Mage Among Superheroes

Taking any sort of vehicle to just a few blocks away was liable to be a waste of time. I’d have to wait for someone to drive… and hope that traffic didn’t suddenly jam up when people noticed the fire. But I hadn’t been running every day for nothing. Doing it with intentionality was much more effective than, say, just running away from people I happened to have zapped a little.

I wasn’t the first one there. I had been on the top floor, after all. Ice Guy was… unfortunately already at home. Most of the team was. I saw Great Girl and an unfamiliar guy in a suit- the dress kind like Calculator wore. He had the Power Brigade logo on pin, however. Then I saw Shockwave. That was surprising not because I didn’t expect Shockwave to come and help, but because they were moving slowly enough for me to actually see it. But I realized why. Moving someone took care, and moving at full speed through a possibly structurally unsound building… well, they weren’t called Shockwave for nothing.

I approached Shockwave but couldn’t predict where they were going to end up. “Hey can you-” they zipped away for ten or twenty seconds, “Stop for a sec?”

“What?” Shockwave was usually happy to talk to me, but seemed upset at being interrupted.

I tapped them on the shoulder as I cast Energy Ward. “Fire protection. Doesn’t help with smoke though.” It wouldn’t matter how fast they moved through the fire if they were in fire for a handful of seconds at a time the heat would still get to them.

“Kthanks-” and Shockwave was off. But this was exactly the time such expediency was needed.

Great Girl was next. She was at the tallest I’d ever seen her. I thought she could only reach fifteen feet, but she seemed to be more. I couldn’t tell exactly since she was standing on her tip-toes to try to reach the fourth floor, but maybe twenty feet tall? When she bent down with someone in her hands I took my chance to cast Enlarge. “Thanks Mage!” she said as she stood back up even taller. It actually made her too big to reach inside the building, but it also allowed her to just hold her hand flat and have a half dozen people hop on. If she needed to shrink, she had control over her part of things at least. And now she could reach the fourth through sixth floors without difficulty.

Midnight was scurrying around to provide support for some of the others. He could only use Energy Ward twice even from full mana, but if one of those was a Haste he could make a speedy savior.

“Excuse me,” the man with the suit walked up to me. “You said something about fire protection?”

“Yes that’s right,” I nodded. “Can you help people?”

“As long as I don’t have to worry about burning up, yes.”

“Alright,” I nodded. He was from the Power Brigade so it should be fine. “It’s the last one though.”

“It will be worth it,” he assured me.

A comforting chill surrounded him as I used Energy Ward. It probably wasn’t actually cold, but it was hard to have any mental understanding of resisting heat except cold. Even if it was a nice, cozy chill.

“Thank you,” the man in the suit said- and then he disappeared with a little zipping sound. Not super speed, but something else.

When I heard the sound again I turned around to see him and a confused civilian for a moment, before he was gone again. Teleportation? And apparently accurate and rapid. When I spun around to look where I next heard him, I realized I should stop doing that before the floor came up to meet me. Being out of mana and dizzy was a recipe for disaster. Except I wasn’t quite out of mana, I realized. Maybe being up high had worked?

I couldn’t do much else except watch and stay out of the way, though. Half-assing an Energy Ward would just make someone overconfident, and making anyone else big would just throw things off. Haste was probably too expensive, since it cost more than four points. And if I knocked myself out then the paramedics would fuss over me when they should be worried about people who were actually in danger.

With Great Girl, Shockwave, the suit guy, and a couple others I didn’t recognize who might have just been locals, the building was cleared out before the fire department even arrived to deal with the fire itself.

Something bright brought my attention up, and it wasn’t the fire. It was a glowing figure, circling around the building a few times and then landing on the roof. Then they hopped off and circled the building a few times more before landing next to some guy in pajamas holding up his phone. The guy looked vaguely familiar for some reason.

His eyes lit up as the bright figure landed. “Shooting Star!” He reoriented his phone. “Zack Brannigan of Channel 72 news. Can I get a few words about the fire?”

Oh right it was that guy. From the time with the slimes. And Shooting Star… was going to hog the glory. Well, whatever. I was prepared to leave, but I saw Great Girl’s eye twitching. It wasn’t hard, because she was currently still over ten feet tall. She’d shrunk as much as she could, but Enlarge was still active. She was upset for some reason, but unable to act because of her position. How unfortunate.

“... and once again heroes saved the day,” Shooting Star finished.

I leaned my head in front of the phone. “She didn’t actually do anything though.”

“What?” Zack Brannigan took a step back to get me in better focus. “What do you mean?”

“I mean she didn’t get here until everyone was already safe.”

Zack Brannigan was quiet for a moment. I felt some sort of power radiating from Shooting Star, but I was trying to look good for the camera. Zack’s eyes darted between me and Shooting Star a couple times. “So… the heroes didn’t do anything?”

“Well, that’s not quite it. That guy in the red-” I pointed, “And the one in the green. They were both here pretty quick. But Shooting Star wasn’t here for any of that, she got here like 2 seconds before you.”

Zack licked his lips and swiveled. “What do you have to say about that? Aaaand she’s gone.” He looked over to where there were a couple news vans with full setups were interviewing Shooting Star. He adjusted the angle of his phone and began commentary. “Did Shooting Star just show up to take credit for the work of other heroes?”

“And mercenaries,” I commented.

“That…” he hesitated, then returned to his announcer voice, “Along with brave mercenary supers, this apartment building was emptied of civilians in a matter of minutes. But Shooting Star has a different story being told to the mainstream media. Let’s talk with the folks who really matter.” He side-eyed me. “This better be true or my career will be over.”

I gestured to the people huddling nearby, looking at the fire being put out by the firefighters. “You can ask any of them. Even the firefighters got here through evening traffic before her.”

“That was the plan,” he agreed as he rushed over to some of those standing nearby, trying to find some sort of lighting where he could actually see them clearly.

I yawned. It wasn’t that late, but going through my magic several times in the day made me tired. It was time to go home and relax.

-----

When I came into work the next morning, Great Girl blocked my way. “What the hell did you do last night?”

“... I read through the first eighty pages of the codices on ‘Exceptional Technology Law’ and then went to sleep. Why?”

“Before that!” she waved her arms.

“I was sitting on top of HQ and I spotted the fire.”

“After that.”

“I cast Enlarge on you.” I looked her over. “It should have worn off about the time I left. Should I have asked if you wanted it canceled early?”

“That- yes, actually, it’s kind of awkward to be stuck at ten feet tall. Twelve. Twelve feet tall.” She cleared her throat. “But that’s not what I meant! The other thing!”

“... Was the suit guy not with the Power Brigade? Energy Ward helped him save people though so it’s fine.”

Great Girl threw up her arms in frustration before showing her phone on which a video was playing.

“This is Zack Brannigan of Channel 72 news. Is Shooting Star a glory hog? Listen to the full story to find out the truth.” I was vaguely paying attention to the visuals, including my face poking into the frame. Some of it was voiceover and some was the actual audio.

“... and? Was I not supposed to talk to the reporter? Am I getting fired?” I thought Great Girl was upset at Shooting Star. Oh well. I bet other mercenaries would hire me. Or maybe Extra. Did they have a combat division? I didn’t want to only do translation work.

“That’s not it! Shooting Star is going to be so mad at you if this spreads!”

“Is that bad?” I frowned.

“That b- Shooting Star is one of the top rated heroes! She has a huge following!”

“Do they have snipers?”

“Wha…?” Great Girl tilted her head. “No, but Shooting Star herself is dangerous.”

“It’s illegal for her to kill me,” I pointed out. “Extra illegal since she’s a hero and I haven’t committed any crimes.”

“Wow that escalated fast,” Great Girl’s eyes widened. “Straight to killing?”

“If she’s not going to kill me I don’t know what the problem is.”

“There are other bad things that can happen besides death!”

“Ripping off my arms is just as illegal.”

“That’s…” Great Girl sighed. “Just be careful, okay?”

“That is the plan. Someone with a rifle shot me and probably still wants to.”

“Yeah…” she grimaced. “Sorry to hear about that. I hear your squad is going through some drills for an upcoming mission. Squads have to be able to operate on their own to some extent, but don’t hesitate to call in backup if you need it. And that guy on probation doesn’t count.”

“Rocker is pretty decent though, when he’s not exploding my eardrums.” I wouldn’t say we were friends, but we could get along.

“Well,” Great Girl straightened herself up. “Just wanted to say be careful. And uh, thanks. That… hero and I have a bit of history, and I hope this knocks her down a couple pegs. Though unfortunately the footage was kind of crap.”

“That’s what happens if you film with a cell phone from the street,” I shrugged. My phone began to ring. I looked down. “I don’t know that number.” I flipped it to Great Girl.

“Uh, I don’t remember any numbers. I just save people as contacts. You should probably answer it though.”

“Hello?”

“Heeey. Is this Mage? Zack Brannigan here, Channel 72 news.”

“It’s that reporter guy,” I said to Great Girl.

“... I’m going to assume that means I got the right person. Can I get you in for an interview?”

“He wants an interview.”

“Then go. Or not, I don’t care. But if you want to, make sure to tell him his footage sucked and he needs to show up earlier to catch Shooting Star glory hogging.”

“My friend says-”

“I heard her,” Zack sighed.

“Do I get paid for this interview thing?”

“We can negotiate that,” he said hesitantly.

“Okay. Also you could see if anyone else got better footage.”

“What like the big news stations? No way I could afford that license.”

“I meant one of the dozens of other people with cell phones present?” Things hadn’t looked dark to me at all, but one of those humans had to have gotten a better lit scene for their own viewing.

There was some kind of muffled profanity before Zack responded. “Right. I suppose I should have thought of that last night. Maybe I can track one of them down.”

I definitely could if I wanted to, but scrying random people didn’t sound fun to me. They would just be in nearby buildings anyway. Or from the one that had been on fire, because several of them had been recording what was happening.