“After Umbra left, I handled all the business with the police force. All hostages were looked through with general inspections. Other than the aforementioned child who got injured during the fight, no major wounds were located,” Nikola repeated to her supervisor the man looked more tired than anything.
“You did everything by the book, Tesla,” Baldur said with a tired look, sipping from his glass as he looked up at the empty ceiling. “There’s nothing in your report that says otherwise. You went in with a textbook strategy, you performed it without fail at any step, and there is no way to blame you. Umbra is at fault here and nobody should be able to say otherwise.”
Baldur didn’t know Nikola’s true identity. The man wasn’t somebody the woman interacted with much in the current years. He had been briefly introduced during her start in the city before she had been left with the rest of the regular heroes. In truth, there was normally no reason for a manager to talk with the likes of her. The only true reason that she had been called in was because of a certain Branded Hero who had gotten some very bad publicity with his recent actions. Even when so many weeks had passed since that incident, there weren’t any signs of the public floodgates of hate stopping. Every person around wanted a piece of that man’s meat and the feast had only just begun.
And it was because of that that Nikola knew what would come out of that man’s mouth. It had been obvious from the start.
“I am putting you off active duty,” Baldur bluntly stated, not looking the Hero in the eyes. “My superiors called in and ordered everything related to the incident to be away from the public. Even the Teleporter that got you there is being put on vacation for the foreseeable future. We’ve had too many issues with that event that we can’t risk anybody making it worse.”
“Even when the only one at fault is Umbra?” Nikola asked.
“You don’t have to say it like that, Tesla. I understand how you’re feeling about this. Everybody above knows that many are having the same ideas,” Baldur replied with a voice that seemed to age the man twenty years. For somebody who was already in his fifties, hair starting to show signs of thinning, the look wasn’t great. “Umbra is a special case in this association. He’s one of the most powerful people we have sitting around and we can’t have him leaving just yet. If that means that we have to accept some of the things he’s done in recent years, so be it.”
“What exactly has he done?” Tesla questioned. “I heard it from the man himself that he knows that he has done something but nobody knows what that is.”
“I am afraid I don’t know either,” Baldur said. “By the sound of it, I have to guess it’s somewhere between beating an innocent man halfway to death and outright burning down an orphanage. Just a few pieces of that man’s personality I could gather makes it clear he wouldn’t feel much from doing either.”
Nikola leaned back in the chair she’d been granted, putting her hands over the mask she wore. Baldur said nothing from his side of the desk, just waiting for her to come to terms with her situation.
“Why was he granted Hero status?” Nikola said as her final question. “I looked him up and he doesn’t have any official academy records. He never went through official training.”
“That’s because he didn’t,” Baldur answered, this time having something he knew. “He helped save Sector 25 from a giant dragon back in the day. He did the impossible, the association realised they didn’t have many with that kind of firepower, and he was granted near-immunity under the pretence that he would work for us for as long as he could. Though… I don’t think we’ll see more of him soon.”
“Why’s that?”
“He’s been moving through the country doing charity events but it doesn’t seem to be helping much,” Baldur said. “At this point, the man might just quit on the spot. He has money and he only does it for entertainment now. If the people don’t love him, I don’t think he cares enough.”
Tesla left the room with a new view of life. She had been in the right, she had done precisely what she needed to do, and the fact that another person had messed up was enough for her to lose nearly any chance she had of ever getting promoted to a higher league. It was ironic, mortifying, and more horrible to experience than Nikola had ever dreamed of.
She had known about this for a long time. She knew that the Branded Heroes got special treatment from the Heroes’ Association. They were the most powerful people around so it made sense that they would be made happy whenever the chance arrived. Maybe that was why the woman had wanted to be in those ranks, to begin with. She wanted to be desired by the association. She wanted the rank and all the perks that came with it.
That had been her sign of greed. The Hero had wanted to be above all the others and had wanted to stand unchallenged. Maybe there was some pride in it as well. She had certainly been the most powerful Manipulation User in her old city. Even her dad’s electrical skills couldn’t keep up. Those early years had nestled in those ideas of always reaching the top.
No, that wasn’t everything. She did want to help people. That had been her dream since she was little before she even knew that she was destined for a powerful ability. Nikola had seen the Heroes on the television, had seen their work written down in books, and she had wanted to stand among them. She wanted to be the saviour.
And… there it was again. Her need to be recognized. Maybe the goal of helping people really just was the excuse to be revered by the public. Maybe she wasn’t so different from Umbra. If given his position, the woman wasn’t sure she could avoid getting the same ideals as him.
Looking down on regular humans was not one of her core ideas but Nikola supposed she could see where it came from. That feeling of superiority, that feeling that they needed to be saved. It was omnipresent in every aspect of her work. She did what the regular police couldn’t. No matter what it was, she knew that she was doing something that the normal humans couldn’t do. It was intoxicating to think about. Umbra, while a maniac that needed to be controlled, was just the by-product of the Association’s needs.
There were villains in the entire world with the same thoughts as Umbra, thousands of them ready to unleash their grandiose plan so they could be feared by all. To fight them, the people needed strong defenders, even if that came with the negatives of said defenders being egomaniacal. And to make sure said defenders kept being defenders… Nikola couldn’t hate them for doing what they did. Umbra was another part of the puzzle that made sure the people were safe. It's just business.
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Yet even when it made logical sense, the woman just couldn’t accept it.
“I heard about the news,” a voice said from the side as Nikola continued down the hallway. Stopping, the face of Harold came into view. Her old mentor had come along yet again. “I am sorry you had to see that side of this place so soon.”
“It’s fine,” Nikola said, hugging the one she had looked up to for so long. “Did you really visit here because of that?”
“Of course I did,” the former Hero by the name of Lux said, smiling in a way that showed both age and experience. “It’s not too many decades ago that I had to go through the same experience. My first time being sent out of active duty was… more my fault but I think it hits the same way.”
“I doubt there’s much you could do to get sent out, Lux,” Thalia said as they walked along, finding a sofa in one of the many private meeting rooms. The lookout to the city was fantastic as always. Having the biggest building out of most in the city helped in more ways than one, after all. “You’re the goody two shoes of the Branded Heroes.”
“You say that as if I always had that position,” Harold complained, though his smile did falter. “I had to fight for that status back in the day. I never really did anything else but work for it, letting my life be consumed by the position. I lost a lot of good years because of it.”
“But you got your dream in the end,” Nikola fired back. “You gained the ultimate prize of being a Hero. You became the name that every child can remember.”
…
“At some point, I don’t think that became the end goal for me,” Harold said with empty eyes. “There were a lot of things that I sacrificed to get that position yet it didn’t bring me any of the supposed joy that I was hoping for. I was told that something had changed but I can’t say I ever felt that. In that last decade, my only real dream was to end my career without screwing something up so bad that I was thrown off.”
“I think you went out on a high note,” Nikola offered, seeing her mentor, not at his best. “You helped me and Seid gain the approval to become actual Heroes. You passed the gauntlet on to the new generation just fine.”
“That’s a nice thought, Nikola, but you know that there were a lot of things that happened before that,” Lux said, leaning back into the sofa. “Before you came along, I worked solo. I went out into the more distant parts of the Sectors to do the work that we didn’t have enough people doing. I… was not always the best fit for those tasks. I’m powerful, yes, but not in the way that I always need to be. Because of that, I sometimes made mistakes. They were mistakes that anybody would do, mistakes that nobody should have been blamed for, but they were also mistakes that were made because I was the one who went to help. And they likely wouldn’t have happened if others were there to take care of it instead of me.”
“But you can’t just quit at that,” Nikola fired back. Harold looked at her with a smile, seeming to nearly feed off that small bit of positivity.
“Very true. I have done a lot of things that I regret, I didn’t save all the people I wanted to save, and many have lost their lives because I wasn’t smart or strong enough,” Harold surmised. “That’s going to happen with you as well, Tesla. You’re strong. With time, you might even be stronger than me. But you are still going to fail at many points. You’re still going to watch people die because you were incompetent. But… you’ll carry on the mantle until the moment where you can give the next person the job that you likely regretted taking to begin with.”
Harold stood from the sofa after a few minutes of silence, popping his back into place as his old body resettled. Nikola never really noticed but the teacher before her had truly gone old with time. And the memories of the past hadn’t helped either. Still, her mentor had the wisdom and she was going to do her best to live up to it. Nikola did not like how it worked but she would follow it for now nonetheless.
“I did see Seid a while ago,” Nikola mentioned with the death of the previous subject. “He came to visit me in my apartment. Broke through the window and ate my food.”
“That’s certainly one way to get back into your life,” Harold mentioned with a small laugh to accompany it. Even if those two had disagreements, it seemed that the old man had somewhat forgiven the younger one. Nikola thought back to the initial reaction when Lux had heard of what Wave had done. Anger was the first emotion. That had been showcased to Seid well enough when the two had made their shouting match. Forgiveness and sadness had only come around after Seid had left. Nikola wasn’t sure the younger man even knew that Harold had accepted the incident.
Or, well, he had accepted what had happened instantly. It was Seid’s reaction to it that had been the breaking point. Seeing it as the right thing to do was a ruling where the two hadn’t stood together. Wave was out of bounds in that area.
“He did seem interested in maybe talking with you at some point,” Nikola offered to the old man, Harold being quick to shake his head.
“I think it’s more you wanting him to speak with me again,” Harold corrected. “That young vigilante isn’t going to come around to my place any time soon. Not of his own free will at least.”
“Well… he is technically an outlaw now,” Nikola replied with a smile. “A small bit of kidnapping could do him well.”
“Seid’s the one who likes to skirt around the law, Tesla,” Lux said, reminding Nikola of her Hero status. “I’m the old man who sits in an abandoned Sector. I don’t get that privilege by doing things my way.”
“You certainly didn’t get it by following theirs,” Nikola challenged, the old man laughing it off.
“Now that is true. When you upset the wrong commander, you get an offer you aren’t allowed to refuse,” Harold explained, sobering up a bit at Nikola’s mildly worried expression. “It’s old history now, of course. I do enjoy life away from the public eye, you know. It’s very quiet. Not as much noise.”
“I’m sure it is,” Nikola said, getting up as well. “I’ll see you around, Harold. I shouldn’t be taking too much of your time.”
“Ah, of course,” Lux said, hugging his former apprentice. “But… do remember that not everybody can be saved. Some lose more than we'll ever be able to realise. We must just move on and try to save another life.”
“I promise I will try to remember,” Nikola said, happy at seeing the old man relaxing. She waved him farewell as she left once more. By the time she was in the elevator again, the Hero checked some of her side pockets, making sure that the Healing Doses were still sitting around. She’d gotten a few more from Iris. The laboratory technician had been more than happy that the starting test had worked without issue, though the addition of green spots was a side-effect that hadn’t been purged yet.
Looking at the small capsules, the Hero was still unsure if she wanted to take them if the need came. The idea of getting green lines on her skin wasn’t too… appealing to her. Yet if it saved her life, the woman supposed it wouldn’t hurt to have it ready.
At any level, it made sure that she had some better medical equipment if any civilian ever needed help.
Getting out of the elevator on the forty-second floor, the Hero went into the regulated archives. It was not often that Nikola had to step off that particular floor, only using it when she had to remind herself of past achievements and cases. And… she supposed that this was one of those times.
Finding an open station with ease, not many ever bothered to come up to the archives, Nikola began to search through her file. With how little time had passed, it took no hardship before she found the farm report. The actual report about the event hadn’t been filled with too much galore, the lack of damage or loss of lives making the Heroes’ Association not spare it a glance. Maybe that was why nobody had looked into it any further.
Taking a glance at the farm’s past as well, Nikola was quick to find… nothing. It wasn’t that nothing was there to see because there were more than a few reports. It was just out of her clearance level, so much redacted. Seeing no sections to even request access, the Hero guessed it was expunged from the reports due to orders from the top branch. Nikola had to wonder why they would have done anything of the sort, though the formatting of a casualty list wasn’t missed. Somebody had died in that place long before she had gotten there. A lot of people.
After the Hero had left the farm behind, a few weeks of silence had been had. New management had been put into place along with a suspicious amount of hiring. Looking into it further, it seemed that a local crime ring had been taken care of, nearly every person attached to it being noted down as missing. Nikola took all of three seconds to think about it before coming to some manner of conclusion.
Seid had truly gotten himself distracted too much. It wasn’t often he did more than fight against the more petty crimes yet Nikola could see him trying to fight against an illegal organisation on a whim. Looking further into the profiles of the people involved, it seemed there was a legitimate connection to organised crime in multiple Sectors. It was no wonder the woman had heard so little about it if a certain vigilante spent his time doing anything but the single thing he was meant to be working on.
Or maybe Wave just didn’t find anything and got bored. Honestly, both were definite possibilities, the man having no real reason to return if he hadn’t. Maybe he would come around in a few months to apologise and steal her food again.
For now, the woman just had a good idea of where he was hiding. And, finally, Nikola was able to see the actual name of the farm. It had been just a few steps away in her mind yet the refresher she needed had now come around.
“Amity Farms.”