Logi grimaced at the TV screen in front of him. The news had been displaying footage of the events in the woods for the past week and a half! He had been forced to lay low, and the itch under his skin was only just assuaged by the three lighters he had gone through in the past week.
It had been stupid, he shouldn’t have taken that shot at the helicopter, but the sight of the water pouring over the beautiful flame, HIS flame, had made him irrational. It was also wildly out of character. Logi was a rational man; he could make more fire whenever so why had he put himself at needless risk like that? He didn’t have an answer for -
“Logi?”
“Hmm? I’m sorry I was thinking about something else ma’am.”
Logi’s boss Lilianna Albief, the CEO of the law firm Logi worked at and his direct boss sighed and shook her head.
“How many times have I had to tell you not to call me ma’am? I’m two years older than you, that's hardly the age to start calling me ma’am. That aside, are you doing ok? I can count on one hand the number of times you weren't focused on the job.”
Logi winced, she was right. No matter what was happening in his life he always put on a straight face and got his work done, it was how he had gotten so high up on the ladder so early, well that and having zero social life or hobbies let him put in obscene amounts of overtime.
“I’m fine Ms Albief, don’t worry about me.”
“Ms is barely any better and you know it but you can always talk to me, when was the last time you used a vacation day? Don’t bother answering. I know the answer to that, over three years ago, we didn't even have rollover!”
“I’ve never seen reason to Ms. Albief. What was it you asked?” Logi deflected, trying to get the conversation back on track and away from his personal (and criminal) life. Lilianna was a good boss and a good woman in general. She had the annoying if good-natured habit of trying to help people who didn’t want it.
She glared at him, it wasn’t very effective. Lilianna was almost a foot shorter than him at just 5 '6 and more than 70 pounds lighter her frame was not one that sparked fear. Unless she was drunk, if she was drunk you should absolutely be afraid.
“I asked if you had any major developments in policy I needed to be informed about.”
With a sharp nod, Logi launched into a detailed description of various problems and what policies needed to be implemented to resolve them.
Finished with his report Logi nodded to his boss “I’ve sent an email to you with all of this written down so that you don’t forget it.”
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“Alright, that's everything for today's meeting then, unless you have any other items to discuss we’re done here.” The young arsonist acknowledged his boss before turning on his heel and walking out of the room. His boss's eyes watched him as he left before she called out to him “Take some time off Logi! You look like you haven’t slept in a week and you're not very good at using makeup to hide it!”
Logi slammed the door shut with maybe a bit more force than necessary and began the trudge back to his office.
Lilianna Albief thought on the tells on the normally stoic man, the way he was slightly pale, the scratching at his own palm, and the massive eye bags. “Wonder if he’s trying to quit smoking or something.” She muttered to herself.
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Logi grunted as he pushed off the wall and darted down the ally at windshearing speeds. He had long since stopped using his car, he was simply faster going through the alleyways. He could avoid any people in them simply by using his superhuman senses.
And so here he was bouncing between walls like a pinball when a loud crash echoed over to him, he would have heard this one even without enhanced senses. He rounded the nearest corner at normal speeds only to find a man lifting a motorcycle straight out in front of him with seemingly no issue. There was a dent in the motorcycle's rusted exterior where it must have been dropped.
There was soon to be another drop given how the men dropped it in his surprise at seeing Logi turn the corner. The instant the two-wheeled vehicle was out of his hand the man turned and ran. Sensible if you didn’t want someone to realise you were superhuman running away would be a good plan and going by the speeds the man was running at he was decidedly superhuman.
Unfortunately for the unknown man, he was decidedly slower than Logi. Taking an extra moment to cover his face entirely in a fire to obscure his features, Logi sprinted catching up and surpassing the man in moments. Clamping his hand onto the stranger's shoulder Logi pushed him to the ground forcing the man into a ground-shattering kneel.
Logi hesitated a moment, completely at a loss for what to say. This was his first meeting with another powered person.
“You aren’t very discreet.” was what he settled on. “I heard that hunk of junk hit the ground a hundred and fifty meters away.” The fire surrounding his voice gave it a choppy buzzing quality reminiscent of a swarm of bees.
Logi took a good look at the man on the ground in front of him. He was an average 5 ‘10 stoutly built African American man. His eyes were practically popping out of his head at the force being put on him undoubtedly Logi was the first thing to hit him this hard since he had awakened his powers.
“You’re the first I’ve met and you can’t even get a word out? That's just sad.” Logi let the pressure on the man's shoulder drop, pushing his body to move he grabbed the man's wallet out of his pocket before flipping it open.
“Christopher Pennanalet? Well? Still nothing to say I guess.” Logi moved to turn away “Good to meet you, Christopher, you're the first of our kind I’ve met, what's your pow-” Logi was cut off.
“Hypocrite” Logi’s head turned to face ‘Christopher’. “I’M the one whose not discreet? So that wasn’t you on the news two weeks ago?”
“Touche, do you hold a grudge against me for it?”
“Depends on why you did it.” Christopher staggered to his feet “Those were good men just doing their job, and you killed them, why?”
Logi sneered “They were trying to put out my fire! No one does that. Do you know why no one does it? BECAUSE IT” S MINE!” Logi practically screamed that last part.
Christopher was surprisingly calm in the face of the screaming madman. “Then yes, I do ‘Hold a grudge for it’.”
Logi stilled, letting out a sigh. “Damnit you were the first one I found, maybe the only one.” The sentence was barely out of his mouth before Logi lunged, his hand darting forward in a knifing motion the appendage coated in fire. Much to his surprise, the other superhuman grabbed his arm just behind the fire when it was a mere inch from his face.
Christopher flinched at the arm he was holding, the fire already drying out his eyes. Reflexively he pulled on the arm, the lack of resisting force allowing him to throw Logi straight up in a move that completely ignored leverage and defied the laws of physics.
By the time Logi had rotated in the air a fireball conjured in his hands Christopher was already around the corner and by the time Logi landed Christopher could have made half a dozen different turns. He would never find him in these alleys.