"What is this," I asked, pointing a hoof in front of me. Cheshire slid off my back and took a look at what I was referring to. It was a man, moving in slow motion, holding his clothing around him tightly. There was a little field of light around him, making him glow a little.

"ABB," Cheshire answered after a moment. "A guy named Supesu, the same one that made those massive fields before. The one that got you trapped in the time effect."

"So what's the point of this," I asked as I reached in and attempted to wrapped the man up in my magic. I frowned as I felt my magic began to move slowly upon entry.

"Testing," Cheshire answered with a frown. "He is attacking randomly, each one with a different effect. It looks like he might be testing the limits of his power, trying to learn what he can and can't do."

"And Lung just lets it happen?" It didn't seem like him, just letting one of his men go around uncontrolled, doing what they like. He wasn't even taking territory or stealing, just attacking.

"Who says he could stop him?" Cheshire asked. "From what I hear and know, Supesu is supposed to be some unhinged maniac. I have my doubts, but it fits more or less. He might just let Supesu do what he wants so long as it isn't anything too big, and he gets away with it because the Protectorate doesn't have an organized response to it."

"And all the while, people in this area get scared." Cheshire nodded. Suddenly, Imp popped back into existence on my back.

"Well, as fun as looking at frozen guys is, I'm bored. When are you going to do something interesting."

Cheshire and I shared a look.

"Well," Cheshire began. "Supesu is long gone. Probably left hours ago. There is always The Sentient. The police finally got its act together and now Sentient members are staying put away, but they're still all over the place. If we fly, we would probably still find some scattered about the area."

"You see," Imp said with a clap of her hands. "That sounds like fun." Cheshire shrugged and moved to climb up on me. Taking the hint, I knelt down to allow her on. I made sure I had pulled the man out of the effect as she did so. He stumbled a moment and climbed to his feet unsteadily. It took a minute to make sure he was okay, at which he just thanked us and went on his way just a little shaken up from the experience.

The moment he was leaving, I teleported into the air, once again relishing in how the dizzying effect of doing so was no longer present. Combine that with the fact the drain on my magic was almost gone since my magic reserves got their boost.

I flew above the area we were assigned by Manpower as the sun began to set. For the most part, Cheshire had sort of exaggerated what kind of targets we would be experiencing. In the first hour we only saw a Sentient member trying to break into a storefront, something I found almost amusing as it both contradicted their goal by attack a normal person and showed how desperate they were for supplies. I knew that Archer had been killing his company to keep them going, and it showed. Not just here, Cheshire had given me the rundown of Sentient all over the country after they had staged attacks.

They were mercilessly destroyed.

They had set off a few bombs, destroying a few buildings. They executed a handful of villains, but no one with any real importance and weight. The had wounded three heroes in their attempts of a coup, but nothing that wasn't immediately healed. It was another nail in the coffin for The Sentient.

Somewhere in the second hour, we started seeing some strange lights going off in the distance. I didn't even need to consult Imp or Cheshire before I turned and teleported away to it.

I reappeared well above the buildings below just so that I didn't accidentally complicate or get us caught in the crossfire of whatever was happening. What I saw was somewhat impressive.

It was the Merchants, about a dozen men and two capes. One was a Tinker, only really clear from the massive gun device he was holding. The other wore a black and white costume, with a white bandana pulled tightly around the lower half of her face and a black one wrapped around her forehead. She was wielding a rapier of all things.

However, the people they were fighting were far more interesting. Both wore black and red armour of reasonably high quality, looking more like a uniform than their own costumes. The source of the light we had seen belong to one who had massive tendrils of light in place of her arms. One was a bright blue and partially see-through, a sort of lighting effect going through it. Her left tendril was also see through, but with a light green colour to it. As The Merchant men attempted to surge forward, she would whip a tendril out and smack them around. The blue tendril electrocuting them and knocking out many of them as she did so.

The second one was a little more interesting as she carried a violin in one hand and the bow to it in the other. She and her friend walked forward towards The Merchants, causing the normal people to drive them further and further into the alley they were getting backed into. The two Merchant capes though, held fast.

I was about to fly in when Cheshire pulled on my fur and began to speak in my ear.

"Hold up, I want to see what those heroes do."

I quirked my mouth but didn't say anything. If they needed help my telekinesis and teleportation would be fast enough.

The Merchant Tinker fired his gun, releasing a massive grey beam out from it that missed the tendril cape entirely. Striking the building behind her. The effect of the beam was an odd one. It left a hole the size of a basketball where it struck as it caused bits of the walls to just fall apart. Not even explosive, they just fell to the ground like a bunch of legos not sticking together anymore.

The tendril cape caught the beam with her green tendril, pressing against it with the strange energy she had. I watch as the other Merchant cape raised her rapier and pointed it at the tendril cape. But as soon as she did, the violin cape raised the bow to the strings. Instead of releasing music though, it threw a wave of kinetic force combined with the sound of a singular note. The wave crashed into the two Merchant capes and caused them to stumble backward.

It would have been the perfect moment for the two independent capes to strike, but they hadn't. Instead, they just kept pressing them backward.

"What's going on?" Imp said. "Those two could totally kick their butts."

"They're putting them into a trap," Cheshire said, craning her neck further to try to get a closer look.

Suddenly, the rapier villain charged forward, the sword in front of her. With each step she took, she got a little faster. But even as she approached the violin cape, the tendril cape reached out and grabbed her with both extremities. The cape managed to push several feet forward despite them, but was slowing down. The violin cape let out another note that struck the Merchant Tinker and nearly knocked him over. The tendril lifted the rapier cape off the ground and tossed her back.

At this point, it was looking more like they were toying with the Merchants.

I was getting ready to ask Cheshire if we could move in to assist, maybe speed things up a bit, when suddenly the battle changed dramatically.

In a single second, massive white floodlights illuminated the area with such bright intensity it made me squint even though I was several dozen feet above the street that the lights were pointed on. Along with the lights, some sort of computerized song roared out of some unseen speaker, deafening The Merchants below. The song went down a few notches just before a voice half sang, half talked to them.

"Oh baby, you don't even know what you've gotten yourself into!" Abruptly as it had come, the song and lights cut out and plunged the street into darkness as our eyes struggled to adjust to the change.

And then a second later, the lights flicked back on brightly. They revealed yet another cape standing a few feet in front of the tendril and violin cape. It was a short man in an unzipped hoodie jacket he had a hand jammed in the pocket of. The only thing marking him as a cape was the white skull mask he was wearing.

The cape raised a hand and suddenly all the Merchants began to float upwards in the air, as if suddenly unaffected by gravity. He then threw his hand downward again, harshly dropping all of them against the ground. He flicked his hand to the right and they all hit the wall of the alley they had been backed into. The lights flicked out again for a second, and then the cape was gone.

Suddenly, the song kicked back on, only this time it was accompanied by its own light show. Yet another cape dropped down from the roof, his Tinker costume displaying the built-in speakers and the laser light show we had seen a moment before.

"The fuck is going on?" Imp demanded.

"I don't even know," Cheshire shouted back with a laugh. I wondered just how true that was, but before I could ask the new Tinker began to speak.

"Surrender now, or prepare to get outperformed!" He struck a pose, followed by an explosive burst in the music and confetti cannons built into his shoulders. Before any of the battered and confused Merchants could move, the Tinker cape did a pirouette on his… Heels? Coming out of the spin, he splayed his hands and several dozen wires exploded out of his hands and struck each person individually. They all let out a cry and collapsed to the ground.

I turned my head to look back at Cheshire and Imp. Cheshire looked to be somewhere between amused and curious. Imp was unreadable through her mask, but I couldn't really imagine her doing but grinning madly at what we just saw. And I didn't think I could blame her, it was kind of amusing.

Not hearing either of them saying anything, I began to fly downward to greet them and help out with the cleanup.

"Oh my gawd!" I heard before I had even landed. I saw the flashy Tinker striding toward me. He wore a metal mask in the vague shape of a human head while a screen on the front displayed his emotions with a more stylized art style.

"It's an absolute pleasure to meet you Nova, girl you are fabulous." He threw his arms upwards as if he was going to wrap me in a hug, but I held out a hoof and casually held him off as he attempted. He didn't really try that hard.

"Hey," a gruff voice said from behind me. I turned and got a view the one cape I had briefly saw before, with the hoody and white skull mask. "Name's Quantumlock. Nice ta meet ya."

"Nova," I answered. "We saw your fight."

"Which was fucking awesome," Imp added.

"Oh, why thaaaank you," the Tinker said joyously. "I put so much effort into our performances and it goes so under appreciated."

"That's Showman, by the way," Quantumlock explained, showing himself to be infinitely more calm than his partner. Quantumlock strode forward to join his other teammates as the tendril cape and the violin cape came up and joined us.

"This is Vibrasonic," Quantumlock said, gesturing to her with a hand. "She's mute, so don't expect much outta her." He spoke with an odd Boston Irish accent, maybe giving away where he came from.

Vibrasonic held her bow and violin away from her and gave a little bow. Quantumlock nodded once and pointed at the tendril cape.

"And that is Hentia, but the Protectorate is insisting on calling her Whiplash so it's a little up in da air."

"I can't imagine why," Cheshire replied dryly.

"Hello!" H-h-h…. Whiplash said with a wave. Alright, apparently that was going to be one of those words. That was a going to be annoying, but at least I had an excuse not to call her… that.

Her tendrils suddenly pulled back into her body formed legitimate limbs which she used to extend a hand out to me. I raised my hoof and gave her an awkward hand/hoof shake. She didn't say anything following that, just grinned at me.

"As you might have guessed," Showman said with a clap of his hands, "We're Team Vigil!" The confetti cannons went off again followed by an electronic organ sound and a flash of the light show. I heard Imp choking on laughter behind me.

"And of course," Showman continued. "This fabulous team is only fit to have a fabulous leader! Meaning me baby! Showman, the most fantastic hero in the city!"

Quantumlock snorted and murmured, "I'm the only fully sane one on this team if ya haven't guessed." I couldn't help but smirk at the remark.

"Well," I said, looking around. "We're not doing anything else tonight, mind if we patrolled together?"

"Patrol with the spectacular Nova!?" Showman cheered, pressing both hands to what would have been his cheeks as his simulated face did its best to look as delighted as Showman sounded. "Why, we would be honoured!" He attempted to go in for another hug, but I held him off again.

"Actually," a new voice began. We turned and saw Miss Militia and Armsmaster walking towards us. "We were wondering if we could have a talk with you, Nova."