Please write this book. I’m begging.

3: Consequences

Later:

There's a bar in town where the superheroes gather. Through an unspoken agreement--and I'll be honest, a fear of what might happen otherwise, the villains mostly leave it alone. It's a place they can go to socialize and relax.

That's why no one is prepared when a rivet-studded brass sphere careens through the door on a jet of steam. That's why in the nearly a full second it takes for it to find the Justice Three, deploy a wicked steel spike, and nail itself to the table through Cannonade's stack of pancakes, no one reacts to stop it. They're still staring dumbfounded at it when it activates its payload.

The top pops open, and a napkin-size translucent screen shoots out, along with a lens and mirror, making a tiny portable movie theater. Scratchy black and white footage plays, and the audio has a tinny quality but it's perfectly intelligible.

"Blood calls out for blood, heroes," says my image. "You killed one of mine and I'm calling you out. Come out and face me like adults, or die cowering."

In moments they've burst out the door and spotted me standing across the parking lot. Cannonade points at me and shouts, "We took a petty criminal off the streets yesterday, and now we'll take down the mastermind!"

I stand, shoulders square, both hands on the head of my cane, as my opera cape flutters gently in the breeze. They're forming up for their standard attack, and I'm processing several trains of thought.

They've dismissed Ray as a "petty criminal." They're not entirely wrong; Ray was convicted of a class C felony auto theft of a car worth less than two thousand dollars; you could call that "petty." They didn't seem to know or care that Ray had been staying out of trouble and looking for work for over a year before he heard about the place that gives ex-cons a second chance. They didn't know or care that Ray had been seeing someone for nine months, or that her kids were starting to call him "dad", or that he'd come to me for advice about affordable engagement rings.

I'm good with tech, but not so good with people, and apparently I've been misreading these people all this time. Stupid! I thought I had someone who understood me, someone who enjoyed playing the same game that I did. I was wrong.

I rapidly consider a dozen different bon mots to sum up the situation, but they're all villainous cliches, and we're not doing that today.

Cannonade raises his gun toward me. It finally sinks in that all this time, he's actually been trying to hit me. Fulcrum is in the process of gathering for a leap, and the Crimson Quiver is quietly preparing to loose an arrow at me, after I've been put off balance by the other two. This is a setup I'm familiar with, but only now do I realize that this isn't a well-rehearsed opening number. They just don't know any better.

"Didn't you ever wonder?" I ask.

Fulcrum is in the air now, fist ready. Of course, she no longer has any way to alter her trajectory, and it's a simple matter to determine where she'll land. Normally I'd make a show of diving out of the way, and put myself in position for a followup attack from one of the others. Today, I simply step to the left, putting a light pole between myself and the Quiver.

"Wonder what?" says Fulcrum as she smashes the pavement where I was just standing.

"Why there were never any bystander casualties?" Time is disjointed, as it always is in these affairs. Surely we shouldn't have time for this much conversation. But we do.

I smack the side of Fulcrum's head with my cane. Of course, her flesh is invulnerable to any physical force I can muster. It's also transparent to magnetic fields, and the concentrated pulse from my cane triggers a cascade of uncoordinated activity in her motor cortex, leaving her collapsed on the ground for the next few seconds.

The Crimson Quiver is moving to his left to restore line of sight; I keep moving to my left and we mutually pivot around the light pole, although this puts me directly into Cannonade's field of fire.

"I used live ammunition and explosives, and no one ever got hurt. Did that never seem unusual?"

As I say this I pause and spread my arms wide, as though inviting an answer. It also invites plasma cannon fire, and Cannonade responds. "Your antiquated junk is no match for us," he says as he levels his gun.

One of my drones puts a 25mm tungsten core nylon-jacketed bullet through the armored shell of his arm cannon as he fires. My targeting software normally ensures that every bullet ends up someplace harmless. Today, it ensures that a few ounces of tungsten are in Cannonade's pulse generation chamber at a bad time. My brass goggles black out my vision for a moment, but I can feel the flash on my face. The goggles go clear in time for me to see him crumple, his arm a smoking wreck. Hmm. The feedback through the control circuits knocked him out; I'd expected his systems to be better than that.

The Crimson Quiver has taken the opportunity to position himself for a shot, and looses. Those arrows of his are made of some good stuff--I regret never having the chance to compare notes on material science with him--and they're moving damn fast for arrows at about 140 meters per second. They'll cut through my soft body armor pretty easily, and this one is headed straight for my heart.

Of course, at this range, it'll take nearly a tenth of a second to make that trip. The optical tracking systems on my area defense automata have dozens of milliseconds to spare as they hit the arrow with the beam from a compact fiber laser. The arrow explodes in mid-flight, and I see one of the feathers spiraling to the ground.

I'll give the archer this much: he's thinking about as fast as I am, and he's realized that he's in a real fight. He's reaching for another arrow, and you know how super archers work; it's going to be optical chaff or a LIDAR jammer or some other clever way of shutting down my area defense.

Normally, I enjoy that interplay, but today's not normal. A pair of fire support drones on a pre-programmed response surround him with a barrage of flash-bang grenades.

(Does it seem like I have rather a lot of drones with me? Well, automata are one of my specialties, and I came here prepared for a wide range of contingencies.)

While he's flinching, I shoot him with a tazer dart from my general purpose pneumatic sidearm.

On schedule, out of the corner of my eye, I see Fulcrum getting her limbs back under control. Before she has a chance to stand, I toss a gas grenade her way. As tough as she is, a few lungfuls of that stuff leave her drooling into the asphalt.

It's quiet except for the ringing in my ears. The crowd in the bar are staring through the windows in shock. I tip my hat to them.

"When the Justice Three wake up, let them know that they still draw breath because Professor Cogsworth, in his mercy, has allowed them to live."

"This time."

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a funeral to plan."

I jet away.

1: Aftermath

I sit on the factory floor, back against a wall, fire-foam soaking through my pants as I stare vacantly. Irony. I've often wished that my mind would stop and be quiet for a while. Now it's as silent as the grave.

It's quiet out there, too. The sirens stopped a while ago. The ambulances are gone. The machines are silent. A few of my employees are still here. Those who were completely uninjured, I sent home. Those who were badly hurt got a ride to the hospital on the company's dime.

Ray got a ride to the morgue.

Margaret, the press operator, touches my shoulder gently. "Boss? It's ... it's not your fault. We knew what we were getting into. And you couldn't have stopped them if you'd been here. They're too powerful."

She doesn't understand, but that's my fault. I've shielded them, kept them in the dark about who I am. Sure, they know they're working for a supervillain, but I never let them know the truth. I should have. I tried to protect them but all I did was deprive them of the ability to make an informed decision.

2: The Heist

Earlier:

I stride out through the wreckage of the bank's doors, cackling in victory. In each hand I have a big bag of loot, and I'm flanked by a pair of Steam-Powered Crime Automata. Suddenly I stop, eyes wide. "The Justice Three? How?!"

Cannonade, leader of the south metro area's number two C-list superhero team, strikes a pose. "Well, if it isn't Professor Cogsworth, the steampunk sideshow, caught red handed." Heat ripples are coming off the plasma gun that makes up his left arm, indicating that it's warmed up and ready for action.

Fulcrum takes a step forward and grins at me as she slams a fist into her palm with a noise that sounds like a gunshot, showing off her super-strength. The Crimson Quiver nocks an arrow with a glittering, wickedly sharp head and simply stares humorlessly.

I gulp nervously, then rally. "It's three on three, super-nerds, and my superior mind tips the scales in AIEEEE!"

I shriek in terror as Cannonade fires a plasma bolt. I bring up my arms in a defensive gesture and the blast hits the swag bag in my right hand, blasting it apart. Quarters and nickels shower the sidewalk like hail and burning dollar bills fill the air like autumn leaves, drifting out to the street.

"GET THEM!" I sputter, and the Steam-Powered Crime Automata spring into action. With a thoomp! the first fires a grenade at Fulcrum. The explosion knocks her on her ass, but she rolls with it and doesn't seem hurt. The other fires a burst of bullets at the Crimson Quiver, but he slides out of the way like a liquid and the bullets stitch a line of pock-marks in the brickwork of the building across the street.

Well, I perform with both valor and panache, but before long, I'm empty handed and my automata are collapsed on the ground spewing steam. Time for me to make an exit. I throw off my opera cape, revealing my jetpack. I spring into the sky on wings of flame, but my opera cape is pinned to the jetpack by an arrow, flapping behind me. The extra drag and imbalanced thrust send me into a spin, and my defiant cry of "You haven't seen the last of Professor Cogsworth!" loses some effect as I corkscrew away.

Later that evening, I'm nursing a fine scotch as I review the media coverage of my encounter. Civilian casualties: zero. Property damage: hundreds of dollars. Fires started: none.

Cannonade gives a big, square-jawed grin for the camera as he says, "Cogsworth is no threat to us, and as long as we're on the job, he's no threat to you, citizens."

I've seen enough. I turn off the TV.

God, this is so much FUN! He's playing the straight man role so perfectly--if I didn't know better, I'd think he was sincere.

In a few weeks, an antique steam locomotive is coming through town on a publicity tour for the railroad--stealing that would be a feather in Professor Cogsworth's cap, would it not? I start planning, knowing that I can count on Cannonade and company to match me move for move.

(part 3 follows)

Well, I would read a 1000 pages of this.

This is great. I was expecting a slapping but this is brutal. The only thing worse would be the hero side naming and shaming after.

[removed]

https://www.tumblr.com/cupidsbower/145960730310/flower-shop-au

[removed]

And now, I feel dumb...

PSHAW: an expression of contempt or impatience.
it is not an acronym, just a word fully capitalised

They all surround me, these strange creatures that look like grizzly bear sized koalas.

They probably resurrected the wrong person, or at least thought that humans had strange customs as I proceeded to pass out in front of all of them.

Several of the creatures run over to make sure I didn't just die on the spot. After checking my pulse, they carry my body to a secluded location.

I wake up a few hours later, my body aches horribly for some reason. I look around, everything seems normal. My memories are all fuzzy though, like really fuzzy.

I hear someone walking towards me so I turn around and see some 7 and a half foot koala walking up to me. My eyes widen as I back away from it, falling off of the table I had been laying on.

I hit the ground and the air in my lungs all leaves as I get winded. The koala thing runs up to me, somehow I swore it just said "Ope".

The koala runs up to me and kneels down on its hind legs like a person would, "Human? Are you okay?"

I don't speak, I just stare at the thing as it asks me if I'm alright. The koala stays kneeling beside me as it stares at me for a second, long enough that I notice it's not wearing any clothes.

The koala then bends over and picks me up without warning and plops me back on the table.

I shake with fear, not knowing that it was about to pick me up and that it did so that easily.

I wrap my arms around myself tightly as the thing starts pulling out some very familiar medical equipment. It takes out a blood pressure measuring tool.

I look at it and scooch away from it, jeeping my eyes on the equipment.

The koala clears its throat by making a horrible grunting noise before speaking, " Human, give me your arm so I can ensure you're healthy."

I gulp, finally gathering the courage to speak, "What are you?!"

The thing stares at me blankly, "I am a koala, can't you tell?"

I become confused, I see that it looks like a koala, but there's no way it's actually a koala.

"So, what happened? I was dead wasn't I? Why does everything look the same as when there were more humans here? What in the world happened to koalas?"

The giant koala smiles and puts a hand on my shoulder, "All will explained in time, first we need to make sure that you're healthy before we show you around."

My eyes widen, "Show me around?"

The koala grabs my arm to take my blood pressure, "Of course, you're the first human we were able to wake up, so get ready to be... examined more."

"What?"

"Examined, like this test here, but with more needles and stuff."

I go to run, ripping my arm away from the machine, but I was caught immediately by the giant creature's hand. He grabbed me and smiled, "No no no, we have too much planned for you to be running off now."

Holy shit, this is excellent! I want a whole book about Tregus.

>AgniEats

Agni, as in the Hindu fire god?

Well I think the ending is absolutely beautiful! Thank you for sharing.

Really did at one point feel like “whose turn is it to post the daily ‘humans are funny and different from aliens because of x’?”

Was curious to see how one would defend bows and arrows against guns, good to see that you don't. Guns are guns.

The rest looked at me with fear after that, but I was a few steps too far from caring.The archer tried to speak again, barely making an audible voice, "I'm s- sorry."

I eased up the pressure on her by a bit, letting her breath more easily, however if everything today could be solved with "sorry" and apologies, I wouldn't be this mad.

My store could be rebuilt, it was barely of any consequence. My people though? My employees and friends? The trauma from today? That wasn't fixable by an apology and a monetary reward.

"If I see you five working as "Heroes" again, I swear to the tiny thread that's holding me back right now, I will kill you."

I eased up the pressure on all of them but one. At that point, there was only one face in front of me as I lifted the red haired man into the air, ruble falling from his struggling body.

"As for you?" I said, not even remembering the man's name, only focusing on the same hateful look that their leader had previously given me, "You won't get a second chance."

And then the man stopped moving. Just like that, without a hand gesture, without any torture, without a warning, the man was dead.

I could see the brown haired barrier mage wet his pants and frowned at that.

I let the pressure around them fade completely, however I was still vigilant and if they decided to test me, I would show them just how fast a life could disappear a second time. Though looking at their terror stricken faces, that was unlikely.

I moved towards the ambulance, where my friend lay unconscious and barely breathing. To this point the police were holding their gaping mouths and quite honestly it was surprising how they hadn't already run from the scene.

The doctor beside him, who seemed to have a healing type of superpower and likely the only reason my friend was still alive, was the only one not perturbed. Technie, or as his real name would soon be known, Nick Evoland, looked at the doctor with gratitude.

I turned my head towards my best friend and hesitated as I uttered what would probably be the last time I spoke to him, "I'm sorry Greg, old friend. Recover well and don't worry about me. You have a child and a family, so don't you die on me. I-" I stopped. I didn't know what else to say.

Guilt and sadness filled my voice and if it weren't for the mask, the public would have seen me cry, though it wasn't lost to the doctor that tears dripped down the mask.I very much wanted to see how the others were doing, but it was unlikely they would let me have the chance.

With a sorrowful sigh, I disappeared from everyone's sight, much to everyone's relief and to the oncoming A-grade Heroes annoyance.

While I was strong, I didn't want to test myself against an entire team of A-grade Heroes, nor did I see the need to. What started off as a joke, what started off as a good day ended up like this.

What a messed up joke this was...

But while what'd happened today was fucked up, I'd come to love messing with the heroes and testing myself and my knowledge against them. Perhaps not with Technie, but I knew what my focus would be for the near future. Technie deserved a well fought for rest.

As I reappeared outside the city, looking back at the empty dark sky, I wondered how best to fill it with light. Problem number one, light pollution, and I knew how I would start my carrier with the next supervillain.

(2/2)

My power is telekinesis, but they've never seen me use that power, instead, "We've defeated your measly robots Technie! It's time for you to surrender and put and end to your evil deeds!" Honestly, it was a fun hobby, but cause an explosion one too many times and all of a sudden you're a supervillain.

It didn't help that I was criminally bored at the time, "You brainless fools! You think these robots were all I had? You were WRONG!" I said, calling forth my new invention. It stood at three meters tall and packed quite a punch. It resembled a gorilla both in form and strength. For this bad puppy I had to call in a few favors. Turns out when you play supervillain for fun, you can also meet actual supervillains.

"Now go!" I ordered my and [Redacted]'s creation. It jumped forward at an incredible pace and for a moment I feared it would be too much for these C-grade heroes, but they managed to surprise me by first taking the robots vision and then its mobility. Thankfully my mask hid my worry and I didn't let my posture waver.

It was a tricky thing to do as there were numerous small hidden cameras, but the black tar they threw at it seemed to cover its entire body and stick.

Their empowered arrows were too weak to bypass its defense, let alone their measly punches and flamethrower attacks, but they were quick to change tactics when nothing of that worked.

After throwing more of that tar, they carefully evaded its punches and attacked its joints. I have to say, they'd improved over the course of these last few years.

While they were busy doing all of that, I sneakily made my escape. Yet another loss for Technie... I wonder what I should have for breakfast.

The day passed quickly as I drank my coffee and watched the news. Today was of course, all about Technie. It was at times like these I had to wonder how many heroes and supervillains were faking it. It was a good reality show though, and I enjoyed messing with the heroes.

I still had to head to my civilian business, but on the meanwhile I would think of new quirky things to add to my dialogue. I should also try to break less roads during my fights, this traffic was horrendous.

Finally when I was right outside my store, I noticed the numerous police cars and sirens that'd surrounded the place. A bad feeling started to well up on my stomach as I had yet to see my dear employees.

I approached with all the self restraint I could master, nudging a cop that very obviously wasn't paying attention, "What happened here?" I asked and he jumped, turning around to see who was speaking.

"Get out of here civilian, there is an ongoing hero investigation here about a supervillain called Technie. I predict things won't be as peaceful as they were in the morning." The man said, trying to shoo me out of the scene.

The bad feeling only increased at his words, I batted away his hands, holding my poker face as best as I could, though he was starting to grow suspicious, so perhaps I wasn't doing as good of a job as I could.

The officer looked me over once more, seeing the figure of a worried man and with a sigh started to answer, "If this is indeed one of the Technie's hideouts, he won't be happy. The heroes entered with a band, not knowing what to expect and a lot of the civilians working inside were injured. I heard one of them was even in a critical condition. Yo-" I cut him off there, any remaining self-restrain I had vanishing in seconds.

The officer didn't even notice when he went unconscious, but it was doubtful he would forget the visage of a man filled with enough anger to burn down a city.

Still, the man hadn't done anything wrong, so I loathed to hurt him more.

As I walked back towards my car, taking out a spare suit I'd only put there as a joke, my mind started to wonder. There was no way the heroes were this stupid, there had to have been customers going in and out. Let alone that, the outside was build from glass, it was reinforced glass, but nowadays it would be rarer to find ones that had normal glass. They had to have seen my employees.

Yet... they still decided to head in with force. They still decided to hurt civilians. My people, my employees.

The law was clear, in a fight between supers, those that'd caused the most harm were called villains. In comparison to what they'd done today, I'd done nothing. They were villains. They were villains, and so was I.

I cracked my neck, wearing the suit without even moving. It was a costly trick to design, though made easier with my telekinesis, but my mind wasn't on that now.

Perhaps I'd been too kind. Perhaps I should take myself seriously for once.

I threw one of the police vehicles that was blocking my way and the police finally started to take notice of me. They noticed my mask and yelled at me to back off, but I didn't reply, I only kept moving towards my store. When the first officer shot at me, I caught the bullet, surprising them all. If they wanted to see a serious Technie, they now would.

I ignored the officer that shot me and passed by him, not sparing him a glance. The man collapsed into his own two feet after I'd passed by, breathing heavily. They could see I was serious when I hadn't made a single comment and shook their heads. This wasn't a fight they could interfere in.

Instead, they opened the radio to inform the others and perhaps even the heroes, but how would I have left a piece of technology intact when I was changing into my suit. There were numerous cameras and the best way to avoid getting my real identity caught was to fry them all. While I wasn't the tech supervillain they all believed me to be, I still had a lot of toys in store to make them think I was.

When I reached the smoldering remains of my store, a vision of happy, hard working employees superimposed itself in front of the destruction. And then, the charred remains and melted glass... my face grew colder and colder beneath the mask, and when I saw the ambulance at the edge of my vision, recognizing Greg, everything turned red.

The pavement cracked beneath me and reality started to undulate. It seems like the heroes had finally heard of who'd appeared and made their entrance. But this time they didn't encounter the quirky and sarcastic man that normally greeted them with a bang, or a trap. No, the Technie they encountered was silent and nothing had attacked them on the way, despite their expectations. And despite what they saw, the man in front of them was an order of magnitude scarier than Technie.

A bit unnerved at his quiet figure, the archer Melinda spoke first, "If this is about your store we're sorry, my friends and I were too excited to finally have a lead at your homebase and-"

Her leader, Tart, stopped her at that point, putting his hand up to shush her, "Why do you care about the base of a supervillain. We either kill or capture him and we're done with this menace to society."

None of the heroes noticed, but the fluctuating space that'd started to calmed down tensed a bit more as the man finished speaking. More cracks appeared at the asphalt but they didn't notice that either.

Not trusting myself to speak much, I only uttered two words, "I see..." My cold tone threw off even their leader, who by now had a glowing sword up and ready to fight with.

Slowly, I started to walk towards them, taking in every little detail as they didn't know how to react to a Technie with no robots. From how they tensed up, to the smirk on their leader vanishing, I saw and accounted for every little detail.

But it wasn't needed. With my next step, they all fell to the ground, the pressure around them intensifying to a point where even the barrier one of them threw around them didn't last for more than a second.

The fire that poured out of the red hair's hands was consequently extinguished moments after its appearance. Still, I didn't want to kill them, so I eased up on the pressure a bit, but not enough where they could move.

From their point of view it should feel like a hundred elephants were pressing down on them. And they should be thankful I hadn't turned their bones into paste already, though looking at the hateful look Tart gave me, that wasn't going to last long.

"Don't bother Tart, you five have a few things to apologize for." I said, breaking Tart's bones the very same second. First his fingers, one by one, then his entire arm and then about every limb in his body.

His screams were more of an annoyance than anything pleasing, and I shut his mouth to make him shut up. The moaning was still very annoying, so at the end, I knocked him unconscious.

(1/2)

Welcome to the Prompt! All top-level comments must be a story or poem. Reply here for other comments.

Reminders:

>* Stories at least 100 words. Poems, 30 but include "[Poem]" >* Responses don't have to fulfill every detail >* See Reality Fiction and Simple Prompts for stricter titles >* Be civil in any feedback and follow the rules

🆕 New Here? ✏ Writing Help? 📢 News 💬 Discord

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

I stare at my great-grandson, who looks back at me in exasperation.

Handsome lad, but oh! So inexperienced, so young and stupid, still! After all. He's only seventeen. Or twenty-seven. I can't very well remeber. Either way, he's young. Too young to be telling me what to do.

"Gammie, please listen to me this once! If you do this, you'll be buried by next Monday." Charles huffed, clearly upset.

I readjust my pince-nez, golden framed glasses and meet his stern glower with a severity I believe he didn't expect.

"Charles Cassian Chill!"

He snorts, and I supress a smile. He hates being called by his full name.

"I'm going, and that's it. Call Darla. And no backchatting me, young man!"

I hear him fiercely dialling a number and smile to myself. I haven't seen Charles this upset in a long time. He had better not attempt some sort of trick to stop me.

I'm only one-hundred-and-one. And even though I probably have thrice as many wrinkles, I know there's nothing stopping me from making my dream a reality.

I'm going to see what is lurking in those long-forgotten dungeons, even if it means I'm buried by Monday.

I was about to single handedly redefine the power scaling system. I could move things with my mind. No faster than the average person could throw something, no larger than a basket ball, and the heaviest thing was a 25 pound plate in a gym but that made my nose bleed.

I focused, I bled, I almost blacked out, but I had my own justice. The bloody bodies with pieces missing of my social outcast comrades who just wanted a safe workplace and some people who treated them like family. Dead. Mangled. I’ve never been serious when I fought someone with real super powers. Low level telekinesis. Like mine was barely considered C level. I will be an S tier threat to anyone who gets in the way of my vengeance.

The unshattered glass fractures. The dust rises and moves in geometric patterns showing the various directions of my powers fluctuating around me. Immediately I had guns drawn on me and uninjured heros taking their special stances.

My nose bled. It was the first time I’d moved more than one thing at a time. Every officers guns were yanked out of their hands, turned around, and the triggers pulled.

My eyes became bloodshot. My skin red. A hero who’s impact resistant charged towards me. They thought because they were bullet proof they were indestructible. They were fast, but I isolated their throat and crushed. Their head bobbled as their body went limp and fell to my feet. I stepped over the brutish body.

I saw the screecher, a woman with super sonic screams, take a deep breath. A scream like that, must’ve been what shattered my remodels windows. My ears bled as the panic set into the screachers eyes. She wanted air, I forced it in. I pushed a basketball sized portion of air down her throat and made her lungs explode inside her body. She threw up blood and chunks as her body bloated with air.

Isolating and rotating their brain inside a hero’s skull. They wouldn’t be controlling my thoughts any time soon.

Plucking your laser eyes out and letting them dangle. Kept you from closing your laser proof eyelids as you tore your own hands and body to shreds trying to cover them. Explained the scorch marks behind the register inside.

Seeing their precious hero’s destroyed in front of them, the crowd that had gathered in front of my simple little late night coffee shop turned tale and ran. The ambulance where the injured hero was being taken care of while my employees were barely being bandaged on the pavement tried to leave. Blood was coming from my ears, eyes, nose, and was starting to push its way through even my skin but I got it. That monsters head. As the ambulance drove away I held his head in place. He was strapped to a Gurnee that was locked in place to the back of the truck. Part of his spine ripped out with his head.

There was no turning back. I done playing around.

It was 4:45 in the afternoon and I knew I was going to be late but I really wanted to finish the documentary. It was called “A brief History: The Extra-Capable”. Brief History was my favorite channel, most of what they covered was relevant and sometimes even useful.

Apparently by their latest counts there’s over a billion of us now AND they finally found the exact mutation that caused us to come about in the first place. That was exciting and a little nerve racking since normies still outnumbered is seven to one I’m sure it’ll have ramifications throughout society. It’s already bad enough that you have to register with the PPDEC (powered people’s department of the extra-capable), more commonly known as Peedics, if you’re ever caught using or having any abilities.

Over all the Peedics themselves weren’t all that terrible but due to bounty hunter laws and a whole lot of lobbying the whole “Hero vs Villain” trope became a reality. Since I came from a family of nobles and way back when there was just enough….keeping it in the family…for the mutation to occur everyone in my family for generations on my moms side has had some sort of ability. Unfortunately due to being a little bit of a rebel with entirely too much attitude I landed myself on the registry and not on the side of the hero’s.

Thankfully one of my cousins was an awfully good lawyer that still owed me one for helping them get a sports scholarship despite their only extra powers being to tell when someone’s lying. Still, getting on that list was the beginning of a life long trail of bad luck and misunderstandings. I used my powered to make a bunch of money in my youth that paid for the startup of a few small businesses, but I always had passion in being a performer. Too ugly to be an actor, and my voice was a little too nasally for standup comedy I figured I’d enjoy my time playing the part of the label I was given at 18.

Now I’m in my late 30’s, run the most visited late night coffee shop “Camera Free Coffee”, a special suit fabrication company for the extra capable “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tailor”, and a small time construction company for ex convicts “Lessen Learned Renovation”. Oh, and in my spare time I harass Heroes and just generally toe the line between terrorism and technically legal for funsies.

After finishing the documentary and heading out for some afternoon taunting of the newbies that just got into town and playing dumb so they’d let me go after a lecture or two I did my rounds between the businesses.

In stark contrast to my personal behavior I was a very serious employer. Every one of my employees mattered to me and I personalized all of their schedules and benefits packages to best fit them while still turning a profit in the business. I genuinely care about those who choose to work for me.

That only made it all the most heartbreaking when the next day I went to check on the progress of my Lessen Learned crews work after they’d all gone home and seen the place look completely ransacked. Everything was either destroyed or missing. I would come in tomorrow when they were all supposed to be here to talk to them.

The Tailor was just around the block from my favorite place in the whole world, the coffee shop, and I passed by it every day except today. Today it was missing in its entirety. Literally gone. Wall to wall the building wasn’t there as if it had been ripped from its foundation and thrown into another dimension. This reminded me of one of the idiot new Peedic heros “never was man” stupid name but apparently he had very specific reality manipulation capabilities and was pretty salty about not being made a class B hero. I jogged to the coffee shop now worried about what might be happening there.

I had at least one extra-capable on staff at all my businesses, except the coffee shop. There, every single employee has some sort of extra capability.

It was a massacre.

Reporters across the street trying to get any information they could and police were taking statements, mostly from the smug hero’s that tried saying my staff attacked them. I had 14 employees. Four survived and only one was uninjured. Jasmine was okay, but she wasn’t fine. Only one hero was injured and it was that almost B rank one that must’ve gone on a rampage because of my antics.

Jasmines only power is called damage swap. After she’s injured to a certain extend in exchange for her experience double the pain she’s able to transfer the injuries to the next person that touches her. She tried being a hero. She couldn’t mentally handle it with the powers she had.

She told me what happened as I wrapped a blanket around her, careful not to touch her directly in case there was anything wrong that I couldn’t see. I wasn’t careful enough. I grazed her ear and was immediately bombarded with the mental trauma of what happened in excruciating detail. She screamed and passed out, probably for the best.

She wouldn’t want to see what happens next.

Super Powereds by Drew Hayes.

Supers : People with powers.

Powereds : People with powers they have little/no control over. One you meet in passing is a man who teleports to a random location whenever they sneeze. Other than not being in any immediate physical danger they can appear anywhere. The only control they have is they carry a feather. To force a teleport if they're in danger. One of the main characters floats whenever they get happy.

Anyway, one of the main characters has the power of luck. Very bipolar, one instance had him winning money, then getting hit by a car (IIRC).

In the books, the main characters undergo a procedure to move them from Powereds to Supers. The luck guy starts out very reluctant to use their power but learns to trust it more.

From the amazon page of book one:

>Knowledge is power. That would be the motto of Lander University, had it not been snatched up and used to death by others long before the school was founded. For while Lander offers a full range of courses to nearly all students, it also offers a small number of specialty classes to a very select few. Lander is home to the Hero Certification Program, a curriculum designed to develop student with superhuman capabilities, commonly known as Supers, into official Heroes.

>Five of this year’s freshmen are extra special. They have a secret aside from their abilities, one that they must guard from even their classmates. Because for every one person in the world with abilities they can control, there are three who lack such skill. These lesser super beings, Powereds as they are called, have always been treated as burdens and second class citizens. Though there has been ample research in the area, no one has ever succeeded in turning a Powered into a regular human, let alone a Super.

>That is, until now…

As Pratchett puts it - they would smash the world if they thought it would make an interesting noise as it breaks.

(Okay, that was talking about Elves, not Fae, but Pratchett's Elves are very much like the Fae you describe)

[removed]