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Anita jumped at the sight of the invading figure, before sawdust filled her eyes and she choked on the funk of smoke debris. The small shadow then rose, bleeding fists sealed in anger, his slowly-appearing face a maelstrom of furious, frustrated dismay. Standing over the corpse of his park, and the sacrificed body of one of his associate’s buildings, the caped weapon called his trigger:

“Venge.”

Before, whenever Bozo threw his fist, all the trickery inside him would activate for a brief moment. Destructive muscles. Quick reflexes. Gravitational manipulation. But in reciting their code trigger, he made the powers passive, and for the time, everlasting. His feet rose above the ground, ready for action. There was unlikely a need for the human Bozo at this moment. Today, Venge City needed a hero.

“NOW!”

While the terrorists were distracted by the savior’s arrival, the sixteen warriors made their assault at their CEO’s order. Clawing through the walls, barriers, and windows with their quick blows and gunfire, they made short work of penetrating the fortress, bursting through freshly-torn holes and jumping through windows.

The cunning Katsuhiko was the one to break through the door’s lock, and Spider noticed this. The boy’s excited eyes falling to his trap in anticipation, he awaited the adversary’s demise to the heavy crate of priceless figures above him- but the second the smirking man triggered his scrappy tripwire, he raised his blade. Dull and blunt, the katana didn’t look capable of slicing even a thin plant. But in one clean stroke, he simply knocked the box aside, as if he’d always known it was there. Figurines spilling uselessly across the floor, his smile only grew as he noticed that young Hood was the one watching eagerly to see his coming demise. He made the boy his first target.

“Tough Boys Comics Marketing Team, restrain all targets!” Happy called out, raising her voice in a way the others hadn’t seen before. “Fire nonlethals on all resistors!”

Behind a short counter, Frankie’s next panic attack was coming on. Somehow, this was worse than the incident with Action. Today, she was in the wrong. She was a bonafide criminal, and if she didn’t make it out of here right now, her life was over.

She sprung to escape, but Katie clasped her thin wrist.

“Frankie.” She whimpered. “If you run, they’ll get you.”

“But-“

“We’ll finish this. Alright? For our dreams.”

Frankie looked at the desperate, crying girl below her. Her life was at stake too. Not just her present- but everything in every potential version of the future she was wishing for.

Frankie nodded.

Startlingly, a single member of Bozo’s cabinet leapt out at her, brandishing a rifle. He appeared rude and intimidating, though in such a way that he was clearly underestimating the girl and her sister. Before shooting, he chose to bark his orders first.

“Alright, on the ground!” Denny yelled, confident he’d picked the easiest targets. “This thing’ll hurt more than a real bullet ever could.” The “hero” gave a sinister cackle. What an ass, she thought to herself.

Used to, the way it worked was pretty simple. Katie was afraid of dying, but if she got hurt, it wouldn’t matter, so long as she lived. In contrast, Frankie herself was fine with dying so long as it meant she didn’t have to undergo any more discomfort. But things were very different now that the two both had something to fight for. And this guy’d pretty much just announced that no matter what, he wouldn’t be able to harm them in any permanent way.

“So… y-you’re the good guy, right?” Frankie struggled, trying to work up some bravado again and get back her old self.

“Damn straight.” He chuckled. “But I’m gonna do some bad things if you don’t wisen up and get on down.”

“Oh… oh, yeah?” She forced a laugh. “Let’s see… will you?”

Katie gasped, almost grabbing her as Frankie shot herself right up to the barrel of the gun and held it to her right eye. Just millimeters away from the metal tube, he tried to yank the weapon away from her ocular organ, but she just held on, moving with it.

“You’re not gonna shoot a girl’s eye out, are you?”

“What the- hey, get me some backup!” He turned away for a brief critical second, in which Frankie obligingly took advantage of his foolishness. She used all the force she could muster and held the rifle, pulling herself on top of it before she fell and tore it away from him with her weight. He actually looked a little afraid, turning his head back to see the girl crouching there with his own weapon pointed at him. Frankie couldn’t know if he’d have the courage to take it back. She couldn’t see the scared look in his eyes as she focused through the gun’s sights.

“COVER YOUR EARS KATIE!”

Frankie popped multiple stinging rubber projectiles onto the man’s exposed skin, pushing him to cry out in pain as he ran terrified from the lone outlaw. Katie shook. It certainly was louder than the guns firing across the room, but the blasts right next to her rang out in a way she quite liked. In all this chaos, they sounded pretty damn hopeful.