Limited Don't Say I Didn't Warn YOU

[Ira]

A police siren whined in the distance, then abruptly cut short. They had been chasing a small group of gangbangers from the Hill District. They had fled some sort of massive gang war and were trying to set up shop outside their original stomping ground. One bad drug deal later and they were chasing toward the warehouse district.

And the police stopped chasing.

For better or for worse, they weren't in police jurisdiction anymore. Oh it certainly upset and infuriated the local cops and lawyers, but what could they do? These places weren't welcome to them anymore, and if the national guard weren't getting called in then there was no assault they could feasibly manifest upon the area. This was just one of another hundred places taken over by the 'Anti-Meta Militia.' These thugs were their problem now.

One of them was half running half limping, some sort of nasty sprain in his ankle. The pain was spreading like a poison, causing chills and quick flashes of sweat every few seconds. Adrenaline was allowing him to keep moving on it, but it hurt like hell. Mary had felt the surge of power from half a mile away, the edge of her range, and started her pursuit immediately.

With the strength from the man's pain, Mary was able to move from rooftop to rooftop by 'stepping' 30 feet at a time. Misty Step felt almost like a drug, Mary had to be careful about using it too much. If the strength was too little, she was liable to stop halfway through the step and fall to an unfortunate experience. But this was enough, for now.

The gangbangers, five men, had stopped in a nearby alleyway to listen for the cops. Mary, smiling like a madwoman from a nearby fire escape, called down to the men.

"Is that the Side-Street Boys I's see down there? Should'a taken my offer Martin!"

One of the men, looking up at the sound of his own name, shouted back, "Go to hell Martinez!" And Mary, never one to let a good line moment pass her by, responded, "I'll see you's there!" Before firing a beam of burgundian force directly into his skull. The force, amplified by the pain of his compatriot, was enough to crack the man's skull and deal a fatal wound.

The others, screaming and cursing, picked themselves up and began to continue running away. Mary only laughed, she'd pursue soon.

 

[Fang]

The metal rooftop of Warehouse 34 radiated the soft heat of the day’s rays like a distant memory, lupine gargoyle of steel and sinew perched atop in shadow as it could be seen on most nights. Nat’s runs had began on the pavement below several months ago; a lone teen jogging through the pathways that barely functioned as streets between each of the warehouse buildings until sweat coated his body and the air he drove into his lungs was inadequate to match his fatigue. When those runs below had become too easy the young vigilante had started donning his armor, racing above as he had below and gradually settling the weight of the steel he manipulated onto his shoulders as his body acclimated to the exertion.



The Wolf launched himself from the Den, the metal below bowing as though to further propel him through the air to the nearest warehouse, his power reducing the sound of his landing to a mere whisper as the rooftop buckled and regained its shape with radiating ripples skating over its surface. Sirens wailed nearby, their call growing closer and closer as Nat skipped over the warehouses toward the commotion before they suddenly stopped. It had surprised him initially, the first time the police had given up a chase so close to his base. Nat paid little heed to the rumors about the warehouse district; they kept the Den hidden and were often based around fleeting glimpses of his own masked form heading toward some disturbance or another. Whatever reason the police had for drawing their line served the Wolf’s purposes well enough without further questioning, though he couldn’t help but wonder whether it was due to his presence that the area was given berth.



As several shadows flitted between the warehouses Nat sort of wished that weren’t the case. He was only a single person, alone moreso than ever with Todd’s disappearance. The series of cameras Nat had placed around the district were useless without eyes to see them, the the number of bodies fleeing the now quiet sirens too many for Nat to track alone. He settled in a single individual, tracked them from above with muted steps as they ran in seeming terror. He only needed to catch the one to find out what had caused such a commotion so close to home.



He powered ahead of the fleeing shadow’s path, rolling over the edge of a rooftop to the street below behind one of the few heavy dumpsters that choked the narrows between the buildings. From a different angle it was clear the man was injured, a rolled ankle or a twisted knee slowing him behind the group that blindly passed by the crouched Wolf behind the receptacle before stopping cautiously with frantic whispers. The straggler, with heavy breaths, caught up in time to be hushed by the others with their ears cocked to the sky above.



”I think we’re good.” The alley was too dark to make out who spoke, though the relief they expressed was short lived as another voice called from above with a thick accent.



"Is that the Side-Street Boys I's see down there? Should'a taken my offer Martin!"



All eyes turned upward, including Nat’s, as one of the men called back with grudging familiarity, no love lost between the apparent gang member and the woman who had appeared on the fire escape on the building opposite Nat’s dumpster disguise. It would have been easy to believe that Nat’s job was being done for him, that the woman being called “Martinez” was another vigilante cleaning up a mess that had spilled into his backyard. It would have been easy, if not for the flash that shot from the woman’s finger to cave the man’s skull and spray a mist of blood onto his friends.



As the body fell the other men made to run back the way they had come, to escape the gore as quickly as possible with little regard to how shrill their screams might have been mid-step. Nat reacted instinctively, though he could feel the bile rise to the back of his throat as he pushed suddenly out at the dumpster in front of him, ripples of his power shaping the steel container and splaying it out into a wide net that covered the alley’s exit and blocked the path of the fleeing men. They were concerns for later, however. His attention was turned to the fire escape, to Martinez Murderbeam and her handiwork below. Nat’s expression was inscrutable behind his masks, but the disgust in his voice was apparent as he called out.



”Sorry to interrupt whatever this is, but…” Nat made a point to stand tall, shoulders squared as though he wasn’t standing among the bags of trash that had flown free from the manipulated dumpster as its shape had changed. ”You guys are making a bit of a mess.”