Villains wear Masks *sequel to Heroes Wear Capes

Chapter 18 - Gathering Forces

"Is Fall Out Boy still cool?"

~ Oliver Queen (Green Arrow)

Taylor Hale sat in the middle of Wild Fire headquarters with a bored expression, throwing a bouncing ball at the wall opposite to her, catching it, and bouncing it again. On Mera Deauxma's rolling chair, she sighed and took a look around the room. It was dark and locked up from the outside. For some reason Mera and her superhero buddy weren't trying to fight crime tonight.

Figured. The one time she went to them for help and they weren't in.

The Black Tiger gang just started moving. For some reason they had become agitated, hearing news from an outside source. It was probably way past midnight, but she had her hopes high that Wild Fire would be awake and ready to help her take down some goons.

Only that morning April Watson had arrived back in Kingdom City, White Knight's damsel. Her arrival caused Black Knight to move out of his lair, which gave the Black Tiger gang free reign to mess around near the border of Kingdom Hills because White Knight was busy. She had already had a long night stopping their petty crimes, when they all suddenly stopped themselves and congregated at a private airplane hangar owned by the Schow Corporation. The streets were cleared by the time Taylor headed to Wild Fire headquarters looking for reinforcements. April Watson had long since escaped from Black Knight and presumably sat at her comfy home cuddling with her hero.

Out of boredom, Taylor turned on their TVs to the news. Maybe she could find some robbers while she waited.

"Reports are still rolling in from San Francisco . . ."

The story gave her a shock. Oh, so that's why the gang was at the hangar. They were getting ready to welcome their newly freed leader.

But, hadn't April Watson been in the city only hours ago? Why had she all of a sudden shown up at the prison right as a major breakout happened? Taylor wondered if anyone else in the brainwashed city would even notice the strangeness. They were probably all too busy worried for the prissy upper class know-it-all to see the curious connection.

Maybe X had outside help after all

One thing was certain. Kingdom City would need its unusually large number of superheroes to fight off this threat.

The door behind her opened unexpectedly, shedding light into the dark room. In staggered Mera Deauxma and her new boy toy, Xander Mendez. She really thought he was an alright kid, just a bit too enthusiastic about his duty to save the world. Too trusting of friends who may stab you in the back. But, Taylor always knew Mera had a thing for superheroes. Emphasis on the super part of the word.

"Taylor?"

"Hey, Bestie. You finally decided to show your face?"

Mera gave her ex a nasty look, "In case you haven't noticed, this is Ross's headquarters, not yours. You can't just walk in unannounced."

Taylor chuckled. "The city is going to the dogs anyways, haven't you seen the news?"

There was no mention of how Taylor had only just now watched the story on the SNN and had not known for a long time like she inferred.

"No? What happened? Is Ross okay?"

"Please," Taylor scoffed, "I don't give a rat's ass about him. X is back. Just broke out of prison, maybe with April Watson's help. I don't know for sure though, just spitting out theories. I always thought she was a bit stuck up."

Mera ignored the last part of the comment. "X escaped? As in the guy who got my mother killed?"

Oh, she almost forgot about that part. Mera's crusade started because a tyrant running the city sold her mother a drug that got her killed. Taylor remembered hearing about it from Mera during their more vulnerable moments. Taylor liked to try and forget those times now that she knew the kind of person Mera really was.