[ Gotham City ]
The two groups on the ground had no clue what Thea was doing up in the air, so dramatically shooting arrow into the street. All eyes turned to the arrow lodged uselessly in the pavement. Whether thug or cop, the shared thought was the same—Is her aim always this terrible?
Thea, hidden behind her goggles and tightly wrapped gear, didn't flinch under the scrutiny. I'm anonymous anyway, she thought smugly. Covered head to toe—you can all keep guessing. While they gawked at the arrow like it was a misplaced traffic cone, she calmly pressed the trigger on her bow.
"Buzz—"
A sharp, low-frequency hum filled the air. Even Thea winced at the sound from above, and on the ground, it was worse. People staggered and flinched as the piercing noise buzzed in their skulls. One poor guy, already woozy from blood loss, nearly collapsed under the noise alone.
With several sharp whoosh sounds, guns yanked from every hand on the field clattered toward the embedded arrow, pulled in by its powerful magnetic core. A few were still glancing at their now-empty hands, baffled. Commissioner Gordon, sharp despite his age, snapped his gaze skyward, tracking the strange masked archer. He'd assumed the figure was an ally—until now. Her impartial takedown muddied the lines.
Thea didn't spare a thought for how confused they looked. No guns means no bullets means no problem, she reasoned. And unless you sprout wings, you're not reaching me anyway. She stayed focused on the task ahead—one step at a time.
"Felicity, I think our magnetic arrows are a little too effective..."
"Yeah, I noticed," Felicity replied dryly. "The original design radius was twenty meters. This blast covered fifty. Probably too many neodymium magnets, and the violent impact spun up the particles. Think we can tone it down by, like, twenty-five percent next time?"
"It definitely needs dialing down. The magnetic wave is too intense—it's yanking more than metal barrels now. Feels like we built a sonic cannon by accident."
"Got it, got it… we'll halve the output next time and see where that lands us…"
Just as Thea was about to keep bantering, she caught sight of Commissioner Gordon flailing and shouting from below. She quickly hit pause on the Felicity tech-talk channel.
"What?" she called down innocently, tilting her head like a puzzled bird. Her bright eyes blinked behind the goggles as if to say, Me? What did I do?
The old commissioner looked like he was about to pop a vessel. He didn't answer right away—just pointed at the enemy side, where two thugs were grunting and wrestling with their stuck weapons like toddlers trapped in a claw machine. The magnetic field still had its grip. Cute, Thea thought, Did they think sheer willpower could beat science?
The thugs eventually gave up on their guns, clearly outmatched. They didn't understand what was happening, but at least had enough brain cells left to realize the fight was still on. They cracked their knuckles and squared up for a brawl, switching to fists now that firepower was off the table.
This was exactly what Gordon had feared. He was a week away from retirement and already half-exhausted. One officer beside him had taken a bullet and could barely stand. Only two of them were still fully capable, and none were spring chickens. On the other side? Seven street-hardened goons, including one 300-pound slab of trouble who looked dim but packed enough muscle to lift a car.
The odds were bad before. Now they were hopeless. With one last desperate wave, Gordon threw Thea a look that said it all: Are you actually here to help… or just sightseeing with flair?
Thea scratched the back of her head, feeling a bit awkward. Yeah… they had things under control before she showed up. Then she swooped in, dropped a fancy arrow, and made everything worse. A flashy move with zero tactical finesse—it didn't even care who was who.
Ugh. She meant well. Really. But the temptation to test the new gadget had been too strong. And now? One shot down, tens of thousands of dollar gone, and judging by Gordon's thundercloud expression, there'd be no reimbursement claim in sight.
Well, too late to back out. She'd have to mop up this mess herself. Running away wasn't an option anyway. One—she had her pride. Two—the skateboard was only built for one, and she wasn't about to turn it into a clown car for four cops and a vigilante.
Besides, she didn't like strangers touching her gear.
Now that she'd committed, her mindset shifted. If they asked nicely, she'd be gracious enough to lend her power and save the day. Hero stuff, you know.
Sure, it'd feel amazing to drop each thug with a single arrow, clean and efficient. But with the cops watching—especially someone like Gordon—it wasn't the smartest play. First impressions were everything. And no one forgot a vigilante who acted like an executioner.
Just look at Green Arrow. Guy tried to do everything—cop, judge, jury—all rolled into one. The bad ones hated him for exposing them, the good ones hated him for breaking the system. In the end, no matter how many wrongs he righted, all people remembered was that they had to chase him too. Criminals in front, heroes behind them, and the cops chasing everyone. What a mess.
Superman never had this kind of trouble. His debut was clean, noble, and practically wrapped in the American flag. With all that power and a flawless smile, people trusted him. Even if the brass shook in their boots behind closed doors, no one dared issue a warrant for the guy. No bounty posters, no whispered orders to shoot on sight. The Metropolis police probably invited him to their charity dinners.
So, if Thea wanted to make the right kind of entrance—one that didn't end in a manhunt—she needed to shelve the idea of showing Gordon how efficiently she could drop seven men in thirty seconds.
She steadied herself midair, angled her bow, and locked eyes on the walking meatball leading the thugs. "Alright, big guy... you're up. Let's call this one a Tangle Arrow," she muttered under her breath. "Felicity, start recording…"
The arrow flew in a clean arc, and Thwip, struck the pavement just ahead of the big guy's feet. The man blinked in confusion. A loud hiss sounded—and a cloud of thick, milky-white gel burst from the shaft, reacting with the air and unfurling into a massive net, nearly two meters tall and five meters wide.
He had no time to react. The net slapped him square in the chest and dragged him down. The others were right behind and couldn't stop fast enough. One by one, they crashed into the sticky mess, limbs flailing.
Thea grinned behind her goggles. That arrow was based on Spider-Man's trick—webbing for days. Not that she had spider-DNA or radioactive silk. Her version used a carbon-yne composite developed years ago by Queen Consolidated's R&D department.
Dr. Hoffman had designed it with noble goals—saving suicidal jumpers, catching bodies before they hit the ground. A tiny capsule that turned into a safety net big and tough enough to catch an elephant. Shelved for "lack of market demand." Then Thea found it. With a little tinkering from Felicity, it became something a whole lot more interesting.
In the end, Thea dubbed it "spider silk" just for convenience. Whether actual spiders would lodge a formal protest over something that had zero acidic compounds, she couldn't have cared less.
The trapped thugs, of course, weren't thrilled about being gift-wrapped in front of the cops. They thrashed inside the netting like fish on a line, the leader especially throwing his weight around in pure, unfiltered rage.
But Thea had tweaked the original design—upping the carbon ratio to trade a bit of hardness for flexibility. Now the webbing bounced slightly under stress, giving off the illusion it might snap any moment.
That illusion was the entire point. The same way someone thinks, "He loves me," right before being ghosted. If a panicked elephant couldn't break out, there was no way these wannabe warlords would.
She raised her hands toward Commissioner Gordon in a theatrical shrug that said, clear as day: I've gift-wrapped your mess. Now it's your turn to clean up.
To Be Continued...
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[POWER STONES AND REVIEWS PLS]