If there was a teenage boy with 50 thousand crescent on hand, anyone would be surprised. The same applied for bank workers, but they knew money beat all, and knew to keep quiet. Anyone who made that amount could blimp them out of their regular life straight to heaven, mostly hell. He put them into his credit card, almost empty after he was sent to the boarding school where he didn’t really need to waste any money but had to either way.

The a little-too-energetic girl metaphorically dragged him deeper to the city center, and straight to the central pavilion with the statue of a large man with a cape, both hands on his waists and a large smile on his face. Apparently he was some superhero, a great one, before the wars started. Chains hung around it, and benches pressed to them from all four sides with the lord’s office to the north, some paces away.

Night had fallen, the moon standing high in the sky, a full moon. Couples held hands and walked through the garden opposite the lord’s office and cars sped around the pavilion. There wasn’t much traffic this late, which was most likely past ten in the evening. The bank had closed when Damian left, after all – it closed at ten.

Damian sat on one of the benches, sipping a soft drink from the fast food chain close by, where he had had his dinner. Tina held a fry in her hand and threw them into her mouth one by one. The lights lit up the night, on the lookout for any air raids. Not that it mattered. The empire soldiers were over-achievers, and wouldn’t let any enemy enter.

“Where’s the base you’re taking me? It better not be some skyscraper.” Said Damian, and pointed all around. “That’d be too obvious.”

“We’re here.” Said Tina with a large grin, pointing downward.

“Wait, w-what?!” Damian shouted. He was having too many surprises in the last few hours.

“I mean what I’m saying.” Tina said, and jumped up the chains, motioning for Damian to follow.

She walked toward the statue, and clicked on a few places on the metal plate with the superhero’s quote on it. As soon as she did so, darkness enveloped Damian and he found himself sliding falling down. The realization didn’t have the time to hit him before he fell to the ground covered in a large soft pillow.

He looked around, already too shocked to be even more. It was a mansion, looked like it. Fancy chandeliers hung from the ceiling of the room. The walls were black, and red lines traversed through it around the top. Two large wooden doors stood at one end of the room the size of around ten steps to each side. Tina was jumping on the pillow much like a child would on a bed, except she wasn’t a child and the pillow not a bed.

After a while, Tina stopped entertaining herself and sprinted toward the door, and opened them. On the other side was a room, enormous. The walls were still black, but one was adorned with a large computer screen depicting what could only be assumed as surveillance cameras around the city. There was a large table, large enough for an international meeting to take place, in the middle of the room with numerous chairs around it, though the littering pizza and fast food garbage took a lot from its glory. In the corner, with a small fence before it, was a gym. In another one, some beds and a shelf with what Damian assumed to be antibiotics.

In his awe, Damian nearly fell down the stairs, not noticing they were there. His mouth opened agape, and looked around. It was truly worthy of a military base, at least that’s what Damian likened it to. Two other doors stood on both walls without the screen, both steel, contrary to the wood of the other one.

“Tina, I told you not to use the pavilion again!” Shouted a man, from below the computer screen. “The lord’s gonna be angry if you abuse the emergency entrance like that.”

“Sorry, showing the newbie around. Had to make him surprised, and I forgot my ID at home.” Said Tina with a small bit of her tongue sticking out her mouth. “He’s the ninja I’ve been telling you about. Seems like he can hold a sword in the public and no one would give him the weird looks, like seeing someone with a weapon, kinda. Oh, and dress like a ninja. No one would bat an eye, like you didn’t notice him over there and don’t care one bit he’s wearing a ninja suit.”

“That’s half me anticipating it.” Said Damian with a shrug, and looked at the ninja that was so talked about. She was talking about him the whole time they were eating, except with telepathy than mouths. She was a real eater, and the personification of chitchat.

“Great. You’re the, what was it again, Titan? Anyways, I’ve been hearing about you a lot from the old man. Name’s Clinton.” The ninja said, a man of color, also a teenager with a bald head.

“It’s Damian, and the nick’s Dreadnought.” Said Damian, shaking hands.

“You never shook hands with me.” Tina complained from the side.

“Yes, because we didn’t need to. You already knew me.” Said Damian, looking at her grabbing a piece of pizza from the table. A really real eater. It was simply incredible how she could afford to eat that much and stay fit.

“Heard you can take hits. O’Brien’s gonna be real happy, I guess. Ever since I got beat down with a single hit, I wouldn’t ever cross hands with that psycho. She’s a complete monster, can see in sort of a slowed down manner when she’s about to get hit and you know what, she’s not gonna be hurt even if you hit him. Can take a car crash and the car got broken.” Said Clinton with a sigh. “You don’t have to push yourself. I can understand.”

“Wait, it’s a she? Tina! You said it was a he!” Damian shouted.

“Surprise, surprise! I thought I’d tell you after you got beaten, since she has so much muscle, wears a mask and doesn’t have much of that. Thought you wouldn’t notice. Clinton, you’ve gotta be real fun at the parties.”

“You never let me in.” He complained.

“Just speak generic, for god’s sake, if you don’t know.” She countered.

“But you have telepathy!” Shouted Clinton, and shortly after fell to his knees on the ground, holding both temples. “I was in the wrong, sorry.”

“I CAN SHOUT TOO!” She shouted back, and proceeded to devour another piece. Imagining that loud voice in his head yelling was painful, to say the least. Hearing her throw a temper tantrum inside the head might have been a little more than difficult to her parents.

“Shit, I apologized.” Clinton mumbled, and got to his feet. A slight chuckle escaped Damian. His friends were injured and he was somewhere with another bunch, possibly making friends.

He walked over to the computer, maybe supercomputer, but the screen changed from its camera feeds to a red screen, with a red meteor… comet inside a black circle outlined with red. After several buzzes, Edwin’s face appeared on the screen. He seemed to be sitting in some sort of office, and had a tired expression on his face.

“Guys, Comet’s rushed in alone again. Go help her, she’s at 15th district fighting a gang… Wait, is that Damian? How did you get there?” Edwin asked, this time Damian had the last laugh. Making someone surprised helped relieve some of his own frustration.

He pointed at Tina, and Edwin visibly grumped, for the lack of a better word. Tina laughed loudly from behind the table, and they both stared at each other, for more than a minute. It was awkward, seeing these two in some sort of rivalry or the kind. Weird, even.

“What’s with them?” Damian asked Clinton, the only possibly sane person before he noticed him putting a large throwing star on his back, two blades both short and long at both sides of his waist, and put on the mask covering the entirety of his face except the eyes. Disturbingly, he didn’t look cheesy but completely natural in the all black outfit. The mask had the comet logo on the forehead.

“Don’t mind them. They’ve been playing that thing since they met like years ago, trying to enter each other’s minds.” Clinton said, and Damian noticed himself nodding to it. The surprise in Edwin having a gift that entered minds was also rather disturbing – completely ignored and taken for granted.

“Oh, I see. Edwin met her before you?” Damian asked, flexing his neck and muscles. He’d have to fight again.

“Yeah, some months ago is my best guess. They aren’t close like family, but kinda like friends.” Clinton said, walking toward the door to the right. “You coming or not?”

“I am.” She said, with her mind.

Clinton produced a card from his pocket, and placed it on a scanner near the door. It slid up, revealing a long corridor lit by old yellow lights. Pipes ran through one wall and the other had metal plating. The ninja started sprinting, not even waiting for Damian to get ready. He had no choice but to follow, since he had no idea what this road led to, or where they were going for that matter. The sound of a wheel turning came from behind, and Tina came scooting on a skateboard. She was awfully good at it, easily overtaking Damian by a fair margin.

He sprinted behind them. Being a boxer, he was no pushover when it came to running and stamina. It was just that Tina was cheating and Clinton was like a professional athlete that specialized in sprints. After five minutes, he could feel himself losing breath all the while Clinton didn’t even breath loudly. Maybe having both hands behind the back really helped, or maybe it didn’t and he was just that good.

There were also two things Damian noticed while blindly dashing against the duo. Tina’s skateboard was moving far more than it should without her even adding momentum. In fact, the only time he had seen her using her legs was when she was overtaking him. The other thing was ladders, leading a fair bit above. It must be used by them to get to the surface is what Damian thought.

Thankfully they stopped, and Clinton started climbing up a ladder. It was pitch black above, and surprisingly, they both started climbing. Tina wasn’t dressed in her casual clothes, dressed in what could only be described as a tight-fitting black bodysuit, also with the comet logo, hers on her back. That led to Damian thinking when he would get his own if he understood how that worked.

There was nothing too fancy about where they appeared in: a back alley, an isolated one. The darkness had settled, nothing too much happening. Red City was a peaceful place if you excluded the downtowns, the numbered districts were nothing short of as peaceful as a ghost town during the night. Nothing happened, and only the few named districts had any life at all. That wasn’t to say there was no lighting. It was lit, all through the night, with streetlamps that had some thirty feet between them.

If Damian recognized the place right, it was the 14th district, not very far from the 15th, but he wasn’t looking forward to all the running he’d do.

“Good luck keeping up, tough boy.” Tina winked at him, and followed after Clinton who’d gotten a head start after getting up the first. However, the one thing Damian wondered was how Tina climbed up with her skateboard, instead of leaving it below.

He was out of breath, Damian had to admit it, but he forced himself to move even if it was slow. There was nothing he could do. He was a normal person, after all, aside from not being hurt and being able to hit hard, just a normal teenager.

Thankfully, the sound of fights could be heard from close by. Damian walked forward, without the need to look for the fight or try to catch up, his sole priority getting his stamina back before the fight, lest he fight like he had already fought four rounds or more. That’s when the fights started to turn sluggish in the ring and things started turning desperate. Not that he fought in any official matches. They didn’t allow gifted to get into tournaments and soil it.

Someone was sent flying to a building, from a fair distance away, and crashed into it strong enough to make a crater. Then it was followed by another two. A figure wearing an all black bodysuit – much like Tina’s –a red cape twisting behind her back with the emblem of the Red Comets came flying majestically, ever so slowly. She was more an angel of death than anything else.

One of the three men stood up, the only possible explanation being that the man had a gift of his own. Damian couldn’t imagine a bona-fide normal person being able to tank a throw that could do that, let alone a punch. Hopefully thinking, he’d be able to take three before he exploded. Exploding was a strong move, but pleasant? Damian would give a no to that any day other than the one he was dead in.

The Comet was fast, closing the more than the sixty feet distance in no more than a second. If Damian had thought he was strong, then this made him humble. Now he felt just dumb for even bothering to brag against her. There was no way he was better than her, maybe technique, but nothing more. She didn’t look the type to train, like the jocks who got buff with sports and the kind instead of real training.

She grabbed the man by the collar, and stared at him from beneath her mask. It covered the entirety of her head, only a small hole at the back of her head letting her ponytail stick out. Her eye parts were covered with red goggles that seemed to glow in an eerie red, either her own doing or the goggles did that. While it did many bad things to hiding identity as a gifted, for intimidation it was one of the greatest tools that one could use. Just showing them how much anger and power you had in yourself was threatening, to say the least. Damian had used this tactic some times himself, and was well acquainted with it. It made the interrogated people visibly pale. That was how scary it was. He couldn’t even imagine how it must feel like to have it be done by someone who could take his life easily, nothing more than a snap of the neck in her hands.

Damian had unknowingly walked a little close to her, and she glared at him, or at least that’s what he thought. No expression could be made out from beneath the mask, but everything about her look angry from her expressionless blank white mask. He threw both hands in the air.

After a while, and maybe some words from Tina, she looked back to the man and pressed her face close to his. Her voice was harsh, but carried the elegance of a woman. For the first time since he had been rejected five years ago, Damian thought he had a crush on someone.

“Who do you work under?” She asked, clutching harder from his neck and holding him up in the air with it.

“I-I’ll tell. Please… let… me…down.” He said, his face turning red from the strangulation. Comet did as asked, and let go, the man falling to the ground with a thump in a rather painful manner. Some bruises, most likely from the fight with Comet, started visibly healing. “On the other hand, I won’t die even if you try to kill me. Why would I tell you?” He asked, with a smirk. Even with his black suit in tatters, no injuries were on his body.

“Regeneration. That’s a neat thing you have there. Let’s see you laugh when my friend over there talks to you. This is for your own good. Just tell me, that’ll save you a lot of trouble.” Said Comet, and turned to look at the fighting, or where the fight was. It had quieted down, and Clinton with Tina were walking toward the interrogating girl. “Just please. We don’t name her Psycho for a wordplay.”

Damian could understand. If Tina took Clinton to his knees and made him apologize in a second, he couldn’t even imagine what would happen if she did what she did for a long time, which he assumed was shouting telepathically. That was just evil. He actually hoped the guy would tell Comet that to save himself trouble.

They arrived quickly, one on his legs and the other on a skateboard. Clinton had some blood here and there, but he wasn’t injured. More surprising was that Tina had more blood on her. Damian was under the impression she was a bad fighter.

“I’ve been telling you, don’t barge in alone. We’re a team, we move as a team.” Tina said, pouting. She had a mock angry expression on her face to go with it.

“I know, but some idiot tried to pick on my civilian identity. When I dressed up and found him, he was in this hideout and I just had to stop what they were doing.” Comet said, dropping to the ground.

“Aaaand, what were they doing again?” Tina asked, still angry looking.

“Drinking! In a bar! The bar was the hideout!” Comet shouted, more trying to justify herself rather than argue.

“And what if you picked on some businessmen hanging out, you moron?!” Tina shouted, pointing at Comet and then rubbed her forehead. “How did you know they were criminals?”

“Because the guy that tried to hit on me was trying to brag. It was true. He was a member of the Smithy.” Comet said.

“He confessed yet?” Tina asked, the angry expression turning to a sweet smile.

“Yes. Yes, he’s just about to confess.” Said Comet, and looked at the torn suited man with what would have been a smile if she didn’t have the hard mask on. “Aren’t you?”

“Not a snowball’s chance in hell. You ain’t gonna be getting information outta me without taking drastic measures. If you’re what I think you are, then you won’t.” Said the man, and laughed maniacally. Snickered even. At that moment, maybe Comet gave up on him or she got angry. She just quieted down, and it was Tina’s cue to start.

She walked toward the man with a smile. No, that was an understatement. She walked toward the man with a grin, a toothy grin at that. She was the only one that hadn’t covered her face, and due to that it was evident. Tina would enjoy extracting information out of him.

“Clinton, grab him. I’ll question him back at HQ. The room’s still clean.” She said in a sweet manner that anyone with a mother or sister knew to refuse. In the distance, Comet could be seen rubbing her forehead and most likely sighing. She had flown a fair distance above, and her figure didn’t really show.

“Sorry, I have school tomorrow! See you later!” She shouted from the distance. It was only then that Damian remembered he had school as well. When entering the army, one had to have a degree. That meant anyone who wanted to be a soldier had to have graduated school, not with good grades, just graduate. That made him slack off most of the time, and it wouldn’t be a news if he did skip class.

“Damn. I have school too.” Damian said. “What about you guys? You not going to sleep early?”

“Well, I don’t go to school and Clinton’s dropped out.” Said Tina, more in her normal gear than the psychotic persona she had a few seconds ago. “You can sleep in the infirmary if you’d like. Getting to your home’s got to be a hassle.”

“Don’t worry. I live in a boarding school.” Damian said.

“I… see.” She said.