As Dylan bounded down the street, he got a few odd glances from passerbys. There hadn’t been anybody outside his house, as most people were currently at work (it was the middle of a weekday). However, as he started to get into a more populated area, people started to show up nonetheless.

Dylan ignored their glances. They wouldn’t get in his way. People were far too used to seeing supers to interfere with one, regardless of whether they thought it was a hero or villain. The consequences were far too dire.

Most of the people Dylan saw were moving away from the scene of the crime, hurriedly walking to try and get out of the danger zone. Some, too used to supers, had their phones and were moving closer, eager to get the action on video, hopeful that their video would be the one that had the next big break, allowing them to rake in the easy money that came with going viral.

Dylan thought about telling them to leave, but decided against it. Some of these people were notoriously stubborn, and would be unlikely to listen. Additionally, he didn’t have a voice changer. If these people wouldn’t listen to an adult super, the chances of them listening to a teen one, especially an unknown one like him, was non-existent. Plus, if any of the villains here heard his voice, they might cease to take him seriously, which could be a problem in its own right. Dylan resolved to make himself a voice changer after this was over. If people didn’t think of him as a kid it would only be to his benefit.

Dylan was fast approaching the scene of the crime, the augmented legs of his suit propelling him faster than he otherwise would be able to move. The location he was headed to was an older gas station, once painted a neon green, now faded. It was still in operation, however, and a villain and a few normals were holding the place up, if the police scanner was to be believed. A squad car was parked about 100 feet away from the entrance, it’s light flashing. One of the officers was speaking over the intercom, warning the public to stay back, before offering assurances that the situation was under control. Dylan could briefly spot another squad car around back.

They were likely waiting for a hero to show up. The police were only likely to make the situation worse if they tried to defuse it. Either they would have something that would work against the villain, and that would prompt them to use their power with less restraint (you didn’t want to see what a Pyro who thought they would be shot to death could burn), or their weapons wouldn’t work, in which case, well, what could they even do then?

No, Dylan would have to handle this himself. It was time to see what he could do. Ignoring a warning from an officer taking cover behind his car, Dylan strode up to the front of the store. His breath started to come faster in his chest as he clenched his hands, noticing a surprising amount of sweat as he did so.

Pushing aside his nerves, he walked through the front doors, and they whirred open automatically with a chime. He immediately saw a shape to his left, and turned just in time to see a wooden baseball bat coming at his head. Whipping his arm around, he barely managed to get his arm up in front of it. It impacted the armored center of his palm, stopping dead with a metallic thwack. A sharp jolt ran up Dylan’s arm, the impact only mostly absorbed by the suit.

The man holding it was wearing a dirty white hoody, his face covered by a bandana. Dylan’s other arm reached around to grab the man, but he jumped back out of Dylan's range, before bringing the bat up and swinging again. This time, the bat hit the back of the hand Dylan had used in his attempt to grab the man, sending it towards the floor. Unprepared, Dylan let out a shout of pain and surprise. His hand throbbed. He stepped forwards, intent on punching the man. He would back his left arm. He would knock the man out in one blow. Just as he was about to commit to the attack, his vision blurred, and suddenly Dylan was on the floor, with pain in his shins.

Another man was standing over him, a dark ski mask on his face. He had swept Dylan's feet out from under him, sending him to the floor. The man leered down at him.

“You’re heavy as shit, kid. Hurt my damn shin”. Before Dylan could reply, he brought his own bat down, this one metal, directly on-top of Dylan’s helmet. A ringing sound filled his ears. He felt dizzy.

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He felt another blow hit him, this one impacting the metal surrounding his chest. Dylan realized that he had to get up, before they realized that his limbs were mostly unarmored. Slamming his elbows into the floor, Dylan shot to his feet, sending the two men stumbling back.

They recovered quickly, however, and in sync they swung at him, a bat coming in from each side. Dylan prioritized the wooden one, more confident in catching that. He turned his back into the metal one, crouching down so it impacted the most armored area of his spine. It gave a dull ring when it hit, like a broken bell.

As for the wooden bat, he was more ready for it, this time catching it in both hands, sparing himself from most of the pain. Stepping towards the man in the white hoody, he slid one of his hands down the bat, before squeezing them in opposite directions. He felt resistance for a second, and then the bat snapped in half.

Dylan’s head moved forwards as the man in the ski mask struck him in the back of the head with the other bat. Dylan ignored it, intent on taking the white hoodie guy out of the fight as quickly as possible.

White hoodie guy himself was backing up, eager to stay out of range now that he had lost his weapon, unwilling to tangle with a man in a suit of power armor with his bare hands. Dylan crouched down, before pushing off with one leg. His vision blurred, and he felt a pressure in his torso as he accelerated across the gap between himself and the man in white.

The man had a chance to let out a shout before Dylan punched him in the face, sending teeth flying out of his mouth. The man collapsed to the floor bonelessly, letting out a pained whimper.

As for the man in the skimask, seeing his companion leveled onto the ground prompted him to turn and run, either to seek a better position, or maybe just to get away from the angry, mechanized super that had just floored his buddy.

Dylan crouched again, before pushing through the floor, harder this time, and the world went dark for a second. By the time he could see again, Dylan’s shoulder was pressed into the man with the ski mask’s back, and they were falling to the floor. Dylan was briefly disoriented, before regaining his bearings and thumping the man on the back of the head, gently this time, unwilling to send his fist through the man’s skull.

He heard footsteps to his left, and saw another man walking out from the back, a pistol in his hand. He was taller than the other two, and looked older. He was wearing a powder blue ski mask. He let out a shout of surprise when he saw Dylan sitting on top of his accomplice.

Dylan, for his part, didn’t stay still after seeing the gun. He scrambled for the metal bat, dropped on the floor after he tackled its wielder, and felt his head rock backwards. His ears rang, and he smelled smoke. Finally getting a grasp on the bat, he looked up, and saw smoke drifting from the barrel of the gun. Dylan’s blood ran cold. The man was bringing the pistol back around, to hit him with a second shot. Without thinking, Dylan brought the bat behind his head, arms wound up like he was about to throw a hammer. He launched the bat forwards, where it careened end over end towards the man with a gun, before embedding itself into his skull with a sickening crunch.

The gun went off, the bullet missing Dylan, pinging off the floor besides him before ricocheting up into the displays behind him. Dylan swore, scanning his vision around the room, to see if any threats remained. The first man, the one in the white hoodie, was still lying on the floor, blood oozing out from his mouth and catching his breathing, giving a sickly wet sound. The second man, the one Dylan had tackled, was unconscious on the floor, but otherwise unharmed.

The final man was likely dead. Dylan was no medical professional, but having a metal baseball bat embedded into your head didn’t seem like something that most people would survive.

Confident that all the immediate threats were taken care of, Dylan scanned himself for injuries. There wasn’t any visible blood on himself (aside from his hands), and he didn’t feel any sharp pain. That was good. He likely wasn’t shot. Both of his arms hurt from the repeated impact with the bat, and he was feeling the beginnings of a headache.

He was short on breath, dizzy, his vision was still a little gray around the edges. Dylan resolved to be more cautious of when he elected to move at the full speed the suit could provide. His body wasn’t able to properly handle the strain.

He must have sat there for another 2 or 3 minutes, panting, when he heard a man's voice.

“What the fuck did you do to my friends?!”

Looking up, he saw a lean man of average height, wearing a cheap spandex suit, standing over the bodies lying in the floor.

Shit. In the chaos of the fight, Dylan had forgotten about the super.

The villain continued to mumble to himself, growing increasingly agitated. Dylan started to stand up, wanting to be ready in case the man decided to fight him, which looked to be an increasingly likely prospect.

Just as he was straightening up, the man crouched down. Before Dylan could move farther, the villain was right in front of him, fist careening towards his face.

“So that’s what it looks like from the outside” thought Dylan, before he went tumbling backwards, head over heels.