My World My Justice Ch.41: A new flicker of hope... (Patreon)

Brockton Bay was fine until it wasn’t.

It started with the wailing sirens. Not police sirens or fire trucks, but the loud tsunami alarms, which she recognized since the city tested once a year and that nobody ever expected to hear for real. 

Then the helicopters came, cutting low across the skyline in tight formation. 

Then the people started running.

Taylor wished with everything she had that it was only a tsunami coming.

She ran against the tide of scared civilians, weaving through gaps in the crowd with her arms pumping and her lungs already burning. Her bugs spread out ahead of her in a wide net, mapping the streets, finding the thinner patches in the crowd so she could redirect without slowing down. The evacuation routes were pulling people inland, which meant the streets toward her neighborhood were clearing faster than the main avenues. 

Yet her phone had been ringing out to voicemail for the past six minutes.

‘Pick up, Dad. Please, just pick up.’

She was rounding a corner when her phone buzzed in her hand. And the name on the screen made her nearly stumble.

ORACLE.

She answered before the second buzz. “Y-Yes?”

“Taylor...” Oracle’s voice was tight in a way Taylor had never heard before, all the usual playful energy gone. “Okay, no time for my usual opening bit, sorry. Lines have been completely saturated and I’ve been running about forty things at once, but I’ve got a window right now so please just listen.”

“What’s happening? Is my dad-“

“Your father is safe. He was evacuated via airlift along with the immediate family members of other known capes. It happened extremely fast because we are extremely pressed for time, so he probably didn’t get a chance to grab his phone. He is safe, Taylor. I checked twice.”

Taylor fully stopped running.

A fleeing civilian clipped her shoulder, and she barely felt it. She stood on the sidewalk while the city moved frantically around her, one hand braced against a lamppost, and the relief hit her so hard that her knees actually buckled. She caught herself on the post, breathing through it, eyes stinging.

“Okay…” she managed. “Okay. Thank you, I... I’m really glad he’s-“

“Yeah. I know. Pass the same information to the Wards if you reach the rally point. Their families were evacuated too, all of them.” There is a moment of pause. “But Taylor, before you go, I need you to actually listen to me right now. Not just hear me and nod. Actually listen. Because I’m about to ask you something and I need you to make a real decision.”

Taylor just noticed that Oracle hadn’t used her cape name once during this entire call.

“Okay.” 

“This is an Endbringer fight.” Oracle said the words plainly, without softening them or building toward them. “Not a villain, not a gang, not even a Class-S threat in the conventional sense. We are talking about a walking extinction event that has sunk entire cities, killed millions of people, and put some of the most powerful capes who ever lived in the ground. Armsmaster’s alarm system bought us preparation time, which is more than most cities get. But it is still an Endbringer.”

Taylor’s heart stopped a full beat. But she said nothing.

“I am not going to force you to join, and I’m not going to pressure you or make you feel like less of a hero if you choose not to fight today. There is literally no shame in it. Knowing your limits is not weakness, it’s one of the most important things a hero can actually understand about themselves. If you want to sit this one out, I will find you somewhere safe with your dad, and I will get you there right now. That is a real option on the table.”

Taylor’s hands had started shaking. Part of her, a loud, scared, seventeen-year-old part, wanted to scream, yes please and mean it.

Then True Might’s face floated up in her mind, and she closed her mouth.

“I also want you to know that True Might is aware you’d be given this choice. He specifically asked me to make sure you got to make it for yourself. And whatever you decide, he will not think less of you and will be proud.”

The evacuation sirens rose and fell.

What could she possibly do against something that had leveled entire cities?

She was barely seventeen years old, a few months into real training, and she’d had exactly one real cape fight, which had been against the Toiletnator, and she’d needed her teammates to help finish it.

What if I drag someone down? 

What if I become a burden? 

What if someone dies trying to save me instead of fighting?

She bit her lower lip hard enough to feel it.

But she already knew what True Might would say. She could hear it so clearly it almost felt like he was standing right next to her on the sidewalk. “A TRUE HERO KNOWS THAT COURAGE IS NOT THE ABSENCE OF FEAR! IT IS CHOOSING TO STAND REGARDLESS!”

But he was also giving her the choice.

So make it.

“I’ll fight.”

Suddenly everything went quiet after making her decision.

“...Alright.” 

So what should she do next?

“You know, for the record, I’ve run a lot of these calls today, and most people either said yes immediately without thinking, or they panicked and said no and then changed their minds three times. You actually took a second to think about it. That’s annoyingly mature of you. I feel like I should unlock an achievement for you or something.”

“Oracle.” Taylor stifled a laugh.

“Right, right, focusing. Okay…” The thinker cleared her throat. “The PRT has a high-altitude marker beacon visible from most of the city, a bright balloon above the rally point, you can’t miss it. There are also PRT officers on bikes posted throughout the evacuation routes ready to give capes transport. Find one, identify yourself, and they’ll get you there. Good luck, Taylor and stay safe. Oracle out.”

The call ended.

Taylor stood there for another moment, breathing in and out through her nose. Her hands were still shaking and her knees were the same. She looked down at them and broke into a sprint in the opposite direction from the crowd.

The main avenue opened up ahead, and she spotted the beacon almost immediately, a bright marker balloon riding high above the rooflines, just like Oracle told her. She locked onto it and adjusted her course, pushing harder until she spotted the PRT officer positioned at the intersection and scanning for exactly someone like her.

“HEY!” She waved both arms. “I’M BUZZWING!”

The officer reacted instantly, engine already revving. “Jump on!”

She grabbed his waist, and the bike surged forward, cutting through nearly empty streets at a speed that made her stomach drop somewhere behind her. She kept her eyes on the beacon above the roofline and tried very hard not to think too carefully about what she’d just agreed to.

A six-story building on a grassy hill came into view. The parking lot was largely empty except for five armored PRT vans and a cluster of capes she couldn’t identify at this distance, and one thing that made her breath catch entirely.

Dragon’s suit.

Dragon is actually here.

It stood motionless on the far end of the lot, facing the ocean, facing the place where the Endbringer would arrive. The water beyond it looked completely and impossibly normal. 

Almost peaceful.

Taylor stared at it for a moment too long.

“Here you go,” the officer said as she hopped off. “Good luck out there.”

She nodded and started toward the building entrance, still watching the horizon, when the sound of another bike braking behind her made her glance back. A cape she didn’t recognize in a flashy costume, moving with shocking confidence.

She shook her head and kept moving, and then she heard a strange crack in the air and turned to see a group of teenage capes arriving in a cluster.

“MAPLE!” Taylor was already running towards them.

“BUZZWING!” Her friend Kaede waved back with both arms with her usual brightness, which felt almost surreal against the backdrop of the evacuation sirens still wailing across the city. “You made it! Oh thank goodness, I was so worried!”

Taylor reached them and immediately felt the words start jamming in her throat. Everything she needed to say about Oracle’s call, about their families, about her own fear, turned into a blabbering mess while her heart pounded against her ribs.

That was when a hand came down on her shoulder, and the worst of the noise inside her chest quieted. Almost like something had turned down her volume, so she looked up to find Gallant watching her.

She took a slow breath.

“Better?” he asked.

“Y-Yeah.” She exhaled. “Sorry. Oracle called me on the way here and I just...” She pulled herself straight and cleared her throat. “Your families. She told me to tell you. They’ve all been evacuated to a safe zone.”

Silence fell over the group.

Then, one by one, she watched the shoulders around her drop with relief.

“I...” Clockblocker started, then stopped. He tried again. “That’s good. That’s really good to hear…. I… I’ve been trying to call home for a while now.”

“Same,” Kid Win said, rubbing the back of his neck with a laugh that was more relief than humor. “Lines were completely jammed. I tried like thirteen times.”

“Wait.” Aegis raised a hand and stepped forward. “How does Oracle even know our families made it to safety?”

“Aegis.” Vista’s spoke up.

“It’s still a legitimate questio-“

“Not now.” She held his gaze until he subsided, then looked back at the rest of the group. “What matters is that we’re all here and we are running out of time. We need to get inside.”

“She’s right,” Clockblocker said, and the fact that he wasn’t even attempting to frame it as a joke said everything about where his head was at. “Let’s move.”

“Sorry for the delay,” Taylor said automatically.

“Stop apologizing,” Gallant said, giving her shoulder one more brief and firm squeeze before dropping his hand. “You got here and told us good news. That’s what matters.”

Kaede appeared at Taylor’s side without preamble and linked their arms together.

“Together, okay?” her friend said, like it was the simplest thing in the world, because for Kaede it probably was.

Taylor looked at the building entrance. Then she looked back at the ocean, still impossibly and deceptively calm.

Many thing went through her head at once but at least one remained.

“Yeah, together.”

She didn’t look at the ocean again because there was no turning back now.

------------------------------------------------------------

-Rebecca Costa-Brown, Alexandria-

Alexandria stood near the front of the room with David at her side as heroes and villains gathered as quickly as possible in the large lobby, independent teams and corporate hero teams filing in alongside everyone else. So far there were eighty-nine capes present, with more arriving by the minute thanks to Strider. Still, the Protectorate remained the organization fielding the largest force.

She couldn’t help but feel a flicker of frustration that the Commando team hadn’t been close enough for Strider to reach when the call went out. They’d had to travel by conventional means, and while they’d assured her they were pushing as fast as possible, their estimated arrival was still a full hour away.

Leviathan, according to Armsmaster’s alarm system, would make landfall in forty-five minutes. The sixty-four minutes of advance warning had been a godsend in itself, buying them precious time. Even so, only ten percent of the civilian population had been evacuated or moved into shelters. 

If it hadn’t been for Oracle’s contribution, that number would have been half of that, or less.

Checking the room timer, she counted at most four more minutes before Legend would call the room to order and brief everyone currently present. The rest would have to make do with an abbreviated version once they arrived.

Alexandria took a slow, subtle breath.

This was it.

The moment of truth. Everything they had built toward, every resource poured into True Might over the past months, was about to be tested in the most unforgiving crucible imaginable. Contessa had shown nothing but optimism, so the least Alexandria could do was try to share that feeling, even if it didn’t come naturally to her.

The countdown reached zero, and Legend stepped up to the front of the room.

The murmurs died as everyone turned to face him, the kind of quiet respect that any Triumvirate member commanded and was owed.

Rebecca noted that Buzzwing was standing with the Wards. The girl had come up fast under True Might’s mentorship. Rebecca didn’t know yet how useful she’d prove to be in an actual fight, but she’d give the girl credit for showing up at all.

Then there were the expected teams, New Wave and the Claw Patrol among them. The Claw Patrol must have counted themselves lucky to find a Strider connection, given they’d been all the way in New York less than an hour ago and were now standing in this lobby.

The villain contingent was smaller and stranger than it might once have been. With the Empire, the ABB, and the Merchants dismantled, the local criminal element had scattered, fled, or been processed into cells weeks prior. The villains present today were all imports, out-of-towners drawn by the same grim reasoning that brought most of their kind to these fights: they understood the stakes, or they were hoping for leniency if they were ever caught. 

Assuming they survived long enough to collect on it.

“We owe thanks to Dragon and Armsmaster for the early alert,” Legend began, his voice carrying easily across the lobby. “We’ve had time to gather, which means we have precious time to prepare and plan, rather than running in blind. With that advantage, and with hard work and teamwork from everyone in this room, I hold out hope this can be one of the good days.”

One in four capes dead. That was a good day.

He let the words settle before continuing, laying out the same grim statistics Alexandria had heard him recite a dozen times before: the same warning against complacency, the same breakdown of Leviathan’s hydrokinesis, the same insistence that they had to stop him before he built up momentum.

She listened with only half her attention, the rest of her mind occupied with a dozen other moving pieces, including the fact that one very conspicuous hero was missing from the room.

She didn’t have to wait long for someone else to voice it.

“Where’s True Might?” one of the out-of-town heroes called out, glancing around as though expecting the man to materialize out of the crowd on cue. A ripple of agreement went through the room. Alexandria caught more than a few heads turning, scanning for that unmistakable silhouette or listening for his booming voice.

Legend held up a hand. “True Might is already briefed and in position. He’s setting up defensive barriers across key points of the city right now, to help blunt the wave damage before Leviathan even makes landfall.”

The tension in the room loosened considerably at that, a wave of quiet relief passing through the assembled capes. Someone near the back let out an audible breath, as though she’d been holding it since she walked in.

Rebecca’s attention drifted, almost involuntarily, to David.

His hand had curled into a fist at his side. She thought she could almost hear the creak of his glove leather. The reaction was gone in an instant, his hand relaxing before most anyone would have noticed, but she had seen it and noted it as more of what was happening with him.

David was resentful again. Resentful that everyone trusted True Might more than they trusted the Triumvirate (Eidolon), the strongest heroes on Earth-Bet, the ones who had fought more Endbringer engagements than anyone alive, and yet a newcomer’s name had been enough to visibly calm an entire room of frightened capes. It was a pointless thing to dwell on, she knew. High morale mattered far more right now than anyone’s bruised pride, hers included. She pushed the thought aside and turned her attention back to Legend as he moved on toward the part that actually mattered.

“Team assignments will follow the pattern most of you are familiar with,” Legend continued. “Front line, close combat, ranged support, movers, and rescue. True Might, Alexandria, and Dragon will direct the front line. Armsmaster and Chevalier will lead close combat. Bastion has backup defense. Myrddin has the movers. I’ll be taking point on ranged attackers myself.”

He paused, and something in his tone shifted. “Oracle will also be connected throughout the engagement, relaying information and, where necessary, direction. PRT and Protectorate command take precedence in all cases, but if the situation calls for it, Oracle’s orders carry the same weight as any of ours. We trust her judgment.” His gaze swept the room, lingering a moment on the out-of-town capes clustered near the back. “I’d ask that the rest of you extend her that same trust, even those of you who don’t call this city home. She has already saved more lives today than most of us will manage in the entire fight.”

The timer in the corner of Rebecca’s vision ticked steadily downward.

Forty-one minutes.

And beyond the windows, the sky began to darken.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

-Daniel, True Might-

The sky darkened drastically in a matter of minutes. It was clear, and then from one moment to the next it became this oppressive, ominous scene.

I stomp the street hard enough to crack the asphalt and heave a chunk of road free with both hands. I drive it into the ground, then wedge two cars against it for reinforcement, and step back.

‘Another barrier set.’

Then I move on to the next spot marked on my map.

I’ve been doing this nonstop for a while now. I know that none of it will stop Leviathan directly, because a wall of scrap metal and broken road doesn’t mean anything to something that can pull the ocean or destroy buildings with a swipe. But it doesn’t have to stop the full force of a direct hit. More like a barrier to redirect and mitigate the flow of water, buying precious seconds and distance for anyone still in the flood zone.

I’ve also been working the drainage systems open as wide as safely allowed. That way the water will be safely channeled to other parts and prevent the endbringer to build up too much momentum.

Then my earpiece crackles.

“Daniel, twenty percent has been evacuated already.” Futaba’s voice comes but I can hear her tone is not the same. “But this is going a lot slower than I calculated. There are way too many bottlenecks and people are panicking. The police are doing their best but they’ve had to use force in two locations just to keep control.” She pauses and takes a shaky breath. “I... I’m sorry, Daniel. I was too optimistic and now I keep running the numbers and none of them look good and I just...”

I stop what I’m doing and close my eyes for a single breath.

Then, despite the darkened sky and the weight of everything bearing down on this moment, I smile. She can’t see it, but somehow I know she’ll hear it in my voice, anyway.

“DESPAIR NOT, MY DEAR FRIEND!” I boom, letting every ounce of conviction pour into it. “WHAT MATTERS IS NOT PERFECTION, BUT THAT WE GIVE EVERYTHING WE HAVE TO SHIELD THE INNOCENT! JUSTICE DOES NOT DEMAND THE IMPOSSIBLE! IT DEMANDS ONLY THAT WE NEVER STOP TRYING!”

There is a moment of silence.

Then she lets out a giggle. “Y-You’re right. Sorry, I was spiraling thanks to the stress. There’s just... so many things hitting at once and nothing’s going the way I planned and I...” She takes a steadier breath this time. “Okay. Yeah. I’ll keep pushing, even harder and get those calls. So you keep going out there and doing your thing like we planned.”

“NO WORRIES, MY DEAR FRIEND! LET JUSTICE TAKE CHARGE AND LEAD US TO VICTORY!”

“Yeah, yeah. Oracle out.”

I look up and feel the first drops of rain hit my face.

‘Twenty more minutes.’

I get back to work.

The rain becomes a downpour faster than I expected, soaking through everything, running in sheets off my shoulders as I work my way back toward the beach. Small rivers are already forming in the street gutters, finding the drains I opened, which is exactly what they’re supposed to do.

I finally stop at the shoreline, completely drenched, and look out at the ocean that it’s raging. Then I look back at the city behind me.

I’ve done everything I can do at the moment. But there’s one more thing I can do to improve the odds of people surviving what’s coming, and I don’t particularly love the idea of it.

I pull out my phone and type to Futaba.

‘I’m going to take a loan to get help. Healers are our best option right now.’

Her reply comes back almost immediately.

‘I’m not going to stop you. Do what you gotta do.’

I nod and quickly switch to the app, going straight to the catalog and sorting by the healer filter. 

But as soon as I start to scroll down the options the screen locks itself completely.

What?

‘TELEPORTING TO RECRUITMENT OFFICE’

“What?“

I blink.

The raging beach is gone.

The downpour is gone along with the wind and the salt taste and the roar of the ocean. Instead, I’m standing in a clean white room with a wooden desk in the center, completely dry, and my brain takes a full second to catch up with the sudden silence.

“Hello...”

I turn toward the new voice.

“...True Might.”

The person sitting across from me has an androgynous face, somewhere in their apparent twenties, with green hair styled with twin bangs framing sharp features. He’s dressed in what looks like carved wood and woven vegetation armor, almost like those fantasy armors… No, it looks like those fantasy elf armor. And to top it off he has a pair of antlers rises from his head and his eyes are a deep, striking gold.

Staring at those eyes pulls at a memory, and it clicks into place almost immediately. I recognize this person, though not by name.

“The hero of nature? No, the hero of healing?” I ask in surprise.

And then I blink, because those words came out completely normally. 

‘I can actually speak normally here?’

The person across from me chuckles softly. “Glad you remembered, even if only partially. Though it is a strange thing, to meet with Uiho Jeong again. Or rather, an alter ego of him.”

I shake my head slowly, raise both hands, and decide immediately that I don’t have time for whatever this might be. “Okay. No. Skip the introductions. Look, I don’t know what you did or what you want, but you need to send me back right now. A lot of people are depending on me. If I disappear without warning, it could throw everyone into panic.”

“I know.” The man nods, but his voice carries no urgency whatsoever. “Don’t worry. You’ll be returned with time still remaining before your world’s calamity arrives. You were brought here specifically to receive help, not to waste the time you have left.”

I pause. “...What?”

“We’re here to help you.” He folds his hands on the desk with a calm that somehow doesn’t feel dismissive. “But first, some context. We represent the Division of Archangels of Benevolence, the collective of patrons that follow a specific ideology in the company.”

“Okay?” I say carefully.

“Our higher-ups observed what you were about to do and decided to intervene before you were forced to compromise the image you’ve been carefully building, voluntarily or otherwise.”

“What do you mean, exactly?” I ask, my frown deepening.

“You were about to purchase a companion through the company app,” he says simply. “A healer, given what’s coming. Our patrons didn’t like that development, so they moved quickly to add a condition. A new modifier, if you prefer the term.”

The cursed modifiers…

“Wait.” I work through the logic of that slowly. “Doesn’t that mean...”

“Yes.” The hero meets my eyes without flinching. “Just as others have intervened to help you, others can intervene to hinder you. You have already experienced before how they made things harder for you. Everything is permitted as long as the core of entertainment is maintained. Give and take. That is the nature of the system you exist within.”

I stand very still for a moment.

It’s not that I didn’t know this on some level. I knew the company operates this way, knew that my life here exists within dumb rules I didn’t even know. Especially how my origin was being a clone that was sold at an auction. But hearing it stated plainly like that, laid out with such calm matter-of-fact clarity, still it’s fucked up.

“So what does all of this mean?” I ask, keeping my voice level.

“From this point forward, your future companions will decide for themselves whether they want to join your journey. You’ll meet them here, in this space, and the choice will be entirely theirs. That is the condition placed for now, at least until another party bids higher to remove it.”

I look around the white room. “And they’re here now?”

“They are... about now.”

I turn my head.

And I raise my brow when Mercy and Lúcio are standing behind me.

Yes, those two from Overwatch.

Angela looks exactly as I remember, wearing her Valkyrie suit with the wings folded back, watching me with calm blue eyes before offering a quiet, steady smile. Lúcio stands beside her with his arms crossed and gives me a small, firm nod when our eyes meet.

They’re both amazing healers, especially Mercy with her technology. But they’re not exactly what I was expecting.

I look back at the Korean man.

“What about you?” I ask, because I know what he’s capable of. He is at the same tier as me, and having a healer at that level would change the entire equation of what’s coming.

But my hopes are dashed when he gives me a sad smile. “I cannot join you, as much as I would love to stand in that city and help you save as many lives as possible. If I intervene directly, other patrons would immediately call foul and move to bid on new rules or modifiers for your world to compensate. And that...”

“Would make things worse.”

A lot worse.

“Yes. I’m sorry.”

I go quiet for a moment, then I let out a slow breath and nod. “No. Don’t be sorry that I’m...” I pause, finding the honest words for it. “I’m grateful this happened at all. If I’d actually purchased someone from that catalog, some part of me would have regretted it. I’m glad it worked out this way instead.”

The healer’s sad smile doesn’t go away, but something behind his golden eyes shine differently.

I turn back to face the two heroes properly this time.

“Thank you, both of you. For choosing this.” I pause for a moment. “But you need to know that what you’re walking into is nothing like anything you’ve faced before. The Omnic War, Talon, any of it. Leviathan is a category so far above all of that combined that it’s difficult to put into words, and not just Leviathan but what comes after that.”

Mercy holds my gaze without wavering. “We read your file before choosing, True Might. We understand the stakes, and that’s precisely why I’m here. Someone has to be.”

Lúcio uncrosses his arms and the easy grin that breaks across his face. “Yeah, what she said.” He gives me a thumbs up. “You can count on us. Let’s make some noise out there.”

I look at them both for a moment longer. Then I return that smile.

“Then let’s go.” I turn back to the hero of healing one last time. “Send us back.”

“Good luck, True Might. I’ll be praying for you.” But why does he keep that sad smile?

The white room disappears in a flash of light.

And I’m back at the beach, in the same place I’ve been standing. However, the downpour has worsened in the time I was gone, hammering down in dense sheets that reduce visibility. The wind has picked up dramatically, driving the rain almost horizontally, and the ocean has pulled back far enough from the shoreline that wet sand stretches out in an unnatural, ominous expanse ahead of us.

The water always pulls back before it comes crashing forward.

And my earpiece explodes.

“DANIEL! WHERE WERE YOU?! I had zero signal, no location data, nothing, you just VANISHED off my grid and I thought... I thought something...” Futaba’s voice cracks slightly before she pulls it back together. “Thank god you picked up. Don’t do that to me!”

“I WAS FINDING OUR NEW ALLIES OF JUSTICE, MY DEAR FRIEND!” I boom over the wind and hammering rain. “FOR THE JUSTICE LEAGUE HAS OFFICIALLY BEEN FORMED THIS DAY!”

“...Did you just name your team the Justice League?”

“I was finding our new allies of justice, my dear friend!”

“You literally just said that! Okay, whatever, who cares about copyright in the multiverse? Connect me with them, quick!”

I pull the spare earpieces and armbands from my pocket space and hand them to Mercy and Lúcio.

“Okay. You’re both connected to the channel now. I’m Oracle, I handle intel, coordination, and communications for this operation after the PRT. I’m sending you a quick brief to your armbands right now. Read it fast because we don’t have time for slow.” 

“I hope you both understand that we are way past the point of any kind of soft landing here. I need you to pull up the map on your armbands, link up with either the PRT command or the Triumvirate members already on the ground, and establish your roles before this thing makes landfall. Report in the moment you’ve made contact.”

Mercy glances at the armband, then back up at the city behind us. “Understood, Oracle. I’ll coordinate with their medical command first and establish a primary healing circuit across the evacuation perimeter if one hasn’t been formed already.”

“Oh, you’re good… Okay yeah, I like her already. Go, go!”

Mercy and Lúcio exchange a single look and nod at each other.

Lúcio reaches down and taps something on his board. A green and gold glow rises around him and a driving dubstep beat pulses outward from him like a second heartbeat. He grins up at me with new energy. “Let’s go! Don’t keep them waiting!” He glances around at the battered shoreline and the retreating ocean and his grin doesn’t falter even slightly. “Okay yeah, this is intense. Let’s make it count.”

And he skates away up the beach, the music carrying behind him into the rain until he reaches the closest building and leaps, wall riding away.

Mercy’s wings unfold behind her with a smooth mechanical hiss. She looks at me one last time before she rises. “We’ll be ready, do you best.”

And then she ascends cleanly and banks toward the city, climbing fast until the downpour swallows her.

And now they are gone.

Then I let out a slow breath.

“Okay so. What actually happened out there? Where did you go, Daniel? And I want the real answer, not the hammy one.”

I pull out my phone and type one-handed.

‘The company interfered. But they did it in our favor this. I’ll explain everything after.’

“I don’t like that they can just do that. Even when they’re helping us because I have a feeling that there are some strings attached there. But I’m glad they did... Okay. After all of this, you will tell me all the details with a beer and some sandwiches!”

‘I will.’

“THREE MINUTES!”

The city speakers cut through everything.

“Daniel.” Futaba’s voice comes back one more time. “I... good luck. No, actually, scratch that. I KNOW you’re going to do it. So just... be careful out there. Okay? Just come back to play games.”

“I WILL, MY DEAR FRIEND! JUSTICE SHALL SEE US THROUGH TO VICTORY!”

My answers make her laugh like always. “Yeah… Yeah it will. Oracle out.”

And our call ends.

“TWO MINUTES!”

The water has pulled back further still, leaving an impossible stretch of wet, empty seafloor between the shoreline and the horizon.

“ONE MINUTE!”

I stand at the edge of the shoreline in the hammering downpour, soaked completely through, watching the horizon with everything I have.

I need to bring hope to people just like I’ve planned and to get strength thanks to my new template, everyone must know of my presence. Not just the civilians still in the evacuation zones. Not just the heroes already in position across the city. 

Everyone. 

I press the left button on the armband.

‘Hard Overdrive.’

I close my eyes.

I let my heart find the words on its own.

“FEAR NOT, CITIZENS!”

This is it.

“FOR. I. AM. HERE!”

Almost on cue, the wall of water rises on the horizon.

The tsunami.

The fire of justice rises in my chest, burning clean and certain through every part of me. I find myself smiling as I feel my strength increasing even further.

My template has worked.

I walk toward the ocean with my head high.

All Might always said go above and beyond. And to never give up, because heroes always find a way.

The tsunami is close enough now that it fills the entire horizon, blotting out everything behind it, a sight that would make anyone turn and run for their lives or pray for salvation. But no to me because All Might also had a phrase.

“PLUS ULTRA!”

I drive both feet into the sand hard enough to sink to my ankles and bury my hands as deep as they’ll go. Fingers find something solid beneath the waterlogged ground and I pull in every single thing I’ve been building since I hit that button.

“JUSTICE…”

The air pressure changes ahead of the wave. The atmosphere itself is being shoved sideways by the displacement. I can feel it pressing against my face and chest even from here.

I grit my teeth.

“TSUNAMI!”

And I release everything and throw it forward.

The beach itself answers.

A colossal wall of earth and sand erupts from the shoreline, rising in a single violent heave almost as tall as the incoming wave, denser than anything water could ever be. It surges outward like a second tsunami made of solid ground, racing to meet Leviathan’s assault head-on.

And they clash in a thunderous roar.

Earth meets water with a force that feels like the world itself just cracked for a second. The shockwave tears across the beach and through the ground beneath my feet, but I barely feel it. White spray and pulverized sand explode upward in towering walls that vanish into the cloud cover.

Then the pressure eases and I remain in the same place.

The water that reaches the shore arrives broken. Robbed of its momentum, its direction, its killing force. Spread wide and thin, it climbs across the beach, reaching the streets and rises only to my ankles.

‘The initiative goes to the defenders this time.’

That when Dragon descends from the clouds and lands heavily on the beach beside me, the impact sending a tremor through the sand. Then Alexandria touches down on my other side a half-second later.

None of us say anything and none of us look at each other.

Because we’re all looking at the same thing.

The salt water stirs out past the broken wave line. Something massive moves beneath the foamy surface. 

Leviathan emerges from the sea to end the hopes of this city.

Water sheets off its body in cascades, revealing a deformed, or more like a very disproportionate scaled body that doesn’t make biological sense, especially those skinny and long legs that carry a body like that. It looks wrong in so many ways, yet it moves without any urgency or worry. 

Then four green eyes find me through the rain.

And they narrow, despite being a faceless face I knew in those eyes held clear contempt against me.

I merely smirk back at the monster and pump my fists together.

“FOR JUSTICE!”