Magnetic Attraction 27 (Patreon)

Magnetic Attraction
Chapter 27

-VB-

“It is a tragedy, what happened this Tuesday.”

---

“Fucking move!” Victor shouted at Othala and Crusader. The three of them jumped out of the way as a refrigerator dropped on top of them.

It crashed right where Victor had been moments ago.

Victor rolled away with perfect ease, but the attacks didn’t stop there.

Just as they were about to clear the alley, another cape skidded into the exit to block them.

In his hand, he had multiple pieces of iron rods.

He hurled them, and Crusader gasped as something impacted his chest before he could even blink.

He stumbled backward from the pain while the object in question, a rod, dropped to the floor with clinks.

And then there was a flicker, and those rods became grenades.

Live grenades.

He ordered his ghost projections to grab Victor and Othala, and tossed them up into the air and towards the edge of the alley’s walls.

---

I stood with head held high before the crowd of people who’ve come to see one of the richest in America come to pay tribute to the senseless loss of life Brockton Bay had seen this week.

The city’s denizens looked up towards me with exhaustion.

They were sick and tired of this but knew nothing else.

Standing here not as Eisenfeld but as Arthur Anders, the current guardian of Theodore Anders the heir of the Medhall Pharmaceutical, I must have looked like another outsider who didn’t know how shitty this city was.

“It hasn’t even been a month since the last Endbringer attack that devastated this very city, and the criminal underside has already caused a hundred people to die. And for what?”

---

“Crusader!” Victor roared in agony as he and Othala were pushed onto the ledge of the building’s rooftop just before the projections disappeared with the fiery background of explosion and smoke underneath them.

“Tsk, you couldn’t even die properly?”

His head snapped up, and Victor glared at the top hat-wearing bastard who ambushed them.

“Seriously, a Nazi parade in this day and age? I mean, come on, man. Have a sense of shame,” he grunted.

Victor pulled out his pistol… but it too changed into a live grenade. He quickly pushed it away, and just in time too. The grenade went off far enough away, but some of the shrapnel still struck his hand and arm.

“Haven’t you learned yet, buddy?” Trickster, the leader of the Travelers, asked. “The time of the Empire is over and you along with it.”

“Othala, run,” Victor grunted as he slid into a fighting stance. “They’re not going to let us leave this place alive. You have to run.”

“Vic-”

“Just run. Please.”

Victor heard Othala take one hesitant step and then another.

And then silence.

He whirled around and saw a mannequin where Othala should have been.

BANG.

His chest lurched forward without his input, and he staggered forward as strength began to rapidly leave him. He looked down and grimaced at the quickly staining his chest.

“One million dollar bonus for the death of a Nazi gang. The rest of my team members were squeamish, but this? This is fucking community service.”

Click.

BANG.

---

“Over a dozen local capes, most of them villains fought each other… for what?!” I demanded angrily.

Angry that Othala was missing.

“This wasn’t even a fight about territory, ideology, or even rivalry! They ran into each other and shot each other up! A true gang fight!”

The crowd grunted and vocalized their agreement.

“Is this what my hometown has become?” I reminded the people that I was one of them. That I came from this city. That I was born here. It made a few heads turn and others gave me more attention. “Tell me, where was the PRT and the Protectorate when the mercenaries responded faster to trouble?!”

---

Luke paused as he saw a van pull up. From within it, a bunch of unfamiliar capes walked out. Most of them looked like Case-53’s except for the very last cape. Dressed from head to toe in steel gray and black and with a welder’s mask to boot, she looked scary.

And he knew who she was: Faultline.

She was a mercenary that the Travelers had heard about. She was a successful and honest mercenary.

So why was she here?

“Hold!” he demanded as he turned towards them. “Why are you here?”

Faultline looked around once before she answered. “I’m here because my client doesn’t want any of the Empire to escape. Are you the lot that the rumor said was about to strike at the racists?”

‘Shit, people already knew about us?!’ Luke thought with panic. “Yeah. So what?”

“Good riddance to the racists. All of them were rapists, murderers, and thieves,” she replied coolly. “But your team don’t do things by halves, huh?”

Luke looked back at the alley and grimaced.

The plan had been to use the containment foam their team had nicked off of PRT agents in Boston, but Francis was way too eager for that bounty money.

And then something exploded atop the roof that Francis and the fleeing Empire capes were supposed to be at.

“The plan was to use containment foam,” he said out loud. “I don’t know why there are bombs going off.”

“Well-” Faultline spoke up but then the building shook. Her eyes widened and she quickly pushed her team back into the van.

People began to run out of the building, but it wasn’t fast enough.

“Trickster, get out of there!” Luke shouted towards the rooftop.

But then the building collapsed.

He ran out of the way as the building crumbled.

---

“How do we keep ourselves safe when the very protectors we trust your lives with are not there?!”

People shouted back. Some disagreed with me vocally, but the majority of the crowd agreed with me.

After all, three buildings collapsed in the ensuing fight and a hundred people had died. On top of that, the dead weren’t the minorities or even the poor but the middle-class and upper-low class workers and office drones working in the buildings when the Travelers’ reckless attacks brought the buildings down.

“Were there other attacks in the city? No! Was there a crisis within their ranks? No! So why did they not show up?! I was in the same areas as the PRT headquarters, and I showed up faster than them when I heard the explosion! Where were the PRT and the Protectorate?!”

The people roared. They demanded answers.

I held a hand up, and the crowd piped down. Even if it was for now, I had them dancing on the palm of my hand.

---

“No…” Luke muttered as he stared at the ruined tophat and the mangled hand sticking out of the rubble. “No no no no-!”

“What the hell is going on here?!”

He glanced and saw some rich guy getting out of his BMW. He ignored him and started to dig for Francis.

He wept when he saw dull eyes staring back at him.

---

The Empire was gone.

The Travelers were neutered.

---

Noelle stared at the flying drone that had somehow gotten into her trailer.

And then there was light.

---

“I can no longer leave my safety - our safety - just in the hands of the state and federal government’s agencies. Not after they have failed us time and time again. For that reason, I am hereby declaring that I, Arthur Anders of the Anders Solutions Corporations, will assemble a hero team of my own, and will take charge of our own security!”

The crowd cheered.

This was a way for my girls to have new cape identities.

All of my problems were starting to disappear, and it was a sensation I relished.