Boosted Villainy Part 22 (Patreon)

Myst focused on the full-length mirror that he'd leaned up against the wall and pushed energy into it, changing it from a simple mirror with a brass frame into a magical mirror that would show people and provide their location. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall, show me… Bad Canary."

"Seriously?" Rose asked with amusement as the mirror clouded over.

"It's a classic," Myst replied as the mist parted and he saw a sad looking young woman curled up on a prison bench looking like she wanted to cry.

"Technically speaking, it's supposed to be ‘magic mirror on the wall," Taylor pointed out.

"Details," Myst replied, wondering if that was a world difference or if he was just misremembering the quote. "This would be easier if I could just reach through the mirror and grab people."

"There's always tomorrow," C. Squealer said cheerfully. "What are the numbers on the bottom?"

Myst glanced at the numbers. "It's supposed to list her location."

"GPS?" Rose asked thoughtfully as she punched the numbers into her phone's search function.

"Maybe?" Myst asked.

Rose smiled when she got a location in Boston that matched a prison. "Yep, she's in Boston, same with the numbers."

"Jailbreak or do you want to replace her with a shadow clone?" C. Squealer asked excitedly.

"Or we could try lodging a complaint about the judge," Taylor suggested, trying to avoid doing something completely criminal.

Myst pulled his attention off Canary's bright yellow feathers and looked at Taylor. "Lisa called while I was talking to Armsmaster, Calle already tried, someone wants her in The Cage because they want to make a political statement."

"That's not how things are supposed to work," Taylor complained.

"Welcome to Earth Bet," Myst muttered.

"Pretty sure Earth Aleph isn't a paradise either," Rose pointed out, having seen some of the police shows.

"Point," Myst admitted. "Corruption seems pretty common on all of them."

"The last one seemed to be at least a little sensible," Rose pointed out.

"Besides Vulture getting forced to be a villain," Myst argued. "How do you feel about making a couple of shadow clones?"

"That depends, what are you thinking?" Taylor asked.

"I think we should head to Boston and make shadow clones of the judge and Paige's lawyer, they'd be able to tell us who was pushing for Canary to get sent to the cage," Myst suggested.

"Then we can drop them on another world," C. Squealer suggested.

"Isn't that a bit harsh?" C. Taylor asked, fairly sure stranding them on another world was crossing a line.

"No, they swore an oath to uphold the laws of the land. Her lawyer outright stated to Lisa that he wanted Paige convicted," Myst complained.

"Seriously?" Rose asked, knowing lawyers weren't supposed to talk about their clients.

"I get the feeling he used wisdom as a dump stat," Myst replied as he focused on the mirror. "Mirror, mirror on the wall, show me Rick Wilson, Canary's lawyer."

Taylor focused on the mirror as it changed to show an average looking man in his mid to late twenties wearing jeans and a sweatshirt sitting in a leather chair watching a football game on a large flat screen television. "I was expecting slacks."

Rose snickered. "Dad wears jeans all the time, unless he's working."

"Can we steal his TV?" C. Squealer asked hopefully.

"Seriously?" C. Taylor asked.

C. Squealer shrugged. "It's a suspiciously nice television for a public defender right out of school."

"She's got a point," S. Rose pointed out as she thought about how much going to law school cost.

"We're not stealing his TV," Myst cut in. "We're going to have enough trouble lining everything up, we don't need to cause waves."

"Especially since Armsmaster might have recorded Lisa's call," S. Rose pointed out.

"Isn't that illegal?" Taylor asked.

"Not really," Myst admitted. "We were on a public street and he mentioned using a recording device to take notes. We didn't mention doing anything illegal but it wouldn't take a genius to connect the dots to Canary after the fact."

"This would be easier if we could make sure her attorney didn't show up for court," Rose mused.

"Wouldn't that make it worse for her?" Taylor asked.

"No, he's a public defender. It would either force a change of lawyers, a delay or force the judge to declare a mistrial," Rose explained.

"Not sure how delaying things helps," Taylor asked, not sure how dragging things out helps.

"Lisa should have the recording of the lawyer, if he doesn't show up and Quinn Calle shares the recording, the lawyer is fucked, same with the judge," Rose explained.

"Any idea how we can keep him from showing up?" Taylor asked.

"Kneecaps or breaklines," C. Squealer suggested.

"In a way that doesn't look suspicious?" Myst asked, fairly sure she was just messing with them.

'Food poisoning,' S. Amy suggested.

Myst manifested S. Amy. "Food poisoning?"

S. Amy used her copy of C. Taylor's power and manifested a fluffy robe. "One touch and he'll have a case of food poisoning that will have everything coming out of both ends."

"Or we could just replace Canary with a shadow clone, change her appearance and not worry about the trial," C. Squealer suggested. “Let ‘em send a shadow clone to the Birdcage, when she vanishes without a trace it’ll just cause them ulcers.”

"Nice to have a backup plan," Myst mused, not seeing a point in leaving Paige in prison.

"Can you use the mirror to just tune in on anyone?" C. Taylor asked curiously.

"Let's find out. Mirror, mirror, on the wall show me Lung." Myst frowned when the mirror changed and he saw a large well built man with a dragon mask banging an asain woman on a pool table in a way that didn't look comfortable. 'At least she seems willing and doesn't look like she's drugged out of her mind.'

"Huh, he's not actually compensating for anything," C. Squealer said with some surprise, having figured that since he was asian he would have been pretty small, except when transformed of course. It was entirely possible she had spent far too much time considering the status of various cape’s genitals while high.

"Unless he's using his powers," S. Rose suggested as she tried to get a better idea of the scale of everything.

"How long do you think it would take to replace all of the villains?" Taylor asked as she pulled a notebook out of her coat pocket and started writing down the GPS coordinates, pretending not to watch the scene playing out in the mirror.

"A few hours, maybe a couple of days depending on how spread out everything is." Myst frowned when he tried and failed to copy Lung through the mirror. "Damn, I was hoping we could copy people through the mirror."

"Now you're just being lazy," Rose teased him.

"There are a couple of villains I'd rather not get close to," Myst replied as he turned to look at Taylor's notebook. "Do you have all of the numbers?"

Taylor pulled her attention off the scene in the mirror and finished writing the numbers down. "Yeah, we're good."

"Or bad," C. Squealer teased. "Nothing wrong with watching people fuck on a pool table."

C. Taylor shook her head. "Looks uncomfortable."

"I've done worse," C. Squealer said cheerfully. "Try inside the truck of a car."

"Why the…" Taylor trailed off. "On second thought, never mind."

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall show me Burnscar." Myst frowned when fog covered the image. "Too far or not in costume? Mirror, mirror, on the wall show me Kaiser."

Rose blinked when the mirror cleared and she saw an image of Max Anders on a couch with a pair of busty panty clad blonde twins that could have been in Playboy. "Huh, that's Max Anders, Medhall's CEO, that certainly explains some things."

"Yeah, he's also the head of the Empire 88," Myst replied as he checked out the blonde sisters, making a mental note to ask their shadow clones if they were actually racist because he couldn't remember and it was annoying him.

"Lovely," Taylor grumbled as she finished writing down the GPS numbers. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall show me someone in this town that isn't corrupt."

The mirror changed, showing a pink and white crib with a sleeping toddler in it.

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall show me Emma Barnes," C. Taylor ordered, causing the mirror to shift and change so that it was showing a naked red haired teenager in a shower washing her hair. "Is it a bad thing that I really want to spank the hell out of her?"

Taylor glanced at her perverted twin. "Probably," she said, keeping to herself what S. Emma had suggested she do to her.

S. Rose smiled as she thought about the fun they could have pranking people. "You should upgrade the mirror so we can talk to people through it."

Rose used C. Taylor's power to manifest a spatula then swatted her shadow clone on the butt.

S. Rose stuck her tongue out at her original. "What was that for?"

"Let's avoid giving the PRT a reason to call in a hit squad that takes out half the town, some of us actually have to live here," Rose reminded her.

"They're not going to call in a hit squad because a cape has clairvoyance and the ability to talk to people at range," S. Rose argued.

"If they realize you can look at state secrets and listen to private conversations, it's one more reason you'd be on their watch lists," Rose pointed out.

"Good point," S. Rose admitted. "Especially since Myst let Armsmaster know that he could jump dimensions."

Myst glanced at S. Rose. "It was going to come up eventually, the schematics are too polished for it to be a prototype, they had decades to make improvements and it shows."

C. Squealer glanced over at the workbench where two of the S. Kid Wins were working on creating a hoverboard. "You could have just sent it to Dragon and skipped letting anyone else know."

"The PRT would have been called in eventually, this should keep Armsmaster and Kid Win distracted for a couple of days while we deal with the rest of the gangs," Myst replied as he pushed a touch more energy into the mirror, giving it the ability to pick up sound.

"This is better than goggle," Squealer said cheerfully.

"We're going to have to keep this a secret," C. Taylor said, knowing how furiously capes protected their secrets.

Rose shook her head. "I'm not telling anyone shit. We should probably increase our own protections for that matter. How much energy do you have?"

"Enough to make a couple of stamps. We should probably head back to Leet and Uber's warehouse and grab some," Myst suggested.

"Or we could hit the craft shop on the edge of the ABB territory. If we show up in costume, it would probably be enough to lure Oni Lee out of wherever he's hiding," Rose suggested.

“And get frag grenades going off everywhere,” C. Squealer couldn’t help but point out, giving her a look that said she thought Rose might be high, which really offended the girl.

“He’s not going to lead off with grenades,” Rose argued.

“Have you met him?” C. Squealer said dryly. “He always leads off with grenades. You get his order wrong at the drive thru and he leads off with grenades and grenades aren’t like bullets with ‘To Whom it may concern’ written on them, they are labeled ‘Dear Occupant and Family!”

“Okay, okay I get it, don’t take villains so lightly,” Rose said, trying to calm down the agitated tinker.

“I’ve seen a lot of death,” C. Squealer said, “most of it because they expected psychos to act like normal people and trust me… most capes ain’t right in the head.”

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall show me Oni Lee," Myst ordered, figuring they might as well get back to work. He frowned slightly when the scene changed and he saw a man in an Asian themed demon mask sitting in a bar filled with people of Asian descent.

"He's not even trying to hide," Taylor complained.

"He works for Lung," C. Squealer pointed out. "Besides, he’s a teleporting serial suicide bomber that doesn't care about collateral damage. Even if someone called the police, he'd just teleport out while leaving grenades behind."

"I have a remote, get the address," Myst said as he walked over to the disguise mirror and changed his appearance to an eighty year old Korean man, figuring the ABB wouldn’t bother to harass an old man.

0o0o0

"Out of the way old man!" one of the six asain thugs strutting down the street snapped at Myst when he stepped away from a street vender that was selling stuffed Chinese dragons.

"No respect!" Myst snapped in an admittedly awful fake Chinese accent as he glared at the six asian thugs wearing far too much green and red.

One of the guys laughed at Myst as he pulled out a knife. "That's the worst accent I've ever heard."

Myst brought his hands up. "You want fight? I give you fight, Kung-Fu ninja turtle teach me to fight."

The leader of the six stared at Myst in disbelief for a couple of seconds. "Fuck this, stab the fuck out of him."

Myst slipped to the side and punched the guy that tried to stab him in the throat, dropping the twenty something idiot to the ground gasping for breath. "Next?"

"Kung-fu, I know Gun-fu," one of the guys said as he pulled his gun and pointed it at Myst.

"I know Gun-fu-" Myst tossed himself out of the way when S. Amy shouted, 'Dodge!' in his mind, causing Oni Lee's knife to miss by a couple of inches. 'Fucking teleporters,' he thought as he rolled to his feet and copied the teleporting cape, not sure why the fuck Oni Lee was attacking him.

"I told you never to return," Oni Lee told Myst.

'What the fuck?!' Myst thought as Oni Lee charged at him with his knife. He blocked the knife and punched his fist through his skull, more than a little annoyed when he turned to ash. He hit the guy with the gun with a roundhouse snapping a couple of ribs and sending him flying into a brick wall as he misjudged the amount of strength he'd need.

'To your left on a roof!' S. Amy said, watching the fight in the mirror.

Myst pulled his remote out of his inventory, pointed it at Oni Lee and pushed the power button then created a naked Oni Lee copy behind the powerless cape. 'Grab…' his train of thought glitched as his shadow clone tackled him off the roof.

Myst reflexively spun around to nail whatever was making noise only to see the remaining thugs sprinting like their lives depended on it. "No honor!"

'The mirror stopped working,' S. Amy warned him as she swapped over to spy on Lung, fairly sure Oni Lee was dead as he'd hit the ground before it cut out, but wanting to give him a heads up.

Myst turned around in just enough time to watch both naked versions of Oni Lee fall apart and vanish as he felt his shadow clone die. 'Yeah, that's annoying,' he thought as he put the remote back in his inventory. 'Makes sense, you make a clone at your teleport point and then your power erases the original.'

'You should get out of there, Lung is on his way,' S. Amy warned him.

'Working on it, I just need to grab Oni Lee's mask. I'll set up the portal, make sure Taylor is in place to copy Lung,' Myst replied over the mental connection as he ran towards where Oni Lee was so he could claim his mask then get to the alley to set everything up since they had less time than he'd like.'

'You're lucky you're fireproof,' S. Rose said as she watched Lung leave the bar he'd been in and start walking towards the street in the mirror. 'You realize he's going to go ballistic when he realizes that Oni Lee is dead, right?'

'I'm aware,' Myst agreed as he made a shadow copy of Oni Lee's mask, hoping he could get Lung through a portal without setting half the city on fire. 'How close is he to where Taylor is hiding?'

'Two blocks, she should be able to spot him,' S. Rose replied.

'Should be five blocks to reach your present location,' S. Amy said after checking the map on her phone. 'Assuming they didn't make a mistake with the map.'

'How many people does he have with him?' Myst asked as he made a shadow copy of the wooden mask. He quickly made shadow copies of the grenades clipped to the lunatic's belt then sacrificed three of them to boost a fourth and made a shadow copy of it. He picked up the boosted grenade and slipped it in his inventory then headed for the nearest alley, wanting to get out of sight so people wouldn't see him make any shadow clones, a naked Oni Lee could easily be explained as a glitch of his powers, random people, not so much.

0o0o0

'Seven feet? Eight feet?' Taylor asked herself as she watched Lung through her binoculars, trying to judge how tall he was by the thugs around him. 'At least seven feet, probably closer to eight.' She frowned when he suddenly turned and glared at one of his thugs that was holding a cell phone. 'I need to copy a cat or a bird I can use to spy.'

She recopied him when he turned and started running, seeming to grow another half a foot as he charged down the street. 'Block and a half, block and a quarter, yeah that's close enough,' she thought as she recopied him, updating her shadow clone. 'What is he planning?'

'He's going to rip the person that killed Oni Lee apart or force him to join,' T.S. Lung replied.

Taylor used her twin's power and copied Lung's dragon mask then slipped back inside the empty apartment and let her shadow binoculars vanish. She walked into the bathroom and checked the mirror, wanting to make sure that her disguise was still in place, finding a strange male teenager with Asian features looking back at her. 'We need to get an invisibility stamp or maybe a notice-me-not stamp.'

'This better be worth it,' Taylor thought as she left the empty apartment, knowing the hallway was empty because of the shadow clone with a spray bottle that was washing windows in the hallway. 'At least running the ABB will let me take it apart,' she told herself as she watched the mirror with her copy of Rose, wanting to make sure Lung hadn't decided to follow some 'random' teenager a block away in defiance of all logic or reason. 'At least people are already fleeing, it's like they've done this before.'

'Is that a surprise?' T.S. Rose asked as she watched Lung leaving his minions behind, too angry or arrogant to care.

'I guess not,' Taylor admitted as she slipped out the side window and climbed out onto the fire escape once Lung was past the alley. 'Do you think Myst's crazy plan will work?'

'Most of the ABB aren't particularly bright,' T.S. Armsmaster offered.

'You work with what you have,' T.S. Lung complained.

Taylor closed the window then flew up to the opposite roof, knowing the building would block Lung's view as long as she stayed low enough and towards the far side of the roof. 'Is that why you kidnap girls?'

'It brings in money and helps extract money from the gang members rather than letting them get their fun elsewhere,' T.S. Lung explained.

'Lovely,' Taylor thought to herself as she flew across the rooftop, moving fast enough to almost be a blur thanks to Myst giving her a copy of Alexandria's flight ability. 'Best damn teammate ever, even if some of his schemes could use work.'

'What percentage of the gang are decent people?' T.S. Rose asked.

'Maybe thirty percent, the Empire makes recruiting Asians easy, if you don't join, you don't get protection and you probably end up stabbed, it doesn't take long before they start to enjoy the perks,' T.S. Lung replied smugly.

'Try to avoid getting caught,' T.S. Armsmaster warned her. 'I'd have to bring you in.'

'Not planning on it,' Taylor assured him as she flew over to where Myst was crouched down and waiting for Lung. "What went wrong?"

"No clue, Oni Lee flipped out and tried to stab me after saying I shouldn't be there," Myst complained in a whisper. "I'm guessing he thought I was someone else."

"What are the odds?" Taylor asked as she crouched down next to the short wall and watched her shadow clones setting things up in front of the portal that stretched across the alley and connected it to the same alley in the deserted city they’d transferred the Merchants to.

"Considering everyone has at least a couple of doppelgangers running around and Oni Lee was insane, not sure," Myst admitted. 'How long until Lung gets here?'

‘Thirty, maybe forty seconds, you might want to make a shadow clone and shoot him, just to make sure he comes your way,’ S. Rose told him at the same time she said the words, wanting T.S. Rose to hear so that Taylor would.

"I'll deal with it," Taylor assured him as she sent one of her thugs to take a shot at Lung and moved the rest of them through the portal so that he'd have a reason to run through in case her bait didn't make it.

"Best of luck," Myst told her as he conjured a shadow version of Oni Lee's mask in front of Taylor's minion. "Might as well wave the mask at him."

"That's cold," Taylor said as she had her minion pick up the mask and head to the mouth of the alley, glad that the minion wasn't particularly important.

"I'm aware," Myst replied, finding it hard to care since this version of Lung didn't seem to have any redeeming features unlike some of the others he'd read about. 'If this works, we can use Taylor's shadow clone and get rid of a couple of hundred idiots, then do the same with the Empire and their supporters.'

Taylor had her minion wave Oni Lee's mask at Lung then shoot him in the chest. She was reasonably sure the mask of his dead second in command pissed him off more than the bullet as she had her minion dive into the alley as Lung gestured and tossed a fireball at him.

'Fuck! Fuck this shit, I'm out!' her minion screamed over the mental connection as he sprinted for the portal, trying to avoid dying.

Taylor aimed and started shooting at Lung with her other minions as he charged around the corner, glad that everyone had already fled and that there was an empty brick wall behind Lung so she wouldn't hit anyone.

Myst waited until Lung stepped through the portal then hit the button, closing the portal and trapping him in the abandoned Brockton Bay. "You're up."

Taylor created a copy of Lung then used her twin's power to give him a copy of his clothes and mask. 'Tell your people you turned the idiot to ash, I'll have more orders for you in a couple of hours once we've sorted out some of the Empire capes.'

'Understood,' T.S. Lung replied, fairly sure the Empire was going to push things once they learned that Oni Lee was dead.