From Columbus Ohio to New York is about an eight hour drive, so to pass the time I have been musing on my power.
It really is far more malleable than I ever thought it would be.
For one, I have found that I don't explicitly have to have my extra's come out from my back. I can just as easily, say, bring my ribbons out from my stomach instead.
It's actually pretty easy to do too, though I think I'm going to try and keep that under wraps, because it would be funny as hell if someone thinks that my power can only come from my back, only to get skewered right in front of me.
A bonus of that is that I would be able to see their faces directly.
But even with all my musings, there is only so much I can do to pass the time while driving and beyond simply moulding my appendages that I should really come up with proper names for into different shapes, nothing really happens.
That is, until about halfway into the journey when it is starting to get dark and I am getting bored of the monotonous drive.
At that point, I decide to pull into a small town called Bedford.
Now, as I am only passing through, I don't bother to stop and take out my new phone that I bought yesterday to look up the local cape scene.
However, as I am making my way to a motel to rest in, my drive is interrupted by something I deem interesting enough to delay me.
Driving down the road as I am, in the late hours of the evening, I am greeted by the sight of what appears to be a robbery of some convenience store.
Not just that however, as despite most of them wearing dark clothes you would expect from night time thieves, 𝘰𝘯𝘦 of them is wearing a far more elaborate costume and mask.
In other words, a cape.
She is wearing a light grey shawl over baggy clothes made up of dark browns and greys, with another piece of cloth wrapped around her head that has a few strands of dark hair spilling out and a cap sticking out the front.
Her mask is a simple black domino with a balaclava covering her lower face and as she stands in the street, waving her hands and shouting at who I presume are her underlings.
I watch with interest as her eyes seem to leave their sockets and start floating above her head, looking both ways down the street.
Of course, she notices me, but as I am simply staying in my car and not doing anything, she seems to deem me a non factor and gets back to 'work'.
That is when another cape arrives, this one I presume to be a hero, purely based off of their brightly coloured costume, filled with yellows and greens as it is.
They start shouting something another at each other, and I belatedly realise that I could actually hear the words if I roll my window down.
But then I decide that I don't really care, as I just got an idea.
I watch for a bit longer as the two of them proceed to fight. The villain's power is clearly to split her body apart which is nifty, while the hero's I guess to be something along the lines of sudden acceleration, but with a cooldown.
Unfortunately for the hero, they seem to have the disadvantage and it isn't long before the villains underlings are out of sight, bounty in tow.
Realising this, the villain makes use of the fact that they can apparently telekinetically control their dismembered parts to split into pieces and fly away, easily escaping the disgruntled hero.
Though I do notice that she carried her feet with her hands, so I assume that her power doesn't technically let her fly, meaning she can't levitate her feet.
Not much of a limitation really, it just seems like a mild annoyance really, or a smokescreen of some sort.
Ah well, it's not like it will matter for long.
Ignoring the downtrodden hero, I pull in to the motel and go book myself a room, paying only for a single day and still nearly emptying myself of my cash.
I really should get a bank account or something.
I assume there is some kind of banking option for villains that won't get my funds frozen. Then of course, all I will need is to actually make some money, but that really shouldn't be too hard.
Especially with my idea in mind.
After paying for the room, I get myself settled in, throwing off all of the covers, because it's a motel and they are probably covered in all sorts of disgusting shit.
Then I just play some solitaire for an hour or so, followed by some minesweeper before I finally decide to stop being lazy.
Moving to my backpack, I take out my cape outfit, consisting of only my black toothed smiling clown mask with my titular pink tear, as well as the striped prison garments I have grown surprisingly attached to.
They 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 a gift from a friend after all.
It only takes a brief moment to get changed and then after double checking that my door is locked, even putting a set of draws in front of it, I climb out of the window and start making my way more or less where I assume the earlier villain to have gone.
Now, you may be wondering how I am going to find her?
Well, the answer to that is quite simple actually.
Bedford is a very small town, so I am just going to run around until I pick her out, something that shouldn't be too hard considering how easily I can smell peoples locations combined with the fact that capes smell distinctly different than normals do.
It only takes me another hour and a half before I find their scent and then another ten minutes to follow it back to a small block of flats, only three stories tall.
Making my way on over, get inside easily enough by just pushing a small blade of whatever my power is made up of out of my elbow and using that to destroy the lock.
I could have pushed it out of my hand, but it's easier to do it this way, presumably because it's closer to the 'source'.
No alarm goes off thankfully and I continue following the scent until I am on the second floor and standing in front of apartment number 4.
Here I pause as I think to myself, how should I do this?
Then I remember that I am already in costume and without spare clothes, so I can't exactly pretend to be a neighbour asking for sugar or some shit.
Ah well, no need to make it complicated.
It's not like it will matter anyway.
If fact, there's no point in even bothering to risk anything. I might as well just go with an anticlimactic victory.
Though I should be careful not to just kill her immediately, after all the whole reason I'm here is that she seems to be reasonably successful as a villain, so she probably has some cash stacked up that I can 'requisition'.
Decision made, I knock on the door three distinct times.
𝘒𝘯𝘰𝘤𝘬 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘤𝘬 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘤𝘬
"One minute!" I hear her shout, muffled and quiet as it is through the door.
At the same time, I bring out my new tail alone and bring it around until it is facing the same way as me, before splitting it into pieces, like a frayed wire tip.
I line each of the tiny lines that make up my tail against specific points on the door and I wait until I hear her soft footsteps approaching.
Then, once I can feel that she is just on the other side of the door, I 𝘮𝘰𝘷𝘦.
My tails burst forward, easily penetrating the door and I quickly wrap them around the woman inside, hoping that she can't split herself into too small pieces to escape, something I guessed was a limitation because if she could turn herself into a fine mist, I'm sure it's something she would do more often.
As planned, the only sound that gets out is the soft thunk of the thin door being penetrated and the muffled scream of surprise that comes from little miss villain.
Feeling that she is fully withing my grasp, my tail produces even more miniature wires of flesh, which now probably number around a hundred or more, which quickly move to start ripping the door to pieces, so that I can walk through without letting go of her.
"Hi there.~" I whisper to her once the door is out of the way, meeting her wide brown eyes with my own blood red ones.
Moving forward, I carry her ahead of me into the front room, my tail easily capable of carrying a single woman without strain.
Once I take a seat on her sofa, I manipulate her so that she is kneeling before me, just because I can.
"Now~ you may be wondering what is going on right about now hmm?~ Well, it's quite simple~ you see, I am in the need of some money and after watching your successful job earlier, I figured you'd be good for it yeah?~" I explain to her.
Idly, I notice just how scared she seems to be and I can't help but wonder if she is just a coward by nature or if I'm scarier than I thought.
Then again.. there may be another reason.
"Say~ do you know who I am by chance?~" I ask, receiving a frantic and shaky nodding in return.
Ah, that explains it then. She must have seen Fool's video.
"...Are you a fan?~" I ask, purely for my own amusement as she, rather predictably, starts nodding her head with even more fervour.
I get the feeling I'm being lied to.
The thought makes me smile.
"I'm going to release your mouth now~ if you shout or scream, then I'm sure I don't need to explain what will happen?~"
She shakes her head and with that, I do as I said I would and stop covering her mouth.
While she is gathering her bearings, I speak up once more.
"Since you're such a big fan of mine, I assume you won't have a problem with telling me where you keep all of your money?~" I ask, my voice saccharine sweet.
"N-n-no", she gulps, managing to speak further without stuttering, though her voice still wavers noticeably, "I keep it all in the top right cupboard."
I nod in thanks to her, glad for the simplicity of the situation, but after glancing over to her kitchenette I decide not to bother getting up and instead just sprout some ribbons.
A pair of my ribbons, shaded with a lighter violet than my armour that is almost dark enough to be black or my tail that is the deep red colour of flesh, reach out behind me and open up the top right cupboard, taking out a black sports bag and bringing it over.
Opening it with my hands, I am pleased to find that it is indeed filled with cash.
With a smile on my face, I turn to face the woman once again, seeing that she has relaxed marginally now that I have got what I want.
Sucks for her I guess.
"Thank you.~ Now you can tell me where you keep the 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘵 of your money, and I can be on my way.~" I say, causing her eyes to widen once again and her breath to hitch.
Struggling in my grasp for a moment, she quickly starts talking again.
"T-that's it! That's everything! I swear it!" She exclaims, but I don't have any ability to tell truth from lie, and she's already dead anyway, so I might as well double check just in case there is more money.
"Now now~ don't lie to me young miss~ I can tell when you do.~" I lie, ignoring the irony for the moment as my tail makes its way back to covering her mouth to silence her.
With her unable to make too much noise, I bring her arm over to my slowly watering mouth and I roll up her sleeve, lifting my mask as I do and start rubbing my lips over her forearm for a moment, staring her in the eye as I do so, watching, feeling how her fear grows with every moment.
Then, under her unwilling stare, I take a hearty bite out of her arm, relishing in her muffled scream more than the barely decent taste.
Once she has calmed down a little, I free her mouth again as I speak.
"I'll ask again~ where is the rest of your ill begotten gains?~" I ask, pretty sure that I already know the answer anyway.
"I-I-I don't h-have anyth-ing else. P-please believe me." She pleads, but I don't listen.
Instead I just cover her mouth again and open my own for another bite, a smile gracing my features.
Repeating the process again, I speak once more, my tone unchanging.
"Another chance~ where is the money?~"
Half an hour later and I am making my way back to the motel.
It turns out that she really didn't have any extra money lying around anywhere else.
Ah well, you live and you learn.
Heh.
Poor choice of words.
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A/N: He~llo! Dear readers!
It is one in the morning
Also, just fair warning but the next few chapters are kind of a buffer as I tried to figure our what to do for the next arc, so they might not bee too great, but I've got an idea now and I already know what I'm going to be doing the the next arc's after it.
(5+)Advanced chapters with the links below!
pat/reon.com/user?u=41732867 (get rid of the first slash)
or
https://ko-fi.com/bored_works
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