"Great, just great," said the hero, sitting back on the ledge and wincing at the pain.
When he'd developed superpowers, there had been no hesitation on his part. With power came responsibility. With the ability to help others, he would do so.
The first thing he'd done, after coming up with a costume and superhero identity, was seek out the established heroes. Get some tips and help, wasn't that what you normally did when finding yourself at a new jobsite? It wasn't like he was trying to become someone's superhero sidekick, he was just trying not to screw things up too much.
It being Gotham City, there was really only one superhero in town and he generally worked alone but HAD been known to team up in the past.
"First time?" asked a shadow.
"I guess it was kind of obvious," said the hero.
"That and your costume indicates sewing is not one of your major talents," indicated the shadow before the Batman eased out of that darkness.
"No, it's not," said the hero, plucking at his torn TAC vest over an Under Armour(r) long-sleeve Tee shirt and his now burned pair of jeans. The mask was what he'd tried to make with sewing and a pair of sunglasses.
"Gotham is my city. Amateurs are likely to get killed."
"Hey, I got superpowers all of a sudden, what am I supposed to do?" asked the hero.
The Batman was silent, unmoving, a shadow among the shadows.
"I can fly. I'm able to lift almost a ton. I'm hard to hurt and able to heal fast," said the hero. "Theoretically, I should be able to do this."
"In theory," admitted the Batman. "I noticed that when you were flying, you weren't invulnerable. So did Harley."
"It's all about shifting percentages," said the hero. "I'm calling myself Percentile."
"No," said Batman. "Come up with something else. Percentile is a minor league villain who works out of Atlanta. Came to Metropolis once to make a name for himself, failed terribly."
"So, not only a supervillain but a failed supervillain," said not-Percentile. "Great. Just off to a great start, aren't I?"
The Batman was silent.
"My powers are super strength, minor invulnerability, healing, a sixth sense that's kind of like radar except it isn't, flight, and I can throw energy bolts. I'm not sure what kind of energy it is, something that has some physical impact though. Everything's a percentage though, like I can choose twenty five percent flight, twenty five percent invulnerability, and fifty percent to energy blasting. Magical, I guess."
The Batman was silent for a moment more before his rough voice came out of the shadows. "Have you considered Search and Rescue? Because your combat abilities weren't even up to handling Harley, and if it had been the Joker you'd already be dead. You aren't the first person to come out and play 'superhero' - there have been three this year that died."
Not-Percentile sagged a bit. "I hadn't heard that."
"Only one of them made the news, and that was because he destroyed several balloons filled with Joker gas rather than let them go out and poison the city's air." The Batman was silent for a moment, letting the newbie think about that. "All three died heroes."
"Yeah, I understand that," said the new hero. "I... I just want to help. To make a difference. There's so much that's wrong, so many problems. I just want to help."
"I beg of you."
"Who?" asked the hero.
"What is it?" asked Batman, seeing the hero straighten up and start looking around.
"My servant who lives somewhere in the universe."
"You don't hear her?" asked the hero.
"Hear who?" asked the Batman.
"Oh sacred, beautiful, and strong familiar spirit."
"A girl, she's asking for help. Something about a servant and a spirit," said the hero.
The Batman considered the beginnings of green glimmering light forming. "You said your abilities are magic in nature."
"I desire and plead from my heart!"
"What's... uh oh," said the hero, concentrating and then going immediately to flight.
The Batman's eyes narrowed as a shadow on a rooftop moved that should not have been there. As it flung a too-small body aside to meet the charge of the flying neophyte.
"Answer to my guidance!"
The neophyte hero slammed into the creature at full speed, knocking it backwards. He then reoriented and flew forward again, trying to engage the creature and keep it away from the human prey.
The Batman had a good view as a green oval appeared and the neophyte hero couldn't change course fast enough to avoid it. Then the hero was gone. Then the monster vanished into the green oval before it could completely close.
At which point Batman checked the little girl and was distracted by performing first aid on the carvings that had been done in her flesh.
Now:
Neophyte switched to 50% toughness, 40% strength, 10% blast with zero range.
The fight with Harlequinn had been instructive on why one did NOT go with 10% toughness and 90% strength. She'd been faster, much better at evading, and used poisons.
The fight with this thing wasn't much better. Straight strength had been useless against the thing, it had been kind of rubbery and simply deformed or stretched when hit. Trying to charge the fists had worked better.
The older guy was apparently the local hero, wherever this local was. Some kind of fire-hurler. Couldn't pay much attention though because the monster was kind of demanding all his attention at present.
The beast crouched and then sprang in a different direction, heading towards the students.
50% toughness, 50% blast.
Golden light formed a globe and then stabbed out, slamming into the back of the creature's head. It fell down.
At which point one of the girls in the robes raised her staff and sent several ice spikes into the creature.
That was his own signal, switching to 30% toughness/20% flight and then using more of the blasts.
It was further helped by the fire-hurler throwing enough concentrated magical flame down on the beast to melt steel. The ice was gone in a few seconds.
The beast was looking decidedly more crispy when the fire stopped being hurled, but the arriving adults apparently weren't taking any chances as they began setting up purification and containment seals.
Exhausted, Neophyte leaned back against the stone wall and watched to make sure the thing stayed dead. He'd heard stories, sometimes these magical things didn't stay as dead as was considered normal.
At which point:
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(Posted Thu, 22 Nov 2012 22:24)
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