The cafeteria was packed when Ray hurried in to grab a bite.

Grimacing at the full tables, the young woman picked up a tray and waited in line. Dealing with the crowd could have been avoided if not for early morning traffic and certain company policies... ah, well. At least coming in late meant there were only two people ahead in line. Piling up the thick metal rectangle with her preferences, still in stock since not many shared them, she made for one of the few tables with open seats.

"Hey boss, Kevin," she greeted the middle-aged guy with the short salt-and-pepper hair, neat suit and chicken and lettuce sandwiches and the much younger dark-haired man in casual work clothes finishing a huge bowl of pasta. Putting the heavy tray down with a dull thud, she joined them in a hasty meal.

"Raleigh," her nominal superior nodded back, raising an eyebrow in challenge at her wince. Using her full name despite knowing how she felt about it was his way of rebuking her for tardiness without making a scene in public.

"Wow, that's a lot of carrots," Kevin said in lieu of good morning, staring at her breakfast choices. "Beetroots and tomatoes too... did I miss a memo about red food day?" Wow, was the newbie rude... or maybe just oblivious?

"You did not," the old man stated, cleaning up with a napkin in neat, efficient moves before folding it up and setting it aside. "Miss Flanagan is a special case." For a split second - blink and you missed it - his lips turned up before firming into neutrality.

"Come on Bossman, you're making me feel old," she fake-whined. "I hear 'Miss Flanagan' and I start looking for my mother."

"Indeed." Blue eyes fixed Kevin for a few seconds but got no reactions. Yep, definitely oblivious. "Raleigh, the archive is still waiting for the report on the Museum incident."

"Did they misplace it again? I handed it over the day before yesterday," she asked, fiddling with a red lock as she thought and chewed. "Boss, I really think we should check for a haunting."

"Those are real?!" Flinching at the looks he got the newbie almost choked on his pasta. He recovered quickly though and pushed on. "I mean, you hear all sorts of rumours. You're not pulling my leg, are you?"

The older man exchanged looks with Ray, both frowning. She nodded imperceptibly and he nodded back.

"Kevin, change of plans," the Boss told him. "You're doing another run of tests and then I'll take you on your first outing."

"Oh man, that's great!" the younger man blurted, his face going red at Ray's snickers. "I mean... thanks, Boss!"

"Just call me Silver," the older man told the younger with a wince. "Raleigh calls me 'Boss' because she finds it funny." Neither of them mentioned what was funny about it; the boy would learn soon enough. "Speaking of which, you get greeter duties for today, Red."

Before she could come up with a cool and cunning retort an alarm pierced through the cafeteria's usual din and half the people there scrambled. She got up as a communicator appeared in Silver's ear as if by magic, but probably was just good reflexes, preparation and skill. While the older man listened and everyone else started moving towards the exits in a mad dash, she took the opportunity to finish two more carrots.

"What's going on?" Kevin shouted to be heard over dozens of voices asking the same thing, his eyes gleaming with apprehension, excitement and something more. "Is it an attack?"

"Large building fire downtown," the Boss said. "Spreading quickly - too quickly. Raleigh, you're up."

"Figures," she muttered as she followed the crowd, leaving the newbie with the Boss. She didn't even finish her breakfast.

xxxx xxxx

Headquarters had once been the control tower for the O'Hare International Airport, back when flights were relatively safe and more numerous. With global airspace being as full of unusual phenomena as anywhere else, international flights had fallen out of favor with tourists and casual travelers and O'Hare's facilities had been put to other uses. The State Guard had gotten a base out of it on the cheap. Unfortunately, it was outside the city and any incidents in it. Fortunately, Ray had a solution to that.

The morning's unfinished cup of tomato juice was upturned, its contents unceremoniously poured out. Instead of splattering to the floor and making a mess of things though, they paused in mid air and began to glow. In the back of Ray's mind her aspect flashed as she drew upon it: Red Tide. The glowing red material that had once been simple juice flowed up and out, rapidly increasing in volume before flowing over her skin and clothes.

She could have simply conjured it, but using an existing source made the result more stable and let her more finely adjust the liquid's properties. Tomato juice was healthy and light; she drew on those concepts for both resilience and speed now. In moments she was fully covered in a skintight layer of opaque, glowing red liquid that would both cushion incoming blows and enhance her own actions. That, however, was far from all. For she was carrying more red liquid; six more litres of it, to be exact.

As her power worked, her body itself felt lighter, stronger, faster, better overall. The world changed, those around her scrambling to respond to the emergency seemingly slowing down even as their every detail became sharper, crystal clear, their movements as easy to predict as a train running on straight tracks. Blood was pretty important to everything her body did and thus she could draw upon that link to enhance all those activities.

Exit Raleigh Flanagan, enter the Crimson Countess. Ray blamed her mother for both the alliteration and gaining powers associated with her name. Who named their daughter 'Raleigh' anyway?

Casting useless regrets and familial annoyances aside, she focused on the matter at hand then moved. Buildings flashed by so quickly they'd have been an unrecognizable blur to people thinking at normal speeds, the wind wailed as she tore through, only a thin, transparent film of glowing material over her eyes protecting them from being scoured away as she approached the sound barrier. Her whole world was tinted red, a small price to pay for speed and power.

Less than a minute later she stood before an apartment block, a towering blaze roaring as it consumed several residential buildings. There was more light than there should have been, neither smoke nor acrid fumes filling the sky. Screams from dozens of people could be heard from within and without, but what really got her was the laughter; a single figure stood on the roof of the tallest building, waving a long glowing stick and tending torrents of flame flying as they cackled madly. The Boss had been right to send her... unfortunately.

She would have liked to punch the madman within an inch of his life, but it would have to wait; innocent lives took precedence and he'd already put every building within his reach to the torch. With a wave of both arms more glowing crimson fluid appeared, her Aspect fueling the conjuration. Any red fluid she'd consumed she could manifest and she picked red-tinted water this time. Water countered fire was the theme she drew upon and even with the effects reduced since it was conjured, it would suffice.

Using her speed and carrying the water along, she dashed through the burning buildings quenching flames where she went. Each time she found survivors she covered them in fluids and carried them out; completely submerged they could handle acceleration far better than if she'd tried to drag them out by hand. Four, thirty, two hundred... in another minute she had all the survivors out and much of the fire suppressed. Not all of it though, and even as she left a scared little girl with her near-hysterical mother the madman sprayed around more fire. Well then... time to do something about it.

The Crimson Countess ran up the building, her "costume" flowing in the gaps between bricks under her feet to provide traction. Another layer over her ears protected them from sonic booms, something that became less and less of a requirement as her power grew - though drowing out both the shouts of fans and the screams of victims was always a plus.

A torrent of fire blocked her path and she simply ran through it without slowing down. A second burst tried to shove her off the building but splashed ineffectually against her costume instead. Her Aspect's control power worked only over red fluids but the invulnerability covered all things red, from magma to red lasers to strawberries at sufficient velocity. Realizing this, the madman became more frantic, flailing around with more blasts of flame sent her way as quickly as he could make them.

He looked like a pretty average guy; not very tall, early middle-age, a bit of a beer gut, frizzy black hair, beady brown eyes. He only wore boxers and a t-shirt, the only normal things in his vicinity that weren't burning, slogging through a rooftop that was slowly melting. The only thing that wasn't normal about him, other than his mad laughter and too wide eyes, was the staff. Five feet of wood less than an inch thick, glowing like red-hot coals; an item of power.

Ray hated items of power; when villains went mad, nine times out of ten it was because they were toying with forces they could neither understand nor control. Some poor shmuck would find a book or a knife or a pair of boots that had become something more and they would use them, no matter how many heroes or experts or people from the government told them not to. It was all a conspiracy, see? A consiracy to keep powers for themselves. Morons.

The madman tried to boil her water away and when that didn't work he started swinging the staff with superhuman strength. Ignoring the few blows that landed to no effect, she shaped some water to engulf and subdue him. With nobody to turn her constructs to steel or make them explode, the fight was over before it'd began. Plus they'd caught him early, before his magic stick had a chance to grow in power much - and her own power had been growing every time she ate or drank something red for years now.

"Hey Boss, the fire's done," she spoke through her communicator. "IOP case, wielder had already gone crazy,"

"Bring it in, standard measures. We'll hand it over to the lab in New York this time," came the muffled reply. "Some new egghead insists they've cracked how they work and want to study a live example."

Ray shuddered; being what it was and from what the madman had been doing, the staff probably grew by burning things... or people. All those years, all the effort put in studying those things, all the failures and accidents and people had yet to stop trying. At least it beat trying to 'study' people with powers again. Leaving that particular mess for the Boss and the Professor, she observed coolly as her captive fell unconscious from lack of air. Drowning him would be... bad form.

Hopefully the emergency would get her out of greeter duties for the day. She hated newbies.