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Right Time, Wrong Place
By: T.W.
A man sat on the street of an alley, his head leaned against the wall.
He was in a state of half asleep half awake. Something nudged him in
the ribs, not gently. He opened his eyes to see a man wielding a
baseball bat raised high to strike.
This new figure wore the leather jacket and beat-up pants and shirt of
many of the thugs in Paragon City. On his face he wore the top half of
a human skull.
“You’re on Skull territory, get up or you’re a dead
man” he threatened. The movement of the real bottom jaw and the
stiffness of the top jaw with teeth, looked like an odd overbite and
made the man stifle a laugh.
The man put up a hand, palm out, as if to say “hold on a
second”, and used the other to help him up. Before he had moved
several bolts of white electricity shot out of his open hand, lifting
the Skull off the ground, throwing him in an unconscious heap across
the alley.
Voltech stood up from the alley street; he looked with pity upon the
unconscious Skull and walked away. It had been almost two months since
the collapse of the Dark Leader’s underground temple.
Voltech’s hair was long, a little passed shoulder length. His
face was clean shaven but dirty and almost unrecognizable. He wore
fingerless gloves a white T-shirt and black cargo pants.
He passed several people crowded around a mall displaying TV’s on
the outside window. On the TV was the Paragon City News Network, with
the usual message. “….Kings Row business district is being
rebuilt after the collapse a few months ago,” spoke the
anchorwoman with her jerky head movements to make her look both cunning
and clever, or some one with an odd twitch. “Again, Statesman
wants to remind the citizens and loyal heroes of Paragon City to be on
the look out for destructive heroes such as this character.”
The TV showed Voltech without his glasses standing in the middle of the
destroyed temple and surrounding buildings, the darkness in the temple
still swarming around him, a look of hatred still on his face.
Statesman appeared on screen, “its heroes like this Voltech that
give Paragon City a bad name. We are a City of Heroes. Heroes should be
trust worthy, loyal….” He started repeating the hero
be-attitudes. Suddenly all the TV’s had exploded and the people
scattered, no one noticing the electricity around Voltech’s
fingers.
‘A bad name’ that was funny. Had he been the one to destroy
the temple after the Dark Master’s attacking, they’d be
pinning a medal to his costume. As he entered another alley he noticed
Skulls ducking behind dumpsters and hiding behind buildings, dragging
their girlfriends along. The temple did have more lasting effects on
him, for example, most Skulls who recognized him left him alone,
getting out of sight and range as quick as possible.
That was another thing, he thought, “range”; he had been
losing it. His blasts were stronger than ever but dissipated at short
range. Also his rage, he didn’t have to fight it. It was a
natural thing. He dealt with his few attackers quickly and quietly,
inflicting as much damage as possible but never tormenting or killing
unless it was forced upon him. He fought with a fury that grew
consistently as a fight lasted.
A Skull jumped out of the alley he had just passed. Voltech turned
around to the barrel of a gun inches from his face, behind him not 3
feet back was a wall. “Any last words Voltech?” said the
prideful Skull.
If he was farther away Voltech would have gambled with his
invincibility that all heroes have, but a bullet between the eyes at
point-blank might prove more than he could handle. The Skull squeezed
the trigger; Voltech jerked his head to the left.
Everything went in slow-motion except for him. The shell sprung out of
the gun twirling slowly in the air, the bullet left the chamber almost
visible. As this was happening Voltech had moved away from the point,
spun around to get behind the Skull. The Skull reacted before he could
get fully behind him, turning around gun still at shoulder height.
As he almost completed a full turn around, Voltech hit him in the chest
with a charged punch. The Skull flew back cracking the stone wall
behind him. Voltech looked at his hands, he had never moved that fast
before.
Voltech heard the sound of a super-speedster running down the alley.
Voltech barely had finished hiding when Shadow Pain of the Onami pulled
up and examined Voltech’s victim, next to her landed N0VA 1 also
of the Onami.
“Here’s another victim of electricity,” said Shadow pointing to the electric burns on his chest.
“Volt must have hit him hard,” said Nova looking at the crater in the wall.
“Yah, c’mon he can’t be far we should find him soon.” Shadow Pain took off as did N0VA.
Voltech dropped from his hiding place. So the Onami was looking for him
to, he had not been to the base since the collapse. They probably
wanted to talk to him and ask pestering questions as he sat strapped to
a chair with a bright light in his eyes. He had to get away from here,
far away from here.
An eighteen-wheeler proved as a useful mode of transportation, Voltech
hopped on top using electricity to stick himself to the top of the
truck and enjoyed the ride.
~~~~
He pulled up to the worst fate imaginable, a country bar. The sound of
the music was like a funeral song for Voltech. He accepted his fate and
walked up to it. He entered, it was worse then he thought it
was….Clean! His first thought was to walk up to the bar, but
thought better. It was possible that his picture was on more then just
the Paragon City News. He took a table a ways away.
He looked at the bar again, this time he saw something that made him
glad he hadn’t gone to the bar. Dancing on the bar surrounded by
a bunch of other men was a beautiful blonde; flirtatious but with no
one in particular.
At once Voltech thought of the horrible situation he would have been in
had she drawn attention to him at the bar. Every eye would be on him as
soon as she recognized his TV picture.
As if reading his thoughts, she dismissed herself from the other men
and danced her way to his table and sat on top of it. She wore tight
blue jeans, a tank top and a cowboy hat. She began to strike up a
conversation. “You seem as if you’re not enjoying
yourself.” She said to Voltech her head was tilted down and
several strands of her blonde hair fell in front of her face, very
seductive.
“You seem to be enjoying yourself to much,” Voltech said
sourly, the blonde backed up, eyes wide with shock. “Sorry,
it’s just I…..” he searched for words, “do you
watch any TV?”
“Barely any,” she said shaking her head, Voltech stiffened less. “What’s your name?”
Voltech scratched his chin for a second, “V, just call me V. I’m not from around here.”
The woman laughed eyeing his clothes and appearance, “I would
have to agree with you there. So what brings you here anyways?”
Before he could answer a large trucker came up and asked, “This
man bothering you miss?” Voltech shot him a warning glance, but
she only said.
“No he’s fine,” the man left swaying slightly. The
blonde sighed silently, “You know, they are not really concerned
for me, but afraid of my partner.”
“Partner?” Voltech asked looking around, “Exactly who is your partner and what are you partners in.”
“Well he hardly ever comes in. he should be-” that’s
as far as she got. The windows on either side of the bar door exploded
inward. A painful cry went out from everyone who got hit by the shining
missiles of glass.
Voltech and the blonde had ducked under the table and were not visible
by the crossbow Warriors that were entering threw the broken windows.
Suddenly the door exploded off its hinges, skidding across the floor to
the opposite side of the bar.
In came an almost fully armored Warrior, he held a long sword which he
casually plucked out of the floor boards as he walked to a point in the
bar. Behind him entered 6 warriors holding torches and several dozen
more holding different weapons.e excepted his fate and walked up to
it.Hhhhda
Voltech looked at the blonde who didn’t have the expression of
fear he had expected, but one of fierce determination. “I know
you probably want to beat the crap out of these guys” Voltech
whispered to her, “but please, I don’t want to have to
worry about you, stay here.”
The lead torch men had made a circle around the middle of the bar. The
leader kicked out of the circle a severely injured man on the floor and
stopped in the middle of the circle. With one gauntleted hand he
plucked up a floor board then another, then another.
Voltech, still under the table, analyzed the situation, and gave a
rough estimate of how many enemies there were, he concluded how fun
this was going to be. He placed both feet on the legs of a chair and
aimed.
The leader reached down into the hole he made in the floor and grabbed
a small chest. The chest glowed with a dark blue light and had runes
all over the metal frame. Suddenly a chair came skidding across the
floor and knocked the leader’s feet out from under him.
Voltech jumped out from under the table, electricity flowing from his
hands. He landed in the middle of a large cluster of armed Warriors. He
was so surrounded that the crossbows on the outer circle couldn’t
get a good enough shot and he was able to deal in hand to hand.
The Warrior leader still clutched the chest, he watched as an ill-kept
man with long hair, dressed in a white T-shirt and cargo pants, and
completely out of the country bar scene attacked his Warriors.
Everywhere he went Warrior after Warrior fell to his electrical
punches. He weaved in and out dodging swinging swords and chopping axes.
The leader signaled to his men and everyone drew weapons and slowly
began to overwhelm the lone hero. The Leader and six of his body
guards, the one holding torches, had drawn weapons and were leaving the
bar.
Slowly more and more Warriors kept crowding around Voltech. Several
bolts from the crossbows stuck out in various places on his torso. Just
when Voltech was being almost completely overwhelmed a man dressed in
civilian clothes came threw one of the broken windows.
Taken completely by surprise the Warriors couldn’t react before
the new player started fighting into the first line of Warriors holding
crossbows. Equally surprising was the frail figure of the blonde who
Voltech was talking to, knocking Warriors over tables and chairs with
fists sparkling with energy.
Voltech admired the two contrasts; on his right was a heavy muscled man
who didn’t even seem to be slightly worried that he looked like a
walking pin cushion, dealing blows with shrouded fists that
didn’t move his targets in the least. And in front of him was the
beautiful, skinny blonde who avoided getting hurt as much as possible,
knocking people across the bar.
Voltech captor’s eyes shifted to the new heroes. That half a
second was all he needed, he ran from Warriors wading threw the others.
Voltech didn’t deal in absolutes, what he knew he could do seemed
boring, and what he never did before he saw as a challenge. And what he
thought right now, he had never dared before.
He came close to the wall of the bar using the speed he used against
the Skull. Not exactly super speed, but fast, really fast. He tore up
the wall with traction to spare; he completed an arc up and down the
wall gaining momentum.
He launched himself head first into the Warriors, fist spread on both
sides. He was a human battering ram covered in electricity, traveling
20 miles an hour in a small area. He hit, hard, cutting through the
Warriors like a hot knife threw butter.
He turned, slowing down coming up behind the dark wielder.
“Excuse me” he murmured, planting his feet on the
man’s back. Sensing what he was going to do the man stood up
straight like spring board and launched Voltech into the air.
He came up, fists together, charging for a Thunder Slam. He landed in
the midst of the remaining Warriors, not that there were many left at
this point, and with a loud eruption of electricity they were thrown in
every direction.
Everything was calm for a second, but only a second. One stirring
Warrior grabbed a lighter, lit, and threw it across to the bar table
where broken bottles of alcohol were scattered. In less time then a dry
forest in California could, the whole bar was in flames. The fire was
slowly creeping to several large kegs in the back room.
“Time to go” said the dark scrapper; he grabbed the blonde
who was staring sadly at the burning bar. They all jumped out the
windows at the same time, rolling down the slight hill the bar was on.
They reached the bottom just as the whole place blew into a shower of
splintered wood and burning ash.
“Well,” Voltech said, “that bar was more fun then I had ever hoped, even if it was country style.”
The large man gave a half smile and the blonde just stared with surprise.
~~~~
Voltech excused himself from the questioning police officers. He gave a
full, edited report, about what had happened. He made it sound like
they were the only civilian survivors of the explosion caused by the
Warriors and several stick of dynamite. But as soon as he tried to
mention Rikti war ships invisible over the bar causing the large
eruption of thunder in the bar. They lost interest.
Voltech returned to Vindea and Wraith, laughing at his over exaggerated
story to the cops. Volt had never heard Wraith say a word; Vindea was
the one who introduced him.
“Wraith thinks you’re a good fighter,” Vindea said
waving her hand towards the solitary man. “I think he wants you
to meet this brother Myth.”
“You are to kind,” Volt said, “and I’m sure I
would be equally impressed by Wraith’s kindness had he opened his
mouth to speak.”
In the background Voltech saw Wraith pursing his lips as if trying to
stop a smile or laugh. “Lead the way, maybe our mute friend will
find his voice.” He said. Vindea started walking down the beat up
road away from the crater that was the bar.
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