Industrial Strength Magic

Chapter 78: Super Teen Delinquents

That usually works, Harv thought. Teens weren’t exactly the most worldly or confident people, and an officer of the law barging in on them unannounced would put them on the back foot, which allowed him to then take control of the situation.

Now Harv was on the backfoot and only one of the kids had any respect for his job. The shortstack kept flinching away whenever he glanced at her, which was at odds with the other two who were about as intimidated by him as a fart in the wind.

I had the fantastic luck to stumble into a couple of Legacy supers, Harv thought, concealing his irritation. The little one was raised by civilians and had an aversion to ‘The Law’. A Legacy on the other hand, often inherited their parent’s total disregard for authority.

“The Washington PD found your fingerprints on every can of insulation, grease and hairspray used in the battle.”

“Oh? Would you like some more tea?” Paradox said without dropping a beat, offering a carafe of the best tea Harv had ever tasted. Hopefully it wasn’t poisoned.

“Sure,” Harv said, doing his damnedest to seem confident and not really caring too much if he died.

While sipping the tea, Harv considered. The first tactic, which was to scare a handful of teens into behaving themselves and not tearing up the city during their stay…wasn’t going to work. If anything, it would just make Harv the asshole.

So he decided to change tactics and offer them the olive branch called honesty.

“We saw that you were attacked last night, while you were out in your civvies.”

“That’s true.”

“Listen, Paradox, it’s a misdemeanor to engage in super-combat without exhausting every available option to escape and notify the police. As far as we could tell by the security footage, you did not exhaust every possible avenue of escape. Now, we’re not gonna press charges or waste your time with paperwork because of High Tide: You’ve got important shit to do. In return for our discretion, the Washington PD requests that you respond to any level of provocation by running away first. If you do not, there’s nothing preventing us from drowning you in paperwork the moment High tide is over.”

“Oh?”

“We have video.” Harv said.

“Can you send me that video?” Paradox asked. “I’d love to use it to review our performance as a team.”

Generally the answer was a resounding ‘NO’, but headquarters wasn’t prosecuting this, and Harv’s job wasn’t to horde evidence, it was to ensure compliance.

“If you behave yourself, I could probably get you a copy at the end of your stay.”

“Sweet.”

“That’s a bad deal,” Wraith said, shaking her head. “Almost every time we go out someone tries to kill us.”

“This has happened before?” Harv asked, brows furrowed. Supers led chaotic lives, but that was pushing it.

“A hag summoned Wraith’s dad, who possessed her body and she had to exorcise him…We took care of it.”

Cool as a cucumber.

“Alright, I suppose I’ll mind my own business,” Harv said as he stood, fully intending to stick his nose into it. If these three were trouble-magnets, it might be more cost effective to assign them a Minder to nudge them in the right direction. Harv had some asking around to do.

“Just make sure you don’t go looking for trouble while you’re in Washington, alright?” Harv said as he left the teen’s room.

***Paradox***

“I’m gonna go looking for trouble.” Perry said after the detective left. The guy had been so rattled that he hadn’t even leaned on them very hard.

“Didn’t he just ask you not to do that?” Natalie asked with a wince.

Perry glanced over at her as he packed some clothes in a bag.

“That only applies if you get caught,” Perry said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “And I’m not gonna get caught.”

I still wanna figure out who this John Gabras guy is and maybe head off some trouble before it comes knocking on my door. Assuming he was still alive, Perry wanted to ask him some questions.

There was a lot about his family that had been glossed over by generations of hero worship. Talking to people who hated them would be…eye-opening.

Am I seriously willing to risk my life for dirt on Gramma?

Perry thought about that long and hard.

Absolutely.

Perry had a trump card that was pretty sure to keep him safe while he looked for John.

Perry glanced over at the other two and sighed. “It’s times like this that I wish I had a bottle of your blood at my home base. Remind me to bleed you when we get home.”

Natalie looked horrified.

“You still owe me a liter of blood,” Heather said.

“Half-liter. And that debt was paid when I used it to rescue you.”

“The way I see it, if you hadn’t been there, I would’ve Triggered just the same, and my dad would’ve taken me out of the armor afterwards, so I don’t know if you really ‘rescued’ me, per se.”

Dangit. That was a bit of a sore spot. He felt as if he’d failed miserably and things had only turned out okay by what felt like sheer luck. Regardless of what his Quest Notification told him.

“Alright, I’m gonna go out and investigate this fella who tried to kill us,” Perry said, scanning the room. “There’s a possibility that he knows where we’re staying, so I just wanna let you know…”

Perry paused for a moment to let it sink in.

“It would be really cliché of you guys to get kidnapped while I’m out and about.”

“Pffft,” Heather punched him in the shoulder. “If anyone’s getting kidnapped, it’s you.”

“It would be fun to get rescued by pretty girls rather than the other way around for once,” Perry said, heading for the door. A weight hit his waist and he glanced down to see Natalie glaring up from where she was glomping him.

“Don’t get kidnapped,” she said, eyes narrowed. “Seriously.”

Perry gave the girl-scouts salute. “I promise I won’t get kidnapped.”

***One Kidnapping Later***

Perry sighed and leaned back in his cage.

This is just embarrassing.

Perry consulted the clock back at his base. He still had a couple hours until the girls would start looking for him, and he absolutely had to get back before that happened, or else he would never live it down.

“You wretches were rescued from the streets. Your lives were meaningless until this point. I, Plagius will give your insignificant lives purpose. I will make your sacrifices mean something. I’m gonna conquer this city, and no one’s gonna stop me. Not my dad, not my teachers, and definitely not the police! I’m Plagius now, and that means something! It means I can do whatever I want to whoever I want! But first I need to absorb your pathetic power and add it to my own!”

Oh, great, an absorption type. Perry thought sourly. They usually went off the deep end since their powers were geared towards being a murder-hobo.

The spandex wearing crazy-pants paced back and forth in front of the cell filled with homeless people, monologuing incessantly. He had a black and brown theme going on, with an emaciated skull mask, but it didn’t have a certain flair to it. It was a bit too simple, lacking the cape and adornments a proper grim-reaper lookalike might go for if they wanted to intimidate.

To be fair, the other homeless people in Perry’s cell were pretty freakin’ intimidated.

Despite Plagius sounding about sixteen.

It probably had something to do with finding themselves trapped in a cell.

Being a teen super himself, Perry had to wonder where Plagius had gotten his holding cells: Those things weren’t cheap, and usually a super was at least in his twenties or thirties before he could afford to kidnap people en masse.

So either this kid had hermit-crabbed into an empty lair or he’d gotten one from a parent.

Judging by the graffiti on the walls, Perry would guess the former.

Perry had disguised himself as a homeless man and had been roaming the streets of the Twilight Zone when he’d been bagged and thrown into a van.

The major problem was this: Perry had gone to great lengths to keep his ability to shapeshift via Wayward’s Defensive Disguise under wraps, and escaping in a conspicuous way would jeopardize that.

He’d found a public bathroom with no cameras on it, then used Wayward’s Defensive Disguise remotely by triggering the spell-frame connected to his personal vat of blood back home. It had mixed the ingredients properly and poured them over a freshly carved lunt bone.

In a matter of seconds, Perry had become Larry the down-and-out homeless bum.

It worked like a charm. As he’d gone around the manitian district asking questions, nobody had suspected him of working for Paradox, let alone being him.

Perry had even chosen this particular form because it was the least likely to attract attention. He didn’t want to be particularly young or old, definitely not pretty and young, which would turn heads and attract the wrong attention.

Male, to suggest he’d be able to handle himself, at least a little bit, but not fit enough looking to seem like a threat. Average height. Stout, bit of a gut. Nondescript, so people didn’t remember him.

I suppose an old lady might’ve worked too.

Perry had incidentally made himself look like the ideal candidate for Plagius’s roundup of unwilling test-subjects.

Perry buried his face in his meaty hands.

So embarrassing. He wasn’t even looking for me, and I got kidnapped. by accident.

“Which of you cattle would like to be the first sacrifice to my power?” Plagius said, watching them with undisguised greed.

Perry peeked out from between his sausage-fingers hardened by a lifetime of hard work.

Well, all that aside, this guy needs to be stopped. My ethics class sense is tingling. Maybe once I kick his butt I can spin getting kidnapped as ‘locating his lair’. Totally on purpose.

Perry raised a shaking hand.

“I reckon I’ll go,” Perry said, his voice deepened by size and years of smoking.

“Excellent,” Plagius said, motioning for one of his minions to open the cage for Perry to walk out.

I wonder where he got minions. He needed them for the kidnappings, too. Rentals, probably.

“Now, this may sting a bit,” Plagius said, reaching his hand toward Perry, dark energy swirling around it.

This guy’s definitely an amateur. A pro would have kept them restrained at all times, kept them separated, and honestly, wouldn’t have taken the bag off their heads before draining them.

Sliding Stats

Body5 -> 9

Perry punched Plagius in the throat.

The would-be supervillain’s eyes widened as his minions rushed to defend him.

Perry caught one of the minions and gently slammed him into another approaching minion, keeping an eye on Plagius. He had one of those catch-you-and-you’re-dead kinda of powers, Perry was sure. It was worth dividing his attention away from the minions for.

His caution paid off when skull-face lashed out for his ankle, and Perry whipped his foot out of the way and stepped on the man’s wrist.

Crunch.

“AAAH!”

Thankfully Plagius hadn’t drained very many people because his speed was human baseline.

“You guys just gonna stand there?” Perry asked, glancing back at the homeless huddled in their cell.

Clang! Perry felt a dull thud against his scalp.

HP: 5

Perry snatched the metal pipe out of the minion’s hand and poked him in the sternum with it. Hard. All the while, he kept an eye on Plagius. The kid was too busy cradling his broken wrist, but one moment of inattention with a Drainer could get Perry killed.

“You heard Larry, let’s get the hell outta here!” Homeless began streaming out of the cells at a breakneck pace, some of them kicking Plagius on the way out, causing the teen to turtle up and curl into a ball.

I guess the hyperweave isn’t hyperweave, Perry thought.

Perry sent a glance towards the minions climbing to their feet.

“Are you a super?” one of them stammered.

“You tell me.” Perry said.

As one, the minions scattered, Leaving Perry alone in the room with a cowering Plagius.

“Boy, your day went bad quick, didn’t it, son?” Perry said, picking up Plagius and setting him down on one of the cell’s benches while Perry sat across from him.

“Yeah,” Plagius sniffled.

“Now you understand that draining homeless people to enhance your powers is wrong, right?” Perry asked.

“n -matter,” Plagius whined.

“Eh?” Perry asked.

“It doesn’t matter!” Plagius said. “My power’s on The List.”

“The list?” Perry asked, brows raised.

“Yeah, the list where they shove you in a dark hole and you never see the light of day again, because they think you’re evil and the only way you can use your power is to hurt people.”

“Huh.” Perry said, pulling out a cigarette he’d bought for his disguise and lighting up. I’ve got Waywards defensive disguise. Any damage goes to my fake body. Might as well see what all the fuss is about.

A few moments of hacking coughs later, he’d sworn off cigarettes forever.

“Did you consider draining monsters?” Perry asked.

“Of course I did. They’d kill me just as easily as you would.”

“What’s your Retainment?”

“My what?” Plagius asked, glancing up at him.

“Drainers get a temporary high from draining, which you probably discovered on some unfortunate soul when you triggered.”

“Mrs. Swanson,” Plagius muttered.

“Right, and for a certain a mount of time, a few minutes, to a couple hours, a Drainer has access to 100% of the powers of their victim. You probably felt like a god.”

Plagius flinched at ‘victim’.

“A certain percentage of that borrowed power is ‘retained’ permanently. Somewhere between zero and three percent.”

“Really?”

“You didn’t know that?” Perry asked. It was part of the A.P. Powers class. A bit of a nerdy class full of theorycrafters and rules lawyers and LARPing but fun nonetheless.

“How do you know so much about powers?” Plagius asked.

“I been around the block a time or two,” Perry bullshitted.

“It doesn’t matter, I’ll never be the good guy. It’s against the rules.”

“Is Mrs. Swanson still alive?” Perry asked.

“Y-Yeah, I think so.”

“So you haven’t killed anybody yet?”

Plagius shook his skull-face hard.

Perry pursed his lips, scrutinizing the high school junior.

“Listen close. There’s no List in Franklin City that gets you tossed in prison automatically.”

“Really!?”

“On the other hand, if you misbehave with your powers, the super-community will kill you. No arrest, no trial, they’ll just snuff you out.”

Plagius frowned.

“So which will it be?” Perry asked. “The place that’ll arrest you just for breathing, or the place that’ll let you live free, but kill you if you pull this again?” Perry motioned to the holding cells.

“How am I supposed to become a cape without draining anyone?” Plagius asked. “If I’d get killed for doing it?”

“I know some supers who’d be glad to subdue a Prawn long enough for you to drain it.” Perry said.

“After the first one, you can go toe to toe with them for however long your high lasts, long enough to drain a couple more. Even if you only retain half a percent, you’d still be physically superhuman after a handful of prawns.”

“If you get good enough to become a Sweeper, you’re basically rich and famous by default,” Perry said.

“How do I get to Franklin City?”

“The inter-city train leaves at the end of the week,” Perry said, pulling a pen out of his pocket and writing the address on the back of plagius’s unbroken hand.

“And here’s Paradox’s number,” Perry said, writing down the number of the motel. “He’s a friend of mine, and he’ll get you set up with a team that can power-level you. I-He owes a guy a team-member, so it might work out pretty well for everyone involved.

“T-thank you.” Plagius said.

Perry locked eyes on the kid. “Remember. If you do this again in Franklin city, your life is forfeit. If you follow the rules, you’re a rock-star. You think you can do that?”

Plagius nodded vigorously.

“Alright, I gotta get back on the streets,” Perry said, heaving his ungainly bulk off the bench. I hate being fat.

“What’s your name?” Plagius called after him.

“Larry,” Perry called over his shoulder as he left.

“Thanks, Larry,” Plagius said.

“Don’t worry about it. Least I could do after I broke your hand. And if you get rich and famous, maybe you can introduce me to some cute super-broads. Maybe Wraith or Hardcase. They’re hot.”

“Gross. You’re like, old enough to be their dad. You’d need to take a bath first, too.” Plagius said.

“Ow, low blow, kid,” Perry said as he left. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I gotta catch the bus.”

Plagius waved him off, staring down at the information written on his hand.

***Later***

“Oh my god, Perry, what happened to you!?” Nat demanded, running up to Perry and inspecting his blood-drenched clothes.

It turns out Wayward’s defensive Disguise is really messy when it sloughs off.

“It’s fine, it’s all my blood but I didn’t get hurt. It’s a magic thing. Not a problem. Nobody got hurt. Well, I broke a kid’s wrist when he tried to mug me, but I gave him some good life advice in exchange.”

“Did you find out anything about that John guy?” Heather asked.

“Nah, I got sidetracked by a bit of trouble. I’ll try a different area tomorrow.”

“You always seem to find trouble, Perry,” Chase, their team leader, said from the couch. “It’s not a great habit to be in.”

Perry narrowed his eyes at their team-leader on the leather-upholstered seat. Something about him was off…

“Did you get a haircut while I was out?” Perry asked.

“How perceptive,” Chase said with a grin. “I sure did.”