A shockwave rocketed my fist toward another man’s face after he finished his futile attempts at stabbing me. I made a note to learn how to fight properly after this, as I had been relying on my powers a lot and without them I would be pretty pitiful.

It was my third night out since I had started doing nightly patrols, and I was currently raiding a Bandidos Sangrientos drug den for more leads on their slave trafficking ring.

I stepped over wounded bodies lying in prone forms, and people too high to move alike on my way further into the complex.

I had already taken out the two guys at the door and four more people in the house if it could still be called that. The walls had been knocked down to allow room for dirty mattresses to be laid out for people to lie on, leaving the room smelling of plaster board and bodily fluids.

A portly man in his late 20’s entered the hall from a room at the back, probably to find out what all the noise was about. His eyes locked with the lenses of my mask and he reached for his gun.

“Oh shit it’s you.” He said while drawing his pistol and emptying his clip at me.

They left nothing more than red marks, as if I had been flicked relatively hard. After his failed attempts to take me out he turned and ran to a room in the back of the hall, yelling something in Spanish.

I chased after him, that room looked important, mostly because it had a distinct decrease in the filth of the floor and walls, which I thought to myself was reason enough to go there in and of itself.

I reached the door and tried to turn the handle, locked. Fuck why does everything thing have to be difficult. Fine, if they wanted to play hard ball, I would play hard ball.

I front kicked the door, sending it off its hinges with an explosive application of force. The door rocketed into a desk, at which sat a man in a suit, knocking the pistol he was previously aiming at the door out of his hands. That didn’t stop the other four people in the room from firing though.

I was consumed in a hail of gun fire, it fucking hurt. Didn’t do any damage, but hurt all the same. I walked through it like a demon and one by one neutralised the thugs with guns. The last one stood their trying desperately to fire his empty gun while begging for mercy.

I punched him in the teeth and added a small shockwave for good measure. Want mercy bitch, how about you don’t enslave innocent women and then try asking for it.

I stepped over his prone form and walked toward the man in the suit. I had changed as a person, a month ago I couldn’t even look someone in the eye without blushing, now. I was fighting gangsters and saving lives. It felt good.

I grabbed the suited man by the hair and pulled his face level with mine. I wanted answers, I had been out looking for the location of the main slavery ring for three whole days now, beating people up until I found someone sufficiently important, and I had a good feeling about this guy.

It might have been because he wore a suit or that he didn’t smell like he hadn’t showered in a week. But the main reason was the stacks and stacks of cash stacked up on his desk.

“Hey shitface, you awake?” I asked my voice sounding quiet and breathy coming out of the mask.

“What do you want?” He said in a Mexican accent. The man had tanned skin and big brown bushy eyebrows and seemed to wear far too much hair gel for his own good. But his must distinctive feature was the large facial tattoo of a bloody knife under his right eye and running all the way down to his chin.

“I want to know where you are keeping the girls.” I said trying to sound menacing. I needed answers fast every day I wasted was another day that more people were torn from their families or sold overseas, it made me sick.

“Girls, what girls? There are no girls here. Look you seem like a reasonable fellow, I’m sure we could make some kind of deal…” I cut him off with a normal punch in the teeth, I had no more fucking time for this shit.

“Ughn.” He groaned. “Yes, yes the girls it’s coming back to me, maybe if we made a deal I could tell you.” I punched him in the face again harder this time, I felt teeth fly back into his mouth and his nose flatten against his face.

“Tell me what I want to know!” I all but yelled into his ear.

“Ah, they are at the docks, in an old warehouse titled “Jimmie’s Cannery” you can’t miss it.” He wailed, looks like my message was getting across.

“Good.” I slammed his head against the desk to knock him out and left the building.

I walked into the cold night air and reached into my pocket for the disposable burner phone I had bought earlier today. While bringing it up to my face I saw my bloodied knuckles, shouldn’t I be feeling something right now? Like a sense of remorse? It’s what the people in the comic books feel after doing their jobs so why aren’t I? I’m not feeling anything, the only thing I think off when I think about it is that those people were bad and they needed justice to be served. Maybe people don’t need a hero to hold their hand and whisper sweet nothings in their ear. Maybe they needed someone to take action, real action and cut out the cancer at the root.

I dialled the police and steeled myself for the next raid. I would never be the celebrity hero, the one on the posters or the one on the t-shirts. I would be the hero in the streets doing what needed to be done. I would be the monster we so desperately needed.