“What- but-” I turned toward the stairs, then back to Tattletale, “My dad. I’ve got to-”
Tattletale cut me off, “He’ll evacuate or get to a shelter like everyone else. Taylor, look at me.”
I did.
“The others and I, we talked about this possibility. It came up before we met you. You listening to me? You know what happens, the usual response.”
“But the real evidence to my ‘cops and robbers’ theory,” Lisa continued, “Is the reaction you see when someone crosses the line.
You’ve heard about it happening. Someone finds out another cape’s secret identity, goes after the cape’s family. Or a cape wins a fight and decides his downed opponent isn’t in a state to say no if he’s feeling lusty?
Word gets around, and the cape community goes after the fucker. Protecting the status quo, keeping the game afloat. Bitter enemies call a truce, everyone bands together, favors get called in and everyone does their damndest to put the asshole down.”
“Like we do with the Endbringers,” I said. I sheathed my knife.
By the sound of it, the Endbringers are terrible enough to warrant a truce á là Hive simply by their presence in the city.
Interestingly, what’s happening here seems to treat a single Endbringer much like a natural disaster approaching the city. Maybe that’s sort of what they are. Maybe it’s not so much a team as a designation, for someone who has been fucked up to such an extent by their power that they’re practically a single-person natural disaster roaming the planet.
I nodded.
“We all decided we’d go. That we’d try to help, however we could. But you weren’t a part of that talk, and there’s tensions in the group. You’re pretty much not on the team, right now, so if you don’t want to-”
I understand what you’re getting at, Lisa, but you’re telling the person who’s preparing to leave the team specifically because the rest of you weren’t willing to help out a single innocent person that it’s okay if she’s not willing to do her part in protecting a whole city full of innocent people.
“I’ll go.” I didn’t even need to think about it. I would never be able to forgive myself if I walked away, knowing there was something I could have done to help.
Thought so.
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