We head out pretty much as soon as we're all geared up, and make our way towards the water. Poseidon City started as a beach town and it still has a lot of that, but there's a pretty decent harbor these days and a navy base not all that far away. Apparently Baitmaster likes to make use of that, using boats to ship captives to another state or overseas.
The beach area is on the south and we start there, working our way north. As soon as we start getting to buildings of any real size again, Dragonfly and I split off, and I gotta say, it's pretty fun trying to compare myself to a flier! I mean, if she just went all out I'd never be able to catch up, but obviously we're not here on a race, we're here to keep an eye out for anything suspicious. As I climb my way up buildings I take the opportunity to peer into windows and alleys, while Dragonfly checks the roofs and other sides.
Her costume is mostly green with black accents, and it actually blends into the dark almost as well as mine. At nighttime, when she's flying high up? You'd probably never see her unless you know exactly where to look. We keep in touch over earpiece though, and before we clear a building we make sure to come into sight and give each other a wave. Marcy, Cold Call and Silver Sensation start falling behind pretty quickly, but covering territory isn't their main goal. Instead they stop and say hi to anyone they meet, ask if anyone's seen anything strange, be obvious in case someone in the area needs help, that sort of thing.
After an hour we take a break, and Dragonfly and I end up sitting on the ledge of one of the smaller warehouses. In between bites of a snack bar I figure it's probably a good opportunity to get to know my new buddy!
"So, Dragonfly! You're a bit of a vet for all of this stuff, yeah?"
Jessie nods between drinks from a canteen. "Yeah, I mean, I'm twenty-three, I'm nothing like the people who've been doing this for decades, right? But if I had to put a number on it, people usually stop treating you like a newbie after, hrmmm...two years or so?"
"Doesn't sound all that long. How hard is it to last for two years?"
"You'd be surprised." She winces after saying that. "I mean, I didn't mean to sound like newbies are dropping left and right or anything. Most people just quit. After a couple of years it's usually pretty obvious whether or not you're going to get famous, and if you don't then it's hard to make money off of the gig. And depending on the powerset? Some people can do a lot better in the private market. I mean, my god, do you have any idea how much money Marcy could get paid being a healer for the high-and-mighty? The President keeps people like her on staff."
I whistle in appreciation. Makes me even more glad she's sorta-maybe mine, now! "So the violence part of it's not so bad?"
Dragonfly frowns. "Well, injuries happen all of the time, but with healers like Marcy around they're usually not career-ending. Mental trauma is probably worse. But uh...people do die, yeah. At least a couple a year." She sighs and pauses before continuing. "I started when I was nineteen, and this one twin duo started at the same time as me. Brother and sister. They just vanished one day. That was probably Baitmaster, he was supposedly in town around then too."
"Oh, damn. No idea what happened to them? Or anyone else this guy grabs?"
She shakes her head. "It's not generally something we find here - Poseidon City is kind of, uh...an export market for superhumans. They don't get brought here. There's articles online sometimes about rings getting busted elsewhere, but honestly I don't usually read them. I'd rather not think about it."
I nod along. "Well, maybe we'll be the ones to finally stop this guy, huh? And then maybe we can even find out what happened to everyone he took!"
She smiles, but it's a bit forced. "Wouldn't that be nice."
After we finish our break and we check back in with the others we resume our patrol. We're much more into the commercial harbor section of it now, although still on the edge of that and the more inner city. As I'm making my way across one rooftop I finally notice something that looks a bit off. In a nearby warehouse the lights are off...except for just one or two which I can make out through a set of windows. That hasn't really fit the pattern I've noticed so far - either places are much more well-lit to provide security, or they're almost completely dark because they're out of business or the owners are just cheapskates. I quickly tap my earpiece to connect to Dragonfly's.
"Hey, that building right to the, uh, east of us, you see it? I want to check it out."
She responds a moment later. "That one? Seems normal from up here, but sure, I'll come by for a closer look."
Dragonfly reaches the windows at the same time as I do, up near the roof, and from this vantage point it's obvious that we've hit paydirt. There's just a handful of lights on and they're lighting up three people tied to chairs, with black bags over their heads. Now, everything I know about crime or warehouses I learned from movies, but I'm pretty sure that's not normal warehouse activity! OSHA would probably not be happy about that! Looking around a bit more I spot at least two guys standing guard, holding automatic rifles.
"Well, we sure got something here. Three captives and two gooners, from what I see. Any sign of that Baitmaster guy?"
"Gooners?" Dragonfly shakes her head and ignores that. "Not from here, but I'll do a quick loop and see if I can spot anything more. You hang tight, okay?"
I give her a thumbs up and she soars off. Nothing much happens while she's gone, although I'm not sure what I'd expect. Do people really just spend hours staring at people tied to chairs? I wonder how much they get paid for that.
Jessie lands back on the roof next to me a minute later. "I spotted one more inside, watching the door on the north side. No sign of anyone special, no one that looks like a supervillain. If those three prisoners are superhuman, they must be low-power if they're just letting a couple of, uh...goons watch them without breaking free."
"Well, we can certainly handle three dumbasses! Think your acid can pop open this window all quiet-like? Then we could sneak inside and have them, no problem!"
"Wait, we need to tell the others before we do anything like that!" She hits her earpiece and starts getting in touch with Silver, but before she can get more than a few words in Silver's the one calling us.
"Hostile contact! We're being fired on, rooftop of 52nd street! Taking cover!"
"Shit, we gotta get back over there!" Just as Dragonfly's about to take off into the air, I grab her ankle and point at the window.
"Uh, I don't think this and that are unrelated. They're doing something!" She pauses long enough to take a peek, and sees what I see. One of the goons is speaking on a phone and gesturing, and the other two are moving to do something with the prisoners. Dragonfly curses at the sight.
"Fuck, they're trying to move the captives! There must have been a patrol that spotted the others, they're trying to buy time to move them somewhere else! By time we help the others and get back they'll probably have vanished!"
I'm not particularly attached to either fight, but I do like the idea of achieving multiple goals at once. "Maybe we should focus on these guys while the others handle that patrol, then?"
She grimaces, but taps her comms again. "Silver, we have eyes on three captives being moved. We may lose them. Do you require support at your position?"
The team leader answers back quickly. "I don't think they're seriously trying to harm us, they're just keeping us pinned down. We can wait for other reinforcements - if you feel confident, make your move."
"Right, then." Without further discussion Dragonfly fires off a bolt of acid at the window latches, each landing with a bit of a squelching noise. It's quiet, though, and no one inside seems to notice that or the sizzling sound they make. As soon as they're loose I slip inside, and a moment later I'm up among the rafters of the building. There's a lot of storage containers in here breaking up the lines of sight, but it's easy enough for me to hear where the criminals are. Dragonfly slips in behind me, although the rafters are a bit too cramped for her wings - instead she moves from container to container, using her wings enough to keep her jumps silent.
We catch sight of the guards and their prisoners again as they're moving towards a loading dock, probably to a vehicle outside. Should we have popped the tires of anything in the area before we started? Too late to worry about that now. Two of the guards are closer to the captives while one's keeping watch, and given that it would probably be bad if Dragonfly did some friendly fire on them with acid, I gesture that I plan to move on the first two while she handles the last. Dragonfly nods back, and I quickly climb to a spot just above them.
Just as I drop, Jessie starts firing at the third guard. The man screams as acid hits his arm, making him drop his gun, but my targets don't have time to react. My venom has one of them knocked out almost immediately, and with surprise on my side I'm able to grapple and disarm the other without too much of a struggle.
"I got this one! Dragonfly, wanna check the captives?"
She shoots her first target once more in the leg, making him drop with another yell, and comes on over. The guy in my arms is squirming pretty good, but he does look a bit panicked as Dragonfly gestures threateningly in his direction. "Yeah, I'll get them. Hey, you three, it's okay! I'm going to get those masks and restraints off, and then we'll get you all home, okay?"
"Please, I want to see my family again..." The man in the middle moans piteously, and Dragonfly pulls his mask off first. I have to do a second glance though when I can't see his face beneath it - all I see is a head-shaped blob of shadow. Dragonfly's quicker on the uptake than I am, and she's already flying into the air as she shouts out.
"Super Stinger, it's him! Get away from him, quickly!"
The other two prisoners suddenly remove their own masks - where did their restraints go? But as I see the hungry look on their faces I realize we've walked into a trap. The one on the left is a woman with bright yellow-blonde hair, and electric sparks coming from her eyes, while the dude on the right has a scar-covered face that says 'do not fuck with me'. Now, I may be a melee combatant but I do my best work with the element of surprise! I'm not stupid enough to take on three supervillains and maybe some goons while they're the ones that have the drop on me. I immediately knee my guy in the nuts and leap away, scrambling up the nearest wall of containers.
Blobface laughs. "Ooh, think we have a newbie tonight! Remember, try not to break them too badly!"
I meet back up with Dragonfly behind cover just as a lightning bolt flashes by me, and swear. "Fuck, he really did it! He master baited us!"
Dragonfly shouts back. "Did you really have to phrase it like that?" She fires back a few unaimed acid bolts and shakes her head. "We're outnumbered, we should retreat."
"Wait!" I grab her arm and shake my head. "My venom's probably pretty effective on these guys! If you can distract them while I sneak around, I can probably pick them off! Safer than running and getting shot in the back, anyhow."
I can tell she doesn't like the idea, but odds are Baitmaster didn't draw us in here just so that it would be easy for us to retreat after the trap was sprung. For all we know there's more guys waiting outside for us to try scrambling through a window. "Fine! Be careful!"
I nod and disappear back into the rafters, fading into the shadow. Dragonfly does her part, quickly hovering from container to container, firing off acid and dodging lightning as she goes. It doesn't take long before I find myself above Baitmaster and Scarface, and I hear the tougher guy making a comment.
"Pretty sure the bug girl's a close-in fighter. I'll stick nearby in case she comes back around."
Well, that sounds to me like someone just volunteered to be my primary target! Some punk thinks he can take me on in a fair fight? Well, maybe he could, which is why I don't fight fair! I drop back down, aiming my stinger towards his neck - but it somehow ends up in his palm instead?
It takes a second for my brain to catch up, but eventually I realize that he was trying to catch my stinger! More than that, it went right through between the bones - which is bad. Almost none of my venom would've gotten into his bloodstream like that! I quickly yank my tail back, and the man grunts but smiles.
"Damn, you're quicker than I gave you credit for, girl. But not quick enough."
He pulls out a nasty, way-too-long dagger from his coat, and my suspicions about his powerset are proven a second later. This fucker is fast! He swings at me repeatedly, and even I have trouble dodging some of them. A couple of times I have to block with my forearm, and the dude leaves a few rough cuts against my chitin along my limb. I hope Marcy can heal exoskeleton!
The one advantage I have is that while this guy might be a professional fighter, he's clearly not used to fighting against someone who uses a tail as a primary weapon. He dodges me once, but I wait and let him get another good hit along my arm - and just when he's distracted I jab the fucker in the thigh. His eyes grow wide, confused...and a moment later he's faceplanted into the concrete floor.
"What, the bitch got Serrate? No, matter, I got her!" Blondie turns to face me, and I narrow my eyes at her.
Pretty bold words for someone in tail range, bitch.
When the lightning bug hits the ground a moment later, I can't help but smile as I turn to face Baitmaster. "Grabbing a high-level villain in practically my first week! You're going to make me famous, Baitmaster!" My tail swings up, and -
Wait.
What?
What am I doing on the ground? Why can't I move my limbs? Everything's so...heavy. I can still move my eyes though, and I watch as Baitmaster checks first on his powered henchmen before moving on to rouse his still-conscious guards. At the same time I hear a massive crashing sound like a ton of metal just collapsed, and a cry that sounds like it came from Dragonfly.
"Well, this is unfortunate. We've disabled both targets, but we can't move them and Jagged and Serrate at the same time, not with Jones out and your leg like that, Smith. Perhaps..." I don't have a good view, but I can tell that he's eyeing his scarred bodyguard. "Perhaps a sample or two will have to do for tonight, then."
He sighs before leaning down next to me, and even though his face is just a shadow somehow I can tell that he's smiling at me. "You might just be a very valuable newbie, hero, once we've seen how you tick. Who knows...maybe sometime I'll be back to bait you personally."
I can make it out as he and his remaining goons drag out the guys I knocked out, and I can hear it as a vehicle starts up outside and drives off. It's not for another few minutes though that I can finally get back to my feet. Given that they're obviously long gone by now I instead rush over to find Dragonfly, and from the looks of it she's not seriously harmed...but she is very, very stuck.
If I had to guess, it seems like Baitmaster used his gravity powers to make a bunch of ceiling rafters collapse on top of her. He must've been manipulating them though, because they somehow landed to pin her without breaking anything as far as I can tell. Both of her hands are trapped, and she's bent over one rafter while another holds down her shoulders.
"Super Stinger! You're alright!? I'm, uh...I'm kind of stuck. I don't have any super strength or anything like that. Do you think you can help me out here?"
I give her another look...but all I can see is that hefty booty pointed right in my direction.
Maybe there's still something I could get out of tonight?