Hitman

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{Johnstone Convention Center.
New Athens, Castleburg.}

The scene around the convention center, even with the big bads being defeated, was still becoming more chaotic, as the hordes of "scared shitless" civilians that formed a nice, neat perimeter were replaced with hordes of "daring and curious" civilians that were now investigating the wrecked parade, the exploded float, the smashed-up robots, and of course, the defeated villains themselves. Civilians began to re-enter the convention center, which was now littered with smashed mechanical machines like it was Blade Runner. This was pretty par-for-the-course for superpowered scuffles in the age of social media, but for every wave of untrained civilians trying to get a picture with an evil villain on their Instagram, there was somebody prepared to take control of the situation and exert authority.

That person in this case, of course, was Director Hugo Powers, who emerged from the side of the Convention Center and immediately got to work. He looked like a little bit worse-for-wear: his suit was slightly tattered and had some grease stains on them, likely from pummeling robots, and he seemed really exhausted by the whole affair, but he was just as imposing as ever as he began to bark out orders, both into his watch and to the assembled people. "Let's form a perimeter here. This is a dangerous area, and there are going to be further investigations going on here. I said BACK!" Powers barked. His presence had an awesome, commanding effect on the crowd, which slowly receded from the area. The director gave his necktie a stiff tug as he gave another look around. "Alright. Heroes, group up on me. The police will be able to handle the rest."

Powers looked down at the assorted group of ragtag heroes he had assembled. Some of them were worse for wear, some of them were probably too young for this kind of work, but all of them had, in some way, contributed to saving the event. That counted for something. Powers clearead his work. "Good work out there. Thanks to your quick action, no civilians were killed, and the Fiendish Five has, by and large, been defeated and will be taken into custody. I also wanted to report that HERO One is safe. Assistant Director Duff got into a bit of trouble, but your colleagues that stayed behind fended off the attackers remarkably well. " Powers scooped up a droid that had been crushed in the scuffle. "Obviously, we’re going to be investigating the remaining member of the group and looking to track him down. I've sent some other heroes that were nearby to comb the streets for our last guy, but at this point I can't imagine he leaves himself out in the open. It’s both a boon and a curse that Professor Gholem is a coward; it’s prevented possible casualties, but it will make him a little more difficult to track down. But with his colleagues apprehended and his robots wrecked, I think it’s safe to say that he’s going to go underground. At least, for a short while. And we’ll be ready if he tries anything else."

Powers looked once more upon the gathered group, his lip twisting up to the slightest semblance of a smile. "Still, well done to all of you. The city is in good hands, and a lot of people were likely saved."

"Now, I have some villains to interrogate. Enjoy the rest of your day off. You've earned it."

---

[ TRANSMISSION END. UPLOADING FILES TO DATABASE. ADVANCING SEQUENCE TO OCTOBER 9TH.]

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{H.E.R.O. One Dune
Savior Island, Castleburg.
Interactions: Dahlia @baraquiel, Gematria @Scarifar, Crane @Zoey Boey, Stray @rabidporcupine, Alchemist @Duoya, Mire @Blizz, Fallout @Aku the Samurai, Freakshow @Crusader Lord}

Unfortunately, the duo had made much more of a scene than they would have liked, and now they were being approached by a larger group of heroes. Freakish heroes, it might be noted. Well, some of them were freakish. The one trying to negotiate with them looked a little bit older than the rest of the group (though not that much), though he was giving a very impassioned speech. His backup singers, on the other hand, were quite different. One of them was so horrifying-looking that description wouldn't do it justice. Then there was the emo guy, the floor fungus, and now some other girl, who decided to just run at him. Well, that was new. She was right in thinking that this whole "surrender" business was meaningless, but she was wrong in that Albino was planning on letting the girl go if things went smoothly. Oh well. The job might not get done, but adding a kill to the books is never too bad of an option.

The girl threw a punch with what looked like a metal fist (maybe some type of metal glove? who knew) right at his knife-arm. Albino assumed that she was trying to take his arm out and free the hostage in some way. However, this wasn't the first time Albino had tried to fight somebody off while holding a hostage, so instead of fleeing, Albino simply quickly turned, contorting Eva as well, and causing Rupa to simply glance past them. The knife did dig into the girl he was grabbing onto a little bit, but Albino wasn't exactly all too concerned with prisoner welfare.

"Well, that was stupid of you! Now, time for this girl to die. I was definitely going to surrender, by the way. There was no way out for me. But now that you tried to kill me, well, I've changed my mind. Now I think I'll just- hey, get your hand off me, you dumb-"

Albino wouldn't get a chance to finish his sentence as lines of green begin to appear across his pale skin. His grip on Eva slackened and then released entirely, dropping both her and the slightly-bloodied knife in his hand. He took one feeble step back, but his body totally froze up due to the toxin, and before he could issue some parting words, he keeled over and collapsed.

Jellyfish was not faring much better, given that before he could try and help his comrade, some weird robot thingy had jumped onto his head, and then began to suck the electricty out of him. The jellyfish man gave an uncharacteristic screech as his powers were drained, his already palish purple skin becoming less purple and substantially more pale as the tendrils that controlled his electricity stopped sparking and simply flailed. After a few moments, the drained villain bucked Gematria unceremoniously off his head, before falling to the ground, only a couple of feet away from his comrade.

Coincidentally, only moments after Jellyfish and Albino were nullified, the groups' watches (well, if they had them on, which they should at all times when possible, per HERO Protocol 4.1.6) adjusted to the proper time as ALISA finally came back online, and with it, the stream of messages and information from the concurrent battle in New Athens did as well. It seemed as though major disaster had been avoided. The Fiendish Five would not be riding once againn.

---

_{TAURUS Advanced Developments Laboratory
Watervale, Castleburg}

"Yo, yo, bro, check this video out!"

The TAURUS Advanced Developments Laboratory was rather quiet due to the holiday. Usually, the laboratory that was managed by TAURUS, one of the most prominent and advanced defense contractors and advanced weapons manufacturers in the world, was bustling with developments. However, because of the festivities in New Athens, almost all of the scientists were absent, leaving only a handful of security guards, as well as two male heroes that had also been hired by TAURUS to guard the facility. One of them was a gruff-looking, muscular, bearded man with wild hair and a leather jacket, named Honey Badger. The other was younger with bright scarlet, spiky hair, named Flamewave. They were both, for different reasons, taking this private job with the defense company on this holiday celebration, though while Honey Badger seemed to be alert and on guard, the younger of the two heroes was currently trying to show his senior a video on his phone.

Honey Badger turned away, his arms crossed. "We're supposed to be on watch right now, you know."

"Relax. It's a holiday, there's a whole perimeter of guards that would alert us if something was happening, and besides, nobody's actually going to try and do anything here. This isn't a weapons plant or anything, all this stuff is mostly vehicle stuff."

Honey Badger huffed and relented, looking down at the other hero's phone. The video, likely filmed by some hiding civilian, showed Ardent flipping the parade float on Doc Holliday. Despite it being a very recent occurrence, it had already gone viral. Flamewave grinned. "Isn't that sick? Too bad we're getting paid to be here instead of fighting off some really cool villains."

"Fighting villains isn't cool, it's a necessity," Honey Badger responded, stiffly looking back up. "And that Ardent guy is a real piece of work. I have friends that operate out of Boston for HERO. From what I hear, dude's an animal. I wouldn't ask to team up with him in a million years. Probably wants to destroy the organization from the inside or something."

"Better than some of the freaks they let join anyway," Flamewave said with a grimace as he put his phone away. "You know they let that girl they kept in lockup join HERO? Freaky skinbag? And they also have this hacker guy who is literally a walking Chernobyl. You ask me, Powers is going crazy."

Honey Badger didn't respond verbally, but his slight, stoic nod of the head indicated some type of agreement. Not all of Powers' decisions were popular. A lot of heroes in the organization didn't like working with former criminals, or outsiders, or people with powers that were extremely uncontrollable and/or dangerous. It felt sometimes that some of these new people were more dangerous than the people they were supposed to fight.

After a moment of silence, Flamewave spoke up again. "Listen, let's just run a check on everything to make sure it's all secure, which it is, and maybe get some lunch. Or at least, I'm getting lunch. You can stay here and 'do your job right' or replace your catheter or whatever you old people do."

"I'm 33. But I'll come check with you."

The pair of heroes walked through the laboratory, an eerie building with stone walls and a number of machines that neither men could name off the top of their heads. As the two were making their rounds, Honey Badger stopped, lifting his nose in the air and squinting his eyes.

"Someone's here," he whispered, before running off, with a confused Flamewave close behind. The two ran, Honey Badger leading the way with his sense of smell, up to a pair of sealed metal doors that was labelled "ENVIRO. DEVELOPMENTS." Honey Badger removed his TAURUS-issued keycard from his pocket, swiped it against the keycard reader, and into the room, which resembled a mad scientist's garage more than the other parts of the lab, with a number of machines and gadgets laying out in the open. Lining one of the walls was a number of circular steel vault doors, one of which was wickedly deformed and bent open. More concerningly, a number of TAURUS security guards were sprawled across the room. Honey Badger approached one of the downed guards, first taking his pulse and sadly finding nothing, before then examining his body.

"No signs of them being attacked physically. Based on their paleness and dilated pupils, I'd guess some type of toxin. Not sure if it's an attacker or some type of lab leak. We need to contact the head of security here. And HERO as well. It's gotta be some type of- Flamewave?" Honey Badger turned around to see his companion woozily hobbling around. He gave an exhausted "ugh" before collapsing, falling straight on his face.

"Looks like somebody slipped through the cracks. Poison immunity, I'm guessing?"

Honey Badger turned towards the source of the voice, to see a pair of people that had almost magically appeared, like they had walked through the wall. One of them was a woman who was likely the source of the voice. She had striking bright, green eyes and tresses of similarly-colored emerald hair, and was wearing some type of black body-suit with what looked like a spider emblem on the shoulder. Next to her was a much taller, muscular, dark-skinned man, with a number of bright blue tattoos and black hair with similarly-colored highlights. They looked and sounded like villains, and Honey Badger, an experienced hero, wasted no time firing back. He lifted his knuckles, unsheathing a set of retractable claws from the knuckles of each hand, before rushing at the two rapidly.

Before he could even close half the distance, he felt a sharp twisting pain, like his bones were being manhandled. He howled loudly as he fell to his knees, watching his metal claws curl like they were being superheated. He looked up to see that the dark-skinned man had raised one of his hands and was now speaking, a big menacing grin on his face. "Well, I guess you're lucky in that you have poison resistance, hmm? But unlucky with the metal endoskeleton and claws and whatnot. Kind of tacky. Like a worse version of Wolverine. With the way you're dressed, you're more like Hugh Jackman in Logan, actually, but whatever." The man reached into his pocket, pulling out what appeared to be a handful of gray dust. "Gotta kill you now. Sorry. Ah, who am I kidding? Not at all sorry." He blew the dust out of the palm of his hand, and like magic, the dust swirled and formed into a number of tiny metal balls. The balls hovered in midair for a moment, before shooting forth at an almost impossible speed. Two balls pierced clean through his torso, before one went straight through his forehead, leaving a bloody hole right. Honey Badger's body fell limp afterwards.

"Shame. Doesn't even have a healing factor." The man signed, looking over at his comrade. "Foxglove, did we get everything we came for? Jeez, this whole mission felt like some type of lame scavenger hunt."

The green-haired woman nodded. "Everything's been loaded onto the helicopter."

"Neat." The man lifted his hand, causing the metal portion of the wall that they had entered through to once again part, as though the thick layers of metal had turned into curtains. "What was the point of this again? Whatever we're stealing doesn't look cool."

"As you would know if you didn't sleep through the briefing, Solidus, the technology here is necessary to execute the next part of the Commander's plan," the woman said disapprovingly.

"I didn't join to listen to briefings, I joined to look for..." The man trailed off. "Whatever. I should've listened, OK, sheesh. Speaking of which, how'd those villains the Commander paid to raid HERO One do? They got the files?"

The woman sighed once again. "Once again, your lack of attention to detail is evident. Obviously, they failed. They were never meant to succeed. Just to advance the plan."

"So a distraction for a distraction for a distraction? Or something?"

The woman sighed with a small shake of the head. "Or something. Now, please help me clean up these bodies?"

"You're no fun."

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

"We are closer than you think, yet we are farther than you want.
We are more dangerous than you think, yet we are quieter than you expect.
We are more than you see, yet we are fewer than you imagine.
We are faster than you can run, yet we are more patient than you could wait.
We know what you fear, yet we fear nothing.
We are Arachnid."

keyword: spider

As cracked by @manythings

@shylarah

wrong

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{Johnstone Convention Center.
New Athens, Castleburg.
Status: Fighting Doc Holliday.
Interacts: Terra & Oracle @shylarah, Ardent @ManyThings, Wireframe @Silver Carrot, Wiseman @Blizz, Bastion @Infinite Cosmos, Alpha @DarkRecon}

Alpha spouted some more stuff about some other pink vigilante also wearing a Blast t-shirt (Jake was positively impressed by how big his fanbase was growing. Maybe an energy drink sponsorship? It matched with the speed superpower, and Jake drank a lot of the stuff). Jake was only barely registering what the man had to say, though, his eyes instead peeled on the conflict between Holliday and Ardent. When the man was finished, Jake stood up, stretching his arms. "I would never arrest somebody wearing my t-shirt, dude. But stay out of trouble here, OK? Let the real heroes handle this one."

Speaking of heroes, Bastion promptly showed up to offer some assistance. Jake gave him a quick thumbs-up to show he was alright. "All good here. You be careful; this guy has some nonsense plasma laser bullets." He cracked his knuckles. "I'm going in."

Just as he prepared to make his move, he heard a loud crashing noise. Ardent had decided to flip the entire platform. Well, that was one way to get a guy off his feet.

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

This platform-flipping a clever move, for sure. Doc Holliday would've given the hero credit, but Holliday was perfectly busy with his own tricks. This time, it wasn't his guns, but what appeared to be his overpriced cowboy boots that saved him. The metal spurs that were attached to his heels- ones that seemed to be just for show in the 21st century- clicked to life with a hum of energy and promptly attached themselves into the side of the rapidly-tipping platform. And so while hunks of cardboard and wooden barrels fell into a heap on the ground, Holliday casually slid down the platform like he was doing the moonwalk, but actually cool. As he reached the bottom, he hopped off, landing awkwardly, but still on his feet. Technology paid off.

Holliday, of course, was not one to rest until the job was done, and his gun was immediately raised in his left arm, pointing at the vertical float. Unless Ardent had octopus arms and/or psychic powers, he was right on the other side of the platform, and going by basic physics, he was probably close to the middle of the platform. That gave Holliday a pretty damn good idea of where the flying superhero was going to come out of.

And come out he did. Ardent came bursting through the platform, right about where the villain expected him to. Holliday squeezed the trigger of his revolver. His timing, of course, was impeccable, and his location was pretty close. These weren't any fancy types of bullets; Holliday planned on filling this hero up with lead. He was running out of time, but he planned on winning this fight. Though unfortunately for the villain, the fight wouldn't remain much of a classic duel for much longer.

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

Holliday would not be able to see whether or not he landed his shots. He wouldn't even be able to recount how many times he was able to rapidly and fluently pull the hammer back and fire. Maybe twice, three times maximum. Before he could revel in his satisfaction or mope in his defeat, he was promptly blasted (no pun intended) to the side from the force of a rapidly-moving speedster slamming into him.

Blast did not have the combat experience or savviness that Ardent was trying to employ. He saw villain with gun shooting at friend (well, friend was a strong word at this point, but you get the idea); Jake's goal was to move gun out of line with friend. And so he stood up, jolted to the right, and then promptly launched his shoulder right at Doc Holliday's side. The good ol' fashioned shoulder slam was very effective when the slammer could build up speed faster than a fighter jet, and when the slam recipient was focused on trying to kill somebody else.

Blast crushed the already-feeble Doc Holliday, sending him careening into the asphalt. Blast zoomed over to the downed body, giving a coy wink before dropping his foot right onto Doc's remaining good hand. The villain attempted to withhold a scream as Blast brought his foot down a few more times directly onto Doc's functioning gun hand. It might've been a little bit overkill, but Blast did not want himself- or anybody else, of course- to get shot again, and this was the best way of making sure of that.

After mimicking the secretary bird a few moments more, Blast brought his foot down onto Doc Holliday's head, not pressing too hard but applying enough pressure to keep the semi-conscious villain's head smooshed to the ground. He lifted his watch. "Got Doc Holliday down over here. Might need some medical attention." Blast looked back over towards where Ardent had just been. Smoke and sawdust were rising from the crushed platform, making it difficult to see if there was anybody there. Blast adjusted his foot, still squarely planted on Holliday's face. "Birdboy, if you're in there, squawk once. If you need a medic, squawk twice."

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

As Wireframe and whatever miscellaneous heroes were in the midst of fierce battles with the robots, they would find that their opposition would suddenly decide to quit on them. All of the robots began to suddenly turn off; the land-based spider robots collapsing onto the ground, and the airborne droid robots falling like coconuts. It was as if whoever was operating them decided to quit in that instance.

---

_{H.E.R.O. One Dune
Savior Island, Castleburg.
Interacts with: Dahlia @baraquiel, Gematria @Scarifar, Crane @Zoey Boey, Stray @rabidporcupine, Alchemist @Duoya, Mire @Blizz, Fallout @Aku the Samurai, Freakshow @Crusader Lord}

That giant lady was terrifying. Fortunately for the villainous twosome, she also wasn't the sharpest super-tool in the hero toolbox. Albino gave his biggest, most friendly-looking smile that he could muster. "Oh, she'll be alright. Wind exhaustion. Happens to us small people all the time. We're, erm, HERO doctors, by the way. Just here to make sure her wind exhaustion wasn't too bad." He looked over his shoulder, mostly to make sure the Assistant Director wasn't readying a counterattack. "Just give her some rest and she'll be fine! Now if you'll excuse us-"

Unfortunately for the remaining two-fifths of the Fiendish Five, some slightly less gullible new recruits showed up. One of them was suspicious of the duo, and the other one flat-out recognized them, and launched some sort of goop right at them (which both trained villains easily avoided), before signaling for help. Apparently, some of the young heroes did read the case files. Albino growled. "Alright, you got us. Now if you know what's best for you- woah!"

Albino started to get sucked into the ground, in the panic dropping the Doctor's communications coin onto the ground. "What the hell is this?" he yelled in alarm as the fungus creature decided to try and chew him up. This was definitely not going according to plan. When did hero start recruiting ground mushrooms and poison people? Albino and Jellyfish were expecting two mid-level hydrokinetics and a guy that could control a certain species of oriole, not this insanity.

"Alright, Jellyfish, now!" Albino shouted out. This may have been worse than he thought, but the Fiendish Five had more tricks up their sleeves.

The jellyfish-like man lifted his tendrils knowingly, before suddenly beginning to sparkle. Intense blue electricity vaulted from his person, arcing in the air and creating an impressive lightshow. That was, however, all this was- a lightshow, a distraction. For as all the eyes, even for a moment, were fixated on Jellyfish's lightning display, Albino activated his powers, vanishing out of the fungal death grip (which had torn up a leg of his nice pants!) and re-appearing right behind the poison girl that had called them out in the first place. Albino flicked out a switchblade as he grabbed the woman, holding the knife to her throat.

"Now listen here, junior heroes. We're just going to take what we want and leave. We'll be taking this annoying one with us as insurance. Any funny business, and I'll make history by killing a hero before their first mission. Understood? I think I'm understood." Albino slowly began to drag Eva backwards. "Now, you all behave and go back to playing Uno, or whatever you were doing."

Jellyfish, meanwhile, hovered nearby, though he looked down at the mossy ground beneath his feat. "Why side with them? You have more in common with us. We can get you freedom. What you desire," the mutant man whispered in his soft, haunting voice, his bulbous eyes flitting between looking at the ground where the fungus monster was and over at the hostage situation scene.

---

_{Dodge City Cigar Lounge
New Athens, Castleburg}

The man in the labcoat nervously fiddled with his computer. This was bad, much worse than any other mission that the group had gone on. Doc Holliday and Lady Blade were down for the count and likely to be apprehended, Albino and Jellyfish were in danger (and one of them had almost been eaten by the ground), and it was only a matter of time before the man got tracked down. The Professor drummed his fingers against the table like a row of jackhammers, his nerves clearly overtaking him in the moment.

HERO had always been difficult, but they had never been this difficult. Something about this new generation of heroes was frightening. Every villain in the city ought to be frightened by them. The Professor nervously wiped his sweaty forehead with a handkerchief as he thought out his options.

He could try and control more drones; perhaps that would be enough to overwhelm the heroes by numbers. But the rest of his drones were quite a way's away, and by the time he would get them over to the location, he would've been tracked down for sure. And plus, there were certainly more heroes on the way, now that they had been smoked out.

Perhaps he could unveil some type of trump card, but unfortunately, the Professor didn't quite have that at his disposal at the moment. The Five had money, but they didn't have mega-death-robot type of money. Especially with almost half of the Five out of the picture.

His last option was to go dark, shut off the drones, and run. That option meant that he likely would be able to avoid HERO for a while longer. But that option also meant that he had to abandon his research and funding and start anew, something that the Professor didn't want to do. The longer he stalled, though, the more Jon Gholem realized that he would infinitely rather endure the setback in his research than endure prison.

"Goodbye, my children," the scientist whispered as he keyed in a few instructions, putting all his active droids on standby. He then activated his failsafe feature- a small pouch of acid within each droid that would hopefully bleach all the software that connected him to the droids, set to go off in about 5 minutes. Gholem then gathered his laptop and other electronics, shoved them in his backpack, and prepared to call an Uber.

Before he could rideshare away from justice, the doors of the Dodge City Cigar Lounge flew open. The Professor squealed like a pig and lifted his backpack in front of his face, as if it could shield him, as a number of armed guards rushed into the room. All of them were dressed head-to-toe in full-body black armor, like they were SWAT, though instead of helmets, each man was wearing a red beret and a balaclava to cover their faces, and instead of positioning themselves to take down the criminal, they lined the walls of the upper lounge and saluted. As the Professor examined the situation, adjusting his glasses nervously, he saw a silhouette appear in the door, and the sound of a female voice filled the room.

"Don't worry, Professor. Your contract has been successfully fulfilled. We're getting you out of here."

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{Johnstone Convention Center.
New Athens, Castleburg.
Status: Fighting Doc Holliday; trying not to bleed out.
Interacts: Terra & Oracle @shylarah, Ardent @ManyThings, Wireframe @Silver Carrot, Wiseman @Blizz, Bastion @Infinite Cosmos, Alpha @DarkRecon, Director Hugo Powers}

Getting shot, as it happens, hurts. Really bad. Even though Jake had not had the misfortune of getting shot somewhere very serious, he was still bleeding quite profusely. Luckily for him, Ardent was approaching to offer some assistance, which meant that Doc Doolittle or whatever his stupid name was would have another very difficult-to-hit target to deal with. Jake peered over the bench as he heard the familiar sound of a hero moving at high speed. That had to be him. Jake looked down at his shoulder, which was now covered in blood. "Holy...I have this much blood?" he said to himself in a quiet, comic tune, chuckling to himself to distract from the fact that the blood was coming out much more than he would have preferred.

Having actively-bleeding open wounds and breaking the sound barrier didn't seem like a particularly useful combo, but Blast wasn't about to let Ardent get filled with bullets by this random cowboy wannabe. Even if it hurt like hell, he was going to go for it. Before he could make his move, though, he was approached by what looked like a normal civilian in blue sweatpants, sneakers, ginger hair, and most importantly, a Blast merch T-shirt. While Blast commended the civilian's fashion sense, he did not commend the fact that he was running into a gunfight. "Hey, pal, appreciate you coming to check on me, but this is kind of, and by kind of I mean extremely, dangerous. I would recommend you get out of here, pronto."

The civilian then pulled a First Aid Kit out of his backpack. Jake understood. He's some wannabe hero guy that I guess is a big fan of me and also knows first-aid. That's nice of him. Maybe a little stupid, but nice.

Then, the guy began to glow. Well, that theory's gone. Maybe he's a vigilante like Ardent, but with way better taste?

"...Alpha reporting sir. Sit rep. Is the bullet still lodged in your shoulder or can I heal it now?" the man asked, with a tone and language use that reminded him of the Director. The guy might have been some type of healer. Maybe he was associated with HERO, and Jake had totally forgotten about him. That would've been unfortunate; guy was a big fan, clearly. "Umm, thanks for the help. It's not lodged at all, just bleeding." Jake glanced down at his shoulder. "Badly. You can patch it up. Thanks for all this, by the way. You with HERO? Or are you some type of...y'know, "independent warrior of justice" and some shit?"

Jake was very much doubting his vigilante theory. Unaffiliated vigilantes, by his experience, were usually characters with big powers, gusto, and all the patience of a charging rhinoceros. Kind of like Ardent. Speaking of Ardent, Jake craned his head over the top of the bench to get a glimpse of how the fight was going down...

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

Doc Holliday immediately turned when he heard the loud taunt. Having been in the villainy business for a long time at this point (and having been a hero before that), Holliday was like teflon when it came to these types of callouts. The way he saw it, they could make fun of his demeanor and persona all they wanted, but he was still quite alive, and many of them were either spending the night in the hospital or the morgue. So instead of retorting, he offered a simple "hmmph" and turned to face the threat, his revolver spinning like a disc in his right hand. He assumed that his shot had bought himself at least a moment of time to focus his attention on the flying threat. Even if he didn't, he trusted that his ally's drones would prove to be worth their sticker cost and provide some level of protection.

It was lucky he did that, because the flying man launched down directly at him in an attempt to dive-bomb him. It was almost cute to see him go for such a head-on attack, and in a vacuum, it made sense. Most people could not see a target moving down at them at ludicrously fast speeds. Ardent would turn 90% of the villains he faced into red pulp with the speed and strength of his attack.

But Doc Holliday was not most villains. He had some of the sharpest eyes in the world, and he had spent years honing his craft. He had spent a year in Africa shooting peregrine falcons out of the sky in the savannah, and he had fought more than his fair share of winged, flying, floating, and otherwise airborne combatants. This was, for the most part, par for the course for the man.

This guy was moving faster than your average superhero with big, useless swan wings, but Holliday also saw a hell of a lot faster than your average supervillain with a gun, and so he simply aimed his already-cocked-and-lifted revolver and pulled down the trigger, firing a single bullet at the man. The bullet he had chambered was the same bullet that he had fired at Blast; it was filled with a special type of plasma that could cut cleanly through most metals. Holliday was hoping that this one would do enough damage to knock the annoying hero clean out of the sky, and let him re-focus his attention on the recovering, earthbound speedster behind the metal bench.

☆

Hurtling down towards his target, Ardent's eyes narrowed as he watched Holliday turn around and take aim. They had only just locked eyes, but this was already the moment of truth that would decide the direction of their fight. The enemy had taken his shot.

Ardent's entire body twisted, spiralling through the air as he psychokinetically pulled his head and torso out of the line of fire. A normal bullet would have been nothing, but if Holliday had ammunition that could melt through a mailbox, it was too risky to take a direct hit to the vitals.

The moment of impact brought white-hot pain as the bullet made impact. It hit Ardent's arm, just as he was preparing to throw his punch. Even from a mere grazing shot, the power and heat of the plasma was overwhelming, digging a groove nearly an inch deep into the meat of the arm as it scorched through reinforced flesh, only barely deflected into curving away and burying itself in the nearest wall.

Ardent clenched his teeth, hissing with pain.

...Doc Holiday can and surely will shoot Ardent out of the sky...

Up against a guy like this, getting shot was a given. It was really the out of the sky part that David took issue with. With his power, he could prevent himself from flinching or doubling over in pain. He wasn't even going to slow down. If Holliday was used to chasing down injured deer, he wasn't ready for this.

For anyone watching, the exchange was instant. Simultaneous. A bullet, glowing with plasma, cut across Ardent's arm, letting loose a spray of blood. At the very same moment, Ardent's fist, unerring, met its mark, crushing bone into innumerable pieces. The villain's upper arm was destroyed, his shoulder rendered a broken wreck in the blink of an eye as he was hit with an attack that carried enough force to send him to the ground.

☆

Doc Holliday knew he would land his shot, but he had not anticipated the hero pushing through the shot and landing a blow of his own, and the villain was certainly punished for his miscalculation. The bones in his arm loudly snapped as they were fractured in too many places to count, and his revolver was launched from his hand, landing a safe distance away on the asphalt of the road. The hit also sent the villain literally spiraling; he was thrown back across his own float, being launched through a couple of tumbleweeds and hitting his back against a (presumably fake) barrel of whiskey. His arm was mangled and, to those who had not been in their fair share of fights, very much offputting by the way it was bent the wrong way.

But Doc Holliday, though old, was also gruff, just like his idol; and though he had been in his fair share of fights, and had taken his fair share of hits, he was also extraordinary resilient for a guy who looked like he worked in Splash Mountain. And besides his toughness, which while not superhuman was certainly impressive, there was one other fact that the H.E.R.O. documenters had failed to mention in his villain profile.

He was ambidextrous.

No sooner had his back slammed against his fake booze than he had tugged his other revolver free with his left hand, and with masterful dextrosity he flicked back the hammer, aimed, and fired the weapon right at Ardent, releasing a special type of bullet from the barrel. This bullet not loaded with plasma, but rather, was laced with a heavy dose of sigillium that would, with luck, quickly spread and take quick effect. The bullet was very expensive, but Doc Holliday paid the big bucks in order to have these types of tools in these types of moments. Ardent may have gotten him here, but he would not get anybody again.

☆

"Fuck, that hurt!" Ardent winced as he remained in flight, not quite touching down on the platform after landing his hit.

Although the enemy appeared to be down, he wasted no time. The blood that had sprayed from his gunshot wound stopped in midair before hitting the ground, reversing direction to return inside his arm, following after him as he flew. Having landed a decisive hit, he needed to maintain the offensive and secure the takedown. However-

While Ardent had surprised the villain with his unexpected endurance and commitment to attacking, those roles were now reversed. He had considered the possibility that Holliday had backup weapons, but hadn't been expecting him to be prepared to draw one within hardly a second of having his arm broken. The hero's face tensed as indecision nearly took over. Why was Holliday so confident he could win after even his plasma bullets had failed? What sort of ammunition had he been keeping stored away in his emergency gun?

Ardent trusted his instincts. His power may have seemed simple on the surface, but it afforded him a few good tricks beyond flying and punching hard. All pieces of his body were under his control. With a wave of his arm, the blood that had been about to return into his wound flew forwards, ahead of his flightpath. Blast's use of the mailbox and bench for cover had proven that while Holliday's aim was impeccable, he still needed to see his target. And so the blood flew straight for the cowboy's eyes.

His movements masked by the splash of blood, Ardent evaded, snapping to the right as soon as the bullet left the chamber. Expensive as it was, it sailed harmlessly through the air and out of sight, its true threat left unknown. The hero circled around Holliday before turning towards him again, aiming to reengage before he had even wiped the blood from his eyes. He might have shouted something about how Castleburg wasn't big enough for the two of them, but Holliday didn't seem to be impressed by those sorts of lines. Ardent would have to settle for beating the hell out of him instead.

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

It would be a great disservice to Lady Blade to say that she was not fast; she had incredibly quick reflexes and was an extremely talented assassin. But it would be fair to say that she might have bitten off more than she could chew in this particular situation, as unlike her Western-themed partner, she was not capable of dodging bullets. And though she had successfully avoided being sucked into the ground by Terraformer, she was not able to avoid the junior Professor Gadget's onslaught of plasma blasts. She did just barely weave out of the trajectory of the first two, but the third one caught her squarely.

Like some type of wicked ballerina, she spun and contorted from the hit as her body temperature plummeted. She knew she was about done for. But she could even the odds.

With her last vestige of strength, she drew a knife from her belt and chucked it at the assembled group of heroes. Due to a significant lack of strength, the knife didn't really soar, instead kind of awkwardly arcing into the floor like a very poorly thrown frisbee. It was what happened afterwards that was more alarming; several lights that were positioned on both the handle and the blade of the knife began to pulse red, and the knife began to emit a loud, periodic beeping noise. Almost like a bomb. Scratch that, exactly like a bomb.

"Goodnight..." Lady Blade whispered before collapsing onto the ground. She may have been defeated much more easily than her compatriots, but it seemed she was willing to go out with a bang.

---

_{H.E.R.O. One Dune
Savior Island, Castleburg.
Interacts with: Dahlia @baraquiel, Gematria @Scarifar, Crane @Zoey Boey, Stray @rabidporcupine, Alchemist @Duoya, Mire @Blizz, Fallout @Aku the Samurai, Freakshow @Crusader Lord}

Emily nodded at Freakshow's request. "It looks like everybody is...kind of doing their own thing. Which I guess means everything is going according to plan." The Assistant Director looked down at her hero watch, which strangely still had the time listed as just before 1PM. Strange. "I'd relay a message from Hugo, but it looks like we're having some technical difficulties. This sometimes happens when ALISA is re-routing her focus away from running our stuff and towards chess. Or predicting the end of the Bachelor." Emily chuckled quietly to herself. "I'll take care of this problem. Why don't you stay here and make sure nothing goes horribly off the rails?"

Emily walked away from the little gathering area by the shore, but she had only walked a minute or so (just another to take her to where the rest of the group near the beach could only just see her silhouette) when she paused. Something was off. A strange, cold sensation, like the temperature had just dropped a good few degrees. Somebody was here.

Emily turned quickly, her powers flaring up just in time to see a pale man in a dark coat looming over her, holding what appeared to be some type of stun baton. Emily's signature crystals flowed from her hands, forming a spiky, crystalline, makeshift shield in front of her, and blocking the baton, encasing it, along with the man's hands, in a layer of crystal.

"Sharp reflexes, Butterfly," the albino man said with a wide grin.

"What are you doing here?" After a few years of heroing, you learn that responding to the villain's taunts gets you nowhere.

"I'd worry less about that and more about what's happening behind you."

In this case, not responding to the taunt didn't do poor Butterfly much good, as from the waters behind her launched what can only be described as a thing. A thing that vaguely resembled a person, though a person with grayish-purpleish skin that was remarkably translucent, a bulbous, jellyfish-like head protrusion, and a number of long purple tendrils hanging from his back. Before Emily could do much of anything, the thing had laid two of its tendrils upon the Assistant Director. Whatever was in those tendrils clearly packed a punch, for as soon as they made contact with Emily's skin she gave a spasm and then collapsed to the floor, the crystals she had formed around her hand shattering and freeing the albino man, who promptly folded up his baton and put it inside his coat.

"The good old one-two. Gets them every time. How was your scouting, Jellyfish?"

The mutated, Leftover-ish man's voice was haunting, almost ghostly, with a layer of pervading sadness added on top of that. "It went...well. From what I observed, mostly junior recruits. They should not pose much resistance. Is Professor Gholem's device is operating as intended?"

The albino man smiled, opening his left palm to reveal a small, black, circular object, only a few inches larger in diameter than a coin. The device was small, but was currently emitting a signal that was scrambling all communications across the entire island. Gholem may have been a coward, but he was a genius coward, and a very helpful one at that.

"Working like a charm." The man closed his palm. "Let's wrap this party up before we go after the real target. Wouldn't want a teenager walking into HERO One and messing up our process."

The jellyfish-like man nodded solemnly, taking a couple steps with his slimy, bow-legged lower limbs. "If you wish. I should have enough moisture for an hour or so, so let's not waste too much time."

The other man once again procured his stun baton from his coat. "You know me well, partner. We won't."

---

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{Johnstone Convention Center.
New Athens, Castleburg.
Status: Talking with other heroes.
Interacts: Terra & Oracle @shylarah, Ardent @ManyThings, Wireframe @Silver Carrot, Wiseman @Blizz, Bastion @Infinite Cosmos, Director Hugo Powers}

Jake gave a slight frown at the snippy response that Ardent initially gave. "Run around really fast, huh. Thanks for the guidance. Why don't you use your powers to tell if it's going to rain tomorrow, Mr. Weather Balloon?" It was not a great retort, but it was something. Jake was not one to lose a battle of words, even if it were not explicitly declared.

Ardent locked in and advised the speedster to patrol the area for any threats on the ground. This made some sense. The aerial view was much wider, but Jake was much more mobile when solid ground was underneath him; he was still not really a great climber. "Sounds good, birdboy." Birdboy. Good one, Jake. Write that one down for later.

Just about then, Wiseman's voice began to sound out into his ear. Apparently, the genius hero had already dissected the droid and determined that it was the handiwork of a certain Professor Gholem, a member of the Fiendish Five. Jake, though not the studious type that would spend his free hours trawling through HERO's collected files on villains, had heard of the name before. They were dangerous, and they were sneaky. Jake's least favorite type of villain. At least the grandstanding "I'm Going To Take Over The City" type of villain was fun to fight against. They smack-talked, they had some type of fun gimmick, they made things interesting. These Fiendish Fucks were the shadowy types that took a shot at you and then sunk back into the shadows. Annoying, unfun, and frequently lethal. A cocktail of frustration for Blast.

Wiseman's briefing was long. Almost as long as some of Hugo's briefings. He had definitely thought this situation out, and to Jake's credit, he did try to listen. But his attention span for long strategy breakdowns was pretty limited, and by the time Wiseman started talking about recommendations to counter individual matchups, Jake had completely tuned out. All of them sounded extremely punch-able, outside of the Jellyfish guy, and Jake didn't plan on going for a swim anytime soon, anyway. He would just head out, scope out the area, and find the bastards before they ruined anything. Easy-peasy.

Though Jake was not interested in Wiseman's speech, the Director clearly sopped it up, as he responded shortly after Wiseman concluded with his own thoughts. "Excellent work, Wiseman. This is an unusual type of operation for the Five. They are rarely large-scale disruptors. But they will do whatever the job calls for." A brief pause. "This could be an excellent opportunity to finally get the weeds at the roots. I'm going to try and get some more hero support at this location, and law enforcement is already converging on the area." This time, a slightly longer pause. "Be very careful. These are a group of very capable killers. One lapse in concentration could mean fatalities. Don't be foolish."

"Loud and clear, bossman. Don't get killed. Blast heading out." The hero bolted through the back door in a burst of speed, put on his goggles, and then really took off.

Blast's super-speed allowed him to quickly survey the area around the Center, but to no avail. He was hoping that the Fiendish Five would be standing right outside the convention center, and that he would be able to plunk them all down like dominoes, but the streets around the center still seemed just about the same. Jake looked left and right. Nothing suspicious. This whole operation seemed a little bit unusual for what were supposedly a bunch of sneaky assassin types. With all the eyes on the city, it would be impossible to just waltz into the convention center while either covered in knives, dressed like Jesse James, sporting a bunch of combat drones, or looking like a character from Spongebob. Jake looked up at the crowd, still gathered around the parade that was just about finished; they were currently cheering as the massive Hugo Powers balloon ("actually terrifying. Whose idea was that?") passed by and a Wild West-themed parade float followed. There was no way that they could get through this massive crowd of people undetected, especially with them knowing HERO was on notice, unless-

Wait, Wild West-themed parade float?

If Jake had thought about the strangeness of the old-fashioned parade float a second later, or didn't have superhuman speed, he would surely have been a goner. Fortunately for him, though, he was just fast enough to avoid the bullet that was fired towards him, dodging just to the left and causing the bullet to lodge into the sidewalk. The BANG! resonated through the area, and the civilians, of course, began screaming and panicking, and the parade came to a halt. The Hugo balloon even began to fly away as the people who were responsible for keeping it tethered down panicked. That was going to be an ecological disaster, but there were obviously much bigger fish to fry.

Jake looked back up to see the villain they were in pursuit of, Doc Holliday, staring him down, revolver in hand. He was standing right in the middle of the parade float advertising the Dodge City Cigar Lounge. That was all the information that Jake could discern, as Doc Holliday still had 5 more bullets chambered. Jake darted backwards as the villain fanned three more shots, forcing the speedster hero to take cover behind a mailbox. He tapped his watch, speaking into it.

"This is Blast. Don't know if you heard, but they're here and they don't seem to be in the mood to negotiate. Cowboy Bebop is in a particularly feisty mood. I'll try to re-engage him when I get the chance- AGH, SHIT! FUCK!"

Jake's report was interrupted as a bullet seared cleanly through the mailbox and caught the tip of Jake's shoulder. Jake cursed a few more times as he rolled away from the skewered mailbox and hid now behind a sturdy-looking bench, his hand gripped tightly around the wound. Luckily, Doc Holliday couldn't see through metal, so the magic bullet or whatever had only caught a little bit of flesh, but it still stung like a motherfucker. Jake winced. Guy had bullets for every occasion, apparently. They weren't a group to be trifled with, that was obvious. Jake hissed into the watch. He assumed revolvers had 6 bullets, so he would have at least a moment of reprieve. "Hey, Birdboy, could use that weather report at some point. I'm target practice out here."

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

Doc Holliday casually loaded six more bullets into his chamber as he looked down at the scene below him; the shouts of a hero isolated within a sea of confusion, screaming, and panicked running. The sounds of cursing meant that he had gotten his target; a particularly difficult one to hit, but one that would be a bit easier now with an injury impeding him. Like an injured deer. Heroes really weren't that much more complex than animals, anyway. In this case, maybe less so. At least deer didn't give their position away by yelling. But the villain wasn't particularly interested in that particular target ant the moment. He'd finish the kill later.

The villain looked over at the float he was standing on. He had reserved a spot in the parade a month or two ago; the perfect Trojan horse for his plan. It was a nice-looking parade float, too. It had a nice mockup of an old-style saloon, with some cactuses, barrels, and tumbleweeds artistically placed atop the platform. It would've been good advertising, had it not been a way of smuggling drones right up to the doorstep of their target. Doc almost felt bad. But the job always came first. Still looking at where the speedster had run off to out of the corner of his eye and holding a revolver in one hand, Doc raised a finger to his ear. "Well, drop the bots, Professor. We're in position."

Just like that, the entire parade float deconstructed itself. The sides of the platform popped open, the barrels on top of the platform popped open, and the walls of the fake saloon toppled as well. Inside all of them were copious amounts of robots of various kinds. Spidery looking robots, like the one that Hugo had wrecked but larger and more menacing-looking, crawled out from the inside of the float, scuttling towards the convention center. Meanwhile, a number of small aerial droids, with spherical bodies, mounted guns, and little helicopter blades, accompanied the land-bound spider droids and floated slowly towards the center in tandem.

"Remember the plan. Isolate the target and get what we need." Doc Holliday pulled back the hammer on one of his revolvers, squinting at the park bench. "I'll keep 'em busy out here."

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

"Leave it to Doc to have all the fun, huh?" the woman known as Lady Blade muttered. She was currently crouched in the thick network of beams that made up the roof of the convention center, a good 40-50 feet from the ground. She nodded to herself as she heard her boss give the order. Now was the time for action.

The woman dropped from the ceiling with remarkable grace and poise, and just like a cat, she landed on her feet, her knees buckling to a crouch as the knife-colored Asian woman looked up at the people she had landed next to. A guy with an eyepatch and two kids. Easy enough. The woman casually drew a combat knife from her jacket, twirling it around her fingers with impressive expertise. "If you hold still, this'll hurt less," she said with a sadistic grin, and though she seemed to almost be tempting the trio to fight, her stance indicated she was far from relaxed. This was a trained killer.

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

The gunshot rang out right when Hugo was about to get on-stage. He was almost thankful. At least it didn't interrupt him mid-speech. The Director tapped his watch as he looked out at the panicking crowd. "Hold your ground, heroes. I'm going to get the mayor out and coordinate the evacuation. Once the civilians are out, I'll make sure these bastards don't get away."

Powers took a second look to see a number of robots crash through the front door of the convention, the spidery-looking robots scuttling forth as a few aerial drones hovered above head. Powers patted his tuxedo. This would be the last time he listened to the Mayor and didn't bring at least a sidearm with him. "And watch out for the robots."

---

_{H.E.R.O. One Dune
Savior Island, Castleburg.
Interacts with: Dahlia @baraquiel, Gematria @Scarifar, Crane @Zoey Boey, Stray @rabidporcupine, Alchemist @Duoya, Mire @Blizz, Fallout @Aku the Samurai,}

Emily waved politely as she was approached by another new addition. Freakshow was her hero identity (a very interesting one at that, but HERO generally didn't intervene with the self-naming process, even when it bordered onto the self-deprecating). "Hey there! Luna, right? I didn't have you listed down here, for whatever reason, but you're welcome to participate." The Assistant Director gave a pleasant smile, though that expression of fondness was soon wiped off her face by the commentary of the mushrooms. She had wished Hugo was here to deal with the thing, but unfortunately, that wasn't really much of an option at the moment.

Luckily, Evangeline came in with the big assist, for which Emily was quite grateful for. "That's right. Part of being a hero involves cooperation. It involves learning about other people, how they synergize, and how to best respond to different kinds of situations as a group. Maybe you have a bit of difficulty adapting to how we do things, but this is an excellent simulation of that in a danger-free environment." Emily did her best to put on her friendly smile. "Give it a chance, alright? This may not seem productive on a surface level, but I assure you it will prove in handy later. I promise."

---

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{Johnstone Convention Center.
New Athens, Castleburg.
Status: Talking with other heroes.
Interacts: Terra & Oracle @shylarah, Ardent @ManyThings, Wireframe @Silver Carrot, Wiseman @Blizz, Director Hugo Powers}

The small group were soon joined by two other heroes, both of whom Jake was vaguely familiar with, both from his time at the Academy and from his time at HERO. Austin, A.K.A. Wiseman, was some type of super-nerd with some really cool-looking get-up and tech, along with the sick eyepatch. The other was Madison, A.K.A...the Human Slinky? Jake vaguely remembered being in the Academy with her a while back, but hadn't really interacted with her much since she had joined HERO. This was a good opportunity to get to know the two of them better, though, and perhaps forge a stronger working relationship. Jake was a big fan of gizmos and gadgets, and an even bigger fan of blonde Californian women. The hero gave the two newcomers his trademark grin and wink, before re-directing his attention to the conversation at hand. Ardent had suggested that if Powers didn't show in five, they leave.

"Deal. I got stuff to do, anyway," Jake said, looking down at his watch. But it was no sooner had Jake checked the time that the man of the hour, Director Hugo Powers, appeared out of a side door at the convention. The man, who was generally adorned in his comfy military-looking garb, looked quite uncomfortable. He was wearing a black tuxedo, though it seemed that whoever had done the Director's tailoring might have gotten the size slightly off, as the tuxedo appeared as though it could barely withhold the musculature of the 6'7" behemoth of a man. He shuffled uncomfortably towards the group, looking as though he was an elementary schooler attending his first recorder concert. The Director's clear annoyance at his situation was funny and interesting, but what was even more interesting was the fact that he was holding what appeared to be a large metal spider in his hand.

The Director approached the group, squinting a little as he eyed the assembled heroes with disappointment, as if he was hoping they would all rip off their skinsuits and reveal themselves to actually be a set of older, more experienced heroes instead. He then shrugged, tossing the metal thing to the floor in front of Wiseman to let the group get a better look. The "thing" was, quite obviously, a robot of some kind, and though it looked miniature balled up in the Director's massive fists, it was quite large, with a metal body the size of a serving platter and with eight spindly-looking robotic legs that were currently switching and sparking from being crushed. It also had some type of neck-like apparatus with a round camera head or something, though it was hard to tell given that the camera-looking head was smooshed and the neck-looking thing was bent in 2 places.

The Director looked at the group left-to-right one more time, before speaking. "Well, this is a group, I suppose. Bastion is also on the way. Let's just cut to the chase." He pointed to the spider-looking robot on the ground. "This robot has been following me around for the better part of the last two hours. See that material that looks like tinfoil?" Indeed, the robot was wrapped in a thin, slightly crinkled layer of what appeared to be aluminum. "Camofoil. It's pretty high-tech stuff; it can assume the color and texture of any surface almost perfectly to the untrained eye. This is some type of espionage drone. And while I wouldn't put it below the press to invest in automatons to do their paparazzi work, the most logical assumption is that I'm being watched by somebody unsavory. Which means that it would be wise to assume that somebody is plotting something involving either me, or this event. Which is why you're here. Contrary to your musings..." The Director gave a squint to make clear the fact that he could hear them from his backroom; Jake gave a weak smile and two thumbs-ups in response, "...I don't plan on having any of you give a speech. But I do plan on having this event go as planned. It would be a bad look for the city to call off an event, whether it's a false alarm or legitimate. And if somebody is planning something, it's best to strike now when we have notice. So I want you all to provide some...let's call it 'additional security.'"

Jake nodded, now with an excited grin. He was not as opposed to the idea of being part of a publicity stunt as the others, but this was much more appealing to the young hero than parading around a stage and doing some tricks. Having this parade day turn into a villan ass-kicking day was very exciting. Jake hadn't gotten a chance to do any real hero work since that whole china incident went down, and he was worrying that he was getting a little rusty. "I'm in, boss. You want me to set up a perimeter? Look through buildings? I got you."

Hugo strained his lips, as if he were withholding an insult directed at Blast from spontaneously leaping out of his mouth. "I want you all to remain low-profile, keep an eye on the area, and make sure nothing suspicious gets inside. If you need to fight something, take it as far away from here as possible. Wiseman, try and figure out who built that thing and why it's here. I tried not to damage any of the important components too much. Terra, stay with him and group up with Bastion when he arrives. Blast, Ardent, Wireframe, use your mobility to set up a vantage point somewhere near here. New Athens has plenty of tall buildings. Oracle..." Powers looked over at the youngest hero. "Do whatever helps your powers work the best, I suppose. And all of you let me know if we need to evacuate the area. It would be very bad optics if we had to shut down such a big event, but it would be worse if anybody were to get hurt." He cracked his knuckles. "Now...I have to prepare a speech, so get to work. I'll keep anybody that hasn't come yet in the loop."

Powers doubled back to re-enter the back room that he had emerged from. Jake, on the other hand, twitched excitedly as he grabbed his goggles, slotting them on. "Alright! Surveillance team. Let's go. Much better than robot team. Any ideas? I know there's that observation tower, like, one block away. Or! We can just go on the roof of the convention center. We can see pretty well from there, too." He looked at the other two heroes that the Director had grouped him with. They couldn't be more different. "You guys have any ideas? Your powers are a little more suited towards high places than mine, I think. Though I can still, like, climb and stuff! Just need to build up a little speed. Anyway, ideas?"

---

_{H.E.R.O. One Dune
Savior Island, Castleburg.
Interacts with: Dahlia @baraquiel, Gematria @Scarifar, Crane @Zoey Boey, Stray @rabidporcupine, Alchemist @Duoya, Mire @Blizz, Fallout @Aku the Samurai}

Apparently, Emily's earlier assessment about the lack of attendance was quite wrong, as more and more people showed up. First, there was the heroine Crane, who Emily distinctly remembered (it was quite hard to forget when a person that is over 5 times taller than you applies to join your organization). Right by her was another anomaly, though a very different kind of anomaly: Mire, some type of sentient fungal Leftover. Emily had to admit that the thing unnerved her greatly. It would be surprising if there was anybody not unnerved by the mushroom person-thing (scratch that, Hugo Powers.) Despite being approached by the two very different peculiar persons, Emily gave her brightest smile to them as well. "That's right, both of you. I am both Assistant Director Emily Duff as well as the human you were asked to talk to. I would offer you both seats but..." She looked up at the enormous girl before down at the fungal amalgamation, "...you might have to make due on your own. We shouldn't be long, anyway, only waiting for one or two-"

Emily was once again interrupted, this time by the heroine she recognized as Alchemist barreling over and giving a very dramatic and very loud introduction to everybody. Emily smiled weakly. Her job got weirder every day. "Hello, Rupa. Glad you could make it. And I don't think that apples and fungus are really close to the same thing. But it's a good thing to thing about your colleagues." Emily looked down at one of the papers she had clipped to her clipboard. There might have been a couple of stragglers, but they were pretty close to maximum capacity. Emily looked up and saw another hero having joined. Stray. Emily double-checked her roster. He wasn't on the list, and shouldn't have been on the list, too, which meant that either he was participating again just for fun, or, more likely, he had never left HERO One. Emily sighed. She had to reminder Alisa to wake up sleeping heroes that set up shop in the lounges. She only barely showed this concern on her face, though, giving Stray a casual "yep!" before looking over at another approaching person. Fallout, another individual with terrifying powers. Between the toxins, fungus, radiation, giant human, and metal-shifting, Savior Island might be a crater by the end of the exercise. Still, Emily offered the young man a quick handshake. "Aw, don't worry, I've made some changes to try and make this experience as tolerable and interesting as possible! Speaking of which, guys!" the Assistant Director called out as she tapped her pen against the clipboard, in a bid to get everybody's attention.

"Alright, guys, hello and welcome. So glad you could all make it. So, as I'm sure you're mostly aware, this is a little orientation seminar on getting acquainted with being a hero. Now, we've done this orientation event yearly, and it's usually just me giving a little speech and doing a Q&A, but I want to make this year a little different! So I've ditched the speech and organized a scavenger hunt." Emily gave a big, toothy grin, hoping that her smile would instill some form of excitement in the heroes gathered before her. Also, the statement was partially a lie- she was supposed to have done a speech, but decided against it in the last minute. "I've placed a bunch of little pyramids all around the island, and all of them have little fun facts written in them! Here, I have an example." Emily removed a small, black pyramid from inside her jacket that was only a little larger than a fortune cookie. The pyramid glowed blue and began to speak. "HERO One is one of the 5 tallest buildings in all of Castleburg, but it is also the most well-fortified, with automated turrets located along the edges of the island and a variety of security functions within. It also has..."

Emily then clasped her fist, causing the little pyramid to stop speaking. "Most of them are more interesting than that. But there's a bunch scattered across the island, which makes for a great bonding activity! You guys can pair up however you want and try and collect as many as you can. Ooh, and here's the fun part, whoever gets the most collects this prize, which I picked special!"

Emily turned around to grab something before facing the group again with two potted plants, one in each hand. They both resembled little bonsai trees, albeit much thicker and leafier. "These are mood plants. They're a type of harmless Leftover. They're very adaptive and will take the shape of their environment, so they'll match whatever decor you have up or whatever type of mood- uh oh." The little plants, while Emily was speaking, had indeed changed substantially, though instead of resembling leafy trees now resembled two hedges that were shaped like flipped birds. Emily embarrassedly put the potted plants back down behind her. "Well, there's your prizes! Pretty neat, huh? So there you go! Fun activity! Pair up, or I guess work alone if you want, and go find the little pyramids! And learn something too."

Her eyes turned towards Joseph. "Joseph, you're free to participate, though I would imagine it's at least a little bit unnecessary to do an activity designed for new recruits? The plants are cool though." She then looked out at the group. "Oh, and one last thing, please don't fight each other! There'll be time for that...another day."

---

_{12:57 PM
Dodge City Cigar Lounge
New Athens, Castleburg}

The Dodge City Cigar Lounge was a profitable business located in New Athens. It was a lovely establishment that had combined the old-timey saloon feel with a refreshingly sophisticated atmosphere, comfortable leather sofas positioned in the middle of a building that was covered in Wild West artifacts. This, combined with some good marketing techniques and an impressive collection of expensive cigars and scotch, made it a popular location frequented by many of the elites of Castleburg, including multiple heroes. This was ironic because the owner of the store was, in fact, a supervillain that went by the name Doc Holliday, and it was one floor right above the establishment where the man was currently standing, looking out the window and at the parade currently marching down the avenue.

Doc Holliday put a lot of effort to make himself look like his historical namesake, complete with the vintage gray frock coat; the cowboy hat; the dark boots with silver spurs; the large, bush gray mustache; and of course, the two enormous revolvers strapped to his waist. The villain was, at the moment, twirling that mustache around his finger as he watched, with great consternation, the parade going on right below his window. He clenched his teeth, turning to look at the other three occupants of the room.

The other gathered individuals, all sitting around a large circular table, were a strange looking bunch. One of them was a woman, with jet-black hair and jet-black bodysuit, that was strapped with knives- down her legs, on her jacket, and a small stiletto even in her hair bun. Next to her, a middle-aged man exhibiting classic male-pattern baldness in a labcoat with a thick-looking laptop in front of him. And next to him, an albino man with shoulder-length snow white hair, pale skin, and red eyes, wearing a coat with an upturned collar. This was certainly an unusual crowd.

"We ready to go yet?" Doc Holliday asked to the group in his characteristic drawl, though his eyes seemed to be focused on the man in the labcoat, who was typing furious on his computer.

"Not yet," the scientist said nervously, fiddling with his computer some more. "I have some, umm, bad news. We've lost a droid."

"What'ya mean, we lost a droid? You left it in your car, lost? Or some hero destroyed it, lost?"

"I couldn't tell you. We just suddenly lost the feed. It could've been tampering, but it also could be a malfunction. I can send another droid to double-check-"

The Wild West cosplayer huffed, the tips of his mustache flitting about as he exhaled annoyedly. "Don't even bother. It's about as likely that that droid accidentally exploded or somethin' as it is that I'm the King of England. And I ain't the King of England. Y'know who this is? This is Hugo Powers thinkin' he's caught on to us. And he has, but he ain't gon' catch us. We just gotta move up the time table, is all." The man grabbed a bottle of bourbon off his window pane, pouring it into a crystal glass. He took the glass in his hand, taking a short sip. "Let's get ready to move, then. Professor, you hold down the fort here and provide backup. Lady Blade, on me. Albino, you know the drill, right? We make the distraction, You support Jellyfish at the actual mark. HERO One."

The pale man adjusted his coat with both hands, sprouting a wide grin, and nodded wordlessly.

Doc Holliday downed the rest of his whiskey. "Let's go, then. The Fiendish Five ride again."

---

_{Mission Control has been updated with necessary information.}

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

Mire

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MIRE

"I helped build the Earth you depend on today, before it was green. You think I have something to prove?"

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[ NAME ]

Subject LMA-93593 "Undergrowth Dweller"

[ HERO IDENTITY ]

Mire

[ NICKNAME/ALIAS ]

Freak, Mushy, Shroomer, etc.

[ AGE ]

Unquantifiable

[ GENDER ]

N/A, they/them

[ AFFILIATION ]

HERO, full time

[ APPEARANCE ]

Mire is not a human being in any way. They are a Leftover, an amalgamation of biology given superpowers by the meteor that spawned them. They were once a network of mundane, uninteresting fungi scattered across a forest, which has coalesced into something vaguely resembling a mockery of the human form. Mire's "bones" are extremely dense mycelical structures that formed around dead trees. Extra material came together to form legs and limbs, but Mire is ultimately a walking incarnation of the role that fungus has on earth. Dozens of molds, mushrooms and other forms of fungus just out from their body like battle scars, blooming and withering eternally. They stand at roughly four feet tall, and atop Mire's "skull" is a huge hymenophore, or the "cap" of a mushroom. Four gaunt limbs jut out from their torso, which seem to constantly be changing shape. They would look beautiful if they didn't appear to be rotting.

[ PERSONALITY TRAITS ]

• Fearless: Fear is a human emotion, and Mire doesn't have an amygdala telling them to preserve their wellbeing. They have a habit of brazenly disregarding the threat something poses to themself, as is self-preservation is something they can't understand.
• Bitter: Mire isn't a very pleasant hero to be around, and it's easy to see why. Over 90% of their kind are murdered for existing, and while they understand why, they absolutely hate it when people look at them and expect that HERO is just debating whether or not to euthanize them. They're used to being sneered at, and it taught them to not be very empathetic. Humans don't like them, why shouldn't the feeling be mutual?
• Thoughtful: Mire displays an odd ability to connect with people and understand what they're going through that should be scientifically impossible for an entity without a brain. Whether it's just Mire mimicking human nature, or the fact that Mire has a genuine personality is unknown, since they refuse to allow a HERO psychologist to study them. But there is some kindness under that prickly exterior.
• Terrifying: When you're a mass of millions of different fungi acting as one in the vague shape of a person, you tend to give off a scary vibe. Mire has found that they're naturally gifted at scaring people straight, which isn't the ideal trait in a hero, but it definitely makes villains think twice.
• Distant: For obvious reasons, Mire has a hard time making friends. Most people don't want to be friends with a fungus monster, so they're a bit on the lonely side, not prone to being the center of attention when a party happens, or during a big gathering.

[ BIO ]

When the X-200 meteor broke apart in the planet's atmosphere, it changed more than just human beings. It changed animals and plants. It made them monsters beneath the awareness of a human being, and above the feral nature of something like a starving animal. One of these monsters rose up from the largest organism on Earth, a colony of fungus found beneath the soil of Oregon, said to be as old as over eight thousand years by some scientists. The fungus was nourished by the particles that flaked off of X-200, stirred to evolve and mutate past its biological programming. No one had the faintest idea this was happening for well over two centuries, since the growth was slow. But overtime, the colony grew aware of itself, its surroundings and what it was. Things below the ground which humans walked picked up little things like the sounds of footsteps one day, and then the mushrooms growing in the forests of Oregon began to listen to things.

Roughly one century ago, the colony began to writhe and shape into things that it had seen, as if it had been watching humanity for the last few hundred years. It evolved the ability to think on the level of humans, and thus a creature of hyphae and mycellium sprouted from the dirt. It grew legs, it grew arms, and like wet clay, it reformed itself over and over again to match what it had witnessed throughout the state of Oregon. This creature did not have a name, it did not truly understand why it existed or what to do with itself, and so it simply wandered the forests. Everywhere it went, it heard a hundred billion voices echoing through the tall trees, among the undergrowth of dead and decaying matter. Mold on rocks, mushrooms growing from dead wood, it all spoke through the walking colony, and it came to understand things about humanity through this.

The creature spied on humans from the edge of its forest, watching them through the mushrooms and the mold that they overlooked. No one knows just how long it did this for, but the fact that it picked up human speech is a clear indicator that it is old. In the dead of night, sometimes the colony would sneak into a nearby town and leave behind figments of its body to hear the whispers of humanity, and understand what was going on in the world. Through this, it learned of events happening in the world, that "heroes" fought "villains," and made the world a better place. To exist as it had was a strange thing, it wasn't meant to exist in this world. But for years, it lived in that forest like a ghost, going from one end of a forest to the other, listening to the world.

But eventually, the Leftover actually encountered humans. Superheroes dressed in their bright costumes intruded on its domain, tracked it to a pit of mold that it had taken to call home. They tried to speak with it, and for the first time in the last century, it spoke back. The words just made sense to it, having watched others use them for so long. They said they meant it no harm, and it told them it wanted to be left alone, but the heroes insisted on taking it from its home. It said no, over and over again, and then they used force.

One of them trapped it in a bubble of energy, another lifted it into the sky and they began to soar over its home. They took it somewhere made not of soil and rocks, but of steel and plastic. There, it stayed for months, where people calling themselves scientists tried to reason with it. They took to calling the Leftover "Mire," and managed to have conversations with it. Of course, Mire was prickly from the moment they trapped it, so these conversations didn't last long, even if they were coherent enough to mistake them for a human. Some of the scientists got brave enough to enter the chamber with Mire. The first ones were reasonable and just sat with them. They gave Mire books that they somehow managed to read, which baffled and intrigued everyone. But then they started talking about running tests on Mire. They mentioned examining the cells of its body, to try and understand why it was so intelligent. Mire refused, and they pressed, eventually coming in with hazmat suits to take samples by force.

Four of the five researchers who attempted this were hospitalized, the fifth transferred to a different department out of fear. No one managed to get anything from the incident, and it was determined that Mire only attacked them out of self-preservation. They didn't trust humans, even if they were sentient like one. Who could blame them? They were taken from their home, and prodded at with instruments nonstop.

Eventually, someone at ICOSA decided that Mire was too unique to simply let loose, so they sent diplomats and experts to speak with Mire in person. They were told, in no uncertain terms, that the only way they'd leave that containment cell was if they used their gifts for the benefit of others. If a human had been impressed into service like that, someone would've faced charges on a national level. But Mire wasn't human, and didn't enjoy the same rights as humans. But they were smart enough to understand that steel and plastic wasn't pleasant. So they relented, and let themself be enslaved.

Mire was transferred to New York, where HERO could monitor their new heroic career in an environment that put them at a disadvantage. After all, Castleburg wasn't known for its lush woods and untamed wilderness.

| MISCELLANEOUS |

Any details you would like the Director to see.

Abilities

[ RANKING ]

Leftover

[ Fungal Incarnation ]

Mire is the walking embodiment of the fungus kingdom. Their body is composed of literal thousands of molds and mushrooms that have never occurred naturally on the planet. They are a colony without beginning or end, never truly done forming. This has many benefits that make them extremely unusual. As a Leftover, their powers are unlike anything a superhuman can demonstrate. They are capable of shapeshifting, reforming limbs and the general shape of their body into whatever state it needs to be in order to navigate terrain or get their new "job" done. The upper limit of this seems to be completely liquifying their body into a thick sludge of fungus and enzymes.

Undying Kingdom: Being composed of mycellium, Mire is also capable of extreme regeneration. If an arm is cut off, or if they are set on fire, they only need to consume organic matter to regain what they lost. This can be anything from food to a villain's arm. Their consciousness exists in every individual strand of hyphae that they are made of. As long as a single piece of it exists, even if it's only a few atoms thick, then Mire is not dead.

One with the Colony: Due to Mire's nature as an infinite colony of fungus, they can rapidly grow entire mushrooms from their body. These mushrooms vary in their exact type, and it is unclear if they are even remotely edible, but Mire could grow them by spreading spores in secretive areas such as a back alley or in a villain's lair. Mire is connected to fungus that isn't directly apart of their body, like a hivemind. This is mostly benign in a city like Castleburg, but it means they can grow patches of mushrooms in an area and keep a constant eye on things that happen, as the mushrooms would "hear" what is going on, in much the same way they learned all they know of humanity.

Cycle of Life: Many mushroom species rely on enzymes to break down dead things for consumption. Mire can secrete a similar, slurry-like substance that resembles chunky glue, to melt any form of matter they need. It acts similar to acid, able to eat through bricks and rocks like normal fungus turning stone into soil. The only known way of neutralizing this substance is either having Mire soak it up, or soak it with water.

For the below-listed rankings, please rank yourself using the colored and uncolored boxes on a scale of 0-10, with a 2 corresponding to what an average, non-powered human can put out, and provide a brief explanation for the reasoning of said ranking. See "Power Rankings" hider below for more guidance.

[ PHYSICAL STRENGTH ]
■■■■■□□□□□

Mire's body is composed up incredibly dense mycellium that could eat bullets from most guns. They are by no means a Superman analogue, but they are definitely sturdier than most heroes.

[ AGILITY ]
■■■□□□□□□□

Mushrooms don't move, so much as grow, and this means that Mire is not very fast. Most heroes can outrun them, even without flight or teleportation. They're slow, build like a fleshy, spore-laced brick.

[ INTELLIGENCE ]
■■■□□□□□□□

Mankind forgets, but the oldest kingdom of life remembers. Mire is a one-in-a-million case of a Leftover that isn't only somewhat benign, but actually sentient, and capable of human speech. They are on par with a particularly smart human being, who might be good at strategy games or research.

[ DESTRUCTIVENESS ]
■■■□□□□□□□

They could smash things with their fleshy limbs, and crash through a brick wall with enough force, but Mire's destructive capabilities don't include summoning mushroom monsters to ransack a city... As far as they know.

[ LETHALITY ]
■■■■■□□□□□

All it would take is one wrong move, and that villain in Mire's face is getting slapped with a fist covered in enzymes. And then, their villain friends would watch their skin melt off like hot butter, before they scream in agony as their muscles and organs go next. On a rainy day, or against someone in thicker armor, Mire isn't that fatal to go up against, but it's still not pleasant.

[ ENDURANCE ]
■■■■■■■■■■

Mire is a monster, in every possible way the word can be used. Explosives that could take out a city block would be needed to scour the battlefield of their presence. And even then, there's a good chance a stray bit of hyphae flaked off of them on their way to the fight. Mold is an infestation, mushrooms will sprout whether you want them to or not. You cannot eradicate fungus, you can only keep it at bay for so long.

[ STAMINA ]
■■■■■□□□□□

Mire doesn't get tired in the way humans do. They don't need to breathe, they don't have muscles. But enough exertion could result in their hyphae structures growing frail and frayed, like a rope under friction. Eventually, they would need a break, but most people wouldn't last long enough to see it.

[ EFFICACY ]
■■■■■□□□□□

Mire’s powers do not line up with the traditional standard of superhuman abilities. Most superhumans have to learn how their powers work, and discover themselves in the process. But Mire’s “powers” are an extension of what they are. Meaning they don’t have to discover much of anything, rather than do it. This is only a five out of ten because ICOSA knows very little about Mire, due to their cagey attitude towards researchers.

[ SURVEILLANCE LEVEL ]
■■■■■■■□□□

Mire has shown a capacity for reason and restraint, on par with humans. A month long effort to spy on them from a distance showed that they only observe humans out of curiosity, rather than malice. And they never asked to be a hero in the first place, so it is no secret that Mire at least has an inclination to leave humans be. But with that in mind, they are an absurd statistical anomaly, an exception to a centuries old rule that their kind is to be shot on sight. Their very existence means that many people in ICOSA want to study Mire, and find out what makes them tick. Unfortunately, ICOSA has learned what can happen if Mire is forced into that situation, meaning their powers are not yet fully known either. For these reasons, HERO has been advised to find a way to make Mire “warm up” to them, and convince the Leftover to trust them enough for study. They are to be watched closely, not necessarily because they are dangerous, but because of what the world might be able to learn from them if their new life as a hero is a success.

[ SKILLS ]

Gardening: Surprise, the fungus monster knows a thing or two about plants.

Stealth: Mire is used to going undetected, dissolving into the ground to avoid being spotted by humans and making absolutely no noise. They are more comfortable with it, anyway.

[ EQUIPMENT ]

N/A

@Blizz

Very spooky, but very cool too! Certainly the most unique character on the roster. Checked.

(Sorry forgot to post this LOL)

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

_{Johnstone Convention Center.
New Athens, Castleburg.
Status: Talking with other heroes.
Interacts: Terra & Oracle @shylarah, Ardent @ManyThings}

Fortunately for Blast, he would not be left to stew in his boredom for too long. Two individuals arrived at the backstage area not long after Blast had sped into the convention. Jake couldn't say that he was particularly familiar with either of them, though they were assuredly heroes, given their attire: the girl was wearing some type of white full-face mask, and the boy was wearing a bandana and a ridiculous-looking pair of goggles (though that would probably be the pot calling the kettle black). The male hero also appeared to be the friendlier of the duo, as he immediately came up and introduced himself to Jake, whereas the girl had navigated herself over to a corner. They seemed nice, though, which in the hero business, was a surprisingly uncommon character trait. A lot of the people Jake had met were either self-centered fame-seekers or totally off-the-wall looney-tunes, so this was a welcome change of pace. Blake immediately hopped up off the chest, a wide grin on his face, as he approached the guy that approached him and introduced himself as Terra (sounds like a girl's name) and the girl as Oracle (sounds like...no idea what that means.) They also recognized him, which was always nice, though not unexpected. "Blast" wasn't exactly a secret identity.

"Hey!" the blonde hero immediately responded, grabbing Jareth's hand and giving it a vigorous shake. "You're right on the money. I'm Blast. You can call me Jake, though, we don't need to play with all the secret name stuff. Unless you're a villain. Which I'm assuming you're not. Yeah, definitely not." Jake looked the young man in front of him up and down, before continuing with the rapid-fire conversation. "OK, so you're Terra, and you're Oracle, then?" In a blur of green and black, Jake zipped over to right in front of Oracle and gave her hand a quick shake. "Nice to meet the both of you."

The small group was then joined by another hero that Blast did in fact recognize: he had actually just read about this guy being transferred over to Castleburg from somewhere else, and that he was some type of former vigilante, something that Jake did not really understand (why do hero work and not get paid? Seems goofy) but also didn't find particularly distasteful. Plus, the guy could fly, which was really cool. If Jake could trade his power out for any power, it would probably be flight. The man introduced himself as Ardent from Boston, which sounded about right. Jake used his powers to zoom on over to the muscular hero that had just joined them, offering him a handshake as well. "Nice to meetcha. Blast, err, Jake. Welcome to Castleburg. Love the suit, by the way."

Upon hearing the new addition's likely-rhetorical question, Jake just gave a shrug as he leaned back against the chest he was once sitting atop of, tapping his foot against it impatiently. "No idea where he is. Whatever it is, though, it's gotta be pretty important. Powers doesn't ask for help unless it's important." Jake tapped a finger against his chin, in thought. Powers was a difficult fellow to decipher. "OK, I got two theories. One, he's brought us all here to humiliate us on live TV for some reason. Maybe some type of punishment. Or two, he's being attacked by a group of ninjas. I'm leaning towards option 1, but you never know with the guy. He's...a character." Jake smiled weakly. "You guys will get to know him well."

---

_{H.E.R.O. One Dune
Savior Island, Castleburg.
Interacts with: Dahlia @baraquiel, Gematria @Scarifar}

Emily had all but given up on the prospect of reclaiming her papers when a young woman with dark hair and a turtleneck approached with one of the escaped sheets. The Assistant Director smiled warmly as she took the paper back, hastily clipping it to a clipboard she had just procured. Emily recognized the woman as Dahlia, one of the more...certainly troubled heroes that was a fairly recent addition to the roster. "Nice to see you. Eva, was it?" the HERO leader asked sweetly before the hero asked if she could be of assistance at the event being planned. "Yes, you're right, that's why I'm here. Orientation is important. And I'm sure Hugo- err, Director Powers, that is, will be fine." She nodded at Eva's request. "I understand. You're quite welcome to stay and help in any way you can. I was thinking we might play an icebreaker or something. Here, I'll get you a seat." She grabbed a folding chair off of a rack that was haphazardly perched on top of a rock by the edge of the water, setting up the chair and planting it firmly in the tall grass. "Have a seat, we're not due to start for a short while- oh!"

Emily's exclamation was not one of pain or shock, but of pleasant surprise, as another heroine, whom Emily recognized as Gematria, approached with another lost paper. Emily grabbed this one and clipped it to her board as well. "Thank you, I want to say, Meg? Megumi? Is that right?" Emily reached over and grabbed another seat, the rack creaking as it see-sawed by the edge of the rock. Emily quickly turned, and with a sparkle of bright pink, a web-like substance had bound the edge of the chair rack to the rocks, crystallizing and glittering like gemstones. She then plopped the seat down near Dahlia. "I have to be honest, I wasn't expecting a huge turnout to this event. But there are a lot of new recruits this year, so maybe we'll get a little crowd."

Emily looked over her shoulder. She had the uncomfortable sensation of being watched, and it bugged her greatly. She sighed. Must've been the wind, right?

---

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

Yes, like has been mentioned, we are quite full at the moment. I'll post updates if that changes.