Summus Proelium

Rubi Nilsen's life had changed quite a bit in a very short time. She had gone from being a completely broke overnight cleaning lady trying to play mother for her two younger siblings (and another girl who might as well have been a third), with no real prospects or hope that things would get better any time soon, to being part of the Ten Towers Star-Touched team. Which had included a new, better place for them to live, a steady, weekly paycheck with an actual comma in the amount, a cover identity as a paralegal, and access to the best legal education in the city.

Yes, a lot had changed for the nineteen-year-old who had not so long ago seriously considered the possibility that she might never actually manage to become the lawyer she'd been dreaming about being since she was barely old enough to know what one of those was. With her parents and the Murphys in prison, there just hadn't been any chance for that. Making sure Roald, Emilee, and even Eleanor (not that Rubi would ever call the girl that over Murphy, even with superpowers) had food and shelter was too important. Maybe in ten years when they were all old enough to fend for themselves, she could focus on that, go to night school for six years, and become a lawyer at thirty-five.

But that had all changed. She was getting that education right now, her siblings were being taken care of, the older two had their own jobs and were part of their own Star-Touched team (not that that was exactly public record), and she didn't have to worry about where their next meal was coming from. All it took was facing the single most terrifying moment of her life, being chased by Pencil and the Scions.

It was a lot, but now things were-- well, not settling down. She was pretty sure they would never do something silly like that. But they were better, even if her life did include a lot more danger than it ever had. At least the people she cared about weren't starving, and she didn't have to try to calculate how many times she could safely donate plasma per month in order to pay the damn utility bill and buy groceries.

And yet, as helpful as this new life was, it still led to some very terrifying moments that she never could have imagined. Such as right now. She was out with two other members of the Towers team, Linesight and Bunglebotch. Among many other problems that had suddenly cropped up all at once across the city, several Fell and Prev members of Oscuro had broken into the secure vault at a bank and were trying to get out of there with an assortment of mysterious lock boxes. Rubi had no idea what was actually in those boxes, but each of them was about three feet high and two feet wide, and seemed to be made of thick enough metal to resist most attempts to break in.

Whatever they were, the contents were important enough for a ten-person squad of Towers Prev troops and three of their Stars to intercede. It would've been more, but again, there was a lot going on right then. Including the fact that Caishen herself was currently out of commission. The Ten Towers field team leader had been caught in some sort of stasis field along with Lexeme and their kids. And that Wren girl, which… Rubi had considered whether she should call Roald and Murphy about that. The kid was their friend. But they were also supposed to be on vacation, and there really wasn't much they could do about it that the Towers and Conservator people weren't already doing. Still, she'd debated about it with herself quite a bit before being interrupted by the whole robbery thing. She'd make a decision once they were done with this.

She wasn't here as Rubi, of course. She was here as Flurry, which meant she was in costume. A costume that consisted of what looked like a diving or surfing wetsuit, black with cyan trim. Her boots and gloves matched, and she wore a black helmet with an incredibly narrow cyan visor that looked too small for her to actually see out of. In truth, the entire front of the helmet was transparent from the inside, so the size of the supposed visor didn't matter. It was an aesthetic thing, which also read her facial expression and made the visor widen or narrow a bit more based on what her eyes were doing. When she raised an eyebrow, it made one side larger than the other. All part of allowing her to show some form of facial expression so she came off as more friendly and approachable as a member of the Ten Towers Star-Touched. She also had a utility belt around her waist with pouches filled with an assortment of small weapons and tools.

Cuélebre himself wasn't part of this attack, thank God. They had what seemed to be about twenty-five or so Prevs, half of whom were inside the bank and the other half spread through the surrounding streets outside. As far as Fells went, Coverfire, Luz Mala, and Silbón were here. The presence of Coverfire had briefly made Rubi wonder why he hadn't simply used his superheated forcefield to melt through the metal boxes so they could take what was inside, but he was probably worried about actually damaging the contents. Thus, all he'd done was melt through the vault itself to get his people access, so the troops could start hauling the boxes out.

Speaking of Coverfire, Linesight was dealing with him. The man's heat shield might have protected him from damage, but Line's concussive blasts (he could make them originate from up to four different spots, and anyone who happened to look at that spot and wasn't included in the man's mental list of exceptions would be slammed by one of those blasts) were still capable of knocking him backwards. Which didn't help that much when the guy closed his eyes and just walked forward, but still. Linesight knew what he was doing. Just as Bunglebotch could probably handle Luz Mala, a Fell whose body armor made them look like a glowing skeleton, with a power that had something to do with making any object they held onto explode into clouds of gas with various effects, like shocking, corrosive, freezing, or even healing. It was versatile.

All of which left Rubi-- Flurry-- to deal with Silbón. The tall man (he was just over six and a half feet, but rather lanky) wore old clothes that looked very ragged and torn, along with a wide-brimmed black hat and a dark gray mask that only covered the top half of his face, leaving his mouth exposed. A mouth that was usually pursed so he could whistle. That was his power. Whenever he was whistling, which he could do for a long time, the man wasn't just immune to damage, he actually absorbed the effect used on him and could instill a future whistle with that. If someone shot him with a bullet, he could absorb its kinetic force and expel it in a whistle that would do as much damage as that gun. The same went for any offensive powers used on him.

At the moment, Flurry was inside the main lobby of the bank, with Linesight just outside and Bunglebotch downstairs, each dealing with their own opponents. Five of the Oscuro Prevs, heavily armed troops wearing dark ski masks and carrying assault rifles, were arrayed in front of the young Star, while Silbón himself was casually descending the stairs from the upper walkway, whistling low to maintain his invulnerability while giving a quick, clearly contemptuous flick of his hand in Rubi's direction. Which was apparently the silent order for all of the troops to open fire.

In that exact second, as the goons raised their weapons and took aim, Rubi focused. The world froze around her, as her own form turned almost ghost-like. Seeing the five troops in front of her, completely motionless, she went to work. Four quick steps forward put her in front of the nearest man, and she made a shoving motion against his raised gun. It turned ghost-like as well, moving it and his arm about a foot to the side. Then she, the gun, and the man's arm snapped back to their original positions. Again, Rubi darted forward and shoved the gun. That time it moved twice as far, completely leaving the man's grip. But she did it once more to be completely certain it would disarm him.

From there, she did the same for each of the five men. Three repetitions each would be enough to knock the guns from their grasps. Fifteen total repetitions, and she wasn't anywhere near her limit. Then she moved on to punching each man in the face, her ghostly fist passing right through them again and again and again. She hit each of the five about four times. Twenty more repetitions. She was up to thirty-five and still not feeling much of a strain. The next fifteen were spent kicking the back of the left leg of each man three times. That was fifty. She finished up that session with three hard shoves forward and down into the back of the Prev goons' shoulders.

With that done, Rubi was up to sixty-five repetitions. That was enough. She allowed time to restart. The world seemed to blur into a rush of motion around her, as her body went with blinding speed to follow the actions she'd laid out for it in those repetitions. Over the span of just a couple seconds, she shoved each man's gun hard enough to knock it from their grasp, punched them with the strength of five of herself, then kicked the back of their legs and shoved them from behind with the strength of three of herselves. All of which was enough to disarm them and put each of them on the floor, groaning and cursing in pain while holding their faces.

They were down. But that still left Silbón himself. The man's head tilted as he took in what had just happened to his troops before he focused on Rubi herself. She saw his already-pursed lips shift just a little. He was going to hit her with one of his absorbed-damage whistles. Or try to, at least. The instant she saw that and realized what was coming, Rubi threw herself back into that frozen world again. She hadn't quite allowed herself enough time to recover from what it took to disarm the Prevs and put them on the floor, but this wouldn't take nearly as many repetitions.

The way her power worked meant she was always put back to where she started before her body went through the motions she'd made. So the moment she released this effect and allowed time to resume, Rubi would be right back in the line of fire. But the more repetitions she made, the faster she moved. The girl used that trick then, flinging herself sideways not once, not twice, but ten times just to be on the safe side. She did it over and over until she was as certain as she could be that it would be enough.

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Finally, she relaxed her hold on time. Everything snapped back into motion, and Rubi suddenly launched herself sideways at ten times her normal speed. It was quick enough to make the incoming whistle completely miss her. Which was apparently a really good thing, since the whistle seemed to be super-heated, probably thanks to Coverfire. It burned a hole six inches wide in the wall right behind where she had just been standing. He wasn't playing around.

Rubi hadn't just been flinging herself in a random direction either. She dove behind one of the tall, decorative metal pillars in the bank lobby. Then, even though she could feel the strain, she did the exact same thing again, freezing time so she could repeat the process of sprinting away from that pillar and over to dive behind the receptionist desk right in the center of the lobby. The desk was mostly behind Silbón and to his right. She did ten more repetitions like that before feeling satisfied, making herself sprint that way at, once again, ten times her normal speed as soon as time resumed.

Which meant that, from Silbón's point of view, she vanished in a blur of motion to put herself behind the pillar. But he couldn't see where she went from there. As far as he knew, she was still right there on the other side of the pillar. Which was why he focused on that, sending a new whistle that burned a hole right through the hollow metal structure. It didn't take long for him to cut through enough of the pillar to convince the man she'd already zipped away. There was a reason everyone outside of a select few believed Flurry was simply a short-range burst speedster. That was what her power looked like to anyone experiencing it from the outside. And, to be honest, it was kind of just that with extra steps anyway. Still, the less that most people knew about how her power actually worked, the less chance the wrong people could counter it.

Case in point right now, Rubi needed a few seconds to catch her breath as she crouched behind the desk and listened to that eerie whistle. Silbón wasn't burning things anymore, but he was maintaining his invulnerability. She could hear the shift in tone as he looked around, clearly trying to figure out where she'd disappeared to. He wasn't moving just yet, his feet staying firmly planted right there in the middle of the lobby. They could both hear the fighting going on elsewhere in the bank and outside, but in that moment only the two of them mattered. The man didn't want to leave those boxes behind, but before he could get the goons back up to carry them he needed to make sure she wasn't there to hit them again. He needed to put her down.

Staying perfectly still in that crouched position behind the desk, Rubi listened intently to the whistle, hoping she'd somehow know if it was being aimed in her direction and was about to go from innocuous invulnerability sound to destructive sonic attack. She just needed another second or two to breathe. Wait… oh, right, she knew what to do. Closing her eyes, she pictured the layout of the lobby, the way it had been when she came in. She focused on remembering the general position of the thing she needed. One of those things that was always just there in the background, but generally went ignored unless it was needed. But when it was, it really was.

She heard the whistle suddenly rise in pitch just before there was a loud crash as it shifted into some sort of concussive effect and slammed into one of the registers over by the teller counter, beyond where she was. A second later the whistle rose again and another concussive shot hit a chair in the nearby waiting area, sending it flipping end over end to crash into the opposite wall. He was trying to draw her out, trying to intimidate her and get a reaction that would show him where she was. But she wasn't that dumb. New to all this and a bit scared, yes, but not dumb.

And speaking of not being dumb, if that was what he was trying to do, it meant something important. Something she could take advantage of now that she was ready. Head tilting, Rubi listened as intently as she had ever listened to anything before. She waited until the whistle rose once more. As the sound of another object being hit filled the room, she waited just one more half-second, then used her power. Everything froze and she took a breath before grabbing the desk over her head with both hands, using that to heave herself up and over. Well, up and onto.

From there, she snapped back to her original spot and did that again, and again, and again. Each time through twenty repetitions, her grab and heave sent herself further. Finally, on that last one, she was sent clear over the frozen Silbón's head to land on the far side of the room.

That was enough for the first step, and she let time resume. Her body flung itself in a wild blur of motion to fly over Silbón, landing about five steps behind the man while he was in the midst of turning toward the spot her motion had started from, his concussive whistle from that last hit in the midst of winding down. She could hear the tone just barely start to shift, all but imperceptible.

Even as his head started to turn as he followed the motion blur, Rubi was already using her power again. But she didn't hit the man directly. That wouldn't have accomplished anything. Not yet, anyway. Instead, she sprinted sideways, moving to the object hanging on the wall, the one she'd had to take a moment to remember the position of. It was a fire extinguisher. She ran to it and managed to get her hands on the thing before being snapped back to the start. The same process repeated through the next several rounds. There was too much to do to waste too much of her efforts on this simple sprint, so she only used about six repetitions. Moving six times as fast as she normally did to get over to that extinguisher was just going to have to be enough.

Letting that happen in real time put her at the extinguisher with her hand on it just as Silbón managed to turn about halfway toward her. His whistle was still changing pitch, but hadn't quite reached the exact moment she needed. It was close though, so close. Rubi instantly froze time again, and used her next six repetitions to grab the extinguisher off the wall, rip the tag out to get the thing ready, then pivot and sprint back that way. Over and over again, six times, she repeated those motions, putting herself within a couple feet of the man before letting time go.

All of which meant Rubi was right there with the extinguisher raised and ready as Silbón finished turning toward her. Which came at the exact second his higher pitched concussive whistle shifted down. He was changing back to his usual flat invulnerability whistle. But to do that, he took in a tiny breath for the shift. She'd heard him doing it before, back behind the counter. That was what she had been listening for, and the same thing happened now. As his concussive whistle ended, he breathed in just a bit to shift back to the other whistle.

That was what she needed. In that instant, Rubi triggered the fire extinguisher, sending a thick cloud of suppressant right into the man's face. More importantly, right into his mouth just as he was trying to breathe in.

It worked. His whistle stopped very briefly, becoming a surprised, sputtering cough as his head jerked backwards. For that second, he wasn't whistling anymore. And a second was all she needed. Before he could recover, Rubi froze time again. Now came the best part. She lunged forward, fist lashing out to collide with the man's frozen face. Then she did it again, and again, and again. Seven, eight, nine times she repeated the motion. But that wasn't enough. From there, Rubi shifted to kicking the man's stomach, though for that one she limited herself to four repetitions. Four solid kicks would be enough to get her point across in this case.

She was running out of repetitions by that point, seriously straining her power. But she kept going anyway. With the five or six turns she had left in her, Rubi put herself behind the man and brought both arms down hard on the back of his shoulders.

When time resumed, her figure blurred so much she was practically invisible. Silbón was hit in the exact second that he was temporarily no longer invulnerable. The equivalent of nine punches to the exact same spot in his face, four kicks to his stomach, and six full-force blows onto the back of his shoulders came all in basically the same instant.

The next thing the man knew, he was on the floor, dazed and in pain while Rubi slipped the stay-down cuffs onto his wrists and shoved a gag from her utility belt into his mouth to stop any whistling. A quick glance around confirmed the rest of his goons weren't about to jump to their feet. This area, at least, was secure. And from the sound of things, the rest of the situation was winding down as well. It was all under control.

Which, of course, was the moment she looked through the open bank doors and saw two familiar figures standing in the alley across the street. Her eyes widened behind the helmet, before she held a hand up for them to stay right there. Before doing anything else, Rubi made sure the situation really was secure. It was… mostly okay. Coverfire and a handful of the Prevs had escaped with a few of those boxes they were after, but Luz Mala had been knocked unconscious. They and Silbón would be transported alongside their troops to a secure facility.

Only then did Rubi cross the street at a jog, disappearing into the alley where those two figures were. Murphy and Roald. Or rather, Calvin and Hobbes, since they were in costume. "What are you guys doing here?" Rubi hissed. "You're supposed to be on vacation, not out in the field. Look, I-- I know you probably wanted to help when you heard what was happening, but what--where's the rest of your team?"

"That's why we're here," Roald informed her. "We just dressed up so you wouldn't be seen talking to our, umm, civilian selves. We really need to talk, Rubi."

Murphy's head bobbed in agreement. "Yeah, and for what we've gotta say, we might wanna find a chair.

"Cuz you're gonna need to sit down."