Turning away from the damaged he caused with an intrigued "Hmm" Steven attempts to track down some real criminals... or an ATM...
You turn around to go look for some other criminals to punish for the crime of existing near you and perhaps dressing unfortunately.
An ATM, unfortunately for your more murderous instincts, is far easier to locate than people obviously engaging in criminal activity.
Alex would blink three times.
"Thought so. Now, the thing is, whatever the hell you were doing in that warehouse, nobody can really disagree that the end result was pretty good for all surviving parties, except maybe you from the looks of it. One crazy drug dealer terrorist woman put in the ground, danger to the public safely averted, lots of bad guys dead. No police casualties, no injured bystanders, no ethical dilemmas about shooting drug dealers. A win for the citizenry all around, and maybe some bonuses for whatever lucky sons of bitches appeared on the scene first," the man says.
"But!" he then begins. "There's one particular interested group who got particularly shafted. That's us, the PRT. All that's come from the incident are new parahumans to worry about in town. This is pretty bad, because so far we've had a pretty decent balance of power at work here. All is not lost, though. There is good to be extracted from this yet. And the most promising avenue, my friend, happens to be you. You fought the law, and it seems like you lost, pretty much. You've got no direction right now. Maybe you're really pissed off, and want to take it out on somebody, only everyone who's responsible is dead or something. So, what I've come here to offer you right now is a pretty special thing. How'd you like to be a PRT... 'affiliate', shall we say? There'd be some real good perks in it for you if you don't fuck it up."
Consider my less murdery options (under the assumption that I can convince them.)
Well, there's the PRT. They'd probably stick you in a subterranean lab where you could live out the rest of your life, working for the good of man or some shit. Or you could try and join up with Project Ed, you hear they've got reasonably lax recruitment procedures, and they'd maybe help you build really fun stuff.
Selina gulps, trying to stay on her feet as she heads back down the stairs and quickly eats a sandwich and downs a bottle of water. She looks at the front door and gets weak in the knees again. If she went out there naked, she could face even more horrors...
She glances around to see if there are drapes over the windows, SOME sort of cloth that could cover her... she didn't want to be taken again...
You find the sandwich most delectable, and the water similarly palatable. And with that done, you go on to look for some drapes or anything else that might potentially cover you, but the house, as mentioned, is largely bare, and the windows have blinds, presumably installed in a recent renovation. It's a very bland, unfinished sort of house, you would say if you did not have other concerns at the moment. It seems to be the middle of the night right now, and the street outside is pretty quiet.
The only place where you think you could maybe find something to cover yourself up with would be the basement. Though you probably won't enjoy it, you can safely say.
"... Chinese steel? I would never... hm... curiouser and curiouser..."
Kyle pauses and flips open the knife.
It is just as crappy as you suspect, obviously a thing that one would buy if they had no money, but loved the sensation of power and brutality that having a knife with you brings. It is certainly not a personal weapon of a knife collector. In fact, a knife collector would probably melt something like this down to slag, just so it does not slander the name of good knives everywhere.
You do notice something curious, however. The blade is smudged a bit, as if it were crudely wiped with something, and traces of something brown seem to be on its handle, you discover as you take a closer look. You suspect you know what it might be. You scratch a bit of it off with your fingernail, and the texture...
What were you thinking again?
Yeah,Flask would probably end up being one of her first targets. Even if the PRT didn't provide her with any support today she would at least try and find his base in town, if he has one.
go see the PRT
Your dad drives you out to the PRT office in town, where you are rather politely received by the officer with the womanly face, who seems to be wondering what you might want from him this fine day.
Unfortunately, I wasn't that good at predicting things. I opened the door, though, and he stepped through.
"So, uh, how ya doin'?"
"Shitty. I'm doing shitty. My little brothers have been kidnapped, how the fuck do you think I'd be doing?"
He winced. I didn't blame him, since I was pissed.
"Well, uh, anyway...I couldn't find much on anything about this...it's not like I had much time, ya know, and-"
"Jake, just shut up for now, okay?"
He did, for which I was grateful. Instead of talking, he picked up the chair I'd thrown and righted it, before sitting down, waiting while I rubbed my temples.
"Alright. Let's just...I don't know. Do you have any cop friends that can help?"
"Ser..."
"Yes or no, Jake."
He sighed, and began to inspect his hands as if they were the most interesting things in the world.
"I asked Bobby, he said they couldn't do anything about it."
"What!?!"
"They're understaffed and overextended. There's cape villains everywhere, and a kidnap victim isn't exactly their top priority."
"Not their goddamned top priority? What the FUCK!"
"I-I think it was the higher-ups that made that call...I'm sorry, Ser."
"But-but...fuck...what are we gonna do now?"
"We can still look for them ourselves."
I swallowed, trying to keep back tears. Turn that into anger. Into rage. Don't let it show. Use it to find Dominic. To find Lucian. To make those motherfuckers pay.
"Y-yeah. Yeah we can. The neighbors'll probably help too. Mrs. Beckinson always liked them, and she can get her sons to help..."
We talked a few minutes longer, and then we went through the apartment complex, explaining what had happened and asking for help. Everyone except Mrs. Friens agreed to help, and Mrs. Friens was a cancer patient, so it wasn't her fault. We would start the search in the morning, since it was past midnight by the time we finished. I went to bed, but couldn't fall asleep for hours, thinking about my brothers in captivity. Jake crashed on the couch, and my mom and sister arrived in the early morning. I think I might have gotten two hours of sleep when my alarm went off. I'd gone to sleep in my clothes, but I didn't care about looking messy. I had bigger problems on my plate.
At least Jake had made coffee...
At some point during your morning routine, Jake voices one particular idea that's occurred to him overnight, possibly motivated by the general uselessness he's displayed so far, and that idea is that this whole kidnapping business is a little unusual as far as he knows. Namely, to kidnap somebody who doesn't really have much money to pay. He's heard about something like this being done in Mexico, maybe, but there kidnapping's a growth industry in need of persistent innovation. Around Edwardstown, though, it's kind of strange. After all, kidnapping's a lot of work compared to, say, jacking an ATM or robbing a drugstore.
Jake browses, searching for something more like a knight helmet.
((Geez, two different Jakes? Glad I don't have to keep track of which one has powers.))
There's a couple plastic knight helmets, you find. They look kind of ridiculous, and more than a bit uncomfortable. Who dresses up as a knight for Halloween, anyway?