Hero by Day

Chapter 2 - Vigilantes aren't that bad

But, since I was his friend, and I liked hearing his theories, I let him talk. "So, why him?"

Ian grinned, "His name is Earl Chambers. He works for the Washington Post, a job in which he has a ton of missed days from work. Being a newspaper writer would help him know the current news, and if Clark Kent was able to do it, then why can't he?"

It took me a moment to know who he was referencing. You see, comic book heroes have gone a little out of style nowadays. Everyone is obsessed with the real supers. I never got into the comic book heroes as much, even though I did work at a comic book shop.

I nodded, "Yeah, I hope this lead pans out."

Ian tilted his head. "Are you doubting me?"

"Well . . ."

Ian gasped. "C'mon, man! This is the best lead that I've gotten yet!"

"Really?" I scoffed, "What about that last guy? The one who worked for the manufacturing plant? Or what about the one who was already dead?"

"Okay, okay. I get it." He sighed.

I chuckled and turned to see what the other students were doing. I was surprised to see that most were on some digital news article app or even super related news websites.

"Hey, Ian?" I asked warily, and he turned to face me. "What happened? Why is everybody on their phones?"

Ian's face immediately brightened. He had that goofy grin on his face that was normally associated with super related news. I wondered for a moment if some other super had visited our city or if one had just saved the world, but it turns out that the news was more local than I thought.

Ian handed me his phone again, but this time there was a news article lined up.

Delinquent, vigilante or villain?

A new super has started to pop up around the nation's capital, and their controversial means of 'saving people' had the city in a storm.

I mentally sighed. Just great, I had another new super villain wannabe to deal with. But I was still intrigued, so I read on.

A new super by the name of Delinquent has been catching many of DC's finest in a pickle. This self-proclaimed 'vigilante' has been all over the city wrecking crime on some of the biggest names out of anywhere.

And, you want to know what else? This new super is a girl.

Just last night she sabotaged a shipping van from Paramount Pharmaceuticals, the medical company currently trying to settle lawsuits for patients who took pills for ADHD and ADD, and developed some very 'super' side effects. Yes, you heard right, some of the patients have developed super powers from their medicine line, which was been recalled until further notice.

She's also been seen painting graffiti murals on government buildings in protest to many of the bills that are being considered as laws. She's protested the Winters-Baker Bill, which would eradicate taxes for America's rich and powerful, and she's also painted a mural dictating Senator Klaus hanging innocent children in retaliation to his reaction to the crisis in Croatia.

And if there's one thing to say about this 'Delinquent,' it's that she is definitely not over yet.

I'd heard about the Paramount Pharmaceuticals incident not too long ago. They had a special prescribed pill for the treatment of ADHD and ADD in teens, but a lot of the kids who took the pills got sick. Like, really sick. Some of the ones who recovered weird powers, but definitely not as many as the news article implied. Only about one out of ten of the kids developed powers, but all the families are trying to get together to sue the company for lying about their clinical trials.

Even the murals were protesting things that were wrong. I couldn't exactly say that she was internally evil, like most villains, even if she was technically breaking the law.

"Cool."

Ian rebutted like I had hit him or something. "Cool? Just cool? Dude, there's this new kickass vigilante super and all you have to say about it is, cool? This is awesome! Plus, she's a girl."

I had to give my friend credit there. There weren't many supers that were women, even though there should statistically be just as many as the men. Villains that were girls were even rarer. I thought of it as like the same phenomena with serial killers. There were just way more male serial killers out there, it must've had something to do with their genes or something.

(Or maybe boys were more likely to put themselves in stupid situations where they had a chance of getting super powers or becoming evil.)

(Like, standing next to a lamppost in the middle of a thunderstorm.)

(Yeah, I was definitely asking to be struck by lightning.)

I studied the picture of the girl more closely. It was grainy security camera footage of her as she stopped the Pharmaceuticals van. She wore a mask that covered the top half of her face, and her black hair made the rest of her face look to be shadowed. From her stance I could tell that she was young, at most early twenties and at least fifteen. She was most likely just a teenager, like me.

Maybe a new vigilante would keep things interesting around here.