PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Vhexxen
N/A
quirk Particle Manipulation Aura
|
N/A
alias Purity/Revenant
|
|
Post by Seren Harrier on Jun 8, 2020 0:12:21 GMT
It felt like decades since he had last dreamed, asleep or awake or somewhere in between. When he eventually fell asleep, a momentary lifetime of hours after Detective Koizumi hung up, it felt like he had dreamed the conversation, and woken up instead.
Tango Koizumi, the police officer handling Haiiro’s case - easier to think of it that way, if he was already tangled in the knowledge - called Seren at least once a week, even if there had been no progress. Most of the time, that was all there was to be said, and the call was brief. This time, the call had been longer, both in how it felt and the time stamp on Seren’s phone.
A lead, the detective had said. After all this time, something had surfaced. Not new evidence, not a new witness coming forward. Not after months. But another crime, another robbery. Less fuss, less flair, less risk. No vigilante involvement. Just a group in white masks raiding ATMs shortly after they were restocked with cash. They had followed an armoured car to four ATMs before drawing enough attention to vanish without a trace. No fingerprints, no DNA evidence, but enough video footage to start narrowing down their builds beneath the obscuring robes.
The conversation hung in Seren’s mind for most of his waking hours, and left his sleeping ones restless. He thought it was the next day, though it might have been the one after that, when the murmuring TV in the background flashed. And kept flashing. It was local news, and eventually it sank in that there was breaking news. Robberies. Villains. ATMs.
Villains robbing ATMs. In featureless white masks and heavy robes.
This time, he grabbed the leather jacket hanging by the door, and shoved his feet into an old pair of boots. The jacket made him stagger for a moment; he hadn’t packed sand in months and clearly had forgotten how heavy it got. He shoved a pair of gloves and his wallet into some pockets that weren’t brimming with sand and hurried out the door.
|
|
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Vhexxen
N/A
quirk Particle Manipulation Aura
|
N/A
alias Purity/Revenant
|
|
Post by Seren Harrier on Jun 8, 2020 0:37:57 GMT
The sky was as grey and grim and it usually was this time of year, but it hadn’t rained recently, and there were only a few lingering puddles amidst stretches of dry, dusty pavement. Seren’s inactive muscles pulled against the length of his strides, but there wasn’t much time. The news had briefly shown a map of the two ATMs hit so far, and the villains had already left the second. The news station didn’t have anyone on scene yet, and there were no reports of pro heroes on site either.
Seren knew the area well enough to figure out the probable third target ATM. If they were following an armoured bank car, they’d keep to the same bank’s ATMs. The two hit so far were the only ones nearby with that name... but the bank owned a different set of ATMs as well, and there was one on a quiet street corner only a few more blocks away. Short blocks.
And he could hear shouting up ahead.
He should probably come up with a plan. He wasn’t a combat-skilled hero. He wasn’t even working right now. He hadn’t been able to do anything to stand up to them before -
But before he had been immobilized. Before, he had fought against burning bonds that branded his flesh. Before, he had been unarmed and surrounded by clean surfaces.
Before, he hadn’t been enraged, barely thinking enough to slide the spare sunglasses in a pocket onto his face. They were meant to keep fans and media from recognizing him when he wanted to go about his business in peace.
They weren’t about peace anymore, and the sand in his pockets right now wasn’t contained in closed containers. It was loose and clung eagerly to his rippling aura, shrugging out of his pockets in little rivulets and waves until he was cloaked in a mantle of suspended debris.
He rounded the last corner as the villains - only four of them - only four of them - calmly closed the zipper on a duffel bag. Three of them carried duffel bags. The fourth had a backpack with the irregular lines of tools; there was also a slender pry bar poking out of the top.
Four white masks turned towards him, then darkened to red with the rest of the world.
|
|
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Vhexxen
N/A
quirk Particle Manipulation Aura
|
N/A
alias Purity/Revenant
|
|
Post by Seren Harrier on Jun 8, 2020 3:09:38 GMT
If Seren weren’t a rescue hero, or if he were at least in his right mind, he probably would have acted differently. As it stood, though, strategic engagement was not a loud enough priority to override the blinding need to attack these four white masks. Somehow. He had never wanted to specialize in combat. He didn’t have a great Quirk for that, and he had always known that.
That didn’t stop him now. He ran, the laces on one of his hastily-tied boots loosening and streaming behind him, his shaggier-than-usual hair trying to do the same, his jacket too stiff and heavy still to do more than hang down. He ran, and swept dust from the pavement to fill in the gaps between the sand already darkening his aura.
The four villains turned toward each other, and the one with the backpack shrugged. Before Seren could get even close to near enough to brush them with debris, the four turned and sprinted down the road.
Seren swore beneath his breath, not that he had a lot to spare at the moment. He didn’t remember exercise of any sort being this exhausting. It was just his first wind, though. It’d pass. He was not going to let them get away. One of them. That was all he needed. Stop them and leave them for the police to find. That would be enough. If he didn’t beat them to a pulp first.
His jacket gradually lightened as more of the weight transferred to his aura, and it got easier to run. He wasn’t catching up to the villains, but they weren’t remotely close to losing him either. Around a corner, but he knew these streets too well for them to lose him by dodging into the winding alley tucked behind a hedge. The moment he turned the corner and saw the mostly-empty street, just some scattered confused civilians, he darted toward the half-hidden entrance. The villains hadn’t stopped but had kept running, so Seren kept running.
|
|
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Vhexxen
N/A
quirk Particle Manipulation Aura
|
N/A
alias Purity/Revenant
|
|
Post by Seren Harrier on Jun 8, 2020 3:54:58 GMT
One of the villains with a duffel bag tossed it to the one with the backpack as they neared the winding alley’s eventual end. Seren kept after them, gritting his teeth against the need to breathe. It was more his lungs than his legs that were struggling, although he’d probably be feeling the latter for longer. Not for the first time, Seren wished he could swing himself along with his aura like so many other Quirks could, but he wasn’t dust, so his aura didn’t pay him any more attention than it did the ground or the walls or the dumpsters he ran past.
The alley opened out onto a mid-sized street that had seen more active days, but now most of the storefronts were closed for the day or until someone else leased them. The apartments above them were better kept, but the road just didn’t get enough street traffic to support a lot of businesses. A convenience store down the block did all right, supplying basics and snacks to the local residence. Seren had been in there a number of times.
Even on this street, there were a few people around in the middle of the afternoon. The group of villains headed towards some of the pedestrians, perhaps aiming to blend in with them, but Seren could hear one of them swear after looking back as he ran out of the alley after them. One of the two still carrying one duffel bag tossed theirs to the other, so that there were two villains with free hands, one with two duffel bags, and one with a duffel bag and a backpack. One of the villains with empty hands spun and seized a random passerby, producing a plain knife to bring up to the stranger’s throat.
Seren froze, and for a moment the overcast street was the inside of a bank, spotless carpet in the place of dusty pavement, filtered fluorescent lights instead of cloud-shaded sunlight, a painfully familiar face where a stranger stood.
Around him, his aura trembled, setting the suspended sand and dirt shivering like a beach-born disco ball a dozen feet across.
|
|
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Mako9890
N/A
quirk Pyroclasm
|
N/A
alias Wisp
|
|
Post by Wisp on Jun 14, 2020 5:34:05 GMT
Leon glanced down at his phone as he twisted the key in the ignition, quieting the low rumble of the engine beneath him. With a few quick taps he brought up the text and then swapped over to the map, double checking the address that he'd been provided with. It was somewhere around here, but time was running short. Honestly, he wasn't too thrilled about this one, but a job was a job and he had his part to play... Oh, the things he did to get paid. With a click of his tongue, the boy swung his leg over and dismounted the motorcycle before turning to eye the pair of bulky packages that were strapped to the back.
This was going to be a pain in the ass.
Things had been quiet for quite awhile. Ever since that last job he hadn't heard a peep out of the others; no grumbling or scheming from The Marionettist, no shouting or arguing from Revenant. Hell, he hadn't even heard from that kid that tagged along either. None of that was particularly odd, considering how big of a splash they'd made. Attacking one of the sponsors of the hero association made a hell of a lot of noise, and killing a hero made even more. Leon still had dreams about that moment when he cut through Livewire's chest, even now not quite sure how to feel about it... Anyway, the point is that it made sense that the Hive was keeping a low profile in the aftermath, it's just that... well, it'd been a long time since his life had been so... ordinary. The payout from Marion's contract combined with the sales of the data he grabbed in there had left him with a not insubstantial chunk of cash, which meant that he hadn't needed to take on any other jobs since. Even the old lady had been pretty lax lately; no insane requests or ridiculous training exercises for weeks, just a whole lot of mundane chores and nothing else. Well, nothing besides the occasional delivery for his cover job, which is what had brought him here.
As Leon hobbled down the street, he kept the pair of over sized packages balanced in a stack that honestly made it feel like he was trying to transport a minifridge that was trying to fall apart. Not particularly heavy, but rather cumbersome to hold all the same. It was just his luck that there'd be nowhere to park closer to the place, but at least there weren't all that many people around to get in his way. Unfortunately though, even that seemingly small saving grace would too become yet another twist of bad luck.
Just as the boy was nearing his destination, an old diner that he was pretty sure had actually closed down years ago, there was a commotion from a bit further down the street... in fact, the disturbance seemed to be coming from just past the shell of the diner itself. Four men in white masks burst out from the alleyway and immediately started to spread into the street. Leon only just had enough time to peak around his burden and recognize that the men were armed before a fifth figure appeared in their wake, some guy in a leather jacket that appeared to be actively using a quirk of some sort. Apparently his appearance put the other four in a mood, because he immediately heard a curse and one of them started frantically looking across the handful of other people on the street.
Until his gaze stopped on Leon.
'Oh, for the love of-' Before he could do anything about it, the man closed the distance and pulled a gun on him, swatting the packages from his arms and knocking them to the pavement with a clatter. In an instant he'd been spun around and had a knife pressed to his neck, waved about in obvious warning to the man that was trying to chase down the group. Every muscle in Leon's body tensed and his grey eyes hardened over, but he didn't try to pull anything right away. He didn't even make eye contact with the person he was apparently being used as a deterrent against, instead simply staring down at the crumpled cardboard boxes he'd been meant to deliver. As usual, he had no idea what was actually in them, but he had a feeling he probably wouldn't be getting paid for this one...
|
|
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Vhexxen
N/A
quirk Particle Manipulation Aura
|
N/A
alias Purity/Revenant
|
|
Post by Seren Harrier on Jun 14, 2020 6:23:49 GMT
Haiiro - he -
No, no, that wasn’t Haiiro, he wasn’t seeing clearly, he wasn’t thinking clearly, he was outside, breathing fresh air, the walls around him were the outsides of buildings, not the inside of a bank, this was not the saME
The hemisphere of debris slowly sank toward the ground, a pair of wings spreading out and down. This was not Haiiro. This was not Haiiro. This was not Haiiro. Some kid. Younger. More serious. Looked nothing like Haiiro, really. And Haiiro hadn’t had a knife to his throat. Seren exhaled slowly, fighting the urge to suck air back in immediately. This was not Haiiro. It wasn’t. Just a kid. A living kid, held hostage to ensure Seren’s good behaviour. Haiiro had died because of Seren. That was his fault. This kid didn’t have to die.
The villains with the bags were resuming their way down the street, moving slower as if they thought that running would suddenly draw too much attention, or as if they didn’t need to move fast anymore. Perhaps they didn’t, not with a kid held hostage. Seren couldn’t be the reason another hostage died.
His feet felt like metal weights, a statue’s feet, heavy and continuous with the ground underneath. The world hissed in his ears, ringing unending and shrill. He needed to swallow, but his throat didn’t respond. He just stood there, setting down his aura like setting down a weapon.
The other villains were getting farther away. The ones who had hurt Haiiro. Haiiro’s death was his own fault, but not only his fault. These people. These villains. This was why he had come out here. He lowered his gaze, as if defeated. This street was hardly free of useful debris, though most would consider it clean....ish. No big rocks or broken concrete, nothing he could pick up and throw... but there was a glass soda bottle against the curb. He ran his aura along the ground, feeding debris into the bottle until it was as dense as he dared pack it. Too much and it would clump and be useless. Too little and it wouldn’t work either.
If it worked, he wouldn’t need to ask for the kid’s forgiveness, and he’d be a step closer to avenging Haiiro. He took a faltering step forward, a hand raised pleadingly. It wasn’t entirely false. He desperately wanted the villain to stop, to let the kid go. Did he have the voice to ask? Brokenly, rough, as though he hadn’t spoken in months. ”Please, let him go.”
The villain shifted their grip on the knife. If they laughed or anything else, Seren couldn’t hear, and he certainly couldn’t see through the mask. But they also hadn’t responded to the movement, so he exhaled again, slowly, and hoped that someone, something, was looking out for the kid, because Seren couldn’t let the villains get away. He pulled on his aura without moving his flesh, eyes fixed on the villain, and threw the dust - and therefore the bottle - as hard as he could.
|
|
