Riverside City Chronicles | Book 1 | Riverside City [Capes & Cowls]

by VanDerHeyden, Paul C.

  “Yes, Hellion is the transport,” Janet says. “He was in the area, so we asked him to pick up your catch—it was your catch, correct?”

  “I can’t take credit, I didn’t lay a hand or power on him. Jinlong took him down, looks like it only took one punch,” Nightmare says with a bit of pride in her voice, she was proud of Jin for that hit.

  “Ah, after he registers we’ll credit him. Do you need anything else, Nightmare?” Janet asks, the sound of the keyboard subsiding.

  “No, I appreciate the quick service. Have a great day.”

  “You as well, Nightmare.”

  Nightmare hangs up and puts her phone away, then looks over at Hellion. He is over 6’ tall and his skin is the color of the night sky in the countryside. He has a black and red chain strapped around him like a bandolier. Black flames lick around his eyes and his long black hair billows in a nonexistent breeze.

  “How are you, Nightmare? Long time no see,” Hellion asks with a bit of a grin.

  “Fine,” she says.

  ‘Just dandy, Mr. Anton, I saw you yesterday if I didn’t miss you in the audience for your son’s speech.’ Kat thinks to Paul Anton, AKA Hellion, AKA Dante’s dad.

  “Excellent,” he replies professionally.

  ‘Great to see you too Kat. Is that who I think it is at your feet?’

  ‘Yeah, it is, and I had to knock him out to prevent him from killing Highrise. Leave that out of your report though, I’m hoping it was just Power Rush,’ Kat thinks back at him.

  ‘Ah, good idea asking for the welcome crew. They’ll explain everything to him, the whole FSA spiel... still makes my head hurt.’ Paul nods approvingly.

  “Highrise is over there, he was hit pretty hard, I don’t see him getting up anytime soon,” Nightmare jokes.

  “Sounds good. I’ll get him out of here.” Hellion strides over to Highrise’s limp body, as he passes Nightmare he pats her shoulder, “Good work here.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Nightmare replies with a small smile.

  Hellion spreads his arms out as wide as they will go and the chains around his torso reach out to grab Highrise. They pull him gently into the air and toward Hellion. Finally, they bind Highrise to the chest of Hellion.

  “Well, I guess I’m off to Detention with him,” Hellion indicates Highrise attached to his chest, arms and legs bound in chains.

  “I guess you are, have a safe flight!” Nightmare smiles.

  Hellion starts to jog out into the street. After he reaches the street, black flames fire from his hands and feet rocketing him into the air.

  “Showoff!” Nightmare yells after him.

  I wish I could fly like that, levitation is so slow!

  Chapter 14: Brigid

  Theo wakes up in a stretched SUV with opposed seating in back, complete with the privacy screen up blocking the driver from view, as he looks around he notices two other people in the vehicle, Nightmare and a woman in a purple and pink suit he didn’t recognize. The sounds of road noise rush past in the background.

  “How are you darling?” the woman in purple and pink asks in a soothing tone. “You’ve been through a lot in the last day or so.”

  Nightmare looks over at him with concern in her eyes, which is all Theo can see behind her mask. He looks down at his body and sees that his Suit is gone. Also, his head is pounding, like a jackhammer is pounding two inches behind his nose.

  Ignoring her question, “Where am I? Who are you? What did you do with my Suit? Finally, why does my head hurt so bad?” Theo asks in rapid succession.

  “My, my, most supers can’t even form coherent sentences for a day or so after Power Rush takes over, you are a hardy one!” the woman smiles and reaches out towards Theo’s head.

  Theo tries to wiggle out of her grasp, but finds that he is too weak to do so. Her grip is strong!

  ‘She’s safe, let it happen,’ Nightmare thinks to Theo in a concerned tone.

  “Oh hold still! I’m going to deal with your headache so we can have a civil conversation. Oh, and people call me Brigid,” she snaps, “This will only take a second. JEN, play some calming music.”

  A gentle voice says, “Playing Winds of Spring.”

  Chords of piano and violin flow through the SUV as a pink light pulses out from Brigid’s hands and wash over Theo. He almost immediately feels like a new person, gone is the weakness and head pain of a few minutes ago!

  Theo goes to thank Brigid and finds her slumped back in her seat, breathing heavily.

  “Are you okay? It looks like that took a lot out of you.”

  “Oh, don’t worry, a minute or so and I’ll be right as rain,” Brigid says, already looking better.

  Theo looks over at Nightmare, “Care to take a crack at the rest of those questions?”

  “Certainly, Brigid, you rest up, I’ll take care of the basics.” Nightmare pats Brigid’s leg.

  Brigid’s shoulders slump and she sinks deeper into her seat, “That will be fine dear.”

  “All right, here’s the deal. You are in an FSA owned SUV on the way to the Allano Arcology and the real FSA HQ. This is Brigid, she is a Cape who is an expert in healing and fire powers, she gets called in whenever someone crashes after Power Rush. For some reason, her power is the only one we’ve found that works on Power Rush aftereffects. JEN is an FSA AI that all FSA members have access to, she can do pretty much anything you ask with data or music.”

  Nightmare grabs a bottle of water from the cupholder beside her and takes a big drink before offering Theo his own bottle of water.

  “Your Suit retracted into your body after I got you in the SUV, it looks like it reacts to danger/stress right now, though you should be able to control that eventually. Your head was hurting because Power Rush amps up your amygdala, which is in charge of rage as well as a few other things. Power Rush makes most supers who experience it go too far, some even kill people if they aren’t stopped, that’s why we treat it so seriously,” she blushes. “I had to knock you out, you were going to kill Highrise.”

  Theo starts “I woul—”

  Nightmare stops him there.

  “You would have killed him. I saw it in your eyes,” Nightmare says. Brigid nods in agreement.

  ‘Also, I tried to get through to you like this and you sounded wrong. You sounded primal, angry, and willing to kill because you were slighted,’ Nightmare sends Theo.

  “Oh,” Theo gulps. “Thanks for stopping me Ka—Nightmare.”

  Brigid sits forward. “Ah, much better, like I said, a minute or so of rest and I’m good as new!” She cracks her knuckles. “Don’t worry about secret identities here, if you decide to work with the FSA I’ll be your handler, just like I am for Katrina here. You can call me Betty if you want to. Right Katrina?” Brigid asks in a questioning tone.

  “Yes, Betty,” Kat laughs as she pulls her mask off, shaking out her hair at the same time.

  Theo watches Kat for a moment, then shakes his head and looks back to Betty/Brigid.

  “FSA, okay. Do I need to register or something?” Theo asks with a raised eyebrow.

  “Only Super-criminals, Cowls and Hoods, and those who wish to work with the FSA directly are required to register. I should hope you will, but I have helped many Capes and Hoods in my time, roughly one in three registers while here, they have all gone on to be Class 3 and up Capes for the FSA, except this one here—” She indicates Kat. “—who has a while to go before that, though she is making good progress.”

  Kat blushes at that. “If Theo signs up, he’ll be closer to Class 2 than I am, taking down Highrise like that on his first day as a Cape.”

  “Worry not Katrina, while you didn’t capture Highrise yourself, you did prevent Jinlong from killing him, granting you partial credit for Highrise’s capture, seeing as there would be no one to capture if he was dead,” Brigid says with a bit of a purr to it. The SUV stops moving at this point. “Ah, it looks like we’ve arrived. Please stick close to me and put this on.” Brigid holds out a plain bl
ack domino mask to Theo.

  “I think I can get my suit back, hold on.” Theo focuses his energy as Richter taught him to do when trying to use his powers.

  Theo hears Kat gasp. “Well that works I guess,” she says.

  Brigid nods approvingly.

  Jin steps out of the SUV after Brigid and Nightmare, who puts her mask back on before the door of the SUV opens fully.

  Chapter 15: FSA HQ

  Jin, Nightmare, and Brigid step out into a small area, no more than 10’ x 10’ with a silver elevator door in front of them. Behind them is a parking garage full of black SUVs and sedans, devoid of the usual trash you see in places like this.

  “Up we go,” Brigid says with a smile. “I can’t wait to introduce you to Jolly and the rest of the staff here. Trust me, avoid the ‘Main Office’ downtown if you can avoid it, mostly paper pushers, necessary mind you, but boring as anything.” With that Brigid waves her arm in front of the panel to the right side of the elevator.

  A blue light scans over Brigid, Nightmare, and Jinlong. “Class 4, Brigid. Class 1, Nightmare. Entry approved. Unknown Super, identify yourself.” a pleasant female sounding, but obviously robotic, voice says.

  Brigid holds up her hand, “I’ve got this dear. Class 4, Brigid override. Temporary designation is Recruit 1.”

  “Override accepted. Welcome, Recruit 1. Entry approved,” the same robotic female voice responds. The door to the elevator opens.

  Nightmare steps into the elevator and holds out her hand, “Come on Jin, it’s going to be fine, I’ve been coming here for a while now, but I never got to meet Jolly. I’m excited!”

  Jin takes Nightmare’s hand and steps into the elevator, as he does he feels his body getting a lot heavier, like the weight of all the kids from RAINBOW are on his back. His field of vision narrows a bit in front of him, maybe 120 degrees, nothing like the perfect visibility he was used to in this suit. He feels like he has been cut off from the world, completely alone for the first time since he Awakened.

  “What’s happening? I feel like I’m going to fall through the floor,” Jin gasps, gripping Nightmare’s hand like it is his only lifeline.

  “Power dampener, sorry I forgot to mention it. It works wonders to prevent Supers from sneaking in with our people. Some people have said they really don’t like it, I guess you’re in that camp. Don’t worry about it, you’ll feel better when you get out at the top.” Brigid gives a quick description as she steps into the elevator, the doors closing behind her. “FSA Main 1,” she says and the elevator starts smoothly.

  Jin looks toward Nightmare, wishing he could think at her how much this hurt him, it feels like his bones are compressing in on themselves.

  “Bone density, your bones are 15 times denser than a normal person, so you feel like you’re going to be crushed by your own skeleton right now. That’s why you’re in pain,” Brigid explains matter of factly.

  The elevator goes up faster than a normal elevator, it takes only 15 seconds to go up the 30 stories to the level they are looking for. The elevator doors open into a room with white marble floors, a large white desk manned by a man and a woman in FSA uniforms. To the left of the elevator is a wall of windows showing the scenery of Riverside City. To the right of the elevator is a wide curving staircase leading up to a loft of some kind.

  Jin falls out of the elevator and immediately feels like things are going back to normal, his bones crack as they settle back where they belong, his body giving off a soft glow. His vision goes back to normal and he can feel the world around him again as well.

  “Yeah, I’ll take the normal entrance over that every time, I don’t care how boring it is,” Jin says with venom in his voice. “I felt like I was dying, if I had stayed in there too long, I would have,” Jin glares at Brigid like she personally did this to him.

  “I’m sorry dear, we have to take new recruits in that way, so we can scan them with their powers not getting in the way,” Brigid explains. “I’m sorry it was uncomfortable for you, but I assure you, if you had been in any danger, I would have turned off the dampening immediately.”

  ‘Are you okay, Theo,’ Nightmare sends concernedly.

  ‘Just in a lot of pain, but even that’s fading now,’ Jin replies.

  “If someone puts me in another one of those ‘Dampening Fields’, I make no promises about the state of the area when I get out of it, fair warning,” Jin says, a puff of smoke rising from his nostrils.

  The sound of clapping fills the silence left behind that threat.

  “Well said, I hate that elevator too, it feels like I’m cut off from the world when I’m in it,” says a man descending a set of wide stairs in a leather duster with a silver suit under it. His face is uncovered, revealing a well-cut face with a bit of stubble, his hair is bright silver. He could be anywhere between 25 and 40, his deep set, silver eyes, and fair complexion making it more difficult to tell.

  “This guy gets it.” Jin gestures at the man in the duster as he stands up and brushes himself off.

  “What did he say? I don’t speak Mandarin very well,” Brigid asks and Nightmare nods her head in agreement.

  “Oh,” Jinlong says.

  I’m going to have to get better at figuring out when someone is speaking in a foreign language, it might matter someday.

  “I just said that I hate that infernal elevator too,” the man in the duster says.

  “Ah, that makes more sense, I remember you mentioning that in a meeting once or twice,” Brigid snaps her fingers in recognition. “Jolly, I’d like to introduce you to Jinlong, our new potential recruit, and Nightmare, a Class 1 Cape already.”

  Nightmare squeals, a tone only teenage girls seem to be able to make reliably, “Jolly! It is such an honor to meet you! I am a huge fan of yours,” she says as she rushes up to Jolly for a handshake.

  “The pleasure is mine to meet a woman like you who knows what she wants to do with her life this young.” Jolly takes her hand and kisses the back of it, which makes Nightmare swoon a bit.

  Nightmare moves back toward Brigid to recover from swooning over Jolly, who walks over toward Jin and offers a hand to him to shake. Jin takes it and gives it a good handshake and a bit of a squeeze.

  “You can call me Jolly, though we should probably call each other by our given names, at least when meeting for the first time, mine is Yinlong,” Jolly/Yinlong says to Jin in Mandarin.

  Theo’s mind flashes back to the third day of his training with Richter.

  “If you ever meet another metallic Child of the Great Golden Dragon, you can trust them with your life, as long as they demonstrate that their powers still work. See, if you do evil acts, your ancestral powers will abandon you until you atone.” Richter explains as Theo sits and listens in the classroom. “Metallic Children are granted far greater powers than their non-metallic siblings, but that power comes with a caveat, they have to remain on the side of the light to maintain their powers.”

  “The only two other metallic descendants that I know of at this time are Yinlong, he has both metal and wood energy, and Tiělong who has metal and fire. Both of which are renowned Capes in your world. They will bow to you in fealty should you ask it, but beware, explaining why Capes with more evident power than you are bowing might not go over well.” Richter smiles.

  “Why will they bow to me?” Theo asks.

  “You’ll understand in due time. Now, back to Earth Gliding…”

  Chapter 16: Jolly

  “Yinlong, you said? As in Silver Dragon, as in desce—” Jin starts to rant in Mandarin before Jolly cuts him off.

  “Yes to all of those, but we should save that conversation for a more private location,” Jolly sternly replies in Mandarin.

  Slinging his arm around Jin’s shoulders. “I’ll take care of the tour and explanation for this one, I have a good feeling about him.” He winks at Brigid as he leads Jinlong over to the staircase.

  “Sir, this is improper,” Brigid says with concern.

  “Wh
at good is being the boss if I don’t get to decide what’s proper? I’m taking Jinlong here and I’ll take good care of him. Go fill out paperwork or something.” He makes a shooing motion.

  “Yes sir,” Brigid says through gritted teeth.

  “Come on Jinlong—can I call you Jin? Jinlong is a bit of a mouthful,” Jolly asks as they walk up the stairs.

  “Of course, sir,” Jin replies, still in shock.

  “I’ll have none of that ‘Sir’ business out of you Jin, the only person who still calls me that here is her.” Jolly indicates Brigid with a finger. “Calling me ‘Sir’ makes her happy; I’m not going to get in the way of something that rare.” Jin and Jolly laugh a bit at the joke.

  He leads Jin toward a nice set of wooden doors, opening them leads them into a lounge of sorts. Pool tables are in the center of the room, restaurant-style tables are scattered around the room, and booths of the same style fill the walls. Jolly walks right through that room, dragging Jin along.

  “We need to have a conversation in private, I’m taking you to my apartment, conveniently I live in this tower,” Jolly says as he pushes into a service hallway behind the lounge. He bumps the service elevator with the up button. “No one thinks to look twice at the service entrances, bad for security, good for making quick escapes!” He grins at Jin.

  Jin looks at Jolly and a grin slowly develops. “You’re the director they were talking about aren’t you?”

  “Got it in one, a bit slow I guess, but you’ve only had your powers for a day, so I guess I can let it slide,” Jolly jokes.

  The elevator dings and Jolly and Jin get in it, Jolly presses the button for 88.

  “I couldn’t resist it, I’m willing to pay more for a bit of good luck.” He points at the number and smiles sheepishly.

  “I can’t blame you,” Jin says through laughs.

  The elevator hums along, not as fast as the other elevator, but a much more pleasant ride as far as Jin was concerned. The door eventually opens up on the 88th floor and Jolly indicates for Theo to head toward the door directly in front of them. Jin walks over and tries the door, a small pressure pushes on his hand and the door opens.