to accept the consequences, you know?"

She could hear the smile in his voice as he obviously thought himself more witty than he actually was. Instead of reacting, she just stoically glared at him while trying to work out how to escape. The more time he wasted by playing around here, the more she could refine her plan. Her silence had him chuckling and shaking his head before he grew serious.

"Come on girly. Will you surrender and save both of us the time and yourself quite a bit of pain or do I have to come up with some... more convincing methods? Believe me, I can be very creative."

He cracked his knuckles and she could feel the menacing grin behind his mask. They wanted to capture her, she realised. Probably to 'reeducate' her if she was of the proper demographic or dispose of her if she wasn't. Did they know who she was?

'Probably not. If they knew I'm a moonlighting Ward... They wouldn't try this I think.' She concluded while trying to regain her equilibrium in the face of her worsening pain. If she wanted to get out of here, she'd have to hurry.

It was becoming harder to concentrate through it, so while gritting her teeth, she tried to think. Before she could decide on a course of action, a second voice startled her. It had an easy, confident tone to it as it divulged a fact she'd rather have kept hidden.

"She has Ward and some Protectorate training. Judging by her skillset, Power, and her appearance as well as apparent age, I am almost positive that this is Vista. It seems the professional and well behaved Ward has entered her rebellious phase. I presume she drew some inspiration from Shadow Stalker?"

She couldn't quite suppress the outrage despite the situation she was in. Her drawing inspiration from that massive bitch Sophia? She'd rather jump off a building without her powers. Quickly, she forced herself to refocus.

The situation was dire, but there had to be a way to get out of this before she lost consciousness. Surreptitiously, she glanced at the newcomer. He too was blonde and muscular, though not as tall and leaner than Hookwolf.

He was wearing a black breastplate with similarly coloured pants as well as a red shirt beneath the armour. A mask following the same colour scheme covered his face.

Victor's reveal gave her some hope that she'd be able to leave alive and with her body somewhat intact, but it was quickly dashed by the other man's words and Victor's reaction.

"Ah, what a shame. Recruitment's out then. I guess we'll just have to kill her and make sure we aren't implicated, right? Maybe blend her and feed the dogs with her remains or something?"

The casually callous tone of his voice chilled her to the bone. She could feel him weighing the pros and cons and couldn't risk the balance to fall on the wrong side. He continued, uncaring of the impact his words had.

"Wouldn't be the first time. If I get a Kill Order, it'll draw the wrong attention to the Empire. It's why I've held back so much the past few months and I kinda don't want all that effort to go to waste because a little kid wanted to play with the big boys."

Realising that her death was a legitimate possibility was jarring in a way she hadn't yet experienced in her short life but now wasn't the time for a breakdown. She could have those later in the safety of her dad's arms and for those to hold her, she had to survive.

As soon as Victor nodded thoughtfully, she pushed her horror aside and decisively put her half-baked plan into action. Concentrating through the pain was difficult but if she wanted to make it, she'd have to do so. Hence, she did.

Making use of her spatial senses, she reached out and thinned the wall behind her before pushing herself backwards. The pain in her shoulder was almost blinding but she couldn't lose focus now.

Victor reacted quickly but not quickly enough. The bullet he shot at her entered the portal to her dimension as she instinctively calculated the approximate trajectory of the fired projectile and drew a small piece of the wall in its way.

She missed him when she let it pass through the other portal she opened between her slightly spread legs, but she made him lose focus and curse so she counted it as a win.

The immediate danger passed as she closed the opening behind her and thickened the wall to the point where even a fully transformed Hookwolf would struggle to get through.

In the complete darkness of the warehouse, she cursed herself for not asking for a proper night vision module as she activated the thermal vision and found vague shapes along with the heat signatures of Hookwolf and Victor.

They seemed to have decided against trying to smash through and were already on the way to flank the warehouse for a two-pronged approach. Feverishly, she tried to think of a plan. Her eyes narrowed as she turned back where she came from. That could work.

She stealthily shifted open the wall and grinned. They didn't know she had a way to observe them so they most likely wouldn't expect that she'd leave from where she entered.

She had to hurry however. While running along the wall and using her power sparingly to speed up the journey while conserving energy for a big push, she tried to think of a viable escape plan.

She was getting weaker thanks to blood loss and general exhaustion so she needed to be quick. Once she reached her dad's territory, she'd be safe so that was the priority. That was the thought that went through her head when she made a near fatal mistake.

In a hurried moment of lacking judgment, she jumped onto the roof of one of the abandoned warehouses to enable a jump that would get her to safety quicker by means of a big jump. She just didn't expect to have her left calf explode in a shower of gore from the high calibre bullet that tagged her.

With a half-suppressed scream of agony, she managed to push her whole weight with the right leg to make one more jump before crumbling to the ground. Trembling, she pushed herself up and looked back at her mangled leg.

'I won't make it, will I?' She thought numbly. The realisation wasn't as life-changing as she'd expected. Or she was just in shock. Probably the latter.

"Boy, oh boy. That's why I love that crazy fucker. Joseph doesn't fool around. He knows that you're just a kid trying for the big leagues and failing miserably, but he didn't even hesitate to pull the trigger. Well, that's it, little girl. Any last words?"

She couldn't even clearly see Hookwolf but she could just imagine that cocky posture. The arrogant expression on his masked face. It... enraged her. Behind that feeling of existential terror that was slowly building, she could feel it. The fury at being dismissed as a threat.

She hated that he felt confident enough to gloat in front of her. He didn't even consider her worthy of a measure of wariness and she despised that feeling even more than her impending doom. So she pushed.

She pushed against that barrier that kept her from laying her eyes on what was behind that non-infinite membrane that kept her inside. She grit her teeth and forcefully drilled through it and finally, it clicked. She was Enlightened.

Her Mind was laid bare once again in front of folded and twisted layers of crystalline flesh. Immeasurably dense structures that formed geometrically abstract patterns spread in front of her mind's eye.

What she was seeing drove her to the brink of insanity at first glance, so much so that her mind suppressed the memory completely. Her second glimpse went only marginally better. The creature's impossible form stretched near-endlessly in front of her.

Before her was an existence so foreign that it resisted any explanation, manifested in a constantly changing yet fixed form. It occupied far more and way less Space than it should. A true Paradox to the human mind. That was when an all-encompassing 'voice' echoed through her mind.

[... Query Acknowledged.]

It welcomed her with an almost apologetic tinge to the mechanical drawl that was how her brain interpreted the information. She felt so utterly small in front of this... Thing.

Her eyes were bleeding again and her brain felt as if it was ripping itself apart while being stabbed by glowing hot needles but she couldn't pay any attention to such meaningless things. All of her focus was on the being in front of her. The reason she had a power to call her own.

[Requested Bandwidth Upgrade... Partial Success. Reassess Parameters... Reattempt...]

The hot needles widened and she silently screamed. She couldn't help it. Detached as she was right now, her body was still a biological construct with instincts and subconscious programming of its own.

Idly, she realised that her brain was being ripped apart and wondered if she would die before Hookwolf even got his rusty nails on her. That was when something shifted.

[Success...]

[Data Transfer commencing...]

Suddenly, what was left of her mind was being overloaded by endless streams of information. She learned more about her power and how to use it than she could ever have learned in her lifetime.

Calculations that left far behind anything terrestrial scientists thought to have discovered bloated the gaping wound that was her brain. She couldn't retain more than the smallest fraction of what she was shown, but it was enough.

With an ill-fated thing that would have been a smile if her motoric functions weren't already failing, she expressed her thanks to the foreign creature and once again received regret in return before she forced herself back into her physical shell.

The picture hadn't changed much beyond the fact that her mouth was now wide open to release a soundless scream. He was still mid-gloat and she would make him pay for his dismissive attitude. It would be the last thing she'd do so she'd have to make it count.

"No more words? Frozen stiff from terror, huh? Well, it happens all the time but I confess I'm a bit disapp-"

"I'll show you what this little girl can do, you sadistic nazi-fuck..."

Her snarl interrupted him as she pushed open her personal Dimension and drew Cosmic Energy through the small passage. She didn't know how long she had left so she had to hurry.

Only the thinnest of strands made it all the way into the three-dimensional Axis, but she hoped it would be enough. Rapidly, she took a hold of it while ignoring the strain and used it to twist the fabrics of reality out of shape.

Space collapsed as she shifted it to collide with a dimension it was never supposed to touch. A parallel transformed into a tangent and caused reality to weep tears of conceptional gravity as a rift opened where she struck this most grievous wound.

The opening was microscopical in scope, but the effect was spectacular, and hopefully, it would be enough to end this feral creature.

His surprised and panicked yelp as he was rapidly pulled towards the Gravity Well she forced into existence managed to draw a vicious half-smile from her despite the horrid pain she was suffering through.

The other half of her face wasn't responding any longer. She may have been on the verge of death, but at least she was taking a vicious nazi with her. As the vicious headache grew more distant, she could feel something hot run down both her nostrils as well as her cheeks.

She was aware that the liquid was blood, possibly with a bit of brain matter mixed in. She pushed further than she should have and paid the price, but that was fine. Even if she survived by some miracle, she'd already suffered severe brain damage.

The only reason she could somewhat think right now was that she'd subconsciously shifted her Self into the flicker of crystalline flesh that had formed in her Corona Pollentia when she forcefully gazed upon the ungazeable.

Slowly, it was rotating on its own axis in the ruins that was her brain. She was aware of it, foreign to her body as it was. That wasn't a permanent solution of course, but it allowed her to witness the consequences of her deed and to mentally say her goodbyes to the people who she cherished.

In the background, she could hear the terrible sound of metal screeching as it scraped against metal. Hookwolf's transformation usually had a poignant way of announcing him, but this time it brought satisfaction instead of terror, knowing that he was fighting with a natural force that was created by her command.

Her body protested and failed as she tried to sit up one last time and she slipped back into her previous position. It seemed she was denied the dignity to die in a seated position, so she slowly turned her head sideways to at least watch the destructive symphony of gravity that was drawing in and destroying large parts of Hookwolf's regenerating metal body.

The massive caricature of a wolf struggled as gravity folded and ripped apart the metal that made up his form again and again in front of her eyes. A smile that was equally vicious and resigned one-sidedly pulled on her lips as her teeth were painted red by the blood flowing from her nose.

Though, the longer he managed to hold on, the more the faint worry that he might actually survive grew. They both were clinging to life with the tenacity of a cockroach for different reasons.

He shifted and turned in the unforgivable grasp of her creation, keeping himself grounded with growing amounts of hooks and blades that somehow allowed him to hold on as they gouged deep trenches in the already damaged concrete road again and again.

The sounds he was making truly marked him as the beast he portrayed himself as. Slowly, she could feel the vestiges of Cosmic Energy dry up and with it the hope that she would achieve something before her death.

Her almost dead eyes observed him as he gained a more solid foothold before he ripped himself free from gravity's pull with a triumphant roar. She could do nothing but steep in the crushing disappointment that washed through her as he crawled away from the disappearing Well.

Immediately after reaching relative safety, he turned in her direction and growled before leaping. A reluctant, muffled scream left her mouth and was quickly cut off when fresh agony exploded through her battered body.

He had transformed into a grotesque, damaged half form and lifted her body effortlessly despite the clear signs of wear on him. Parts of his body were missing, replaced by metallic facsimiles that kept what was left of his flesh stitched together.

He was holding her up to his eye level and glared at her with savage intent and reluctant respect in his beast-like eyes.

"That... Really... Hurt... Girly."

He growled out with a bit of blood leaking from his mouth as he marginally tightened his hold. The bladed fingers of his hands cut into her flesh and she did the only thing she could think of to announce her opinion.

She spat the thick globule of blood and a bit of vomit that had collected in her mouth into his still-masked face while glaring defiantly. Surprise flickered and made way for more pronounced respect.

How she hated that expression. She didn't want respect from a murderous nazi. She also didn't want to die at the hands of an unrepentant savage and disappear without having lived a life worth living, but such was the Fate of her existence, she guessed.

"I'll give you a quick death. As deserved by a warrior. You have larger balls than most men in this city."

He stated calmly, not that she cared much. She felt even more faint than before with her consciousness flickering. Blood that she'd much rather would've had on the inside was flowing out of her in decidedly unhealthy amounts. Not to mention her brain.

Altogether, she really wasn't well. She almost snorted out a laugh at the thought. Her delirious mind was of the opinion that this was the time to say her goodbyes. She didn't want to fade but by now, she had lost any and all hope.

With tears stinging in her eyes, she sent her final good-byes with the last one directed at the man she'd found regretfully late. 'I'm sorry, dad. It seems I can't fulfill my part of the Deal after all. Do me a favour and help some heroes anyways from time to time. For the dumb dead kid who's nothing but a disappointment.'

She would have liked to throw a cool one liner at the metallic menace before dying but the crystalline core of her brain felt as if it was wrung out before someone pierced it with hundreds of glowing hot needles, so her wit was kinda indisposed right now. She also wasn't sure if she was even capable of talking anymore.

She could feel his fingers flex around her throat and was certain this was her end when suddenly, he stopped. His eyes were as bewildered as she felt, especially when she was suddenly plucked from his grasp with gentle care and ensconced in warmth and comfort that seeped into her body.

She looked down when she heard something pop and found that the asphalt beneath her was glowing and bubbling as if someone put a flamethrower to it. The air was wavering from the heat but she felt nothing of it.

Instead, the hold on her adjusted to completely support her and neither heat nor cold touched her any longer. She was just thinking that she finally went completely around the bend and had begun hallucinating with all her senses when she looked back up and noticed that Hookwolf seemed to strain against an invisible hold with all his might.

His muscles were bulging and metal was forming once again on his body. It looked as if he was trying to force himself to move but utterly failed to do so. Fascinated by what was happening, she even forgot her own state for a moment as she watched him keep pushing his power to its limits against the hold that kept him contained.

Where before, he looked mangled as if something had eaten parts of his body and he needed to replace them with metal, which wasn't too far off the truth she supposed, he was now growing larger by the second, all the while failing to make any headway.

"You fucking piece of trash! I'll slaughter you when I get my teeth in you! Even your mother won't recognise the bits of flesh that will be left of you when I'm done blending you into a smoothie! And then I'll send her right after you!"

He growled and raved. If his head wasn't part of a nonorganic metallic beast of murder and mayhem, she was sure he would have frothed at the mouth. As it was, he did his best to imitate a raving mad beast, only for his increasingly offensive and aggressive ramblings to stop instantly.

"Oh, be silent. There is no need to beg for your Punishment so impatiently. I will take good care of you soon. Now please do not open that offensive trap of yours again before you are talked to. It truly is a pain to discipline barbarians such as you. Learning from mistakes tends to be a scarcity in your collective skillset."

She knew that voice, though not the smooth, dismissive coldness in it. Glancing upwards with a head far heavier than it's ever been, she found the very much welcome features of her dad. His eyes weren't on her though.

They were staring at the vicious metal beast like an executioner at his target. There was none of the usual playfulness or compassion in them and she could have sworn they flickered between angry red and brown a few times.

When he glanced down at her, his eyes softened considerably. The warmth she'd become used to find in his brown orbs overtook the dispassionate Wrath, though it didn't disappear. It just took a backseat.

"So be it, little one. I do not mind taking that role in your life, I suppose... What's one more spawn in the grand scheme of things, after all."

Warmth, this time the emotional kind, seeped into her at the gentle tone of voice and made her even drowsier than she already was as she felt her body continuously mend. He was healing her, she belatedly realised.

Her brain was receiving the majority of the cozy heat flowing through her body. It still felt raw and open from the torture she'd put it through in the short time since she left her house, but at least she didn't feel like she was on the very edge of death anymore.

The sensation of agony was leaving her slowly but steadily and her body relaxed into the comfortable hold. His voice took on a quality of gentle sternness when he continued to talk, not that much filtered through the thick wool that continued to encase her mind.

"I do protest your brand of self-flagellation, Devilspawn. You are the opposite of dumb, though your evident impulsive streak does come across as such at times. Do remember however that you will never be anything close to a disappointment. And I will most certainly not let you die, so see to it that you fulfill your end of our Deal."

She finally felt safe again, causing silent tears intermingled with blood to flow down her cheeks. Some of her dad's soft words slowly registered and she blinked languidly with one eye since the other stubbornly refused to close, even as its eyeball twitched slightly.

An involuntary silly smile, completely at odds with the bloody tears, spread on her lips. Thankfully, both were hidden behind her mask. 'He heard me... And he doesn't mind... That means he acknowledges me, right?... Wait... One more?' She tried to keep the faint thread of her consciousness going, but it was of no use.

Her tired, drawn, and traumatized mind failed to make sense of all the words and began drifting off, but not before she felt a gentle kiss on her forehead.

Idly, she asked herself how long it's been since she received this kind of parental affection and why she felt the touch when she was supposed to wear her mask. She quickly decided that those thoughts were inconsequential and did away with them.

"Sleep now, sweet child. We will speak when you wake. Do not worry. I will take care of this unruly mutt and quite possibly his owner as well. There are so many targets to hunt on this eventful evening. It's hard to decide which ones I'll take care of myself. We shall soon see who else earned my personal attention..."

The ominous words followed her into unconsciousness as she fell into a deep slumber she wouldn't resurface from for days on end. This time, she wasn't subjected to any nightmares. Just dreams of eldritch creatures connecting to the world and offering powers as they hid away in separate dimensions.

~Brad Meadows/Hookwolf~

The evening started well enough. Almost all planned operations to assert their dominance were given a go after Max confirmed the information that Lung would be out of the city for a while yet. Which also seemed to have been the reason he called the truce in the first place, though he obviously underestimated the time he'd need.

They'd received that piece of intel from their main spy in the ABB. Some half chink who deemed himself white enough to follow their ideology or whatever. That was bullshit of course but he was useful so Max decided to string him along until he lost his value.

Based on that information, he finally decided to cut loose. Recently, he was way too careful and Brad had begun to contemplate mutiny if his cowardly streak continued. Luckily it didn't because he fucking hated to deal with administrative shit.

He would have done it for the good of the gang but he wasn't really a leader. He was a born enforcer and he was proud of it. Soon after, they'd gotten a tip from someone who called himself a sympathiser that the new vigilante causing trouble for the gangs as a whole and the Empire in particular had a route through the still-abandoned part of the docks.

They traveled that way regularly and it was the perfect spot for an ambush. Max wanted nothing to do with it since he claimed it was a suicide mission as it was too close to the new fucker's territory. He protested by volunteering in front of the whole fucking gang to run an op anyways.

A fact that forced Max to allow it, lest he appeared as the cowardly fuck he shaped up to be. The way he had grit his teeth at being shoehorned into this told him he'd probably suffer for his decision later on but he was reasonably sure it wouldn't be too harsh a punishment if he managed to bring that annoyance in to convert or dispose.

Victor chose to join him as a 'moderating influence' and Max allowed it, so he was confident they'd manage to snatch her up. They took with them a few more volunteers to make sure they'd be able to take her out and bring her back.

They were lucky and the tip proved to be spot on, so they opted to send in the squad first to test her reactions. That was when things began to go sideways. Because one of the volunteers was the best friend of Roderick, who had his nuts twisted into a knot by the little space bender.

Something he thought was a bit too harsh a punishment for the little bit of fun he had with that race traitor, but his expression was hilarious. How they missed that his friend had snuck on the mission, he'd never know.

The guy was out for revenge of course, so despite the clear orders not to shoot until they were sure to not hit anything vital, he fired at first chance. And since he went for it, the other morons followed like the brainless sheep they were.

It took Victor threatening to court-martial them via radio to make them stop popping. He observed it all from the roof of the building he chose and found how she reacted pretty impressive.

It was clear by now that she was a young one, but she reacted with the composure of a veteran when she was clipped by a bullet. She wasted no time to react and got behind cover before fooling the entire squad with some strange tinker-tech ball that imitated a crying bitch and some potent spacefuckery.

He found it amusing how the little brat played the idiots. It ended with them being trapped in strangely twisted concrete things that left them helpless. Victor decided to end the show then and signalled for Joseph to take the shot.

Surprisingly, she actually managed to stay almost silent and on her feet when her shoulder was ripped apart by a sniper bullet. Still, she was obviously at her limits.

Things then turned more complicated when she was outed as a Ward. He should have known. A young, female, surprisingly competent space bender? Of course it was that little goody-two-shoes Vista.

And she would have fit so well into their lineup... Oh well. One couldn't have everything. Despite it leaving a slightly bad taste in his mouth, he decided to do business as per usual and end the threat.

She was young but powerful, making her a danger for the future, and her report would have almost certainly earned him his Kill Order. If he had to decide between a faint dislike of an action or his personal safety, he'd go for the latter every time.

It wasn't the first time the Empire made a fresh trigger disappear while taking care to not be implicated and it certainly wouldn't be the last time. One didn't survive as a warrior like him without being ruthless and resourceful and he endeavoured to spread those ideals to his brothers in arms.

She was a slippery little shit and led them on a merry chase but Joseph came through once again and obliterated the lower part of her leg so he easily caught up thanks to his heightened physical capabilities while Victor fell behind a bit.

He liked her bearing if nothing else. She had guts. Sadly, he would need to spill them. That thought was the last one in his mind before his body froze in the middle of his traditional monologuing. His instincts were screaming at him to get out of there but it was too late.

Whatever it was that she did, it rocked his world and not in a good way. Never did he have to fight for his life so viscerally before. But he survived. He won. And he claimed his price. Only to be stopped at the last possible moment.

He simply couldn't move any longer. He was bewildered and tried to push against the resistance with more power but the result was the same. He failed. 'What the fuck?!' He thought to himself as a grunt of exertion left his bloody metallic maw.

The reason for his sudden immobility became apparent when a glaring Light ignited behind the girl. It was bright enough to make him blink away the spots in front of his eyes.

When he could see again, the brat was already cradled in the arms of that well dressed fucker Max warned him about. The ground around him was throwing up bubbles like lava and a faint orange glow surrounded him as swirling embers manifested around him. Max's words came to his mind.

'Don't engage him. He took out the Nine and made it look easy. You've seen the footage. If you meet him, stay courteous and retreat. I mean it, Brad. No solo action against him. He's dangerous. So much so that even Lung feels threatened. Do. Not. Engage.'

That advice wasn't really applicable any more so he fell back to his modus operandi. He viciously threatened with disembowelment while trying to follow through with his words. Only for him to be silenced by a single statement.

He struggled and raged against the hold he had on him but it simply wouldn't budge, no matter what he did. Helplessly, he watched him heal the worst of the girl's wounds with that gentle Light of his while silently talking to her.

His entire body communicated gentleness and carin before his eyes turned to him. Brad wasn't a jumpy guy. There were very few things in this world that could truly make him fear for his life. But those eyes?

That burning intensity that seemed to dissect him as if he was an insect waiting to be crushed, all the while he was completely at his nonexistent mercy? A very real shiver of fear ran down his spine.

"A bestial form created from metal and an all too human body hidden away in a separate space. Oh, she managed to intrude, didn't she? To damage your body within its sanctuary. How... intriguing."

The tone of his voice was conversational as he came closer, the child still gently propped in his arms. He could see that she had snuggled up to him like a limpet while soft Light surrounded her and mended her flesh.

And to think that he had respect for her. Sadly, he couldn't even scoff as he was completely muzzled, much to his ire. Rage overwhelmed the reason his survival instincts had forced upon him as he soundlessly snarled.

He wouldn't be suppressed or chained! He promised himself to live his life on his own terms! And yet, he was powerless to stop this man's influence. How was that fucker doing that?!

"I have no use for this worthless construct. I'd much rather look the true beast into the eyes."

He ominously stated and Brad couldn't help the horror gripping at his mind with icy tendrils when he watched him push his hand into his transformed body, only for the hand to appear in front of his real eyes and grasp him at his jaw.

Frozen as before, he felt himself drawn out of the safety of wherever his real body went when he transformed. Helplessly, he watched as the metal gave away and fell to the ground uselessly, leaving only his vulnerable flesh behind.

Even the permanent metallic enhancements of his body faded away to nothing, allowing blood to flow again. This had never happened before and it terrified him even more than the way the little brat's... whatever that was intruded on his real body.

Because while she very nearly died doing that, he was just casually reaching in and pulling him out as if it took no effort at all. Even against Lung, he could somewhat hold his own since he didn't really need to worry about injuries as long as he transformed.

Not even nullifiers could get rid of his powers so thoroughly. Once more a vulnerable human instead of the unstoppable Beast he'd become on that fateful day, he was laid bare in front of a far greater Monster.

The man's unforgiving grasp on his chin clued him in that his face was naked and visible too. That was the least of his worries though. The Devil forced him to look into his burning eyes with dispassionate scorn and what he saw reflected in them was his own weak and terrified form.

Without the veil through which he observed the surroundings as long as he was the lupine metal beast, the mind breaking horror that was the Hellfire in this Monster's eyes impacted him fully.

He could feel his sanity slip away like the will to live from his victims' eyes while forcing them to watch as he blended their families into a gory mush. Years upon years of brutal murders rose from his mind and the faces of his victims became crystal clear as they looked at him with unveiled dark glee.

The spirits of those he murdered were of the vengeful sort, it seemed. They returned from their eternal rest to claim his mind as their own, and there was nothing he could do as they ripped into it with vicious abandon.

He tried to fight back, to reclaim the victory he'd already fought for, but he was powerless against the onslaught. Every touch he suffered in this Hellscape of his own making sent searing agony through his already breaking mind.

A rather loud tormented scream, intermittently interrupted by broken, incoherent apologies, echoed around him and it took him a long moment to realize that it was his own voice he heard. How long had it been since he genuinely screamed from pain? That his voice sounded so remorseful? He couldn't remember and it wasn't important.

"Oh no, that won't do. I will not let you slip away so easily after committing such grievous sins. You have far too much to answer for to just let you lose your mind. Now, tell me...-"

He couldn't tell him anything because he didn't ask a question yet. The reason soon became apparent when almost silent gunshots echoed through the night.

He recognised the sound of the weapon that fired as Victor's tinker-enhanced handgun and it did absolutely nothing to the man who kept him subdued and focused on him.

"Oh, that was adorable but ultimately useless, don't you agree? Oh, your ability is an intriguing one... Are you trying to rob me of my experiences? The skills I have accumulated over billions of years? How unfathomable the Greed of Humanity has grown... I suppose I can indulge you this once. But I do wonder, will you be able to handle it?"

The cruel amusement in his voice was clear as day. Brad's mind was preoccupied however as his voice involuntarily rose again when the spirits of his past resumed their gruesome work and it was soon joined by another's tormented screams.

Together, they formed a harmonious symphony of agony. If he wasn't completely preoccupied with fighting for the last vestiges of his mind, he might have found the melody hauntingly beautiful.

~Miss Militia/Hannah~

'This is a warzone...' She thought grimly as she hid the old horror that was drawn from deep down in her psyche in front of those she was sworn to protect. She opted to let her ingrained instincts take over to efficiently evacuate the civilians caught in this gruesome mess.

She grit her teeth in frustration as she coordinated with Armsmaster over the secure line they feverishly established after realising that communications were compromised.

The scale of gang movement this night so far eclipsed everything they'd seen since Marquis took on the Empire on his lonesome after allegedly murdering Iron Rain.

Hot pockets suddenly began appearing all over the city, timed in a way to spread their forces. Clashes between the Empire 88 and the ABB were called in by the minute and information was contradictory in many cases.

Troopers arrived at the scene only to notice that the reports they received were false while a few blocks away, squads of unpowered gangbangers were wailing on each other.

It took them embarrassingly long to realise that they couldn't rely on the usual dissemination of information and tasked Armsmaster to establish his own secured network. He did just that in record time with the gracious help of Dragon.

Together, they rapidly took control over their forces but coordination and travel still took a fair amount of time. Meanwhile, several Empire Capes were slaughtering their way through ABB territories and Lung himself was sighted shortly afterwards fending them off.

The last she heard from that front was that he was escalating quickly and that the Protectorate was engaging. She truly hoped her colleagues were alright but couldn't waste many thoughts on it because she needed to concentrate on her own tasks.

Oni Lee was on a warpath in Empire territory, evidently exacting revenge for their audacity and the rank and file of both gangs caused mayhem wherever they went. It wasn't easy to circumvent a teleporter while transporting civilians from a war zone.

Especially so when battles consumed the entirety of the city with the exception of most of the Docks. What she was seeing only affirmed that she truly despised the gangs and what they stood for. Their need to show a strong front once again pushed them to unmentionable extremes.

She abhorred those creatures whom she refused to call human. It wasn't just them alone however. Opportunists existed too and more than she ever thought possible. All kinds of criminal scum took this potent chaos as a chance to cause their own brand of mayhem, looting and pillaging through the city.

They were stretched thin as it was and even with local law enforcement backing them fully instead of reluctantly cooperating for a change, they simply lacked the manpower to suppress what was quickly becoming a city wide riot.

In a desperate bid, they asked for permission to redirect the victims of this disproportionate case of gang violence towards Lucifer Morningstar's territory for its vaunted safety. They lacked the resources and the people to build the emergency camps they'd need to contain them.

Luckily they quickly received an answer from Danny Hebert who rallied the workers and gave permission to use several protected spaces, much to the relief of everyone on site and that was where she was now bringing those terrified civilians.

She was determined to do her part and safely escort the people they'd rescued and to not let anymore harm come to them. It was the least she could do to absolve the sin of arriving too late.

Guilt consumed her when she saw children crying for their parents who probably didn't make it. She saw the empty eyed stare of those who witnessed people close to them perish in this worthless bid for power. Very few Brocktonites would keep this day positively in their memory.

"Miss Militia, prepare for combat. Stormtiger and a squad of unpowered gang members incoming."

Dragon's warning came just early enough for her to summon a thick oversized Riot Shield with a built in rifle. The unconventional 'weapon' was something Claire suggested to try and it worked well enough.

The winds sliced against it with enough force to push her back a step before one of the civilians behind her laid his large hands on her back and helped her fortify her stance to weather the winds.

"Now what do we have here? A sandnigger cunt escorting a couple of race traitor ducklings through the streets. What a joke. Luckily I'm here to be the punchline."

Her features hardened when she laid her eyes on the cockily smirking Stormtiger, leading his men to intercept them. She had just over thirty civilians behind her and only five troopers while the man was leading a whole squad of Neonazis.

This would be a hard fought battle if she wanted to...- All thought processes stopped to reset when she saw a massive trout slap the topless man across his masked face with pinpoint accuracy.

There was only one person she knew who was audacious enough to do something like that and it drew an involuntary smile from her. Her guess was confirmed seconds later when she heard a bold voice.

"Don't you worry, innocents! Your knight in cheesy armour is here! Let Mouse Protector do her job and protect you from the Breezy Kitty! Valiant rodent warrior or distasteful feline predator! Tonight we will learn just who will prevail!"

She knew that voice, of course. She knew it well. She'd just spent hours cuddling with its owner. Claire had left after a call from Maze. Something about her needing help to contain the chaos. A poor decision as she was more likely to add to it.

Claire jumped from the roof she'd posed on, surreptitiously throwing a marble in Hannah's direction as she did a bona fide front flip before teleporting just at the right moment to avoid the furious counterattack in the form of air blades from the Empire Cape.

Hannah had no time to prepare before she was pressed against Claire's unforgiving Armor. The embrace only lasted a short moment, but it was enough for her to whisper something in her ear.

"We'll talk later. Escort those people to my new boss. He'll sort them out. I'll play with the kitty cat."

"Ok..."

She was gone as quickly as she appeared, teleporting to the fishing hook in the trout's mouth and mule kicking the blonde man from below. Hannah was impressed she could still pull those moves after so long, but this wasn't the time to appreciate her partner's flexibility.

Instead she wordlessly threw some hand signals to inform the troopers of the new route that would circumvent this battle. 'More like a slaughter. Those Nazis never stood a chance.'

She almost smiled despite the situation at witnessing them being demolished by nothing but jokes, cheese, and baguettes with a few fish thrown in there for good measure. She really had no idea just how many puns with mice and cats there were until now.

Claire's fighting style was just as chaotic as ever and warmth bloomed inside of her when she heard some stifled laughs behind her.

The fact that she managed to bring some of those traumatized people a short moment of reprieve and joy was worth anything to her and she would certainly show her appreciation later on.

~Victoria Dallon/Glory Girl~

The mallet was caught by her forcefield before it could do anything to her and her punch landed through the ignored bout of flames. Circus didn't manage a notable defense and was sent flying.

She remembered at the last moment that while her opponent's reflexes were enhanced, their durability was not so she pulled back her strength a bit.

All the reflexes and enhanced sense of balance in the world didn't help the gender fluid villain when they slammed into the brick wall behind them and crumbled into a colourful heap. She quickly checked if they were conscious and secured them once she was certain they were not.

"All clear over here, Proton Mom!"

She called out cheekily and received the obligatory 'Don't call me that!' in return. She looked at the downed villain and couldn't help but feel a bit proud. Her sparring sessions with Lucifer and Maze were really beginning to pay off.

In comparison to those two, Circus was downright slow and she quickly found an opportunity to end the fight. There wasn't even all that much collateral damage! 'If only the circumstances weren't so fucked...' She grumbled inwardly as she looked around.

Somehow, Circus managed to hire a whole squad of mercs who were equipped with minor Tinker-tech weaponry and they gleefully joined the absolute mayhem that was spreading through the whole city. Or maybe it was the other way around?

Were they working for Coil? He was known for using mercs, right? Maybe he decided to capitalize on the chaos and hired a Cape for once? She shook her head and focused.

She was glad that at least Amy was relatively safe in BB General where she volunteered for emergency healing duty once this whole mess started. The rest of the family was active on the streets.

Vicky was with her aunt, Eric, and Crystal while her dad, mom, and uncle were busy in another part of the city. They were doing what they could to suppress the riots happening everywhere and they were working closely with the PRT while the Protectorate took care of the main threats, namely the Empire and the ABB.

Soon, the clean-up on their end was done and she breathed a sigh of relief. Not much damage was caused in the surroundings so things weren't looking too bleak on their end. Her cautiously optimistic thoughts were quickly squashed when Crystal came flying with a panicked expression on her face.

"Guys! You have to see this!"

How she managed to find the time to look at her phone in this chaos, Vicky couldn't understand. What she could empathise with as soon as her eyes focused on what they were shown was the mounting panic mixed with a healthy amount of terror her cousin communicated.

"Well... Shit."

Proudly displayed in front of her was the screenshot of a post made by the user AllSeeingEye, presumably because the original post was deleted. Not quickly enough though because the list of names was right there.

Civilian names, complete with fitting cape personas and addresses. The Empire was outed. This was... bad. No, it was worse than bad. It was catastrophic. If this was accurate then the fallout of this... 'Oh god. I think I'm gonna be sick...'

She shared a stricken look with her present family. Once the Empire saw this, all bets were off. 'Max Anders... I always thought he's a smarmy git, but to think he's Kaiser...' She thought back to the few times she saw him in the public and then to the times she witnessed Kaiser and found that it fit.

If Kaiser's identity was accurate, then the others probably were too. Medhall was one of the biggest aspects of BB's economy and now they'd be lucky to survive the riots that would no doubt soon start.

What could she do? Could she even do anything? 'Probably not... Right. If I can't help on that front, I'll have to do what I can elsewhere.' With a determined frown on her brows, she addressed her aunt.

"We can't do anything about it. Let's continue the clean-up and push towards Medhall. If the civilians start rioting, we'll have to stop them for their own safety. Let's prioritise immediate threats, alright?"

Her answer was a sharp nod.

"I agree. Let's go."

She sent a quick notification to the PRT that Circus and a bunch of mercs were here to be transported away before following her family. She was the fastest flier and the most durable one, at least for one solid hit, so she took point. It was time to prove that she was a hero.

~Ethan/Assault~

The heat surrounding him as he dodged another jet of fire was drawing on his stamina something fierce. Breathing was a challenge and it felt as if his lungs were drying up in the unforgiving blaze. He struggled to keep calm in the current situation as he once again began to build up momentum.

Fighting Lung in such a state was barely any different than facing down an Endbringer. What made it worse was having to worry about the Empire getting their pot shots in.

He could see Armsie take a heavy blow to the chest and pushed his speed to his current limit to catch him and drawing the kinetic energy that moved the man away from him. He wobbled on his legs for a bit and released a suspiciously wet cough before wordlessly nodding in thanks and pushing off the ground to rejoin the battle.

Ethan was pretty sure his kinetic dampeners failed from that blow, judging from the amount of kinetic charge he received from siphoning it off him. He used it to reunite with his darling wife who promptly used his body as a springboard to leap across the street and slam into the by now massive form of Lung.

He roared in annoyance as he was pushed off his feet and sent scrambling backwards. Ethan followed immediately and caught her falling body before turning and absorbing the retaliating blow he dealt with his tail as he shot backwards, giving him a prime seat to watch the half formed wings on his back jut upwards and stabilize him as fleshy membranes grew from their skeletal form.

A helpless laugh escaped him as he watched him escalate even further. If this continued, the city would be gone by the morning. Right now, the battle was still contained in an area they had evacuated earlier but if he grew even more, they wouldn't be capable of that any longer.

He looked down at the woman he loved and winced. Not because the blow had hurt beyond the heat it carried, but because the force behind that hit would have liquefied his wife had it landed.

She'd used up her charge so he smiled at her and played toss with Dauntless, who received her and safely put her down where neither Nazi nor Dragon would immediately get to her. Good man.

Ethan then quickly turned around and pushed off the ground, ignoring the menacing heat around him, to tackle the massive monster's leg with all his might while he was winding up for a big move. He could feel agony bloom where the draconic scales touched his suit.

It was melting from the horrible heat and he was pretty sure he smelled roasted Ethan through the All-encompassing smoke and ash around them. All of that for a blow that while a debilitating wound for most, was barely an inconvenience for the big lizard.

At least it bought his colleagues some time to collect themselves. He took shallow breaths as he hurried and pushed backwards to get some distance between the rapidly healing dragon-man and himself.

Frustration made him grit his teeth painfully as he watched those he learned to call friends desperately struggle against the creature that could barely be recognised as human.

The Nazis were fighting too but he didn't really care about them beyond the danger they posed. It was still notable though that Lung used Alabaster's body as a surprisingly effective regenerating weapon earlier in the fight, much to Krieg's outrage.

Despite the addition of the Empire Capes, they were worse off than last time. Especially so since not all members of the Protectorate were present. The understandably nonexistent teamwork between them and the Empire didn't help matters.

Neither did the molten slags of metal Kaiser was throwing around, obviously aiming haphazardly since he wasn't opposed to 'friendly' fire towards them. 'Charming guy, that one.' He thought with grit teeth, his anger almost getting the better of him.

He hated that they had to team up with the most deplorable gang of the city and the reason for this mess simply to survive. If only they had more people... He may not like her but he could understand the director's frustration.

To have such a monster sitting in a city that is basically a nuclear powder keg with a lit match just waiting to fall was ludicrous, and being denied reinforcements on every turn even more so.

'We are losing... The longer this battle goes on, the worse it'll get. Armsie's new tranquilizer lost effect a while ago and it only went downhill from there. We have to do something, but what?!' He internally screamed as he forced his battered body to move once more.

Before he could really rack up any momentum, something completely unexpected happened. He caught a shadow with his dynamic vision and suddenly, the Dragon's snout was grabbed as he was slammed into the ground with enough force to make a big splash out of the half-molten concrete that surrounded him.

"Yo. The boss man sent me since he is a bit busy."

He watched in fascinated horror as the hot bartender who offed Skidmark, good riddance by the way, forcefully punched Lung in the face a few times and caved it in.

Even the escalating Dragon-man needed a moment to regenerate from that one and he created a massive blaze to cover his partial retreat. She used that moment to deliver an ominous message.

"He also told me to tell you something. If the Empire of Fuckwads isn't in custody by the end of this shitshow, daybreak at the latest, he'll come for them personally. And after what happened earlier tonight? There's no mercy left to be had."

There was some amusement in her voice, but that was surface-level at best. More prevalent was a rage of such an intensity that made the hairs on his neck stand. His instincts told him he should really nope out if he was the target of her ire.

'What happened? Wait... Hookwolf isn't here and neither is Victor. I thought they're running another raid. What if they chose one of Lucifer's holdings? Could they be so fucking stupid?'

Obviously, Nazis weren't the brightest bunch but they had to have some survival instincts, right? Right?... Lung chose that moment to get reinvolved in the conversation since his head was fully healed.

His roar shook the surroundings and his baleful glare made Ethan feel like he was the next dish to be served up. A fate he'd very much like to avoid. The murderer whom he'd sent an anonymous gift basket for her efforts in cleaning up the streets seemed less than impressed though.

"You really wanna do this, big boy? Don't you remember the last time? That scar I gave you should be a pretty little reminder, no? Or do you think that things will go differently because you had some time to ramp up? Oh wait, you actually do… You want revenge, is that it? Now that's adorable."

Ethan wouldn't have called the raging beast adorable in any capacity but what did he know? He kept his attention in equal parts on the Dragon and the tense members of the Empire with an emphasis on Krieg and Kaiser who were most likely to try something as his thoughts raced.

He couldn't help but be alarmed by that piece of information. As far as they knew, Lung had never engaged Lucifer or those under him. Obviously, that wasn't quite the case.

If they'd clashed before and Lung came up short, it would explain why he was so passive as parts of his territory in the docks were subsumed by the DAU under Lucifer's guidance.

His wife's presence behind him clued him in that there was likely a plan to be put into motion that he wasn't privy of since his com wasn't functional. She was vibrating as she collected her charges so he would simply follow her cues.

If he wasn't wrong, they'd try to contain the Empire since the hot bartender seemed to be able to match Lung even in his current state. A scary thought if there ever was one.

"Well, it's been a while since I've stretched my wings anyway. Let's take this to the skies, shall we?"

'Wait, wings?...' He asked himself and received the answer immediately afterwards. Directly above the waistband of her leather pants, a bony, whip-like tail sprouted as half of her face melted away, leaving behind a decomposed ruin. She threw her jacket to the side and he could see the skin between her shoulder blades split as skeletal wings unfolded on her back.

Faster than he could react, she'd closed the gap between herself and the monstrous Cape and grabbed him by his elongated neck. The strangled roar he released as he was dragged away was involuntarily comical.

Loudly and with unmatched seriousness, he asked a question that had to be asked.

"Would it be cheating if I asked the Demon Mommy to step on me? Don't worry. You can watch."

He grinned when he saw the nonplussed looks on the faces of the Empire capes while his friends reacted with weary sighs and exasperation. He felt the familiar sensation of his wife's slap impact the back of his head and took it as the cue to get it back into the game. As one, his colleagues exploded into motion with him leading.

He was due for some healing, but there was still a bit of juice left to fuck up some Nazis. After all, now that the rage dragon wasn't trying to roast them for dinner, they could concentrate on the true villains of the day.