Location: Washington Avenue, Dakota City
Time: 8.00 PM
The blade cut through Mari's jacket like a hot knife cutting through a jacket that was made out of butter rather than leather. It was a tragic sign of how far the once proud garment industry had fallen. Thrift store leather just wasn't the same, it wasn't the armor Mari needed, not anymore. Worse still, the cold kiss of steel against her shoulder was a bitter reminder that she'd been too slow. Searing pain faded to familiar numbness as Mari darted out of range of the machete. She'd messed up. She'd fucked up. She'd been cut, but the wound to her ego was far deeper. Some random mook wasn't supposed to get the better of her and certainly wasn't supposed to make her bleed. She had standards to live up to and irritating spider deities to keep quiet.
"You're bleeding," Nancy lazily drawled from somewhere in the darkness.
"I know."
"That was sloppy," the spider added in a sing song voice, lowering himself down from a nearby street light by a thin thread of spiderweb. "You won't last long if you keep this up."
"I
fucking know," Mari hissed between gritted teeth as she tossed her jacket aside. She needed to be able to move, she needed to be faster. She was done playing.
"If you're done talking to yourself, then let's finish this," the woman taunted twirling the bloodied machete in a figure eight in front of her. "I've got better things to do with my time than to fight some masked idiot."
"Fine by me," Mari agreed, circling closer.
Launching herself forward, Mari swung wide with the claws of her right hand. She caught fabric and threw herself aside to avoid the blade that whistled past her in reply.
Catching the blade with a leathery hand covered in thick scales, Mari flashed a winning smile before she smashed her clinched fist repeatedly into her opponent's face. The sickening crunch and blood that followed made it clear that she'd hit her mark. A broken nose made fighting hard and made it far easier for her to subdue an enterprising criminal hellbent on fighting to the death. Mari wasn't much for killing and she needed answers which meant she needed at least one of the scumbags to be conscious.
"Bet you didn't see that coming, did ya, Miss Big Knife," Mari huffed, tossing the machete into a pile of garbage.
---
"Concrete face, where is he?" Mari asked, slamming the woman face first against the nearest wall. A wet smack followed, the sound of flesh meeting unmoving brick, and blood splattering onto concrete. Mari hesitated. Interrogations had never been her strong suit. She took no pleasure in the suffering of her prey. It was the thrill of the hunt that drove her. A need matched only by her desire to clean up the streets, to act when others would not, in the forgotten neighborhoods where the cops and capes would never venture. Not before the city was burning. Not before it was too late.
"Don't worry about it-"
"What's that? Speak up."
"The name's
Tarmack not Concrete Face," a deep voice full of gravel and rocks boomed, accompanied by the rasping laughter of the unnamed woman.
"
Fuck," Mari managed.
Mari was prepared for the flying improvised projectiles, but she wasn't expecting a gunfight, and the rounds of 9 millimeter parabellum that came racing towards her sent her diving behind a wooden barrier for cover. The heavy hammer like thud of the gun firing in her direction sent Mari scrambling towards a simple block of concrete. The 124 grain hollow points propelled at more than 1200 feet per second easily punched through the thin wood, smashing into the wall behind her. Covering her head with her arms, Mari pushed herself closer to the ground.
"God dammit, Tiny, no guns, I said no guns," Tarmack roared over the shooting, slamming a great fist down on an innocent dumpster that exploded in a cloud of recently recycled plastic. Mari heard a loud thud, a lower scream, and peaked her head over the wooden barrier to see the gunman collapsed on the sidewalk. The giant hands of the concrete monster loomed above his prone form and Mari could hear the big man hurling insults at the his unconscious colleague.
Mari could hear the sirens getting closer. Burning buildings and gunshots tended to cause a scene. Pyrotechnics attracted the sort of crowd she preferred to avoid. Firefighters, EMTs, and cops, lots of cops, lots of cops with guns.
"И Все идет по плану. Все идет по плану," Nancy sang as Mari dodged a burning car that came crashing to the ground in front of her before somersaulting through a glass bus stop that shattered into a mixture of glass, demolished car parts, and burning petrochemicals.
"What's that?" Mari panted.
"And everything is going according to plan. Everything is going according to plan," Nancy repeated in the same unfamiliar language. But this time the words made sense. Mari could understand him.
"Great plan, really great plan, Nancy," Mari growled back, stumbling down the alley, desperately trying to keep her feet moving. "I love the part where it ends with me getting my head smashed in by a fucking pile of sentient asphalt or shot by some trigger happy cop that thinks I'm gonna disintegrate him with my laser eyes."
"Just trust me."
"Trust you?"
"Trust me."
"Why should I trust you?"
"Because tonight, my dear girl, I'm going to teach you how to fly."
---
Weaving through traffic, Officer Mikhailov, respected ten year veteran of the Dakota PD raced towards the scene of the latest crime. He had no real bead on the situation. All he'd gotten from dispatch was chaos. Multiple fires. Multiple casualties. Gunshots reported.
Metahumans. Mikhailov could feel the sweat running down his brow. Protect and serve, sure. He knew the drill. His father had been a cop, his father had been a cop, countless generations of Mikhailov's had worn the Blue since the family had come to the country. Mikhailov knew his duty. He could feel it in the marrow of his bones. But, he hadn't signed up to fight monsters. What good was a gun against a metahuman?
Mikahilov did not see the large crow that came flying out of an adjacent alley until it was almost too late. He slammed his brakes and let out a string of curses as he fought against the wheel. He juked his patrol car to the right, preying that there were no pedestrians on the sidewalk. The row of trash cans that he barreled into sent week old garbage flying across his windshield and his car careening into the wall of the nearest building.
Drawing his firearm and stepping out of his car in a swift, well-practiced motion, Mikahilov found himself standing in the aftermath of a battle. An entire block's worth of cars lay scattered across the streets and sidewalks around him. Two crumbling buildings roared with flames and a third threatened to follow. Tied to a mailbox he found two people. A young man with a deep cut on his arm and a woman who looked liked she taken quite the beating. Her nose was certainly broken and he didn't doubt that she was missing some teeth.
Sighing loudly, Mikahilov gazed at the growing inferno. He hoped the fire department were putting the pedal to the metal, they wouldn't have much time. Removing his cap, Mikahilov brought his radio to the his mouth,"Dispatch, this is Officer Mikahilov, how about next time you send me into a war zone, you give me a bigger gun."
