---

---

As Anthony clacked away at his laptop he could hear more people showing up. He took a moment to look up just in time to catch a loving little number of a reporter interviewing an elderly woman. Due to him being tone deaf he made a habit to learn how to read lips. By the looks of it the older woman didn't appretiate hypes. If the sign she held wasn't proof enough. But, the reporter seemed to be a simpithizer. I rare breed if he had to say. He only hoped she did her homework. By his own research Point Bordeux not only was hosting the rally, but supported it by a nearly eighty percent margin. Anyone could tell that by the size of the crowd, and it was still growing. Fairchild Electronics didn't help any with it fear mongering properganda that Anthony could only compare to was the work of Goebels, head of public affairs during Nazi Germany. It made him want to throw up.

Shutting down his computer Anthony took off his headphones and hung them around his neck before lifting the hood on his jacket over his head after feeling first drops of rain. He then returned his laptop to the carrier bag on his shoulder before standing and joining the rowdy crowd as they waited for the rally to begin. Keeping his head down and staying quiet he just filtered into the crowd. Being as tall as he was made it hard, but he managed to get half way into the crowd before they were addressed by Robert Fairchild himself. By the dignified yet excitable way he spoke made Anthony's earlier comparison to Nazi Germany fit perfectly with Fairchild resembling a certain mustachioed dictator. Anthony could help but pity the ignorant fools eating the man's garbage right out of his hand. As Anthony continured watching he had to hold back an elated guffaw when he same the demonstration. Even from here Anthony could tell the "Pacifier" was a glorified tazer.

Anthony's next thought would have been: "Well nothing wrong with free, and with that giftcard I could make an easy twenty bucks off some shmoe Fairchild fanboy." But, that never happened because as Robert announced the hand out a group of roughnecks crashed the party spouting some crap about the "Freak Train" sitting outside the city. Then Anthony realized just what he was talking about. The convoy. Talking action Anthony quickly played along shouting along with the crowd as he filed with them to grab one of the weapons for himself. When he got one he grinned. Yeah, nothing more than a frickin' tazer. What a joke. Anthony thought as he nonchalantly gave it a once over with his power. He didn't worry getting caught with how caught up the crowd was already with the mob mentality. Mimicking the other rally-goers he ran for his truck and peeled out of the parking garage. Following the traffic he tossed his Durango in four wheel drive in anticipation for offroading he expected might happen to get past the slower cars.

Liza.
Hype Convoy.
Point Bordeaux.
18/03/2016.

---

Truck rattled as it skipped over rough terrain. Settled as wheels hit road. Liza kept her sun steady all the same - arms outstretched like the others she shared the truck's back with. In the center, circle made of palms, floated a small ball of heat - about the size of her fist. Liza kept it small - made it hotter. More efficient. It was easier that way - not much heat to pull from, with the downpour. Good thing she'd made this one back when there was enough heat not to want it. High-noon sun last time they stopped; now a miserable pallor hung over them. She heard the rain on the roof now - just reminded her of how far they'd come. Point Bordeaux. Liza imagined the rain was just the first of poor receptions. At least she kept her vehicle warm and dry through the weather. She flexed her fingers, enjoying the heat - never did well with cold. Supposed she never had to.

Brakes squeaked - more from nearby vehicles too. Radio crackled on, then off. Tarvos came and went with the static. She pulled her sun slowly away from the circle - only a single mumble to ignore - and pushed it towards the sunroof. An apt name in the moment - Liza nearly chuckled. The sun went out first, expanding as it left the vehicle. Liza stopped it as it reach beach-ball size. Still hot enough to sizzle rain that hit it. An umbrella as good as any. She imagined herself - a peculiar sight to her mind's eye, let alone anyone's regular ones. Girl, young, thin, poking out of sunroof. Sun floating above her, raindrops sizzling, steam wafting up and away. Her truck was parked relatively close to Serena's black van. She had a good view as Tarvos approached - held the same one as Lucas did the same. She smiled at Lucas, though he didn't see her. A genuine smile. The man was gentle, kind, troubled. Liza counted him a friend. He seemed to understand her - probably due to his power, more than his character. She didn't care why - just that he did. It was nice not having to explain.

For a few minutes, sitting on the truck with the sun above her was all she did - nothing else was happening, just another stop on the convoy's long journey. Tasks had been distributed by Tarvos - despite Liza's long 'service' with the convoy, she wasn't completely trusted, nor completely qualified. Just a young girl who'd run away, like so many others that surrounded her. She was reserved, withdrawn. Left good people behind in search of an unclear better. But she tried to be useful where she could; where she was able and allowed. Like heating up a vehicle of soggy Hypes. Then, she noticed a closed gaggle of Hypes, and saw Tarvos flare up, hand on gun and eyes steeled. A girl appeared, boy over shoulder.

It never did take long after they'd stopped.

A short exchange between Tarvos and...Thumper? Liza had some vague awareness. 23 and constantly travelling - there was little else to do than plug into the internet. Especially on long roads. She was tempted to speak up - but best not. Tarvos would handle it. He would want to handle it. It was why he lead the convoy, after all. And then Lucas, gentle man, checked them. Liza smiled again. She remembered being checked. It was peculiar - mostly by Lucas' mannerisms - but effective. She'd been approved, for which she was grateful. Thumper seemed to get it as well. Her charge, however...

Unpleasant. Aggressive. Acerbic. Antisocial. Liza recognized them all. They belied the true meaning - defense mechanism. Fear. Sorrow. Desperation. An inability to understand. Liza didn't need Lucas' hands to see through the boy, identified as Joshua. He was Hype, that much was clear - but he didn't like it. Didn't want it. Wasn't at peace with it. Virtues Liza shared, in parallel. Hype made him different. Made him alien.

Made him unwanted.

"He's right." She said, finding courage now. The driver of her truck looked at her. "He's desperate. Has been for a long while." She looked away from Joshua, turning to Tarvos as she climbed from the truck to rest her feet on solid ground. She saw Serena leaning over behind him, watching the whole situation play out in a way only she could see. She gulped. "I'll ride with him when we move. I'll take a bike. Alone. Less risk." She turned sharply, giving a quick glance to Lucas before returning her eyes to Joshua. "Safer if he's in the convoy. For everyone."

---

---

Ilani took a deep sigh as the particularly cold blast of air settled on her skin, that only a government building could provide. The humidity was almost a viscous entity outside, and she was glad to be rid of it, if only for a few moments.

Al was currently headed back to the car to grab the spare battery she’d carelessly forgotten.

“What are you going to do? Besides get into trouble while I’m gone?” Al had asked Ilani.

“Well...there’s the possibility I might pee, but that’s about all the variety I’ve got” she’d shrugged off the question. She’d shown her phone, indicating that she would have something to record from at least and waved a goodbye as she’d scrambled through the crowd toward City Hall.

Now, standing inside the entryway, she could think for a moment. She and Al had gotten a few bits from people, and enough to paint a picture. But, Ilani wanted more. She had to sell the narrative of the villain that Fairchild Electronics really was. But how? Security was present, but they seemed a bit more thinned than she would have guessed. No doubt the personnel was probably being concentrated more outside as the commencement neared.

With a pause, Ilani took a deep breath, widening her eyes and feeling the familiar jolt up her spine as her powers activated. The world around her pulsed and expanded as Illy took in every detail around her: the people, the furniture, supplies, architecture, cameras, and etc. Scanning the room, her eyes honed in on a man holding a tablet, across the lobby from her. His back was to her, and she could see the tablet. Her pupils dilated as her powers manifested once more, honing in on the tablet. Within an instant, the tablet zoomed into her vision with perfect detail, as if she were standing right over the man’s shoulder.

“Jackpot,” she whispered to herself. He was flitting through the Security Personnel itinerary before switching tabs to a layout of the map. Ilani was able to visually process the schematic in the seconds it took him to check his position and switch tabs yet again. An alert flashed across his screen, and Illy saw the notification that Robert Fairchild was preparing to depart from his office.

Her timing couldn’t be better. With a view of the itinerary, map and bird flown from his nest, Ilani was in a prime position. What secrets could she find in the office of a nefarious and wealthy man? She turned, leaving the building. There was a side-exit that was often forgotten she might be able to use.

---

Keeping her body low and quick, Ilani darted to the side of City Hall, avoiding people and officials. There seemed to be some kind of rush of security personnel just as she left and Ilani didn’t know to be thankful of her timing or wary of it. Would Fairchild still be able to leave his office, or was this a dead end?
As she rounded the corner, attention focused behind her, she was taken aback by a presence. With a jolt, Illy scrambled back a pace, dipping lower, hiding behind a garbage can. The figure didn’t look to be security and was...somewhat familiar.

Before she could curb her impulses, Ilani took a step forward and called out, startling the figure.

“Emory Fairchild?”

She took a step forward, eyeing him. She knew about all the Fairchild members, at least somewhat, though her attention centered and Robert. But, something seemed off about the Fairchild son. Primarily, he looked disgruntled and otherwise agitated. But also, hurried and even panicked. Her eyes could see the small ruffles in his clothes and tension in demeanor. She could even see a slight sheen to him, almost as if he were sweaty, but it looked almost oily.

“Are you...are you alright Mr. Fairchild?” she asked, extending a hand to him. She looked down to see a black, ichor-like substance around his feet. “Uhh...let’s get you away from here, okay?”

---

---

Grace felt a heat wave of anger and embarrassment flood over her body as the man she had dragged to the convoy called her an idiot for the second time that day. She now certainly felt like she had been an idiot for helping him out in the first place as the man continued to shove his own foot further and further into his mouth. She had thought she lacked tact, but at this rate the man would be noshing on his entire leg in no time. Part of her felt like it would be for the greater good if she picked him up by the ankles, spun him around like she was an olympian, and hammer threw his ungrateful rear back into the swamp she had found him in. The seasonable part of her knew that would be terrible for at least a hundred thousand reasons with the top one being that it would actually prove his allegations about her intelligence to be accurate. Grace also imagined the insanely crippling amount of guilt and the stigmata that comes with being a murderer would be pretty big bummers, too.

Still, the man was truly pissing her off. Disgusting her. Lucas (she believed that military man had called mister search-and-seizure Lucas) had discovered some nugget of information on the man the same way he had discovered that her varsity jacket was really Joseph’s. However, his secret was much, much worse judging by the implications. She glowered at the man as he tried to use broken logic to convince the others to take him in. She wanted to yell at him, to drop him with the Golden Rule straight from the Sermon on the Mount, to bring him to justice, to punch him, to go old testament on his—crrrrrrrrrrrrack!

Wide-eyed, Grace looked down at the helmet in her hand. A low, quiet groan escaped from her mouth as she was greeted by the splintered mask. The upsetting man had made her forget about it completely, and in her annoyance she had forgotten to hold her strength back. The mouthguard was totally ruined, and there was a web of cracks over the tinted eye protectors. She walked a few yards away from the men, shaking her head in frustration. She couldn’t listen to them anymore. She turned the mask over in her hand. It wasn’t completely ruined, right? Man, Joseph is going to freaking kill me, she thought. She sighed with relief as the mask fit over the top of her head. She carefully took it back off and put it in her bag for safe keeping.

Unzipping the bag, she was greeted by the blinking light on her silenced phone. A message, call, email, update, tweet, notification? It likely wasn’t anything important, but she couldn’t refuse the temptation to find out check it. It gave her an excuse to bury her face into a tiny screen instead of, gulp, having an actual conversation. She pushed the button on the side. Her first thought wasn’t one of fear or concern, but annoyance. If she missed a call, it meant she was busy and didn’t have her phone. Calling her a million times would never change this. She was about to read the message when the phone lit up again. It was Joseph.

“Finally!” her brother yelled over the line before she could say anything. “Are you safe? Can you hear me? Grace?” She could hear the fear in his voice. “Grace? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said, laughing nervously. “Are you—”

“Why the fuck weren’t you answering your phone! Jesus, I thought you were doing something stupid. Listen, Grace, I know you think this would be a good time to get some publicity, but you can’t do anything in this situation, okay? Take the day off. Hell, the week,” said Joseph. He was rambling, not letting her get a word in edgewise. “We got to make sure this things aren’t legit, or make sure they can’t hurt you. You’re out of costume, right? Think you can grab one so we can do some tests later?”

“Joseph, I literally do not know what you are talking about,” she said. Today, she felt like she didn’t understand anything that anyone was talking about.

“How do you not know what I’m talking about? The, the, the, the thing, grab one of those things, and then get the hell out of there,” he said.

“Oh yeah, those things, no, I totally got you now,” she said dryly. “Listen, it’s not my spot to tell you whether or not to get high in the middle of the day, but please tell me you didn’t do it inside. You know I hate the smell, so…”

“Grace, you are a real idiot sometimes!” he said. She grimaced. “The taser-gun-whatever-thing. That thing. Grab one and then get out, okay?” There was a pause. “You did go to that rally, right?”

“The…” Oh, right. “Yeah, about that. Well, I, um, got a little distracted.”

“Seriously?” said Joseph. She couldn’t tell if he was relieved or angry. “Fine, okay, no that’s good. Probably best that you aren’t in that crowd of maniacs. Yeah, this is good. So where are you?” She told him that she was at the old plantation. “Why the hell are you out there?” She gave him a truncated version of what happened. When she mentioned the convoy, the speaker next to her ear almost exploded. “What the fuck are you doing with the convoy? Get the fuck out of there, okay?”

“Look, I’m fine, they aren’t going to do anything weird to me, okay?” she said. That had already happened. “I just want to walk around for a bit, talk to some people, and then I’ll come home for dinner. Okay?”

“Oh my god, Grace, how do you not know what’s going on?” he said. “Look, I can’t really explain all of this craziness. It’s bad. Like, real bad, okay? Just get on Twitter.”

Although skeptical, Grace obliged her brother. Clicking on bird icon, her personal account pulled up. Scrolling through a feed of strangers talking about their personal lives, bands advertising for concerts she would never be able to attend, and an ungodly amount of pictures of animals, her eyes widen with horror as it settled upon a new string of messages, each one ending in the same hashtag. She clicked on the hashtag, delving deeper into a cesspool of anger and hate. She felt her stomach twist as she thumbed through the feed, gathering the whole picture one hundred and forty characters at a time. There was a video. She clicked on it, her teeth gritting as she watched some corporate prick knocked out some poor wage slave while the crowd went wild like animals. Her eyes fell on one of the top comments.

Oh God.

Her feet were already moving, kicking up mud as she ran through the convoy back towards the group of men. She ran by the oddity of a miniature sun, her head not even turning to look as the unusual sight as her mind raced in pace with her beating heart. She didn’t slow as she came upon the group still arguing over the loathsome man. Grace tucked around a girl and caught sight of the black beret. She slowed her pace as she got closer to the man, out of fear of causing a panic and losing her footing and knocking him out with her body. Halting right in front of him, the girl shoved her phone right into his face so that he could clearly read the message:



“You guys have to get out of here. It’s not safe,” said Grace, trying to keep her voice low as she scrolled through a list of similar comments. “The cops aren’t doing anything about this. It’s like a mass hysteria or something,” she said, dropping the phone into her bag and pulling out her cracked mask. She gave Tarvos a look completely devoid of confidence and then slid the mask over her face, her spiderwebbed visor blocking out the uncertainty in her eyes.

“I’m want to help you guys, okay? I might not look it, but I can really pull some weight,” she said, realizing as the words came out of her mouth how stupid they really were. “What I mean...oh, nevermind. We got to warn the others, right?”

---

---

The man had walked over to Marcus and lifted him up, introducing himself as Gareth Corrigan. Marcus grinned when he was told that they were even. "I'll be fine, all my bleeding is internal. Name's Marcus." He off-hand mentioned to Gareth, as the two headed out of the alley, but, only when they were a few meters away from the alley, a truck pulled up with inbred rednecks - the worst of the lot was a dude named Landin, Marcus had heard of him over the years. He was trained in a speraratist guerilla training camp for a few years, always harboring a strong Hyperhuman-Hate, they talked about a convoy, something he had heard about. "Stop." Marcus told Gareth, as the man let go of his arm, leaning against the wall, listening to what Landin shouted at Remy - their exchange wasn't long, and the sound of sirens coming for the men in the alley filled the air, forcing Landin and his boys to move out.

Marcus looked dryly up at Gareth, he had refused to answer his question previously, but he was more or less forced to now. "Yeah, I am, MARS-Type." He said, low-key, making sure others couldn't hear it. Marcus grunted, pointing towards the other street. "We should head that way, around the corner is where my car is at. We have to warn the convoy."

"Yeah," said Gareth, nodding. "Okay." He began walking again before stopping himself, turning back to look at Marcus - his eyes were blank, near emotionless, but his voice told of something different - concern. "Are you okay to walk?" Nodding in response, Marcus leaned against the wall before stabalizing himself, walking towards the turn of the road, making sure to getting out of the area before the cops would start looking for them, he had already been in plenty of trouble with the P.B.P.D. Marcus shifted his weight, holding his sides while heading towards the parking lot on the other side of the harlot cafe, where his Mustang Shelby GT stood, the slate grey paintjob with the black stripes reacing over the hood to the wing made it a beautiful car.

Marcus opened the door, as he nodded for Gareth to get in the passenger side, once he started the car, he pointed to the glove compartment. "There's pain killers in there, I need some, you?" Marcus asked, digging through trash near the handbreak, finding about half a bottle of fireball alcohol, he screwed the cork off and took a big swig, following it with three pills. "All right. We could play catch-up with the inbreds, or we could try and find the convoy. You much of a detective, Gary?" Marcus asked as he backed the car onto the road, driving in the same direction they had seen Landin and his boys go to.

"You could say that," replied Gareth, handing Marcus the painkillers, not taking any himself. "I used to be Detroit Police. Worked there as detective for a few years before my wife died." Placing the painkillers back in the glove compartment, his eyes glazed over, as if he was getting lost in memory.

"Yeah, I was in law enforcement, too." Marcus mentioned, one hand on the steering wheel, the other taking another swig from the bottle.

"I say we go to the convoy. Maybe we could warn them." Gareth paused, thinking. "It can't be too well hidden... I'm willing to bet they stopped somewhere on the outskirts of the city. Do you know anywhere that might be an ideal spot? Some factory, a farm, maybe?"

Marcus nodded. "Yeah, there's a pretty big place on the outskirts of town, Old Foster's Plantation. It's where I'd go. Got a good view of the surroundings."

"Might as well check it out."

Marcus nodded, and with that, the two were off towards the plantation. After a few minutes drive - it couldn't have been longer than fifteen - they exited the city. The plantation came into sight a few minutes more, and Gareth and Marcus feasted their eyes to the display on hand: an enormous collection of cars, vans, trucks and motorcycles, all parked near the variety of people scattered on the property. They exited the car as fast as their injuries allowed them, making their way through the crowd of vehicles. "Excuse me," said Gareth, approaching a portly young man, "Can you take us to whoever's in charge?" He paused at the man's distrustful stare. "We're - we're Hypes." At that the man leapt into action, leading Gareth and Marcus to where they wanted to go.

---

---

---

---

There were few things in life that brought Ezekiel Thoreau as much please as the sensation of a few hundred horse power between his legs. Of course he would have preferred it to be a Triumph over a Harley any day but like beggars, thieves couldn't be picky. Going around the city had seemed like the obvious choice if he wanted to make it to the rally in time, however Zeke had forgot to take into consideration just how little he knew about the area and how much he enjoyed riding a good bike. Passing the same exit for the third time that afternoon, Zeke shook his head as he gun the throttle into a hard turn. The tail end of the bike slid around as though it was part of him as he brought it to a stop. Looking up towards the sky, Zeke studied it intensely as he tried to find something to navigate with. Nighttime was obviously easier and while he had glimpses of the sun, the storm clouds were doing a pretty good job hiding it. The smell of the ocean had been getting stronger so he must have been heading South.

Or is it East?

Zeke pulled the helmet off his head as he massaged his temple briefly. It was at times like this he wished he did carry one of those 'smartphones' but Zeke hadn't owned an electronic device longer than a day before he shorted it out or wiped it clean with a magnetic pulse. Plus when you live on the run, a cellphone just seemed like an unnecessary expense, especially when you had no one to call or text.

While he would have preferred to be left alone to his thoughts, it seemed fate had other plans as a large truck suddenly raced out of the city followed by an older model muscle car. Another vehicle came after that, and another. Guns were hanging out windows as people screamed and hollowed, obviously riled up by something or someone.

Then it hit Zeke.

The rally.

The convoy!

These people were essentially a twenty first century lynch mob. They had traded in their pitchforks and torches for tazers and .45's. Revving the powerful bike, Zeke forced his way into the stampede of vehicles as he weaved in and out of the erratic drivers thanking the military training he had received at P.R.C.U for each questionable maneuver. People cheered him on as he did, it was a bizarre sensation knowing that they simply assumed he like them was in a hurry to kill people whose lives they deemed to be irrelevant. Lives that were equal to their own in every way except they possessed a very different set of talents, talents that he himself possessed and would be killed on the spot for. But P.R.C.U. didn't raise Zeke to be a coward, they didn't teach him to control his powers simply to hide. He was able to defend himself and this wasn't vigilantism this time, no this was being a decent human being and standing up for others. This was standing up against murder.

A bolt of plasma erupted from his hand as he struck the back axel of a truck in front of him. The metal superheated as the tires suddenly went up in flame. The smell of burning and melting rubber encompassing the area as the rims began to grind into the rough road. Sparks flew every direction as the driver began to lose control of the vehicle, the back-end fishtailing all over the road before it suddenly rolled and bounced. Gunning the bike's throttle again, Zeke drove under the flying vehicle as he created a magnetic repulsion to carry the vehicle into the ditch.

His victory was short lived as searing pain suddenly burned through his arm. A bullet grazing his shoulder as one of the vehicles behind him opened fire.

"KILL THE FUCKIN' HYPE!" A voice screamed viciously over the roar of the numerous vehicles as Zeke dipped the bike between another set of vehicles. Seeing him appear there, the drivers nodded at each other as they moved to crush Zeke between them. Passengers raising their pacifers and firing. Two sets of tazer prongs dug into Zeke's skin as the triggers were pulled. Feeling the electric pulse enter his body and provide a quick recharge he couldn't help but smirk. The Fairchild idiot had scammed this crowd, his 'Hyperhuman Pacifier' was no more than a glorified tazer.

"Thanks for the boost folks." Zeke said with a mook salute as he repelled himself from the bike and landed on the roof of the vehicle to his right. His stolen motorcycle cried out in protest as the engine was snuffed out and it fell to the ground, vehicle after vehicle swerving out of the way of the fallen bike until a large truck simply trampled it. Losing control as the motorcycle became lodged underneath its front axle, the truck went sliding off the road before hitting the ditch and rolling. Zeke smiled slightly before jumping from the roof of the van beneath him and magnetizing himself to the next vehicle. Bullets flew from underneath him as the deluded riots began to fire from within their own vehicle in an effort to kill him.

Coming around the bend, Zeke jumped to another vehicle as the convoy came into sight. People were scrambling for their vehicles as the rioters began to hoot and hollow once again. People were practically jumping out of moving vehicles as bullets and tazers began to fly. Innocent Hyperhumans were immediately killed, dropping to the ground pumped full of lead as the frenzied people continued to taze their dead bodies. Zeke wanted to be sick, he wanted to cry but something inside him prevented that as he pushed off from his current perch. Electricity encompassed his body as he launched forward like Zeus' thunderbolt.

Dropping the first rioter he saw, Zeke deliver his own fist as a tazer dropping the man into a series of convulsing seizures. Covering a nearby group of Hyperhumans with a magnetic field, Zeke nodded to them to run as he decided to be their first line of defense.

"Appreciate the backup Thoreau." A familiar voice called as Zeke turned to see Tarvos providing cover fire to another group of fleeing Hyperhumans.

"Always happy to help Sir." Zeke replied with a nod as he pushed himself to expand the field.

---

---

Pushing his truck to the limit Anthony followed the mob out of the city. Doing his best to keep it level he cut in and out of the traffic trying to make headway. Suddenly he was cut off by a blur shaped like a motorcycle. Shaking a fist and flipping the bird Anthony shook his head. Nuts like that were the first ones to get killed in a situation like this. Sighing Anthony pushed the thought aside as he needed to concentrate on driving, but that may have been easier said than done. As he approached the head of the pack Anthony watched as a lightning bolt shot from the motorcyclist hand and disabled the pack leader. Dodging and weaving Anthony sceamed at the top of his lungs, "Hey asshole! I'm a good guy too! So watch where you're chuckin' creeps!" All the ducking trouble pushed him back so when Anthony arrived at the plantation it was already a bloodbath.

As soon as he pulled up and stepped out of his truck he was fired upon. Suddenly playing along with an angry mob to find these guys wasn't sounding like a good idea. Well he was here now so might as well stick with the plan. Brandishing his new Pacifier he bolted for the nearest cover. Finding and older man fumbling with reloading his Pacifier behind an overturned wagon Anthony smirked. "Seriously? You join and angry mob and you have no inclination on how to use your weapon. Pathetic, give it here!" Anthony berates the man as he yanks the tazer from his hand before pressing his own to the man's neck and shocking him unconscious. Using the man's Pcifier and his own Anthony combined them forming a sort of sawed off double barrel shotgun form of the weapon. Looking around he checked if anyone had saw what happened. Not seeing any other hostility towards him then before he moved on.

Jumping from cover to cover Anthony covertly disabled mob member after mob member picking up spare Pacifiers and ammo along the way. Going in too deep him and two other mob members got surrounded. When the advancing hypes looked like they weren't going to take prisoners so to speak Anthony quickly seperated his Pacifer and shocked both humans on either side of him. "I'm with you! See? I don't think a non-hype can do that." He exclaimed pointing to the unconscious men on the ground. Giving Anthony a suspicious look they let him be and told him to look for Tarvos when all this was over. Tarvos? Anthony knew that name! Anyone who went to PRCU knew that name. Tarvos was the commander of HIT. Was he leader of the convoy too? Anthony supposed it made sense. Well at least he knew he'd be in good hands. Catching sight of a group of retreating hypes Anthony jumped back into action and provided cover fire as they fled.

---

---

Cracks in the sidewalk, falling through when the world broke. Broken made his head hurt. “Ow.” Lucas winced a few seconds after Grace realised she’d cracked her helmet, pressing his hands to his own head and no longer paying attention to the talk he’d started or the memory that had caught him up and slipped him through warmth and sliding, parting slippery resistance. Cracks in his head were a good distraction and he didn’t want to think anymore. But he wasn’t done, was he?

They were still talking; breathe in and out and listen to the right words dropped in desperation just trying to survive. Sorry, not sorry, he didn’t know what he was, but neither did anyone else, he thought. No, not him, the man with the knife and strings attached. Not him, her, dry in the wet and smiling sad, Liza. She was here and talking and looking his way, but he didn’t know what she wanted so he just shook his head and covered his ears, he’d missed the words. “He knows not to do what he did.”

He didn’t know if he was helping or not. Didn’t know if anyone was listening anymore. Too much tension in decision and indecision, bated breaths and waiting. Running scared with lines splicing city into swamp in his eyes. The man shook his head and blinked again, hard, feeling his breath speed up in answer to the tight worry beside him as the girl came back with a phone. Her phone, she’d had one, he couldn’t read it, but Tarvos did. Didn’t like it. Didn’t like what he saw and all Lucas could do was forget the rain chilling his skin and the double vision splintering his eyes and brain as the militant man raised his voice to raise the alarm.

“That’s bad for you don’t tell me.” Accident or not, the words that came out of his mouth were rather sincere. He didn’t think he wanted to know. In his world, ignorance was more than bliss, it was quiet and calm and safe. But the real world didn’t care about his preferences, and everyone found out too soon what the newest trouble was. He was rubbing at his eyes and trying to find Liza in the mess of distorted images when it came in a wave of fireworks and festival fiascos.

Fear.

Fear under fire.

Not lights, guns. Lucas hadn’t even the chance to realise on his own what was coming. He’d still been pulling words out of the muddle when the convoy fell into a nightmare. Everyone was frightened. Scared, scattered, scarred. Every vehicle, every bit of cloth and worn down precious possession that knew the feeling gathered it, echoed it, strengthened it, and strangled him. Squeezing close comfort.

He couldn’t breathe.

A bright-flower target in the middle of chaos. A sodden and shaking man. He couldn’t look, couldn’t see, didn’t want to. His eyes were closed, tears leaking out to mingle with the rain, fingers tight against his scalp, nails scraping skin as he tried to block out every sharp retort to keep it from echoing. But he couldn’t press his palms hard enough to his ears. Couldn’t push back against the flood. It had come too suddenly and he was caught, lost in the current and gasping for air.

Lucas crumpled under the onslaught, crouching down to make himself smaller. He tried to hide in his head, somewhere the gunshots couldn’t reach him, where the grasping fingers of terror couldn’t catch him. He didn’t know what else to do. Hiding in a car was the last thing on his mind.

---

---

Like that, once the two had emerged from his vehicle, things went sideways, before they had had a chance to talk to anyone, besides greetings, they were met with the sound of screaching tires as a truck - the same truck Marcus had seen Landin in, be flipped upside down. A fight had started, Marcus and Gareth had arrived to warn the convoy, so, here they were. Holding his side, Marcus nodded for Gareth to try and get behind cover - Gar had done more than enough already. Finishing the last swig of alcohol from the bottle in his hand, Marcus eyes lit up with a emerald light for a moment as he launched the bottle a impressive 150 meters, the bottle hitting a biker with a sawed of shotgon so hard in the face that he was knocked unconscious. Ducking under gunfire, Marcus reached for the gun he carried on his back, in his belt. Usually a holster was placed on his shoulder - but he had gotten sloppy lately. Getting out the gun, he rolled out from cover, aiming the gun at one of the hillbilly's shoulders.

Pulling the trigger, he was met with a unsatisfied 'click' noise. "What th- Oh." Marcus mumbled to himself, realizing he hadn't replaced the magazine in the gun with a new clip - he was out of ammo. Having seen his eyes light up, two bikers rushed at him, armed with tazers and crowbars. Marcus had gotten beaten enough for today.

Twirling the hold of the gun - the finger on the trigger the gun spun around in his hand, letting him get a firm grip on the barrel of the 1911 Colt. The biker swung at Marcus with the crowbar - dodging by crouching, he hit the man in the back of the knee with the gun, using the grip as a weapon. The second biker came, tazer coming at him. Marcus quickly disarmed him by smacking the grip of the gun against his wrist - hard enough to send out the sound of cracking bones. The biker cried out in pain, but was quickly silenced by Marcus hitting him right in the head, knocking him out cold.

The first biker came at him, having recovered his balance since the hype's first attack. "Filthy fucking Hype!" The biker shouted, swinging at Marcus again. He dodged, put his shoulder towards the man and rolled the man over his back, sending the heavier biker to the ground with a loud thud, as Marcus came down onto his chest, knee first, holding him in place - the barrel of his gun between the biker's teeth. Seeing the sudden look of terror in the man's eyes, Marcus quickly hit him upon the jaw, knocking him out. Getting of the biker, he sat down in the sand, his heart pounding.

Looking to the side, he saw another man approaching a hype with a shotgun - the gun fired, buckshot piercing the air. In a green wave, the pieces of lead all clogged together, turning into one sphere, levitating in the air, a few inches from the chest of target. Changing the gravitational direction on the ball of lead, Marcus sent it right back at the shooter, hitting him in the face. His powers were lacking the exact nature of a telekinetic, but they had many applications.

Marcus cravled onto his hand and feet, dashing behind cover when more gunfire erupted. Hiding behind a vehicle that was not his own, he clutched his gun. His instincts might have dulled, but they weren't gone. He still kept track of the entire battlefield, he knew what was happening. In the back of his head. His subconscious recognized several of the people on the Hype-side, either because they attended PRCU, or because he had kept track of them himself. Yet, his concious mind was making no real connections, the only one he for certain knew was Gareth, and he had no clue what Corrigan's powers were.

Remember to talk more on the next roadtrip.

---

Some Awful Day, Some Awful Month, Some Awful Year - 0 Time For Messages

---

Grace only heard the ringing in her ears as she opened her eyes, blinking the dancing stars out of her vision. Her head hurt as if her older brother Peter had just drilled her with a baseball again. For a moment, she felt herself transported through time back to that moment of her childhood. The ringing was still there, but she could also hear shouts from her brothers mixed with the wild hoots of laughter from her sisters. The sun was shining and she could feel the grass on the back of her legs and arms. It was hard to breath. She could feel the warmth of her own blood on her face from where the ball had smashed her nose. She could hear Peter’s voice, the gravitas in his angry words marred by the cracking of his voice as he yelled at someone to check if she was still breathing.

“No way is that bitch still alive after that headshot,” said someone. A man. Joseph, maybe. How? He was younger than Peter, it made little sense for his voice to be deeper. Had her hearing been ruined too by that fastball?

“Trust me, it’s best to hit these freaks twice,” said Peter. Except, no, that wasn’t right. He hadn’t been the nicest of brothers, but he was never downright malicious. Peter had moved away.

She blinked again. The sunny sky disappeared, blackened out almost instantly by the storm clouds above. The grass turned into mud; Grace could feel it seeping in through the cracks in her helmet and clinging to her hair. The blood on her face was gone, replaced by the cold drops of rain from the sky above. The visor on her mask had completely shattered. Her head still hurt, but her nose no longer felt smashed. She was overwhelmed by the smell of smoke, swamp, and something putrid that she couldn’t place but would later learn to be burnt flesh. She closed her eye in concentration as she pulled herself out of the past. There was no time for unhappy walk down memory lane. The convoy. The attack. She had to do something.

Step one: Get up. Get safe.

“Holy shit, I went to school with this girl. Should’ve guessed that stuck up bitch was Thu—”

Grace heard three sounds at once as she sat up. The first sound was of someone yelling out in surprise. It seemed like it was supposed to be a warning, but the words that came out were a mixture of unhelpful rage-fuelled gibberish. The second was the mousy squeak of her own voice as she saw the man looming over her whip his revolver towards her face, his reaction time slowed by the surprise of seeing a corpse (or what he had assumed to be a corpse) come back to life. The third was the discordant and percussive noise of a bone snapping in two accompanied by the shrill symphony of vocal cords being shredded by bloodcurdling screams.

An instant wave of regret hit Grace as she realized that she had reacted too fast and had not controlled her strength. She scrambled as she pulled her body out of the mud, lost her balance, and dropped forward onto all fours. A noise like a cannon firing went off nearby, but it was not enough to cut the gut wrenching cries of anguish from the crippled man. She crawled next to him and carefully smacked him in the face. The blow was strong enough to knock him unconscious. It had been an attempt to be merciful both to her attacker and to her own ears. Grace did not have time to become sick as her eyes danced over his twisted leg. Move on, move on.

She stumbled to her feet as the other man yelled something at her and fired his gun at her chest. Grace had expected a bullet to smack the wind out of her, possibly even putting her on her ass again and send her drifting back to wonderland. The man had expected the girl to drop to the ground and to start shaking like a pair of back alley dice. There was a brief tingling sensation as the barbs bounced off of her body that cause Grace to jump and tense up ever so slightly, but in the end the wires harmlessly fell to the ground along with the bloom of plastic confetti. The two exchanged a short, confused glance before they quickly realized what had actually occurred.

“Seriously? Why would you think that would work?” said Grace as she walked towards the man. She wasn’t taunting the man; she was offended. Do I really have that little of a reputation? she thought. Using a taser on her was like trying to kill someone with a nerf gun—unless you were going to disregard the choking hazard warning and shove the damn thing down their throat then you’d be better off just pissing into the wind. She tapped him in the gut as he tried firing on her again, knocking the wind out of him as he doubled over in pain. He’d be incapacitated for a good while. Grabbing the taser, she chucked it effortlessly into the swamp.

Step two: assess the situation.

Grace had to figure out what was going on—getting shot in the face had a way of confusing your timeline. The welt on her forehead was already throbbing in dull pain.The last thing she remembered was rushing around warning people about the attack, and then there was a loud noise, and then she was on her back. She looked around and tried to grasp what was happening besides the obvious fact that her warning had been too little, too late.

Cars were continuing to swarm into the plantation. She couldn’t tell where the vehicles belonging to the convoy ended and the ones brought by the rioters began. It was noisy, way too noisy. Guns rang out in the air. Electricity crackled through the sky. Rallying cries and screams pierced through her helmet. The damn crunched up thing was blinding her peripherals, but for some dumb reason she couldn’t bring herself to break it off even though it no longer masked her face. A stupid comfort in all of this chaos. It wasn’t enough. Months of childish games of make believe where she ran around a city in some shitty get up and confronted drug addicts, petty thieves, and wannabe wiseguys did nothing to prepare her for something like this.

She was moving. Why was she moving? My phone, my phone. I stashed my bag in a van. I need to call Joseph. He can help, she thought, her better judgment clouded with panic. She could hear someone praying between heavy, sobbing breaths. It took her a minute to realize it was her own voice. The soft voice faded as her eyes fell upon throngs of bodies. She couldn’t stop looking. Surely they were okay. Surely they were just napping; tasers were always nonlethal, right? Surely it was normal for that man to only have half of a face left, the rest of it blown away by a weapon. Surely she wasn’t the only—hrk! Her mind cleared just in time for her to move to ditch the helmet. Ripping the mask off of her face, Grace doubled over as she lost her breakfast. How lame, she thought, wiping her mouth off with a muddy sleeve. Really, you’re worried about that? Dizzied but strangely sobered by the sickness escaping from her body, Grace pulled her thoughts together.

“Step three,” she muttered under her breath, echoing the words Joseph had said to her ages ago. “You gotta be a hero.” The logic, in her mind, was sound. She knew she could take a beating; she wasn’t so sure about the others. She had to protect her people, whatever that fucking meant. Until this afternoon she had considered the citizenry of Pointe Bordeaux to be “her people”. Now, she had her doubts about it. Whatever. She’d worry about that cerebral shit later. She had to stop this madness from spinning further out of hand. Okay. You got this, Grace.As she stood up, there was just enough time for her to cover her face with her arms as a truck crashed into her.

She didn’t see what happened, but she felt the force of the truck smashing into her chest as pain shot through her entire body. The air pushed itself out of her lungs, but she did not budge. She couldn’t budge. Typically, a person would have been thrown like a ragdoll over the hood or smashed under a tire like a opossum. For Grace, the vehicle just wrapped itself around her body and encaged her in steel. Trying her best to ignore the pain (and the crumpled over body that was sprawling over the windshield) she pried herself free from the tangled mess of metal and made her way around to the side of the truck. She checked for fire and saw none. Good. There would be no need to move anyone then—she didn’t want to be that idiot who paralyzed someone by pulling them from a wreck that wasn’t going to go up in flames. Despite the fact that the driver had tried to mow her down, she ripped the door off the side of the truck to make sure that nobody needed immediate attention.

The scene in the front of the truck was vicious; there was no convincing herself that the driver or the man sprawled across the windshield were alive. She felt the churn of sickness in her stomach once again and averted her gaze, her fingers clasping around her necklace. It was rough, way too rough. Move on. Focus. They crashed into you. It’s not your fault. Not your fault. Move on. Focus. Tearing the collapsed back door off of its hinges, Grace felt a shadow fall over her. There was nobody to save. She felt her head spin as she backed away from the wreck. Move on. Move on. There are others. Move on. Not your fault. Move on. Move on. It didn’t work. She collapsed behind a car in despair, her hands clutching her face in shock.

She didn’t have much time to wallow in her own miseries. Say what you will about Catholics, but they knew how to use guilt to motivate themselves. Grace forced her to keep moving. She had said she would help. Taking her dirty hands from her face, Grace looked to her left and spotted the man who had searched her earlier. Lucas, right? He clearly was not okay. The man was crouching down in the mire, his hands pressed to his ears as he sat on his haunches with his hands on his ears like a scared child. It was like how she wanted to be, come to think of it. I can atleast help him, right? God, please don’t let me screw this up too. She crouch-walked her way over to the man, cautiously reaching out to grab his shoulder.

“H-h-hey,” she said, brushing a finger against him. “Come with me, okay? I, I, I...you’re going to be okay, okay? You are okay, right? No injuries or anything? I think the convoy’s retreating. I’m going to help you, alright?” Whatever confidence that seemed to be in her voice (which was little if even any) faded, replaced instead by a frantic desperation. “Jesus, let me help you, please? I, I, I can’t live with myself if I don’t even...listen, grab my hand. I’ll protect you, okay?”She held her hand out to Lucas, knowing that she could just throw him over a shoulder if he was unwilling or unable to cooperate.

“Please?” she said, trying to force a trusting smile on her face. It failed, a pained frown taking its place. The only thing she could think about was what Joseph had said to her on the phone about him fearing that she was doing something stupid. She exhaled deeply. The real step three: do something stupid. My fucking creed.

It had been such a nice occasion. Two new people, which was always a pleasant surprise. He'd watched with keen interest as Lucas rummaged through their belongings, something which Nick himself had gone through as well. He still didn't really understand the power all too well, but it was pretty well in any case. And that's when the girl, Thumper, had given them the warning of an in-coming mob. The man was off in an instant, bowling into the nearest vehicle and quickly donning his own unique outfit. If he was quick enough he could get out there and maybe disrupt the in-coming goons before they arrived, take a few of them in the wrong direction. But he had clearly underestimated just how close the attackers were. Even as he threw on his bomber jacket Nick heard it. Gun fire. Screams. All hell breaking loose.

"No," he muttered, bolting out of his makeshift changing room just in time to see the carnage begin to unfold with a ruthless swiftness. Through the continuing downpour Nick watched as a large group of angry citizens crashed into their convoy, a number of Hypes getting cut down in the initial onslaught. They hadn't stood a chance. And he hadn't been fast enough.

"NO!"

Nick's legs moved before his brain had time to think. Fuelled by a sudden and violent rage, Nick exhibited a feat of acceleration which was impressive even for him. Rain pelted against his goggles as he tore a tent pole from its place in the ground and in one smooth movement hurled it Olympic-javelin-style straight into the windscreen of an on-coming pickup. It was thrown at such a speed that the first thing the driver knew about it was when it cut through the glass and dug into his flesh, pinning the man against his seat. The pain, being surely immense, caused the man to wail in pain, quickly losing control of his vehicle and crashing into a nearby car of the convoy. Those who had been in the back of the pick-up were quickly scattered, either being thrown over the side or across the top of the roof.

But Nick was already onto his next targets, going hell for leather across the grounds of the plantation toward a group of gunmen. They were too caught up in their orgy of bullets to notice their fast-approaching assailant. Suddenly one of them was hammered into, their jaw bone noticeably cracking under the impact as Nick threw a devastatingly rapid punch. As their comrade slowly dropped to their ground, the other two yobs turned to their latest victim and laid their eyes upon the strangely dressed man, the American flag baseball helmet an easily recognizable feature. They would have laughed if it wasn't for the fact that the man was upon them before they could even swing their guns up. Putting his hand on the wrist of the local, Nick then proceeded to deliver a karate-chop blow to his elbow joint, creating a satisfying crunch. Although this all happened extremely fast, normal human reaction time was enough to allow the third assailant to bring his shotgun to bear and even to pull the trigger. Nick turned to face what he thought must surely be his own brutal end. His life didn't flash before his eyes or anything. No, all he felt was a jolt of fear shake through him.

Then a green wave suddenly enveloped the buckshot, crunching the whole thing and stopping it a few inches short of his chest. Both Hype and human stood dumbfounded, before the newly formed ball of lead was thrown back at the man's face, knocking him out cold. If Nick was a religious man, he'd say it was divine intervention, but he knew that he had a nearby fellow Hype to thank. He'd have to seek them out later. But for now, the man with the broken arm was still groaning, though a swift kick to the face from the speedster soon put an end to that.

His near-death experience had allowed Nick a brief moment of respite. Looking here and there quickly he noticed that the Hyperhumans were falling back, and though every enraged bone in his body was telling him to go and punch more faces, the man knew he had to help with the retreat. In this moment of calm he managed to spy Lucas on his knees, hands over his head. Fortunately Thumper was right there with him, and though he wanted to go and help someone who'd been nicer to him than most others, Nick knew there were those who were potentially wounded and needed the help now. So with that he sped over to a group of Hypes taking cover, trying their best to stay out of the firefight. Crouching down with them, he gave what he hoped was a reassuring nod.

"Anyone here hurt?" he shouted over the crackle of guns.

"Angie got shot up pretty bad, I don't think she can walk," one of them answered, a young boy, not much older than eighteen. The girl, Angie, looked pale and was bleeding from her left leg.

Nick wasn't the strongest of people, but he could at least carry her on her back quicker than anyone else. With some help he got Angie onto his back as carefully as possible, and with a perhaps inappropriate salute set off again, accelerating a bit slower due to the added weight, but still faster than anyone else could hope. With bullets and tazers whizzing here and there, Nick did his best to use as much cover as he could before getting to one of the convoy's vehicles which was far enough away from the fighting to be considered safe-ish. Settling Angie into one of the vehicles, Nick got the attention of a another nearby convoy-member and instructed them on the basics of putting pressure on a wound, though honestly it was all just stuff he had seen in the movies.

"Stay here, there'll be more Hypes coming soon," he stood back up at full height "I've got to get back out there."

And with that he was off again, darting through the disarray of vehicles and bodies.

---

Desperate for any foothold beyond his mind, Lucas' nails were drawing blood beneath his hair, but he wasn't brave enough to open his eyes. Cities hid pockets of bad memories the way mines hid bad air. Moments of an individual's terror, scattered pieces of lives dragged away screaming, the clatter of guns or a single, sharp retort ricocheting off walls, and the final silence of no one left breathing. Sometimes, he stood inside them for a while when he found them. Losing himself in the streets and walls and never needing to imagine dying alone. More usually, he tucked in his chin and walked through them. Traced the route in broken words and tears when someone was willing to listen, or just found another way.

He'd had Toronto mapped out in colour coded lines on his wall before all this, filling in the holes and building on the layers sunk into the stones throughout the years. For easy reference, Mark had told him, so he wouldn't forget. He never did.

This was just another memory. Frantic, frenetic, fractious... Familiar. Too much, too fast.

Flooding empty space and filling every dark corner of his mind even as it swept out again. He couldn't hold himself against it, and letting go just left him falling away from his own mind.

Dragged down and drowning...

Drowning even as every gasped in breath rushed through his head with the rasping wail of a stormwind. All of it caught up in echoes from his hands pressed so close to his ears. His body was rocked by the beat of his own heart and it was all the comfort he could find.

The last thing the man had been waiting for just then was an unexpected brush against his shoulder and Lucas started violently, spinning towards the touch on instinct. Eyes wide and balance lost, he sat in the mud and stared through the girl first. She didn't look threatening at all and it took him a long moment while her lips shaped hopeful platitudes he wasn't hearing to really see her. Little girl lost in desperation he could feel clawing through his gut, but desperation was not despair and he clung to that feeble difference the way she clung to hope.

The offered hand from Grace, his grace, shook as he looked at it uncomprehending, mouth opening, throat working, but nothing came out. There was nothing to say. Behind her, beneath the weight now pressing him down and squeezing but holding him steady, he could see nobody had time to listen. This world frightened him. Too heavy to lift his arms if air was all she had to offer. If he just closed his eyes again he could give in, give up, let go. But he didn't want to stay here, didn't want to be left behind or caught in memories. And finally, the slightest shift, her standing between him and that world, meaning well, meaning to do well, gave him the strength to bring his own hand up.

He grabbed for her wrist though, trembling fingers trapping the cuff of her sleeve between them and her skin. A second later and his fingers tightened, free hand back against his head, heedless of the mud, expression twisting as a solid impact thundered through bones that felt like jelly. Lucas could only wheeze through the sensation, lucky not to feel the bruises though it made his head ache, and take refuge behind the heavy edges pressing into cloth, scraping on his skull, holding back the tide enough, just enough.

"Don't let me go. Don't leave. Don't. It's filling up with screaming, scared. I'm scared." The words emerged with a breathless disregard for clarity as Lucas found his voice. It rasped from a dry, closed throat, and he didn't care that he should have been the responsible one. He just wanted everything to stop.

"I'm here. It's going to be okay," she said, uncertain in her words. Truth be told, she was scared, too. Real scared. Yet, she didn't let Lucas know that; she couldn't. Grace sighed. She'd have to pretend to actually be in some sort of control. It was easier said than done. "Look, do you know..." She shook her head. "Can you walk, can you move? Do you want me to carry you?"

"Okay," An empty word, filling space, he was just echoing her. "Alright, okay, dunno." He had to fight to figure out what she wanted, too busy trying not to notice anything to listen. But his confusion wasn't just lack of understanding when she asked her final question. And the furrow between his eyes was all for her and the idea of being carried anywhere as he worked towards getting up with something pressing him down. He wasn't letting her go though, couldn't.

She returned his confused look with one of her own. She couldn't decide if his words were in actual response to her questions or the rambling of a frightened man. She decided it didn't matter, knowing that being anywhere but here was the best choice of action. Pulling herself—and inadvertently tugging Lucas, too—up to poke her head over their cover, she scanned the chaos in the hope of being hit with some kind of eureka moment. If the clouds above were to pull away and a beacon of light was to shine down to show Grace the way, then now clearly was not that moment. The sound of a ricocheting bullet rang out; it was too close for comfort. She ducked back down.

"Lucas, I have a plan," she said, lying through her teeth and hoping that the look she had on her face was one of stony confidence instead of a frightened rabbit. "Are you ready?"

Up, then down and that was his name. He stared at her, she looked at him. Scared together was easier than scared alone. But ready for what? "Okay." No time for questions, no time to find the words. He shook his head even as he agreed.

It was a good enough answer for Grace. Grabbing the man, she effortlessly lifted him out of the dirt as she cradled him in her arms and ignored his surprised yelp. She made sure to keep his head pressed into her chest in case a stray bullet missed her and hit him. Taking in one final deep breath, she pulled herself out of the mud and bolted for the next car and prayed that she was heading deeper into the convoy.

The ground was gone... He was floating in that hard metal hug he didn't know how to explain and Grace was holding him. He forgot to question how in his surprise, just grabbed her shoulders and hid his face and found a few prayers ready to hand when he wanted them. Breathless voice and quiet muttering, they belonged to her, so he borrowed the words for them both. No one else was listening, he didn't know if God would, but the litany came easy.

"There, not too bad, right?" she said, huffing despite not really being out of breath. She wasn't sure if she was trying to convince Lucas or herself. "Okay, we're going again. Three, two..."

She lifted herself up on one, bolting to the next vehicle. The sounds of guns cracking rang throughout the air; each one gave her a mini heart attack. Her feet pounded through the mud, kicking up filth all over the place as she sunk further and further into the mire. She felt her foot catch on something and lost her balance. Knowing that landing on Lucas would spell the end to the man's life, she twisted and gave him a lit toss towards the cover. Hopefully, the mud would cushion his blow. Pulling herself back up, she scrambled over to the man.

"Sorry, sorry, oh man, are you okay? Please tell me you're okay?" she said.

"Ow..." He'd gone flying. Landed hard, tried to roll, run out of breath instead and skidded. The mud was cold, but shock had broken him out of the cycle, and he rolled over with a groan. "Okay, ow, ha." His head wasn't any clearer, but he'd found the foothold she'd almost been. Still scared, oh, who wasn't? But his reaching hand was steadier, and he tried a sorry smile at the girl kneeling beside him while sitting up. "Good plan."

He meant the words sincerely. And, despite the mud now covering over half of him and the stinging on his arm where he'd tried to catch himself, Lucas believed them. They'd moved at any rate. Better than he'd managed.

"Yeah, it was really well thought out," she said, frowning as she lifted him into her arms again. "Since it hasn't failed us yet..."

However, she did not know where to go. Her tumble had disoriented her already lost sense of direction. She looked around, trying to make the growing look of alarm on her face appear more like alert watchfulness. A human blur ran past the two, carrying what Grace believed to be another person on its back. Either that, or it was the quickest hunchback she had ever seen. Regardless, a few moments later and the blur ran past them once again minus its hump. Nodding to herself as if she knew what she was doing, she moved towards the blur's first destination.

After what felt like hours (but was really more like a minute or two) of trudging through the muck, the two of them came onto a van. Grace could still hear the sound of gunfire and tasers discharging, but they did not feel as close as before. Stopping outside of the side door of the camper, she couldn't help but feel like the vehicle deserved more to be at Woodstock than a plantation in Louisiana being sieged by a crazed mob.

As strange as it felt to be cradled by a girl smaller than he was, Lucas didn't protest the arrangement until he realised where she'd brought him. Then he scrambled out of her arms, flailing to get his balance and stand up straight enough to bang against the nearest window. "Serena! Serena, it's all coming into here. Can I come in?" Was she still safe? He'd walked away and everything had changed. "We found mud and flying. It's all leaking in the windows."

Lucas tugged at the door handle when he finally remembered her voice inviting him in. Whether it was echoing her now or from any number of earlier invitations he didn't care. He just pulled it open and almost fell into the safety of a van he knew that wasn't quite as full of fright as the others. But... With his foot up, he paused and turned. "Thanks, thank you, come into the-in. Come in, too?"

Looking back at Grace, mud washing off in the rain, blood flowing from a scrape when she'd tossed him, he made a rather disreputable sight, but she'd gotten him here safe. Brought herself here, too, and inside was safer still.

She wanted to get in the camper and curl up into a ball until they drove away or the rioters overran them. She really, truly wanted to, but she couldn't. Maybe it was a sense of duty; maybe it was just that guilt. She thought back to that blur. Others were trying to help; she couldn't stop now.Trying to give Lucas a strong smile, she shook her head no.

"I have to make sure that the others are okay," she said. "It's...it's important, I have to go. But I'll be back, okay? I'll be back."

Not coming in? Back? She had to go back. "Okay, no. No. There's scared and scared together making too much noise it hurts. You can stay scared here." He didn't mean to deny anyone else her help, or tell her she wasn't allowed to be brave, he just knew how hard that smile was to find. Thought someone needed to say she didn't have to lift anyone else. Was that bad?

"If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn't do it, it is sin for them," she said, throwing on her best Thumper voice. It felt weird to do it without the mask. She turned away from Lucas and started walking back to the front, muttering to herself. "Or something dumb like that."

Lucas watched her go, unable to hide or ignore his worry, until another rash of gunfire made him duck inside, breathing back to ragged. One hand over an ear until the door clicked shut. “She’s scared to death and dying. Of dying. Everyone’s scared to piss their pants…” Someone needed to know. He didn’t think Serena needed to be told, but when he turned to look for her, he found other eyes in huddled together faces and tried his own smile this time. It wasn’t half-made before it was already fading, and he shook his head at the memory of what he’d found in her clothes. That much force… “And she won. She won chicken with a car.”

---

---

---

---

They were overwhelmed.

Zeke couldn't help but notice that the convoy was getting small by the minute. No matter how many he repelled, how many he zapped, the rioters seemed to just keep coming as the mob continued to swarm them. Even Tarvos seemed to be having trouble as the man reloaded his gun for a third time. An expert marksmen, Tarvos had only been aiming at kneecaps and elbows but it wasn't enough to deter the mob. The only thing that would stop them was lethal force but lethal force was a measure that Zeke was not willing to take and Tarvos wouldn't condone.

"We have to run." The brogue accent came from behind Zeke as Tarvos took down two more rioters. The gunshots rang in Zeke's ears as he turned to listen to the former commander of H.I.T. while producing a repulsion field.

"We won't accomplish anything holding our ground here." Tarvos continued. "We need to get the convoy on the road and regroup. They won't chase us far beyond the city."

"Sound enough." Zeke replied as he turned to hurl a lightning bolt. "How do you propose we give the convoy the room?"

With a tap on Zeke's shoulder, the rugged hype let his pressence be known. "Sup." Marcus spoke, turning to Tarvos. "Hi Chief." Of course, the commander had sniffed the drunk since he and Gareth had come to the convoy, Marcus's terrible taste in cologne and the alcohol on his breath gave him more than away.

"Long time no talk, and what not. We're not gonna win this fight, not with acceptible casualties, anyway." He began, crouching behind cover, to dodge bullets that much to his surprise were repulsed thanks to Zeke's powers. Leaning over to Tarvos, pointing at his empty gun.

"Got a spare?"

"No point in wasting the ammo." Tarvos grunted. While the help was appreciated he would have preferred it wasn't a washed out former agent of his who struggled with soberity. "Did you forget how to use your particular talents Weston?" Tarvos barked as he motioned to others in the convoy to move back. "A gravity field would be quite the asset about now."

"See, problem with that is, you have to pull your people out." Marcus spoke, turning to Zeke again, nodding his head as a greeting.

Turning to look at Marcus with a slight expression of awe, Zeke could only utter one haunting word as it suddenly clicked exactly who this alchol soaked man was.

"Winnipeg."

"Not the time Thoreau." Tarvos growled knowing full well it wasn't in their best interest to trigger Weston's PTSD. "Weston get that field up, repelling the bullets is a novel idea but if they can't move that'd be even better."

"Seriously, Cheif T, you best get a move on." The gravity manipulator spoke, peaking onto the battlefield. He really wouldn't have minded if Tarvos had given him more ammo, but this wasn't the time to argue with his former commander.

"Lets get this convoy moving people!" Tarvos yelled before turning his head as a sound caught his attention. Suddenly an anguished scream rang out before it was quickly snuffed. The same strange sound suddenly echoed in his ears as it got closer. It was almost like a 'Pop', a bursting of air.

And then he saw the source.

There was five of them. Appearing out of nowhere, eyes glowing like hell itself as they unleashed what could only be described as laser on the rioters.

"No..." Zeke muttered as Tarvos turned to him.

"You know them?"

"They've already tried to kill me once." Zeke spat as the horrific beings moved towards the group. "I don't know what they are but they're not Hyperhumans."

"GET THIS CONVOY MOVING NOW!" Tarvos roared to the others as he motioned to Thoreau and Weston. "You two with me. Forget the rioters, they're the least of our concern at the moment. Protect the convoy at all costs."

"Someone trying to kill you, Zekiel? What did they do, dunk you in the water?" Marcus mentioned as he rose up. His eyes lit up with the golden hue with the green tint - the same shade of color that signaled that he was using his powers. "All right. Here goes nothing." Pushing his hands forward, he created a zone of approximately a hundred feet in a diameter where he increased the gravity by a hundred times - forcing every man, woman and hillbilly inside of the area to the floor. Yet, the five beings that had appeared where not inside of the area.

Marcus kept holding the field up while following Tarvos. "Zeke, we're taking my ride."