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“UrsaMajor, watch out!”
Deadwalker gave a grunt as she landed a punch in the villain's stomach, sending them back into a wall. There was a deep rumble as the bricks crumbled with the collision, landing in a heap on top of the weakened figure.
UrsaMajor wiped the dried blood off of his face and stared at them. Deadwalker made her way towards him, a hand gripping their side, but otherwise unharmed.
“Have you seen Moonstone?” UrsaMajor asked, holding the gun at the pile of bricks. Deadwalker shook her head, ginger hair moving slightly with the motion.
“Not at all. She didn’t answer my messages.”
UrsaMajor hummed, taking a step closer. Deadwalker did the same, her axe shimmering. They had been working together on missions like this for years, Moonstone the third member of their trio. A few months ago, a strange new villain had appeared- Eclipse- and began wreaking havoc. Now, after the longest game of cat and mouse possible, they had them cornered.
“You’re done for, Eclipse,” UrsaMajor said, allowing his voice to echo off of the walls. He could distantly hear a helicopter, likely filming the events taking place. “Surrender so that you may be held on trial.”
The bricks shifted slightly. He was met with silence.
UrsaMajor glanced at Deadwalker, who tilted her head curiously. They took a step closer, then another. She took the end of her axe and nudged the pile. It only toppled further.
Fed up, Deadwalker jammed the axe into the bricks. Nothing happened other than a few bricks chopped in half. She groaned, angrily slashing in a random direction.
“Damn it! We were so close!”
“Cleo,” UrsaMajor muttered under his breath. “They’re watching.”
She glared before looking up into the sky, face falling. “Shit.”
“Let’s get out of here before the reporters come.” She nodded in agreement and grabbed onto UrsaMajor’s arm as he began to shimmer a strange shade of blue. The two stayed still before disappearing, a dizzying sensation as they teleported as far as his powers would allow them.
Scott toppled to the ground and Cleo caught him, settling him down in a chair. They were back at their base, a small underground bunker with rooms for the rough nights and medical supplies after fights. It was normally a dark place with them all gone, but some lamps were on, a girl in the corner on a small recliner reading.
“Pearl,” Scott managed, gratefully taking a sip from the glass Cleo offered him. He recoiled a bit at the taste- they had added some minerals to help, but it made the water bitter. “Where were you?”
Pearl looked up, slamming the book shut. “Oh, me? Just readin’ the old book, ya know? Gotta study if I want to make sure I save people. These powers aren’t gonna learn themselves.”
Cleo raised an eyebrow. “You’ve been a hero for two years.”
“And there’s always more to learn!”
Scott waved his hand in the air, dismissing it. “Doesn’t matter. We had a run-in with Eclipse and you weren’t there. You can’t keep bailing on us.”
Pearl gasped dramatically. “Them again? God, when I finally get out there and get them, I swear.”
Cleo tore off their mask and slapped it on the counter. “I almost had them. They’re lucky they got away; I was ready to slice them to bits.”
She chuckled nervously from her seat, opening the book again. “Yeah, I’m sure you were! I wouldn’t want to be them today.”
Scott stood up carefully. “I’m going to go take a nap. Don’t kill anybody while I’m out.”
Cleo nodded and waved to him, and Pearl gave a small smile. Scott left the room to the hallway and turned at his door, feeling relieved in the cold and dark room. There were small lights and decorations, but for the most part, his room was a safe and quiet place for him to rest and recuperate after days like this.
As he lay down on his bed, not bothering to overturn the covers, he was able to think more clearly. The fight that day was strange. It wasn’t unusual for Pearl to miss out on a battle, even if she was acting weird. But how had Eclipse managed to escape? Neither Scott nor Cleo had taken their eyes off of them long enough to get away. He could try and see if there was camera footage the next day, check to see any traces they had left.
Scott allowed himself to drift off into an uneasy sleep. The problems of Eclipse could be dealt with later.
*
A week later, the alarms in their bunker began going off.
Scott rushed out into the main room to find Cleo already ready. She held up a letter in one hand, giving it to Scott before he could ask what it was for.
Out for coffee. Sorry! =) - Pearlo
“How does she pick the worst timing ever?” Scott asked, shocked. They shrugged, spinning their axe.
“Doesn’t matter right now. Eclipse is out there again, this time at an animal shelter.”
“What? Why?” He picked up his guns and put them in the holsters at his side, following Cleo as she navigated up the ladder to the surface.
“They’re trying to tame all the strays and turn them against the city,” they said, using air quotations. “Apparently. They claim they want to take revenge against all the bad owners and, additionally, all of capitalism.”
“Well, that’s a pretty solid reason,” Scott said, squinting as the bright light of day made black splotches in his vision. The two ran through alleyways and climbed rooves, searching for the shelter. It wasn’t hard to find considering the police cars surrounding the building.
Eclipse was stood on the roof, hands out and laughing. Dogs surrounded them, circling and growling. Despite the sunlight, around them felt colder, as if all life was being drained as they stood there.
“The dogs of war demand sacrifice for your sins!” Eclipse giggled, then saw the two heroes on the roof. “Oh, some more fascists for my pets to snack on!”
“Step down, Eclipse, before we have to use violence,” Scott, now dressed as UrsaMajor, said. Cleo tilted their head from side to side, as if to say, I already want to use violence, but alright.
They only chuckled in response. “I doubt you could do anything besides try and shoot me.”
“We could do a lot more than that, Eclipse,” Cleo, using their Deadwalker voice changer, said. “Come over here and we’ll show you.”
“Ooh, is that a challenge?” Eclipse taunted, taking a step forward. “If so, I accept. I’ve been itching for a fight.”
The dogs began barking, pushing the police backward. UrsaMajor and Deadwalker looked between each other and the villain in front of them, readying their weapons. Eclipse inched their way towards them. Their walk was slow, boots clicking against the cement. It was now that UrsaMajor realized the elaborate outfit the villain wore- a red hood and cape with a dark moon covering their face, red string flowing and tied to their limbs. It was strange; it didn’t seem flexible or convenient, yet the villain didn’t seem to struggle.
They definitely didn’t struggle when they raised their arms and threw UrsaMajor and Deadwalker halfway across the city. They slammed against the metal ventilation of another building, heaving from the effort. Before UrsaMajor could even process what had happened, Eclipse appeared out of thin air , slicing at him with a scythe.
He narrowly avoided the blade, pointing his gun and aiming for Eclipse. Deadwalker swept her axe beneath Eclipse, but the villain jumped and dodged with ease. Behind their mask, he could have sworn he saw the slightest part of brown hair.
His heart sunk to his gut. UrsaMajor looked at Deadwalker, now in hand-to-hand combat with Eclipse. They locked eyes before nodding.
UrsaMajor jumped the villain, leaping and slamming them into the ground. They struggled and writhed, but he held them firm, both his guns placed at either side of their forehead.
“Get off of me!” Eclipse screeched, nails digging into UrsaMajor’s skin. Up close, their voice sounded so familiar, so close to being known.
“Oh, God,” Deadwalker said, only a few feet away from him. She had realized, too.
Carefully, using one of his guns, UrsaMajor lifted the moon mask off of Eclipse’s face. It fell to the floor with a clatter, and he heard Cleo take a sharp breath behind him.
She flinched, trying to lift her arms and hide her face. There was red running down from her nose, eyes bloodshot. Tears were making marks through grime down her cheeks.
“Pearl,” Scott breathed, trying to process everything.
“Scott,” Pearl choked. He couldn’t decide if she sounded heartbroken or angry.
“Why the fuck would you-”
Cleo was cut off. “Because! God , because I can’t keep fighting crime and pretending we’re actually fixing anything!” Pearl sobbed, her head hitting the gun as she spoke.
“Pearl, our job was to save people! That’s called making a difference!” Scott said, more baffled than anything.
Pearl forced herself up on her forearms. Scott kept his gun resting against her head, but she didn’t seem to notice. The red string of her disguise was unraveling around her on the pavement. “We were helping bad people, indirectly or not. What’s the use of doing everyone else’s job for them? It only encourages complicity on their part! I wanted to show them what we were preventing,” her breath hitched. “I wanted them to hurt.”
“Why? Why would you want to hurt them, despite everything you saw as a hero?” Cleo asked, her voice somehow softer than before.
“Because they were hurting us! ”
Scott thought back to every battle the three had endured together. He thought about the other villains, the police themself, the times when he had to patch up Pearl and Cleo- the times when they had to tend to his wounds in return. The three of them had been a strange in-between of publicly recognized heroes and illegal vigilantes. It put them all in danger, but they had agreed it would be worth it. Apparently, Pearl had begun to think differently.
“Why didn’t you just tell us?” Cleo asked. “Especially before almost killing us.”
“That wasn’t something I was proud of, if it helps,” Pearl giggled through her tears. “I tried to. Whenever I would, you two just brought up why we started this in the first place, and I got exhausted. I wanted to take it into my own hands.”
Scott and Cleo locked eyes for a moment. They nodded at him, eyes determined, and Scott dropped his gun.
“You did a lot of bad things, Pearl.”
Pearl nodded solemnly. “Yeah… I think I realize that, now.”
“But you’re still Pearl,” Scott said, standing up and holding out a hand. “I’m sorry you were hurt. We can’t just forgive you for this, and it’ll take a lot of work, but if you’re willing-”
She took his hand. “You don’t even have to finish that sentence.”
He pulled her up, watching as the dogs at the shelter ran loose. The three stood on the roof, the media’s attention on the shelter rather than the trio.
“We should get out of here, I think,” Cleo noted. The other two nodded their agreement, beginning to make their way down the building and back to their base underground. The moon mask sat alone on the cement, a crack through it. If Scott were watching, he might have noted the strange shimmer the underneath seemed to have, the low whispering that weaved its way out into the world.
*
When they got back, Pearl sat in her chair before being dragged back to the kitchen and the blood on her face wiped off. The three cleaned and bandaged wounds, none heavily injured despite their fight only a few hours before. It was strangely silent, only the sound of footsteps breaking the quiet, but Scott was surprised at how easily they fell back into their old routine.
Pearl had made mistakes- really bad mistakes. It was possible they would never be the same after that night. But the three were willing to try; in the end, it didn’t matter who did what. It mattered that they were going to grow together, learn and change and understand at the others’ sides. It would be hard, but never possible.
If there was one thing Scott had learned, it was that nothing is impossible.