Chapter Twenty-Eight - A Perfectly Ordinary Day

It was a little strange to go from a day where everything felt like it was happening all at once, to a rather quiet day where she woke up, showered, went to classes, crammed some homework between breaks, then finished for the day around noon.

All perfectly normal, all perfectly ordinary.

She stopped by an Ims Orton on the way back to the dorm and picked up some doughnuts (not all honey-glazed... but a few of those) and a strong coffee to keep her going, then walked all the way back home.

Again, all perfectly ordinary.

Her room was a bit messier than she liked it, with a pair of very empty pizza boxes left on her desk and a half-eaten box of fries scattered across the floor leading up to the mattress like an evidence trail, but Emily could ignore that.

Teddy was there, sleeping with her tummy exposed and her mouth wide opened. Her entire belly was bloated, no doubt with the two large pizzas she’d devoured the night before.

“Teddy?” Emily asked once the door was closed.

Teddy cracked one eye open and stared at her. She mumbled something that could be vaguely made out as “Boss?”

“I bought doughnuts,” Emily said.

Teddy’s response was a painful groan before she tried to roll onto her side, then failed as both her tummy and the wobbliness of the mattress conspired against her.

“I’ll, uh, put them on the desk,” Emily said.

“Mmmhhmm,” Teddy said.

Emily paused next to Teddy’s bed to look at her arm. The signs of the burn were still there, though they’d gotten a lot less obvious overnight. Teddy was a fast healer, then. That was great. Emily didn’t know how they’d handle a hospital visit.

She set the box of doughnuts on her desk, then stacked up the pizza boxes to one side after checking to see if there were any leftovers (there weren’t). Then, because she was in a cleaning mode, she picked up the fries flung all over and packed everything away next to the door so that she could put it out later.

Then, and only then, did she sit down, pull out her computer, and settle in to look things up while eating. She glanced at her usual haunts first, but even brand new images of kittens and puppies being themselves didn’t spark more than a passing ‘aww,’ so she moved on to looking at the local news.

Not from an actual news site though. She wasn’t made of gold, and those had paywalls. Instead she found the sub-forum for Eauclaire.

The first post at the top had her blood turning to ice.

New Local Hero Melaton and Two Unknowns Take Out Pyromaniac Villain!

6.7K Up | 231 Down

“Oh no,” Emily said. With nearly trembling hands she clicked on the link.

Local Hero Melaton and Two Unknowns Take Out Pyromaniac Villain!

Posted: Yesterday 6:54pm By: ArthorMac

Last night at around 4pm local heroine Melaton was seen chasing after an unmasked young man who used fire-based abilities. The known hero was accompanied by two others. A young woman that turned into a bear (Images!) and another who wore a 20s-style gangster costume and who didn’t use any obvious powers.

The arsonist was apprehended when the bear-hero caught him and Melaton knocked him out.

Police have yet to comment, but Melaton’s agent spoke up on Witter saying that Melaton was glad to work with some new up-and-comers to take out a villainous threat.

EDIT: More footage here.

More sources:

Eauclaire Gazette

Hero News Weekly

EDIT: And even more pics!

Posts sorted by: Best Rated

User/TheChub509

28 points Yesterday at 6:56pm

Protip: Don’t piss off the bear.

User/SamMax

24 points Yesterday at 7:07pm

That takedown was brutal. I wonder if it was legal? That’s like, a classic excessive use of force.

2 Replies:

> User/Kat

> 10 points Yesterday at 7:09pm

> Don’t be an idiot. That guy tried to light her ON FIRE! Plus she’s a minor.

> User/TheWanterofAcogs

> 8 points Yesterday at 9:56pm

> kid isn’t even a registered mask. Wtf was melaton thinking bringing her along?

User/TheChub509

23 points Yesterday at 8:02pm

Our new heroes need names!

4 Replies:

> User/MerlinS

> 11 points Yesterday at 8:09pm

> Ursa Minor for the bear girl!

> User/MomentKiller

> 8 points Yesterday at 8:02pm

> Ursa Minor is a great name! What about the other mask?

> User/SomethingSomething-KidFriendly

> 7 points Yesterday at 9:09pm

> Capone? The Head Honcho? Maybe something more feminine? Femme Fatale?

> User/J-Giannuzzi

> 6 points Yesterday at 9:54pm

> OMG yis!

User/HandshakesThrowawayAccount

18 points Yesterday at 6:56pm

That’s certainly a development!

User/ChaoticSky

17 points Yesterday at 7:05pm

I want to give it pats!

2 Replies:

> User/KentBoy

> 14 points Yesterday at 7:09pm

> She would eat you.... But it would be worth it!

> User/KoalaTodd

> 8 points Yesterday at 8:54pm

>She’s so fluffy!

User/CrazyCoder

15 points Yesterday at 7:05pm

Does anyone have anything on the bad guy in this case? Anything at all?

2 Replies:

> User/Taveri

> 7 points Yesterday at 8:09pm

>

> User/TheWarriorDale

> 4 points Yesterday at 8:09pm

> Not much to go on. Seems like his costume is a... cooks? Looks rather dirty. Powers don’t seem like direct fire-control. More like control over a liquid fire? Napalm maybe? Range and speeds were okay, but not spectacular.

User/Deamion

14 points Yesterday at 9:02pm

So... Ursa Minor merch when?

3 Replies:

> User/BookishWyrm

> 12 points Yesterday at 9:09pm

> My soul for a Ursa plushie!

> User/ShaggyMelsa

> 7 points Yesterday at 9:12pm

> She does seem very marketable. Plus she’s a kid, how hard would it be to just get her to sign off on a contract to sell

> User/GreatOm

> 5 points Yesterday at 9:19pm

>They’d need to join a corp-team, then get an official costume, then have it be signed off on, and then... so yeah, give it like a month.

Emily lowered her head into her hands. There was just so much out there about them. Pictures and videos. She didn’t doubt for a moment that there were some people trying to unmask them already.

Her only saving grace was that they hadn’t been too close to anyone and that the lighting was pretty poor. Most of the pictures were amateurish and poorly made, so maybe there wouldn’t be enough to identify them.

That, and they’d been caught doing something heroic, which was... okay?

Her phone buzzed.

With a sinking heart, Emily pulled the phone out of her purse and checked the number. Melanie’s number was displayed right there for her to see, along with a message.

Mel: You free?

Emily took a deep breath and unlocked her phone to reply.

E-Wright: I am.

Mel: Good. Got some info, but I’m being grilled for yesterday. Sent it to HS to send it to you. Check your mail.

E-Wright: Okay. Thank you.

Emily slid her phone to the side and opened her email client. It didn’t take much to find Handshake’s email. It was the only one that she'd received all week that wasn’t an ad for something or a likely scam.

The contents were surprisingly sparse though, just two addresses. Addresses that Homie could often be found at. Tacked at the end was a rather unwelcome ‘good luck’ from the informant.

Leaning back into her seat, Emily wondered just how wrong everything would go if she headed out there all on her own (with Teddy, of course) and tried to tackle a villain solo.

She didn’t like her odds.

And how would Homie react to losing someone with powers that worked for him?

She bit her lip and fell back onto a breathing exercise to keep her heart rate down. If she couldn’t take on the situation in one go, then she had to break it down.

First, she had to find out where Homie was. Then she had to corner him, preferably with an annoyed Teddy. Then... steal the drive back.

She’d need to be so stupidly lucky for all of that to work out.

Something clicked in the back of her mind and she spun around in her seat. “Teddy!”

“Mmm?” Teddy mumbled.

“Teddy... where did you say you last saw Alea Iacta?”

***