The Confidential

After finding a new hideout to replace the last one, Cyrus takes some time to read the news about the latest events.

Ortega tries to be a good friend, but consequences come back to bite him.

The rangers move one step closer to finding Husk’s true identity.

————————————

“I’ll be taking all these… and a copy of The Confidential, please”

The shopkeeper arches his eyebrows at the mountain of candy and chocolate you’ve deposited in front of him, before adding the newspaper on top.

What? Do you even know how much sugar my brain needs to burn every day?

You almost want to scream about it for everyone to hear, but of course, you can’t. Just smile and wait as he passes every item over the scanner.

“That’ll be twenty-six dollars and fifty cents.” He announces, his gaze going back towards the game on the small TV as he puts the items in a plastic bag.

You try not to curse at the cost while looking for the money in your pocket, every last coin needed to pay up. You calculated the cost of it all but still missed by the fifty cents and now you’re not sure you have enough.

Reluctantly, you push a dollar of gummy bears aside. It hurts because you really wanted those bears, but the man is indifferent to your struggle as he swipes the coins off the counter.

He would never notice if you took them. Perhaps he wouldn’t care, but you contain yourself and just head out. Not that desperate just yet.

The days are getting colder, something you can’t be thankful enough for. Seeing everyone wearing T-shirts when you had to wear triple layers was less than ideal.

You peek into your bag, looking inside. The hundred dollars Ortega lent you are long gone, and there’s no more money for real food today, but you know sugar will keep you going. Keep walking, towards the neon signs of the videogame arcade.

Milos, the owner gives you a hi-five as you come in, handing you a list of repairs on the machines that will need to be fixed. Repairs will be easy, you will just have to do some late shifts and mop the floors in the mornings. In return, there’s a large basement where you can sleep. It was an offer you couldn’t refuse, especially not mere hours after your apartment got washed away in the mudslide. It really paid off to be a good neighbor…

The arcade floor may perpetually stink of cigarettes even if you leave it spotless each morning, but as soon as the customers leave, you can play any game in the arcade, and you have the run of the entire place.

Not going to play today though.

There are few customers by the time you are done and finally close up for the evening, heading downstairs and to that newspaper waiting for you.

You lay on the mattress, forcing yourself to reach for the news, and a few candy bars to help your resolve.

Yesterday’s news wasn’t very informative about what happened, but you expect the reporters will have their act together by now. Asked questions. Knocked on doors.

Reading the stories is an anxiety ride filled with emotions because you are terrified about what they’ll say about you. You wanted to prove you are a hero and that path ended sending you on a collision course against corporations that own you.

How will that ever help make the directive see your worth?

You know It won’t.

The titles stand out, in bold letters distributed through the front page.

“CITY CELEBRATES RECAPTURE OF PSYCHO BUT PHARMACORE THREATENS LAWSUIT AGAINST THE RANGERS. MAYOR CAUGHT IN THE MIDDLE?” followed by “GUARDIAN’S CAPTAIN RETIRING AFTER FIASCO. SUCCESSION BATTLE BEGINS!” and finally, the one that makes your hands shake “MEET THE SIDESTEP. EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW! KNOW ALL ABOUT LOS DIABLOS NEWEST HERO”

Your heart pounds as you see pictures of your second battle with Psychopathor… if the media managed to get that close, does that mean there’s a picture if your face there? Ortega took off your mask, didn’t he? All you can do is flip the pages one after another, frantically looking for one, and you’re relieved to find none.

You didn’t feel any reporters around at the time, but you had your hands full trying to keep the Rat King’s telepathic link from blasting you and Ortega.

Going through each page a few more times doesn’t reveal anything. No picture. No mention of the kiss. No talk about regenes breaking their programming and going loose in the city.

On top of that, the coverage is…

Positive?

The Confidential praises you for being there before anyone other hero arrived at the scene. On trying to save lives before the cameras were rolling. On risking your neck to save others…

You’ve done this before. You’ve saved people before while working for the Special Directive, but no one other than Ortega ever said words like these about it. Performance was satisfactory or not, but nobody ever commended your “bravery” as this newspaper does. People thank you for showing off what PharmaCore was doing. According to this, the rangers intervention forced them to enact a real resettlement plan after their lies were exposed?

You’re not used to good news, and there’s no helping the smile on your lips, as you re-read the main story one more time, followed by your “interview”, that is the loose questions and statements you made for the media.

They asked you why you became a hero. You replied you wanted to prove that you could…

And now these articles are proof that you did.

Your face must look stupid now, blushing and smiling like a damned fool, so you hide it from view with the extended newspaper and close your eyes, smelling the ink as you sink into the mattress.

You did it.

A regene that became a hero.

You fucking did it!

It’s hard to remember when was the last time you went to sleep smiling.

The ranger’s communicator wakes you up, much later.

————————-

The Confidential office building, hours earlier.

“Pero que pinche viejo cabrón…” Ortega muttered while coming out of the building, holding the picture to his chest as the newspaper’s front doors closed behind him.

“You!” the voice startled him, making him raise his gaze to see the woman accusing him, finger pointed at his face.

“I knew it! Of course, you’d be here, completing your work!”

Mierda. Riley, standing right there, glaring at him, her young assistant by her side, seeming uncomfortable. Linda, was it? He hadn’t met her before but she seemed eerily familiar.

“Rye?” he asked, trying to play it as surprised… because he really was surprised among other things.

“Don’t you dare call me that! You and your goons and that Vernon clown are trying to ruin me, but I won’t have it, you hear me?”

“Miss Carter, perhaps we should…-” Linda started, only to be cut off.

“Shut it, Linda! You know what this piece of shit did!” she went on, looking the Marshal up and down.

“Now hold on Cruella! We were not the ones in the wrong there. We were preserving the peace against YOUR grunts who were trying to toss poor people into the streets and demolish their homes, remember?!”

“Then why didn’t you tell Psychopathor that? Everything was going to be demolished anyway! And now the Mayor’s blaming me for sending her Guardians into a trap. Their Captain quitting because of that Photo-op you pulled, humiliating their team, and now somehow that’s also my fault? But I’m not the one that’s bad at my job! No! I’m not the one who’s been letting Psychopathor do whatever he wanted for months!” By now she was now poking at Ortega’s chest with her finger, an unhinged murderous look in her eyes.

“Back off!” he grunted, and as he didn’t, he started to yell as well. “Look! This woman is insane! I’m not even touching her!” Only a few bypassers actually looked, before going on about their business, indifferent to their quarrel.

“Seriously Miss Carter, we should go inside… we are embarrassing ourselves, what if someone takes a picture?” Linda tried again.

But Carter wouldn’t let go, getting worse with each passing second until she started to toss harmless punches at Ortega, who blocked with one of his modded arms, while still protecting the picture against his chest.

“Por Dios Riley… You know there are cameras here, right?”We are in front of a newspaper? Hello?”

That did it. Linda walked in and physically pulled Riley off the Marshall, as she screamed her lungs out, face red with anger, makeup all but ruined now.

“I WILL RUIN YOU! YOU HEAR ME? YOU ARE DONE! YOUR STUPID RANGERS ARE DONE! I’LL RUN YOU ALL OUT OF MY CITY! MARK MY FUCKING WORDS!”

And with that, Linda shoved Riley inside the building and out of view -surprising strength for such a small frame- leaving Ortega alone.

Ricardo sighed, cursing again. Cyrus had told him this could happen. All that emotion would have to go somewhere, and now he was reaping what he sowed. Pure hatred, and a new dangerous enemy.

He looked at the picture he had come to retrieve once more, and it seemed unharmed.

Kissing Sidestep.

It wouldn’t ever see the light of day, and he should burn it.

He really should. It was a violation of his trust that it existed at all.

A shake of his head, and he started walking towards his bike when he remembered where he had seen Linda before.

He pulled his phone and dialed a number, wondering if it was just his mind playing tricks, but he had to be sure.

“It’s me, Chen. Are you at the HQ?”

“Yes. Running some system diagnostics. Something came up?”

“Maybe. Once you’re done, can you get those drawings Sidestep made, the ones from Husk’s mind? They must be somewhere in my office. I need to compare one of them with a real-life person… see if there’s a match”

“Who is it?”

“Goodman. Linda Goodman.”

“But Isn’t that…”

“Yes.”

A moment of silence, as the implications sank in

“We’re going to need a lot more than a drawing made by a telepath you picked off the streets”.

“I know. We can’t touch PharmaCore unless we’re sure. Not after all this mess… we’ll have to be subtle.“
———

My Fanfiction:https://chaniters.tumblr.com/post/181692759294/my-fanfiction-for-fallen-heroDISCLAIMER: This is a work of fan fiction using characters and the setting of the Fallen Hero: Rebirth and upcoming Fallen Hero: Retribution games written by Malin Riden. I do not claim ownership of any characters from the Fallen Hero world. These stories are a work of my imagination, and I do not ascribe them to the official story canon. These works are intended for entertainment outside the official storyline owned by the author. I am not profiting financially from the creation of these stories, and thank the author for his wonderful game/s, without which these works would not exist.

NEVER

In the aftermath of the battle with Psyschopathor, Ashfall enters the scene to save the day and enrage Ortega. Cyrus walks away, still shocked by Ortega’s kiss.

——————————

“What are you doing?” you manage to ask for some sort of explanation to this.

“What does it look like I’m doing?
Words have always abandoned you every time someone decided they wanted to learn what your lips tasted like and today is not the exception.

Why does this keep happening? You know perfectly well what happened the last time a human kissed you, and yet you’re not pulling back, because some stupid part of you wants this, ever since he ‘taught you how to smoke’ properly in that alley…

Stupid and careless, tossing caution into the wind.

It won’t end well now, you know that, but…

…but he saved you. Psychopathor was about to kill you and he saved you… and this kiss is different. Delicate? Gentle? Something you’ve never felt.

Are you deluding yourself? Is this how humans kiss each other?

He’s holding you in his arms, and you feel yourself drift away. Your arm holds onto his shoulder, pulling closer to him while it lasts, even when you know it has to stop.

“Are you really ok?” he asks, worried “For a moment I thought I had fucked up and that you…”

“I’m alright, It’s nothing. It’s not even broken…” You interrupt, gasping as you receive a wave of despair from the victims around your crushes your shields. “The landslide! There are people trapped, we have to help them!”

“Mierda!” he is startled, and let’s go without warning, making you scramble not to hit your head against the rubble. “I don’t see them, how are we going to find them?” he asks, trying to pierce through the dust cloud and devastation that surrounds you.

“Leave that to me,” you say, pulling down your mask quickly.

“Can you even walk?”

“I’ll have to” you answer, standing up with his help and taking a few steps just to see if you can. The pain is about what you expected, but you can still do it, which means there’s work to be done, so you pull your mask back down.

“There! A woman!” you point to a nearby spot, and he immediately sets to work on it, digging with both hands, pushing heavy pieces or rubble and wreckage away.

“Where is he?” Steel barges in, ready for combat, armor smoking but somehow reactivated. “The Psycho is out” You explain, “We need to help the survivors!”

A single nod and he immediately starts helping the Marshal. Between the two of them, they manage to dig her out, still alive.

“There’s more” you mumble, trying to focus.

“How many? Where?”

“Everywhere! A lot of them a lot”

Victims in every direction… which one do you help first?

“Someone’s coming” you blink, noticing the new presence as you scan. “There!”

“Once again the Marshal bites more than he can chew!” the newcomer says, hopping down next to you. “Look at the mess you’ve made, Charge!”

“Who are you?” you ask, confused.

“Yopu can call me Ashfall” he winks “I’m here to take down the old monster and all that jazz. So if you gents would point me towards him, I’ll do what the Marshal keeps failing to and…oh, shit” His speech is interrupted as he notices Psychopathor, passed out, his armor still smoking on the ground.

“Psychopathor ya está jodido.” Charge yells. “Stop being a pendejo and help us rescue the victims already!”

“Victims? Did you ruin everything again, Ricardo?” Ashfall asks taking a second look around.

“Enough. People are buried. If you are going to help it needs to happen now.” Steel interrupts their showdown.

“Alright alright! I’ll do it… geez. Where are they? I can’t just…”

“There’s one right there” you point at the nearest one.

“Eh? And how does he know?”

“He just knows,” Steel says in a tone that leaves no room for questions. “So do your thing already.”

“Fiiine… I’ll do my ‘thing’ since you ask so nicely.” he says, mumbling some curses against the rangers.

He raises his hand… and the mud and ash on the ground trembles, becoming almost liquid and running to the sides, freeing an injured PharmaCore Soldier underneath.

“My ‘thing’ he calls it.” Ashfall scoffs as Charge and Steel pull the man out, making sure he’s still breathing

“Another one there… and there.” you start pointing them out, and he nods, using his power (power over dirt? Ash? Mud?) to free each and every one. Steel and Charge take turns to take them to safety, joined by the soldiers and locals alike, suddenly joining forces. You’re already freeing the tenth victim when you hear the ambulances approaching in the distance.

It seems impossible, but no one dies. Thanks to Ashfall, all you need to do is scan, point, and a human is saved. Almost too easy.

“We make a good team” he smiles, releasing one of the guardians. “Want to come work with me? You’d be more than second fiddle with me, unlike with that guy”. Ashfall says pointing at Ortega with his thumb.

“Thanks, but I like where I am right now…” you say, trying not to get distracted and not miss anyone that needs help.

“Really? I’ve seen your work, you’re too good to be in his shadow all your life!”

“Don’t you even think about stealing my Sidekick!” Charge says as he carries a furious Aegis towards the ambulances.

“What makes him YOURS?” Ashfall asks. “Besides, you let him get his leg messed up.”

“I’m warning you!” He replies, infuriated.

“Seriously, thanks, but I’m not looking to jump ship,” you say

“Really? Pisses me off… you’re too good to be working with these losers.”

You manage to untangle yourself from Ashfall with an excuse, helping one of the victims come back to his senses because he’s asking too many questions.

Reporters have gathered already, taking pictures of the three of you working along with first responders, civilians, and the Pharmacore forces. The Guardians are utterly furious as the pictures have Ashfall and Charge digging their whole team out off the ground. Looking into their minds, it’s clear they’re, humiliated at having their rivals save them from Psychopathor’s plot.

The Guardians walk towards one of the standing buildings, out of sight as the reporters ask them if the mayor sent them to help kick people out of their homes for PharmaCore instead of fighting Psychopathor.

Charge approaches you as the reporters move back towards you, now that the last survivor is rescued.

“Hey, I think this is all going to end well… we just need to have a small press conference to explain what happened, so you have to leave. Slip through the back while I talk to them” Ortega says, pulling you to the side.

“I knew it! You know, you’re real scum, Charge! I won’t stand here and let you steal Sidestep’s cover, you ass! You want all the fame while he walks away with a fucked up leg?” Ashfall jumps in front of you.

“Get off my face, right now!” Charge threatens.

“It’s ok” you smile weakly. “I don’t like interviews anyways”.

“Shit, you can’t let his scumbag get away with this!” Ashfall protests. “You helped take down the villain as much as he did, you don’t owe him shit!”

“Seriously, It’s better this way!” you say, starting to walk away as Ashfall keeps arguing with Ortega.

Reporters flock towards Charge and Ashfall like a pack of Vultures, but you’re a good distance away by then, enough for your stealth aura to keep you from being focused on.

Without all the enemies and danger in front of you, it’s only a few moments for you to walk away and head back to your…

Oh.

You don’t have a home anymore… the landslide washed the building away like a house of cards, along with several others.

Looking back, the damage is catastrophic. Even if they were humiliated, PharmaCore or someone like them will likely take the neighborhood anyways since many blocks have become unlivable now. You fought everyone and everything, but that didn’t prevent the damage…

Did you make any difference at all?

Yes.

Yes, you did.

“No one died” you try to convince yourself. “That’s got to count for something”

Still, a lot of people are homeless.

Just like you.

You’re not sure where you’re going, so you just keep walking. As you pass through an electronic’s store, you notice several people standing next to an electronics shop, watching the  TV sets showing the Marshal is giving his version of the events on the live news.

You can’t help running the tip of your finger over your lips, before shaking your head and walking away into the night.

This can’t happen ever again.

———
My Fanfiction:https://chaniters.tumblr.com/post/181692759294/my-fanfiction-for-fallen-heroDISCLAIMER: This is a work of fan fiction using characters and the setting of the Fallen Hero: Rebirth and upcoming Fallen Hero: Retribution games written by Malin Riden. I do not claim ownership of any characters from the Fallen Hero world. These stories are a work of my imagination, and I do not ascribe them to the official story canon. These works are intended for entertainment outside the official storyline owned by the author. I am not profiting financially from the creation of these stories, and thank the author for his wonderful game/s, without which these works would not exist.