章 13: Hi mom! I'm famous!
"Do it again! Do it again!"
An excited laugh comes from the hooded super heroine after hearing the demands of the little girl who was wearing a t-shirt with a logo that was the same, but larger than the logo that was on the heroine's chest.
"Of course! Anything for my cute fan!" she replied.
With that, she carried the little girl like a princess as she spun around flying in the air above the crowd who watched in awe as they recorded with their phones.
"Higher! Higher!"
The girl's pleas were heard by all the spectators in the place and in one corner you could see how the smile of the alleged mother of the girl became a little brittle when the heroine not only decided to fulfill the whim of her fan, but began to do pirouettes and maneuvers that even if I say so myself, looked quite exciting.
It was noticeable in the video how the heroine suddenly became a little stiff in the air, and quickly interrupted the whole show by taking the girl to her mother.
"I want to continue!" the girl demanded.
The hooded heroine shook her head slightly before tapping her finger on the girl's nose, making her giggle as she tried to cover it with her hands.
"I'm sorry, cutie, it seems someone else needs my help right now."
The girl's eyes widened.
"You have to help them!" she shouted.
The heroine seemed proud that the girl quickly realized how important the situation was compared to her own desires.
"Of course! After all, that's what I'm here for!"
She stroked the girl's head and then shot off into the sky, to continue her usual purpose of helping others.
"Thank you, Rogue!"
A final scream from the girl was heard in the background before the video came to an end.
And there I was, Rogue, the heroine in question, a week after that event, watching the video that had gone viral before apparently anyone could do anything about it.
"One million views…"
A million views. I repeat it again in my mind, still not quite believing it.
I started thinking about this while floating above some not-so-tall buildings in a Brooklyn neighborhood.
Almost two months after my debut as a superhero, I help everyone I meet on my way, and I can finally feel how little by little my fame is reaching really serious levels with this.
This isn't a video about me defeating some mutant, destroying a weapons cache, or shutting down any other clandestine operation, no. Just me, my number one little fan, and an adorable moment.
And for some reason, I wouldn't have it any other way.
I've fought a lot of fools over these weeks and even without any new powers, I've done so without much trouble so far. Even against mutants.
Are you very strong? Let's float.
Too fast? Topsy's gravity shift and caught by Kaiser.
Do you fly? Loss of powers with Animos.
You throw stuff? Oh, man, you can bet what I throw is a lot better.
I feel like I'm not stronger than anyone else in many things, but I'm versatile enough that it doesn't matter.
Still, my favorite moments have always been when I'm not just helping people, but living with them. Bringing smiles wherever I go.
Flying around The Big Apple and having someone shout my name as I fly by? I can hardly put into words how good that feels.
Of course, I want to be recognized as someone strong, invincible even, but I don't want to be just someone strong who can destroy things better than other people, no. I want to bring smiles to others, hope that things can be better.
I like Marvel, but I've always felt that their superheroes are mostly a bit… crude? They all feel like they're soldiers ready to get their hands dirty and beat the shit out of anyone who messes with them or the world, so in that sense, Marvel and Worm's superheroes aren't much different.
I don't want to be like that.
I'd like to be more like the DC heroes. The movies try to give them a different interpretation, but I've always considered them to be the most idealistic. The ones who bring hope and peace, who are liked by everyone, even by their villains.
Unless you're from Gotham, but that's another story.
Sure, I said all that about DC, Marvel, or Worm, but I'm just talking about the general feeling that franchises give me, there are exceptions after all.
DC has dark, street-smart heroes like Batman or Green Arrow. Marvel has bright heroes like Spider-Man or…
Umm…
Spider-Man?
And Worm has… Scion? I mean, before… you know… Gold Morning. Not that it was a big deal, considering he could pass as an autistic person at best, a mid-functioning sociopath if you were realistic, and something considerably worse if you were correct.
Legend?
He was a bit useless, but at least he was charismatic…
Worm is pretty screwed.
Before I continued with my reflections, I began to sense increasingly common criminal actions and emotions in the Jed Taylor and Effervescent detention camp.
Although with Effervescent it could be fairly clear that a crime was occurring from the victims' emotions of fear, this was not always reliable, so I decided to put in some effort into better understanding Jed Taylor's senses of living beings.
While its 200-meter detection range is nearly half that of Effervescent, it was far more reliable at detecting crime, and that quality only improved over time.
Normally, even though Jed Taylor is constantly active while I'm on patrol, whatever I feel with Jed Taylor is sort of in the background. However, with practice, something interesting happened. Over the weeks, I had developed a mental alarm system, a signal that alerts me when a crime is happening based on patterns I've come to recognize over time. Kind of like Superman's mental filter with his super hearing.
I have no idea how I managed to do something like that. However, I have an idea and if it's even remotely like how Skitter's bugs eventually began to behave without Skitter's consent then I was in serious trouble.
Still, right now was not the ideal time to think about that.
To start off, as I flew towards the location, I began to analyze what my super senses were telling me. The incident was not yet in Jed Taylor's range, so I could only use Effervescent.
One person scared and afraid for their life, definitely the victim and basically the one who made me activate my Effervescent alarm. Four more people who seemed a little nervous, relieved and excited at the same time, the aggressors.
They were closing in on the victim in question, and while I couldn't fly any faster, I could always do the old reliable.
Dispatch.
I open the bubble, I fly forward, I close the bubble, I open the bubble, I fly forward, I close the bubble, I open the bubble…
My old favorite high-speed maneuver. I seemed to be flashing in the air while flying at high speed until…
They entered the range of Jed Taylor.
Within Jed Taylor's range, I was able to better identify the figures of the attackers. It seemed that the victim, in this case, was an older gentleman. I couldn't tell his age, but I'd say he was around 60 years old. The attackers were a group of two girls and two boys, somewhat young, about sixteen or seventeen years old or so.
That surprised me a little. They were usually closer to 30 than 20, but this group in particular seemed way too young. Still, I can't let them get away with this.
Since they were in Jed Taylor's range this time, I could now start doing things before the old man gets hurt.
With a bending of my will, all the phantoms of the living beings in Jed Taylor's range moved around the old man. Most of them were slow and could only follow one command at a time, but for now the five largest phantoms generated by all parties at the scene served their purpose as an invisible wall while I and/or the other ghosts arrived.
I continued to alternate between entering and exiting Dispatch to reduce my arrival time to more than half.
One of the thugs who seemed to be pointing something at the elderly man decided to approach the man after suffering a sudden surge of anger.
However, as he was about to put his hands on the gentleman's shoulder, he became more and more frightened.
An invisible wall seemed to stop his movements.
Well, invisible to them, at least. It was obvious to me that some kind of ghostly figure was standing in the middle, blocking their way. Of course, the ghosts couldn't cover the old man completely, but I just needed them to buy time while I got to the place.
The thugs were frightened and seemed paralyzed by the thought of whether they should run or try to attack the old man. I wouldn't blame them if they thought he was some kind of mutant.
The old man was also surprised, I'm sure he knows he's not responsible, as the old man started looking around as if looking for who was responsible for this.
That was a bad move, because the thugs also realized that the old man wasn't the one who did it, and the one who seemed the smartest realized what it meant: reinforcements are going.
The thug with the alleged knife, put it in his pockets before he seemed to shout something to the others. They were startled before feelings of fear filled the alley. They were ready to run, however…
It was already late.
With a cool superhero drop that I definitely haven't practiced dozens of times, I stood before them in all my glory. Of course, I didn't destroy the public ground after my superhero drop, and I didn't hit them with a "Fear me!" aura, but I think I did a lot better than a certain heroine.
Everyone froze at my arrival. Yes, even the old man.
I stare at them for a while for dramatic effect.
"Stop criminal scum! You are under arrest!"
Hey man! don't be scared anymore! I'm the superhero here, you know?!
For some reason, almost everyone but one of the girls and the old man who was still scared went from fear to disbelief.
What? What happened?
The knife boy smiled as if he had fallen for his trap card and quickly unsheathed his gun.
Click.
Everyone stared in disbelief as his gun was now unrecognizable from before, with the firing system completely damaged and the muzzle of the gun had an oddly familiar hand that was making the famous peace sign.
Everyone stared in disbelief at the now damaged weapon, as if the weight of the situation had finally caught up with them.
"Idiots, that's the mutant running around putting on shows! We're screwed!"
The girl, frightened, seems to have finally come out of the shock she was in, because after shouting that, she decided to start running, but before she could get very far…
"Argh!"
She hit the ground after her feet could not advance more than a step or two. After the scream, the girl looked down at her feet and found them trapped inside chained shackles made of steel that seemed to have come out of the ground.
The others, including the old man, for some reason quickly looked down at their feet, where they realized that without having noticed before, their feet were already chained in the same way.
Yes, they never had the chance to run.
If these morons thought I wasn't doing anything while they stood there ogling me, almost out of their minds, they are sorely mistaken.
The girl who knew me just lay there on the ground, surrendering to her fate. The other girl was trying to break the steel chains with all her might while screaming more profanities than I even knew existed, some in Spanish too.
The guy with the gun seemed to be trying to find a way out, and the other guy seemed a little slower because he was still standing there doing nothing.
With a wave of my hands, I shot streams of what looked like dark ink towards the walls. To the disbelief of the others, eight clones of me created with the power of Seir emerged from the stain like a shadow, coming to life in the 3D world. I gave each pair of clones some zip ties to tie up the criminals as I approached the old man.
"Are you okay, sir?"
"Y-yes. Thank you for your help, miss…"
"Rogue, you can call me Rogue. Great heroine of New York."
Hearing my name, the gentleman suddenly felt much calmer as a sense of relief filled his emotional cloud.
"Aah… So you're that Rogue. May told me about you, you seem like a nice girl, Rogue. Keep it up."
May? Like, May Parker? I remember I helped her once during one of my first patrols. I didn't expect her to speak so highly of me for the small gesture, but it makes me very happy.
"Thank you for your support, sir!"
The man nodded and patted me on the shoulder.
"Shit, let me go!"
We were kind of ignoring it, but The Criminal Jr. Team™ were still there. It seems my clones were done with their task, so they just stood there waiting for further orders. It was kind of creepy, how they just stood there, not breathing, while staring into absolute nothingness.
As if sensing my intentions, they began to move their shoulders evenly while pretending to breathe and moving their heads as if looking at interesting things.
Yeah, it's still creepy. Even though they try to fulfill any thought or intention, even if it's not explicit, it's still pretty creepy.
Using that same ability, I made every clone disappear. After that using some Grue to surround the thugs. They'll freak out a bit, but I honestly can't stand to listen to them anymore.
I turned to the old man, who was looking at the cloud of absolute darkness with some fear.
Urgh!
That's why I don't like using Grue in front of witnesses. Apparently, seeing a cloud of absolute darkness that looks photoshopped in reality can be creepy.
"Excuse me, sir, would you like to wait for the police? While I have the confidence of the NYPD, your testimony could help keep them in jail."
I said in an attempt to get his attention. It's still true, though.
My improved relationship with the police after Yuri finished the most important paperwork made me realize a lot of interesting things. One of them was that my testimony didn't do much to keep some of the people I caught.
While it does give to the police a probable cause, unless the people I caught do something really serious, they won't last more than a week in jail. Considering these kids are almost certainly minors? At most, they'll get a scare from taking the gun away from their parents or something.
If I really want to make a change, victim witnesses can be crucial to achieving a fairer sentence.
The gentleman turned his attention away from Grue at my words. It seemed that I had achieved my goal of distracting him because he seemed less frightened and more contemplative.
"If you'll excuse me, Miss… I'd actually like to get going. I promised I'd help out with a charity event at FEST today and I wouldn't want to be late. Besides…
He looks at the boys inside Grue.
"I think these kids will get a big enough scare from the police and… Whatever that is."
"Of course, sir! No problem!"
The lord nodded before stepping around the cloud of darkness as he began to walk away from the scene. He didn't run, but I'm sure he walked a little faster than he should have.
Honestly, I didn't agree with him about the punishment of these guys. They may be young, but what happened here could have very easily ended in tragedy. The least they can do is serve the full sentence, however short it may be.
Still, I wasn't here to impose my will on anyone who doesn't do the same to others. And if the gentleman doesn't want to stay with the police, I won't stop him.
I was just starting to dial the police number when, for the first time in two months, my power decided to give me a new star.
Oh, no.
I don't know what I did to gain new power after two months of peace, but something tells me things are about to heat up.
However, I won't let that stop me, after all...
It's a new power baby!
I think I'm a little addicted to having new powers.
I brought the star closer, ready to discover my new power.
Damsel of Distress. Bronze.
Shit.
Well, it's not bad. It's basically a shotgun, which destroys everything around it, but it has two problems.
The first is that I can barely control when it activates, or rather, it's easier to fire it than not to. Even a scare would send a blaster bolt flying out of my arms.
The second is that it's a disintegration ray. Basically useless if I don't want to send someone to Saint Peter.
I probably kept it because, unlike Damsel of Distress (I'll call it Damsel from now on for short), I can shut off my powers and a blaster shotgun is always welcome for emergencies, but it seems like the kind of power that gathers cobwebs like Sundancer.
I took a deep breath.
Where are the Brute powers?!
No, no, no, remember, Rogue, you are a privileged person. It's only a matter of time before I'll have a good Brute power ready to help me fight crime.
Sigh.
Well, nothing to do.
I went back to what I was doing to call the police and have them come pick up the kids.
The phone only needed to ring once before my now regular assitant picked up the phone.
"Rogue! How long has it been since I heard your voice!" A high-pitched, lively voice responded.
"Greetings to you too, Sakura!" I replied happily.
After Yuri settled things with me and the police, I almost immediately got into a somewhat conspicuous fight with a group of mutants.
Yuri decided right then and there that it was best for me to have my own contact with the police. That contact is Sakura ("Call me Sakura-chan") she is a very lively girl. I have never met her in person, but she sounds young and full of energy, she is a sweetheart. I would like to take her out shopping or something, sure it would be fun, but despite what my first meeting with Maddy may seem like, until I actually did it, I myself didn't want anyone to know about my secret identity, so our relationship for now is only through these calls.
"You should call me more often! It can get a little boring around here when you don't bring me some action, you know?"
Then you should get busy doing other things instead of using your new position to slack off…
I didn't tell her that, of course.
"Don't worry, Sakura, I now have about four minors who tried to rob an elderly gentleman. Two of them are armed, but the weapons are deactivated in the usual way."
"Perfect! I'll send a patrol to your address. In the meantime, you don't have them in your blacky dark fog right now, do you?"
I grimaced. Grue is my least violent way of keeping people I arrest calm, so it's one of my most used powers for that. Apparently, though, some of the people I traps inside come out pretty scared, and the police have been complaining about it.
Who would have thought that the fear of darkness and isolation would be so common, right?
I ignored her question and simply gave her the address of the place before hanging up.
I decided to take the Grue fog off their heads while we waited for the police, although if they got too loud I would put it back on.
This time they were more obedient and, to my Effervescent senses, duly scared. I don't know if they were scared of me, of the darkness, or of the police.
About thirty minutes later I flew out of the place while saying goodbye to the police who were taking the boys away in their patrol cars.
I was flying through the air, reflecting a bit on today. Although it may not seem like it, the most important thing today, in my opinion, was without a doubt that viral video. It made me realize how much closer I am to my goal.
However, it made me realize something else. I need a medium-term goal. I haven't had anything like that up until now, I mean, it's not something that superheroes have, not really.
Heroes are rather… Reactionaries.
They react to what villains, criminals, or bad things happen in general. Their goals are to do good for X or Y, but there is no specific close goal.
Skitter was a bit of an exception to the rule in that regard, constantly seeking mid-term goals for herself, but even she started her career simply as a way to escape her horrible life.
I want something like that too.
Not the horrible life, just a medium-term goal to focus on until whatever canonical events need to happen, happen. There's a year or so until Avengers happens, and I basically have nothing to do until then.
Mmn… Get to SHIELD? I mean, it shouldn't be that hard; in fact, if La Maggia has it, I'm sure SHIELD has a giant file about me on their computers, HYDRA probably does too.
I wouldn't join them because that would go against my goal of basically being Superman, but surely they can give me information, training or equipment that I couldn't get anywhere else, so coming into contact with them, sooner rather than later, can't be a bad thing.
What about the sorcerers? I'm surprised the Ancient One hasn't come to my house or something, I honestly prefer it that way, I don't want anything to do with them.
I don't like magic, so I'll just keep them out of sight and out of mind, at least until the Ancient One dies, then I will see.
What about the mutants? I know Magneto is out there destroying things, and if he's here, surely the X-Men are out there too. I might as well take their targets for myself and help them out where I can.
However, their goals seem like the long-term thing that I have no idea how to deal with right now. Helping mutants.
I don't feel sorry for their problems, either, because I haven't really encountered many problems for being a mutant. Some people have given me the evil eye, but nothing that justifies the mess they think they're in.
It is also perfectly possible that it is because of my incredible charisma and that they are more tolerant here than in other places, so I don't want to give too much of an opinion.
Magneto is out of the question, and the X-Men tend to work in secret, which defeats my main purpose in the first place.
For now, I'll leave them alone.
Although I wonder what they think about a mutant like me going around doing what they've been doing for a while in public and people not hating me for it.
That same "fighting in the shadows" thing is also what keeps me from being as proactive in my battle against New York's many mobs as the other vigilantes are.
These gangs, as should be obvious, operate in hidden and isolated places. Tracking them down would not only be a pain, but it would do virtually nothing to help my goal of becoming important. If they come out of their cave, though, I'll hunt them down like rats. Until they do, I'm not interested in doing much else.
Hmm.
It seems like finding SHIELD is my best medium-term goal. It will allow me to access more targets and even get me closer to the "plot." Dealing with HYDRA might be a problem, but at least Scanner will finally see some use.
It's decided. Starting tomorrow I'll be looking for SHIELD, it's time for my superhero career to become more professional.
Another star approaches.
Huh, that was fast. What's up Power? Now you're not only into conflict but also monologues?
I approached the star and found…
Snubnose. Gray
Blaster: Fires a small bolt of electricity that deals a little damage and reduces the gravity of whoever it hits.
It's nothing special, but it's basically a portable Taser, so it's not bad.
With the power checked and the musings done, I started thinking about what to do for the rest of the day. I was going to continue patrolling as usual, but I remembered the FEST charity event that the gentleman mentioned earlier.
Maybe I can participate in this charity event, me too. It's always good to do some good in a more general way, and maybe I can bring more people.
A quick post on my social media promoting the event and my participation, and I took off towards the place.
クリエイターの想い 
Weaving_That
Weaving_That The power detector of my laptop charger has been damaged, so my computer is working at the minimum of absolute power. Result? The PC is so slow right now that it was not even able to execute the Gacha without a crash. Upload the chapter also was reaaaally slow.
Even so, it manages to work and here you have a new chapter. It works a bit like the introduction to what I hope is a moderately long arch.
With this we also reached 70k words ... and I still don't touch the mcu canon even with a stick. Help me.
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