Angel veered aside sharply, and there was a rumbling roar passing him by as The Mountain nearly knocked him out of the sky when he came shooting back up from the ground, face split in a rare grin, and this time moving at an angle, heading off into the distance.

“Holy shit, he nearly rammed into me a quarter-mile off the ground! He hit the ground and bounced back up moving fast enough to break the sound barrier!” Angel reported, glowing wings flaring to catch and stabilize him from the buffeting of the winds. “He’s almost out of standard sight already! I don’t think I can catch him at that speed!”

-The Mountain has found a way to jump around?- Fugit /groaned in the Mark link. -Wonderful. That is such welcome news for everyone!...-

“But at least we know, right?” Angel muttered, clinging to the tiny bit of good news there. “That could have been real bad to find out in a fight...”

-We’ll inform the other hero teams, but as a professional courtesy, let everyone else he fights find out on their own. You don’t think it’s just chance he let you see him, do you?- Fugit /sighed. -He wanted us to know. He’s just showing off now.-

Angel swore to himself as he banked around and headed back for the Aerie. The Mountain. Up in the sky. Moving faster than he could.

Well, it was just another day on the job...

--------

Repulse the footing, then release it before it actually kicks in. His timing was a little bad, but he didn’t have the practice yet, and landed a bit heavily, like he’d fallen from a couple hundred feet. It wasn’t much of a thump, and he walked out of that pretty easily.

I tossed him his dust-free coat, and we got back into his truck to leave the area.

He paused before starting the truck up. “I got a lot of timing to work out, but these Heavyfoot techniques aren’t going to be near as hard as I thought.”

“You’ll still need to master the Pull and Release if you want to master the Heavy Hand,” I warned him, and he grunted, raising one hand and clenching it, picturing hitting someone with real speed and power.

Like actually getting punched by a mountain, or something.

“I owe you big time for this, girl,” he said, and I could tell he meant it.

“Yeah, you do. Just wait until I make you a cookbook. You’re gonna be my slave forever.”

He huffed as he turned the oversized key and got the truck into motion, but his eyes were twinkling. “So, what do you need to make up something like that?”

“Well, raw materials. We gotta see what they taste and feel like to you. Then we gotta get ’em Energized up a bunch of different ways, but I can handle that.”

He turned his head to stare at me again. “You can Energize stuff?” he asked in a low voice.

“Not much at one time, and I’m limited in what Elements apply and what I can do it to. Gotta be taken out of the ground using the One Tool rule, and same applies to smelting or refining the stuff. Tech mostly borks that nowadays, so we might have to dig up the raw materials ourselves, or grab Energized materials from somewhere.”

“Well, you’re going to Burn gold anyways...” he trailed off thoughtfully, eyes squinting as he thought about that. “I know where there’s lots of raw materials, but I ain’t a heist planner, and I know that when you start targeting money, a lot of people come hunting for you. You want to start robbing people, there’s gonna be lots of guns after you. The Detectives don’t go after thieves like they do killers, but they consider it a challenge to nab a master burglar.”

“And I’m not gonna ruin your reputation by having you being seen in the vicinity of high-end robberies, either, although what I’ve found of your records indicates you aren’t above a little looting yourself.”

“A man’s gotta eat right,” he answered without a shred of remorse.

“Truth!” I paused for a moment. “You open for a change in venue?”

“Where to?” he asked reasonably.

“New York City.”

He grunted as he drove us away, thinking it over. “I put down some careful roots here and in my neighborhood. Why you think I should pull up and move to that place? Damn city’s half slums, full of deluded Muricans who think they’re gonna be the equal of the Tribes any day now and show ‘em what they can do.”

“The biggest reason that the locus of the world is on the Tribes and Russia is because of gods. Unconscious or not, they bring conflict, change, and great events. The Tribes have more active gods than anyone. The Coast has Hercules Himself right there in San Francisco. Russia has Perun at the very least, and probably the rest of the Slavic Pantheon.

“The Norse Pantheon is now in play, and in New York City, of all places.

“There’s a new Tinker genius at play, the son of Howard Stark, who was so determined to reclaim the family name he started his own company to get out from under his dad.

“Reed Richards is the new head of that Foursome out there, and he was rated one of the smartest men in the world before he became a mutate. You think about the implications of a supergenius who can reshape his brain to become even smarter.”

Mr. Hill looked thoughtful as he considered that.

“All those sprouted up in less than a month. Things came together, Fate is beckoning.

“I’m not saying that the Tribes are going to lose anything, but New York City is going to be the focus of a lot more Powered stuff going on, just by the fact there’s a god there. Indeed, if the reports are true, Loki, a second Norse god, made an appearance, too.”

He grunted again. “So, they’re gonna become a second LA?”

“Well, they aren’t going to be a San Fran.” The Champions were there, and there were more Cored people there than anywhere else on the planet... except maybe Moscow, it was hard to tell.

Plus, The Hag was there. Sure, the Great Council was ostensibly the head of the Tribal Nations, but you were absolutely stupid if you thought The Hag didn’t do exactly as she pleased for the benefit of the world. Politicians had been heaping shit on her name for decades, and she still didn’t give a damn.

Said politicians were also quick to come begging her and the Champions she had assembled for help whenever the people they mismanaged couldn’t deal with a lot of crap, too. Didn’t stop the newer ones edging for a newsbite or free publicity, the wealthy people she stepped on, or the arch-conservatives looking for something to fear and fight from continuing to denounce her, of course.

“Furthermore, you’re going to be learning to Teleport. The cities are literally going to be a step apart to you,” I pointed out. “Work in New York in the day, come back and enjoy the sunset again on the Coast.”

“Huh!” He had forgotten that, naturally, too used to taking cruder methods to travel around. “Well, what am I going to do there?” he asked roughly.

“Utterly dominate the Brick scene, and give all the supers there something to look up to. Except maybe Thor. He can give you a real pounding if you let him.

“Oh, and introduce the Muricans to the wonders of regular massive property destruction.”

His nostrils flared shrewdly. “I should invest in rebuilding companies!”

“I’m betting The Hag is already doing so, but putting some cash in as a major shareholder should be great. Also, making yourself available for ‘special jobs’ requiring some muscle and stuff. Little things to fill the spare time.

“Also.” I held up a finger. “Hereditary crime families flourish in New York, and have a lot of pull. They’ll probably start competing in the same field.” At least if Damage Control was any indication...

“Other small jobs.” His expression was mirthless. “Sounds like fewer big jobs, but a lot of smaller ones. It’ll probably take me a bit to learn the lay of the land...”

“The big crime syndicates don’t fit in established Powered too well. They’re too used to lording it over civilians and stuff, and ties of blood. Finding there’s a Brick around who can stare them down isn’t going to go over well, but it will definitely be exciting.”

“What about you? What are you going to be doing there?”

I drummed my fingers on one another. “They’ll probably end up trying to get me sent to school, I imagine.”

He gave me another of those funny looks. “I got the impression you know more about history than me now after these last couple of weeks. What in tarnation’s name do you need to go to school for?” His tone completely indicated that he didn’t think it very important.

“Well, over there in the States, education is mandatory up through secondary schooling unless you have a guardian who can sign off on your education, and you have a job that requires that time. There’s little doubt the Shielders will come down, find out I have no background and am ‘untrained to be a superhero’, and try to send me off to school somewhere.”

“And you want to go there for that? They’d be happy to train a girl like you here in the Tribes. You’re geared to be a fighter, you can do magic, and you’re smart-smart. That’s like a ticket right to the top, right?” He wasn’t dumb, and was totally capable of judging competency.

I shook my head. “Not for me. For the other kids.” I had to sigh. “You know that guy in blue and red they were calling Spider-Man in New York?”

“Kinda weird name for the colors, but everyone’s a critic. What about him?”

“He hasn’t been seen for the last couple of days. I think he’s a teenager who got some dumb ideas into his head, the Shielders tracked him down with surveillance, and they’ve shipped him off.” I sighed again. “I also think he’s a Spider Totem Warlock, like me, just a different side of it.”

“And you want to make sure he’s taught right,” The Mountain grunted. “Okay, got it. You know where they are sending him?”

“You ever heard of Charles Xavier?”

“The Mutants and Mutates author?” He rubbed his jaw. “Rumor is he’s a telepath, and a strong one, learned some Core Techniques by mind-bending and mindreaming some disciples, and he really pissed off The Great Bear. He might even be a cripple now, and doesn’t dare leave the States.”

“He also runs a School for Gifted Youngsters in upstate New York. Imagine what kind of students he teaches there.”

“Name kinda says it all, right?” Mr. Hill shook his head. “None of my business worrying about Muricans, but it looks like this other Totem-guy has you worried.”

“Xavier is a closet mutant supremacist. You can see it in his book, the inherent superiority of mutants over mutates and Primos comes through if you are watching for it. Murica itself is a hotbed of racism on multiple levels, it's why the Crux does so well there.

“He’s one of the foremost authorities on genetics in America, and has been warning that there’s going to be a mutant rise over there for years. Well, it’s going to be more than mutants, and it has begun. That’s very much a mixed blessing in the eyes of a lot of Muricans.”

“Politics,” spat Mr. Hill out the window, unimpressed. “Easier just to thump heads. Puts everyone’s priorities in line properly.”

“Yeah. But if he passes his politics on to the next generation, it’s going to be a disaster.”