City of Zeroes: Chapter One
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Title: City of Zeroes
Authors: Raggedpelt and Yami_Neko_Tsuki
Summary: An AU fic based loosely off the "City of Heroes" universe. Post movie by roughly two decades.
Wordcount: 1,399
Rating: This chapter is rated PG. Rating of the overall story will vary from PG to NC-17.
Other Notes: Stryker and Furball were written by Raggedpelt
A worn, thin man with tousled light brown hair walked down the hallways of the supergroup headquarters. Unlike the spandex-clad rainbow of people he passed (none of which paid him any mind) he was dressed in a simple brown suit with a blue turtleneck. After all, he was just a “normal,” beneath the notice of “supers” like them. They only kept him around for tasks they couldn't even get the sidekicks to do.
He was done with his mountain of chores for today, thankful for the privacy and rest his room offered. T'was a modest room, only a bed, a mostly empty dresser, a closet of unused suits and an old, small TV on a milk crate. He closed the door, flopped down on the bed and flipped a switch on his watch. His image blurred for a moment before settling on his natural state. Instead of and incredibly average man in his mid forties, he was now a rail thin blue man with an extraordinarily large cranium.
Megamind flopped down on the bed, too tired to change into sleepwear. He’d been too busy today to gather any information or find a chance to check in with Minion. Megamind couldn’t risk blowing his cover, but at the same time, he needed to know that his daughter was still alright. In this “City of Heroes” being labeled a “villain” was much more dangerous now than when he had been starting out. ….Of course, being a hero was much different too, that was why he quit, and why he was so worried about Sophie.
~~~~~~~~
Across town in, an old power station, a small black cat with splashes of white was staring up at wall full of different capes with an old, charred white one at the top. Nearby, a teenage girl was spinning in a high-backed chair, occasionally glancing at the monitors. She was, well, blue. Blue hair, blue skin, blue eyes, blue outfit. Thankfully, they were all different shades so she didn’t look like she’d had a bucket of paint dumped over her, her hair was nearly black even.
She got up and walked over to the trophy wall. “This is a really stupid idea.”
The cat arched her back, rubbing against the girl’s leg. “Ghost Widow didn’t give him much choice. Getting your cape can wait until he returns, Sophie. We need to stay inside. ...Besides, in the lair we have food and warm places to sleep and fish to watch.”
Sophie sighed. It had been forever since her dad had been given an important mission by one of the really important villains in Arachnos, but she wanted her cape now so she could stop being a henchman, and she was really tired of having to wait inside doing nothing. “Furball, I don’t like watching fish. And what if Dad doesn’t come back?”
Furball purred a little. “He will come back.”
“But what if he doesn’t?” Sophie had already lost one parent, she didn’t want to loose the one she had left.
Furball froze and looked back over her shoulder. Her ears had perked up and her tail was quivering, that usually meant something was wrong.
“What is it?”
“Hide, I will go see.”
“Just tell me!”
Furball’s eat twitched in annoyance. “I hear something. Now shut up and hide.”
Sophie picked her up and hid behind some of the old partially-finished inventions that littered the lair, if she had to hide, Furball was hiding with her. She knew Furball was scared too, because Sophie could feel her nervous purring.
Across the lair, two sidekicks had just entered the lair.
“Are you sure this is the right place? There's nobody here,” the older one, a girl with earth related powers called Termor, asked as she followed her partner around.
The other sidekick, Stryker, was a more unusual sight. While he was still human, he also had a number of catlike features, including a tail and some very sharp claws. “I'm sure.” He turned a corner and came face to face to a very colorful part of the lair. “Ooh, check it out. Megamind's trophy wall. ...I heard the only one of these guys he actually killed was Metro Man, though.”
Termor rolled her eyes. “I heard he faked it.” She looked over the wall, realizing that even if those capes hadn’t come from dead heroes, they were still likely out of their league. “There's a lot of capes here, are you sure he's gone?”
“So what if he isn't?” Stryker scoffed. “He won't bother with us except for chasing us out. We're just sidekicks, remember?”
Tremor looked around nervously, she wasn’t sure about this. “Being chased can still hurt, and you'd be surprised what you can live through.”
The sidekicks were getting closer, and it was only a matter of time before they found their target. The little black cat gave her charge a reassuring nudge before padding across the floor to get some help. She accidentally bumped into a piece of scrap metal, startling Styker who whirled around, claws ready to tear apart whatever happened to be there. He relaxed after seeing what made the sound, letting out a laugh. “Just a fucking cat.”
Tremor rolled her eyes and reach over to pull her partner towards the entrance. “There’s nobody here, let’s go back.”
Furball used this opportunity to scoot right over to a closet where she and Sophie had locked Minion earlier, then hopped up and wrapped her paws around the knob, using her body weight to unlock the door and let him out. A very irritated Minion stepped out of the closet, giving the feline an annoyed look. “It’s about time!”
At that sound, which was most certainly not a cat, the sidekicks sprang into action. Tremor used her earth-based powers to turn the ground around where the voice had come from into quicksand, making it difficult to get away while Stryker unsheathed his claws and started to stalk towards the sound.
Furball hopped down to get to back to Sophie, only to find that the floor had become gooey and hard to walk in, much to her confusion. Minion looked down at the distressed feline and picked her up. “I’m sorry about this, but you need to not be right here,” and with that, he tossed her to the edge of the “quicksand.” Furball promptly scurried back to her and Sophie’s hiding spot.
The Scrapper-in-training let out a laugh after he got a clear view of Minion, noticing that the alien fish’s robot suit didn’t have a cap attached to it. “Hey Dev, it’s just a henchman.”
“So? You’re just a sidekick,” a mildly offended Minion replied.
Tremor had to concentrate to keep the fishy simian in place, and she didn’t have enough Endurance to keep this up forever. “Hey, it’d be really nice if we did something instead of just talking!”
With that, Stryker attacked, fully intending to rip that robot suit apart in an epic battle. But as soon as he was within arms’ reach of Minion, the newbie Stalker was on the ground, KO’d after one punch. As soon as he hit the ground, Tremor stopped trying to hold Minion and ran over to help her partner, pausing when she got close, intimidated by the deceptively dangerous henchman.
Tremor looked up at Minion nervously, “I-I just want to take him home. Coming here was a bad idea.”
After a moment, Minion shoved the unconscious sidekick towards her. This poor girl looked genuinely terrified. “Get out.”
Needless to say, the remaining sidekick retreated as hastily as she could while carrying her dozing partner.
With the threat over, Megamind’s daughter and her cat left their hiding place and walked back over to Minion. Furball piped up first, “It’s too bad he had no cape, or you could’ve finally earned yours.”
Minion couldn’t help smile a little at that, “Not everything is about capes.”
Sophie hugged her cat tightly, suddenly really feeling her father’s absence. “I want Dad to come home.”
“He will later. For now we have Minion.” Furball rubbed her head against her friend affectionately, to help comfort her.
Sophie brightened up at that. “Yeah. Thanks Minion.”
Minion put a hand on the blue girl’s shoulder and smiled. “Hey, your dad knows he can count on me for the important stuff.”
Title: City of Zeroes
Authors: Raggedpelt and Yami_Neko_Tsuki
Summary: An AU fic based loosely off the "City of Heroes" universe. Post movie by roughly two decades.
Wordcount: 1,399
Rating: This chapter is rated PG. Rating of the overall story will vary from PG to NC-17.
Other Notes: Stryker and Furball were written by Raggedpelt
A worn, thin man with tousled light brown hair walked down the hallways of the supergroup headquarters. Unlike the spandex-clad rainbow of people he passed (none of which paid him any mind) he was dressed in a simple brown suit with a blue turtleneck. After all, he was just a “normal,” beneath the notice of “supers” like them. They only kept him around for tasks they couldn't even get the sidekicks to do.
He was done with his mountain of chores for today, thankful for the privacy and rest his room offered. T'was a modest room, only a bed, a mostly empty dresser, a closet of unused suits and an old, small TV on a milk crate. He closed the door, flopped down on the bed and flipped a switch on his watch. His image blurred for a moment before settling on his natural state. Instead of and incredibly average man in his mid forties, he was now a rail thin blue man with an extraordinarily large cranium.
Megamind flopped down on the bed, too tired to change into sleepwear. He’d been too busy today to gather any information or find a chance to check in with Minion. Megamind couldn’t risk blowing his cover, but at the same time, he needed to know that his daughter was still alright. In this “City of Heroes” being labeled a “villain” was much more dangerous now than when he had been starting out. ….Of course, being a hero was much different too, that was why he quit, and why he was so worried about Sophie.
~~~~~~~~
Across town in, an old power station, a small black cat with splashes of white was staring up at wall full of different capes with an old, charred white one at the top. Nearby, a teenage girl was spinning in a high-backed chair, occasionally glancing at the monitors. She was, well, blue. Blue hair, blue skin, blue eyes, blue outfit. Thankfully, they were all different shades so she didn’t look like she’d had a bucket of paint dumped over her, her hair was nearly black even.
She got up and walked over to the trophy wall. “This is a really stupid idea.”
The cat arched her back, rubbing against the girl’s leg. “Ghost Widow didn’t give him much choice. Getting your cape can wait until he returns, Sophie. We need to stay inside. ...Besides, in the lair we have food and warm places to sleep and fish to watch.”
Sophie sighed. It had been forever since her dad had been given an important mission by one of the really important villains in Arachnos, but she wanted her cape now so she could stop being a henchman, and she was really tired of having to wait inside doing nothing. “Furball, I don’t like watching fish. And what if Dad doesn’t come back?”
Furball purred a little. “He will come back.”
“But what if he doesn’t?” Sophie had already lost one parent, she didn’t want to loose the one she had left.
Furball froze and looked back over her shoulder. Her ears had perked up and her tail was quivering, that usually meant something was wrong.
“What is it?”
“Hide, I will go see.”
“Just tell me!”
Furball’s eat twitched in annoyance. “I hear something. Now shut up and hide.”
Sophie picked her up and hid behind some of the old partially-finished inventions that littered the lair, if she had to hide, Furball was hiding with her. She knew Furball was scared too, because Sophie could feel her nervous purring.
Across the lair, two sidekicks had just entered the lair.
“Are you sure this is the right place? There's nobody here,” the older one, a girl with earth related powers called Termor, asked as she followed her partner around.
The other sidekick, Stryker, was a more unusual sight. While he was still human, he also had a number of catlike features, including a tail and some very sharp claws. “I'm sure.” He turned a corner and came face to face to a very colorful part of the lair. “Ooh, check it out. Megamind's trophy wall. ...I heard the only one of these guys he actually killed was Metro Man, though.”
Termor rolled her eyes. “I heard he faked it.” She looked over the wall, realizing that even if those capes hadn’t come from dead heroes, they were still likely out of their league. “There's a lot of capes here, are you sure he's gone?”
“So what if he isn't?” Stryker scoffed. “He won't bother with us except for chasing us out. We're just sidekicks, remember?”
Tremor looked around nervously, she wasn’t sure about this. “Being chased can still hurt, and you'd be surprised what you can live through.”
The sidekicks were getting closer, and it was only a matter of time before they found their target. The little black cat gave her charge a reassuring nudge before padding across the floor to get some help. She accidentally bumped into a piece of scrap metal, startling Styker who whirled around, claws ready to tear apart whatever happened to be there. He relaxed after seeing what made the sound, letting out a laugh. “Just a fucking cat.”
Tremor rolled her eyes and reach over to pull her partner towards the entrance. “There’s nobody here, let’s go back.”
Furball used this opportunity to scoot right over to a closet where she and Sophie had locked Minion earlier, then hopped up and wrapped her paws around the knob, using her body weight to unlock the door and let him out. A very irritated Minion stepped out of the closet, giving the feline an annoyed look. “It’s about time!”
At that sound, which was most certainly not a cat, the sidekicks sprang into action. Tremor used her earth-based powers to turn the ground around where the voice had come from into quicksand, making it difficult to get away while Stryker unsheathed his claws and started to stalk towards the sound.
Furball hopped down to get to back to Sophie, only to find that the floor had become gooey and hard to walk in, much to her confusion. Minion looked down at the distressed feline and picked her up. “I’m sorry about this, but you need to not be right here,” and with that, he tossed her to the edge of the “quicksand.” Furball promptly scurried back to her and Sophie’s hiding spot.
The Scrapper-in-training let out a laugh after he got a clear view of Minion, noticing that the alien fish’s robot suit didn’t have a cap attached to it. “Hey Dev, it’s just a henchman.”
“So? You’re just a sidekick,” a mildly offended Minion replied.
Tremor had to concentrate to keep the fishy simian in place, and she didn’t have enough Endurance to keep this up forever. “Hey, it’d be really nice if we did something instead of just talking!”
With that, Stryker attacked, fully intending to rip that robot suit apart in an epic battle. But as soon as he was within arms’ reach of Minion, the newbie Stalker was on the ground, KO’d after one punch. As soon as he hit the ground, Tremor stopped trying to hold Minion and ran over to help her partner, pausing when she got close, intimidated by the deceptively dangerous henchman.
Tremor looked up at Minion nervously, “I-I just want to take him home. Coming here was a bad idea.”
After a moment, Minion shoved the unconscious sidekick towards her. This poor girl looked genuinely terrified. “Get out.”
Needless to say, the remaining sidekick retreated as hastily as she could while carrying her dozing partner.
With the threat over, Megamind’s daughter and her cat left their hiding place and walked back over to Minion. Furball piped up first, “It’s too bad he had no cape, or you could’ve finally earned yours.”
Minion couldn’t help smile a little at that, “Not everything is about capes.”
Sophie hugged her cat tightly, suddenly really feeling her father’s absence. “I want Dad to come home.”
“He will later. For now we have Minion.” Furball rubbed her head against her friend affectionately, to help comfort her.
Sophie brightened up at that. “Yeah. Thanks Minion.”
Minion put a hand on the blue girl’s shoulder and smiled. “Hey, your dad knows he can count on me for the important stuff.”