Westbrook Academy for Metahumans: Forums

"Maybe some kinda rubber band,” I thought to myself. "Just as long as it didn’t look weird or girly or nothi-damn!” I'd gotten pretty good at jumping rooftop to rooftop, but the earbuds for my ipod kept falling out. I was gonna have to figure something out; no way I was gonna be cruisin' the city when I was solo without hot beats. Wind in my hair, street two stories below me, and a bad-ass jam from Omega el fuerte or Wisin y Yandel? Damn straight I was making that work.

Maybe I could ask one of the tech geeks; I wasn't doing so hot on my own. Gettin' across one alley my earbuds had come loose and fallen completely, and I'd had to chase an Outcast three blocks before I'd gotten them back, his buddy playing Pin the Icicle on the Juan the whole time. Not cool at all. Pretty cold, though.

And that was the other thing: the gang bangers. I for real had cause there. That's where I be plannin' on makin' my splash. They were gonna know me, and they weren't gonna like it. And when I finally came back home for real? They were gonna wish they'd never even heard of color or signs or tags. They were all gonna learn they were 'llergic to the scorp juice, they just didn't know it yet.

I'd been in it, but ain’t never been of it, and never would be. I coulda kept separate from all that like my sister had, but that wasn't me, and you gotta be you, right? I mighta gotten pulled in all the way, but then that stray bullet had hit my bud, and I was done with the idea of being part of a gang before I'd ever gotten serious. 'Sides, my pops and moms took us on all them trips all over the place lookin' for crazy stuff for their work; it made the world in my head bigger than the streets. I may have wanted to keep the street in me, but I knew there was more out there, and that ain't the way you gotta think to live the gang life.

But that was future stuff. Right now, it was about getting set up, figuring everything out. My only hero class was still in the "so you've learned that you have super powers” chapters, but I was gonna milk this place for everything I could snatch to be what I had to be. Meantime, with my hero license (well, alright, a probationary junior minor permit thing, but whatever), I had enough to ruin the day of all kinds of gang bangers.

Let a chick with a fat purse know some dude was creepin' on 'er. Let a guy casin' a joint know he was being cased right back. Pop off a spine at a dealer to let 'em think it was too hot to do business. And every now and then, jump down from a rooftop and show up the minor leaguers and leave 'em all scorped up. I mean, you seen the chicks those dudes have hangin' with 'em sometimes? Totally worth it to get a little show off in.

Oh yeah. It was time to play.

If only I could get the ear buds to stay in...

I was tempted to bob my head to the melody as Don Omar blared in my ears; my new ear-bud tech was golden, for sure standing up to everything I’d wanted and then some. I knew Syd was the way to go, even if he did probably sneak somethin' in I didn't know about.

Running full speed down the alley, I vaulted over the fence at the end and stopped for a second, muting the music all the way down. The sound of a crowd of feet pounding after me was still there, and I grinned and turned the tunes back up. The fence wouldn’t stop the group of Warriors for long, but enough to give me just the right amount of breathing space. I took off again as they started to clamber over; two of them vaulted like I did.

Figures.

Reaching the street, I jumped up to a second-story balcony, then to the building’s roof, before bunching up my legs and bounding into the air and across the street to the roof of the building across the way. I broke off a spine and launched it to make sure the Warriors kept it up. The two jumpers ran across the street instead of leapin like I had, but leapt up to the roof of the building I was on once they got there; as soon as they landed, I rushed them before they could fully catch their balances. Only some quick scratches, but as much scorp venom as I could pump. Still working on controlling my venom flow. Not the best area of my powers. But I was working on it. Working on the weaknesses.

I turned and burned, sprinting to the other side of the roof, which overlooked another alley. I looked down to see the main body of Warriors milling. Making sure they saw me, I hopped across the alley to the next building, then dropped down to street-level again in front of them. The Warrior at the lead let out a cry, probably in expectation of finally getting his hands on me. ‘Keep dreamin’, chico’, I thought to myself. Hitting the next corner I took a left, then went ahead and turned off my music completely. I saw the dumpster I was expecting, and heard the clangs I’d been hoping would still be there. As I got closer, I heard the hiss and pop of high voltage, and smelled the smell of ozone.

I let out a shout of “Come on, Warriors!” That egged them on real good, and they were obviously hell bent on getting me. Closer and closer, the distance shortening, a few of them pulling out maces and swords and whatnot. Finally, I turned away and jumped again, easily clearing the dumpster and the crowd of Freakshow I’d seen earlier milling on the other side. A couple of Freaks had eyes on me, but thanks to my shout the rest turned the other way and were prepped for the Warriors which came barreling around the dumpster and right at ‘em. The couple of Freak slashers that came at me were easy to take; they could cut into my spines real deep, but not enough that scorp-heal couldn’t deal with it, and my spines could slash and venom them plenty enough to take them down.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Freaks were busting up the Warriors like nobody’s business. I couldn’t help but grin, and almost laughed when one of the Warriors, probably a leader, actually grunted “We got pulled!” Damn right you did. Miami ain’t got the meta-gangs like Paragon does, but gangs were gangs when it came to turf. And I understood it without even having to think about it; which is *your* side of a given street, who got what park and which block. Or what beach, of course. Looking it up and scouting it out was no big. The point was, thanks to me the Warriors were out of their turf and out of luck, especially since the Freaks had one of their tanks, and he was turnin’ ‘em into hamburger.

Once the Warriors had done all the damage they were gonna do and had definitely lost, I went in to mop up. Picking that moment was the hardest part of the whole thing, but I’m golden like that. Most Warriors that weren’t already down or pulled a runner had lost the fight in ‘em, and went down without much. The Freaks were tougher, but they generally were regardless. Still, there were plenty of targets on ‘em; I hammered the dings and dents and cuts and stuff the Warriors had left behind as much as I could.

And Freaks? Not the best fighters for themselves. Going wild with slashes and hammers and lightnin’, but there was only me in the middle weavin’ an’ jumpin’, which left a lot of stray shot flyin’ around to hit each other. And little by little my venom creeped into one after another, cut by cut, poke by poke. A couple times worrying about the lightning got my head pounded by the tank; I’m pretty sure I took out one minor league Freak by falling into ‘im after getting my bell rung.

I kept at ‘em, though. My scorp heal, endurance, knowin’ I couldn’t lose, and the tick tick tick as my venom kept workin’; it all came through. Finally, the tank was down. A couple I thought had already been out tried to make a move, but I was getting my second wind too and they ain’t do any better the second time than the first. I turned one last time to take someone on, and nobody was there. Big mob of Warriors, big mob of Freaks, all done,all down, just like I’d wanted, and all cause I was two steps ahead of both and they’d done most of my work for me. Not perfect; I still got pretty dinged up. But I was on top, and soon enough I’d be back to 100%. Breathing heavily but smiling, I turned my music back on and turned the volume up on the earbuds.

“Checkmate.”