Now

With the collar off, Shae was able to streak across Angel Falls as a body of pure energy.  Her top speed was considerably slower than Evin’s- why that boy hadn’t figured out how to fly was a mystery that Shae wasn’t prepared to speculate on- but she could still manage right around, she figured, eight hundred miles per hour with no real strain, and that was more than enough to get her from Icon to South River in less than a second flat.

Hovering above the prison yard, Shae could see the various skirmishes playing out as guards rallied and broke through less-organized groups of prisoners, as knots of gangs and thugs engaged one another to exact vengeance for various perceived slights, and as some of the more violent inmates found ways to finalize old rivalries.  She noted absently that at least one opportunistic felon had vaulted the fence and was limping his way towards the city proper; she considered apprehending him, but another situation below her caught her attention.

A tall, dark-skinned man was clipped by a rock; the man who’d thrown it was even bigger than his victim, tall, broad, and moving with a muscular grace that belied experience and, quite possibly, training in combat sports.  The smaller man staggered and fell and his assailant approached him, swaggering as he shouldered aside another inmate with negligent ease.

And if that fella isn’t a meta, Shae thought, I’ll eat Evin’s boots!

She dropped out of the sky, landing slightly back from the apparent victim and raised her hands.  A solid bolt of glowing silvery-white force shot from her hands and lifted the giant off his feet, knocking him for several yards before he managed to brace himself and find his footing.

Shae waved at him, feeling a little weak in the knees.  She knew Luke could project energy; she’d had no idea how draining it would be, though.  “Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to throw stones?” she called, “you might hurt somebody!”

“I’m gonna do more than hurt that little snitching toerag,” the giant growled, “I’m gonna crucify him!”

Shae stepped up behind the smaller man.  “Hi there,” she said under her breath, “I’m- uh… call me Will-O-Wisp.  What’s your name?”

The giant was starting to move back towards them, now.  Apparently her force blast had winded him pretty well, but he was far from out of it, yet.

“Jamal,” the dark-skinned man said.  His eyes rolled slightly wildly as he observed their imminent doom approaching, “shouldn’t we be running?” he asked.

Shae looked up and took Jamal’s shoulder just as the giant lowered his shoulder and dove at them in a low tackle.  The monster passed through them as if they were made of smoke and Shae dimpled at Jamal.  “Really, Jamal,” she said, “you worry too much.  Where’s your cell?”

*****

Hailey Storm,
Now

With control of operations and the armory, things were starting to look up.  Ellie had started using the fences and the mechanical doors to funnel prisoners away from potentially catastrophic security risks and to start channeling the remaining guards back to the armory and the ops center for regrouping.  We were far from in the clear, yet, and Ellie was still trying to locate a higher authority to take command responsibility off her shoulders, but I could live with the delay- better the devil I knew, after all.

Sophia had taken to pummeling knots of Los Santiagos- the Hispanic gangbangers were not only far better organized than any other group on the yard, there was a disturbing percentage of them that were manifesting fire powers and super-strength powers.  There didn’t seem to be a great deal of variety beyond that, but the concentration was enough that South River simply wasn’t equipped to deal with them.

Luke joined her, but, frankly, his energy was flagging so badly that he was almost no use at all.  Evin was faring considerably better, given that he could herd the panicking inmates as effectively as several squads of well-armed guards without even breaking a sweat.

For myself, I was mainly doing mop-up and helping trapped guards get to clear zones; Anne was pretty helpful with that, too, although she whined a lot about how blind she felt since I took down so many cameras.  I kind of ignored that, though- having the cameras down had made the difference between us retaking ops and having a bloodbath on our hands, and I certainly didn’t regret it.

All in all, it looked like things might be back under control in pretty short order, making this one of the fastest major-league riots in prison history.

Of course, I should know better than to start doing my victory dance before finishing the last lap, right?

“We’ve got a problem,” Ellie reported, “the super-max building is completely locked down.”

“Why’s that a problem?” Luke asked.  He was breathing hard, panting through his mic as he worked his way through recalcitrant inmates.

“I’m not getting any response from the guards,” Ellie explained.  “I think the inmates may have control, and we can’t open it up without cracking it like an egg…”

“That would be… bad,” Sophie snorted.  She didn’t doubt that we could do it, of course- stone and steel are of limited usefulness when you can fold battleship armor like an old towel- but destroying the building would probably be considered bad form.

“I can get in,” Shae offered.  She’d been ferrying the nonviolent offenders back to their cell and Ellie had been locking them in, getting them off the playing field.  The fact that she could literally walk through walls was turning out to be surprisingly useful.

“Me too,” I added.  After all, a little thing like a locked door couldn’t very well stop a teleporter.

“Be careful,” Network warned, “we’ve got no eyes in there, so we don’t know what the situation’s like.”

“Yes, mom,” I said, rolling my eyes.  I heard Shae giggle through the comms.

“Not funny, Shae,” Apollo cut in, but she cut him off.

“Stuff it, big brother,” she snorted, “you’ve been playing sheriff on the plantation for way too long, anyways.  Maybe it’s time you let somebody else have a turn.  Coming Hailey?”

How could I refuse?

I sang the traveller’s song and, like that, I vanished.

***************************************************************************************************************************************************************

To be honest, I really had no idea what image was appropriate to this section.  Then I wrote Training Days Part 1: That Lucky Stiff... and Training Days Part 2: Of All the Luck..., and it got me to thinking: Apollo really is a major hero; he gets caught in a lot of stuff that's just short of slapstick, but he's more than a paper-thin, one-sided boy scout, and he doesn't get anywhere close to enough screen time where he gets to be genuinely badass with no real repercussions.  This section, where he, like Sophia, is breaking up groups of rioting prisoners, and doing it while his energy reserves are starting to flag... that was exactly what I needed.  And boy-howdy, delivered!  Apollo really gives the sense of being a nearly unstoppable force of nature, here, which- at least to normal people- he really is.  I really can't say enough about the way she reworked his costume here or the poses and expressions on the models faces; it's an entire story all by itself, one that runs in parallel with the story I wrote, and I love it!

This picture- and all the artwork for Shooting stars- is brought to you by the amazingly talented and lovely .

Shooting Stars is an epic tale (okay, maybe that's pushing it, but I've always wanted to call something I wrote an epic) taking place in  and will feature characters by , , and an appearance of Esau by .

Sophia Storm, Hailey Storm, and Gertrude Stacks belong to .

Sergeant Ellie Martinez, Will-O-Wisp, Pyrite, Apollo, Network and the various South River extras belong to .

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