Phallica #3

Dispos.garlic turned out to be a tremendous pain in the ass to actually use. Firstly, it could only be accessed via a unique browser that you had to download through a torrent, which you could only find the link to via a few other Deep Web sites. I spent half a day just trying to find the file, then another day downloading the thing on the slowest download rate I’d ever seen, then another half a day trying to get it working on my computer.

When I finally got the damn thing to function, I was just confused. I had to assume there were middle men actually coordinating everything, because there was no possible way your average person could just log on and know what they were looking at.

Even accessing the site was almost impossible; the address changed weekly. Only certain people had access to the constant updates, people with connections who then had other people spread the word at certain seedy locations. From there, people interested in a quick hit of dirty money had only a couple days to scope the site, figure out what jobs they could do, and try to check in.

Every entry was a phone number, an e-mail, or a screen name for an instant messaging service, followed by a seemingly random string of letters, and a shorter random string of numbers. If you didn’t already know what to look for, there was no way you were figuring any of it out. Moreover, two-fifths of the contacts were duds; you wouldn’t get any response if you tried them. A third of the remaining were fake, sending people off to a job that was never intended to actually happen. The remaining two-fifths were real, but you wouldn’t know the details until they got back to you, and there was a chance you weren’t going to be able to do it anyway, no matter how willing.

The only way to actually get an assignment, even if you knew exactly what you were looking at, was to just shotgun as many offers as you could, and hope they got back to you within a week. With a network this complicated, it was an absolute wonder it even worked. But I guess it was the only way such a system could operate. Anything more convenient, and the superheroes and cops could use Dispos to constantly interfere with the crimes. Making the site so hard to access, and making 60% of the offers misleads, ensured the service was unreliable enough that the limited resources of the authorities couldn’t be stretched thin to cover all the possibilities.

Sure, a couple snitches probably got a lucky break and were able to interfere with an actual drug sale or break in here or there, but I bet the hits were far, far fewer than the misses. I would just have to make sure I got a hit.

None of this information was available on your basic web search, obviously. I had to go back to Michael a couple days later just to figure any of this out. I had him call me on another burner phone (one I decided to keep for a little while, as I couldn’t afford to just keep buying and pitching the things). Between punishing ball squeezes and the most amazing blowjob he’d ever had in his life, I was able to coax him to get me an address and tell me all about the service.

He apparently didn’t know most of the codes. He only knew that among the seemingly random strings of letters, various combinations of “d” meant the job involved a delivery, various combinations of “b” meant break-ins/robberies, and if there was a capital “Z” anywhere in the code, it meant a superhuman was involved.

As for the number codes, they related to where the job was supposed to take place. They alternated between geographical coordinates and zip codes, but this was mostly just to give the potential caller a general idea of where the crime would take place. The numbers were never accurate to the exact location.

Once I wrung as much information out of Michael as I could, I gave him the sensations of a triple blowjob that left him mewing like a kitten, then gave him another soul-crushing orgasm. I probably left the poor guy with some kind of complex, but hey, I could have done a lot worse to him as a send off.

I sent all this information to Zebra. He’d already gotten back to me earlier; as I thought, his team was aware of Dispos, but their contacts had not been able to provide them with new updates, which was one reason they’d hit their dead ends. I gave them the updated address, hoping it might give them something to go off for a few days. He told me to stay out of it again. I told him I would.

I had my fingers crossed, of course. I was in this deep already. The more I learned about all this, the more I felt the call to action. Even if my powers sucked, I knew they could be effective under the right circumstances. I’d disabled those men at the drug sale quite easily, and I managed to get information from one of them without causing injury or destroying property.

Sure the drug sale had been a fiasco, but that’s because I hadn’t been careful enough, and through pure bad luck, the situation had involved a superhuman I couldn’t affect. Next time, I would be more careful. No making demands from the shadows, trying to act like some tough girl. Just disabling the guys at a distance and calling the cops, keeping the guys pinned until the police could come in and arrest them.

Now that I had the gist of what to look for, I got onto the site, and decided to go with the shotgun approach. Two e-mails under different dummy accounts, a phone call on the burner phone, and two messenger dummy accounts. The messengers came up as duds, despite the entries being fairly new. The phone number never picked up despite trying three times throughout the day, and it never set up a voice mail for me to leave a message.

One e-mail did get back to me, but I found out the job involved crossing into another country, so that was out of the question. I called the police tip line, but didn’t respond to the e-mail.

The other e-mail, however, ended up working out. A smash-and-grab at a museum in the next town over, to acquire an old ruby. And this assignment was labeled with a “Z”. The mission would occur tomorrow, at midnight.

I could try hiding out in the museum and ambushing them with my powers. Heck, I could do it from another building nearby, as long as I could figure out with my senses who the robbers were. I still had to assume most of the people trying for these missions were men. Enough of them likely would be, at least, that I could disrupt things pretty handily.

Still, if a superhuman was involved, this would be trouble, even if they were a man. I mulled it over. The smart thing would be to alert Zebra. Obviously, I’d call the cops, but if a superhuman were present, they would need superhuman muscle to face that. Zebra might not like it, but I could just say I was only doing research to help out, not trying to get involved. I confirmed with the contact that I would be there, and then sent Zebra and the cops the information.

Of course, after sending the message, I realized this could also be one of the fake jobs. Part of me hoped it was, since it meant no crime would actually happen. But I had a hunch that wasn’t the case.

***

I had to go to work the next day, but I would be off in plenty of time to get there, scope out the area, and figure out where to hide. I was off the day after, so even if the action ran late, I’d be able to sleep in.

Zebra hadn’t gotten back to me, so I didn’t know if his group was going to be there. I also didn’t expect the cops to actually send out a whole force to block off the museum. I warned the museum, of course, but I doubted their force of rent-a-guards had much to stop a group of armed thugs backed by a superhuman.

After work, I got home, showered, stuffed my body suit in a backpack, and started to head outside. I opened the door to see a petite, long-haired young woman leaning on the opposite wall, waiting for me. She was wearing the same tight black shorts and white tank top I’d last seen her in.

Shell smirked as I froze up.

“Yo,” she said, giving me a little wave.

“Uh… hey…”

“And just where do you think you’re off to?” she said.

“Um… running an errand?”

“Try another one.”

I sighed. Shutting my door and locking it, I said, “Alright, I’m heading to that job.”

“Figured. Zebra told you leave it alone. Not that we don’t appreciate you wanting to help, but we do not want you getting killed. You don’t know how many supers get themselves killed in the first month, going off half-cocked and throwing themselves into fights they weren’t ready for.”

I gave her a cool look. “I appreciate the concern, but I’m not going to sit on the sidelines forever. And as I recall, you guys weren’t exactly ready for that Broad chick.”

Shell scowled. “We wouldn’t have had to be if—”

“I hadn’t fucked everything up, yeah, alright, got it.” I started walking towards the stairwell. “You really want to lecture me, you can do it on the way.” I paused and turned back. “Unless you got your own ride?”

She smirked again. “I do, but if I can’t stop you, I may as well go along.”

“Alright, then,” I said. “Just don’t transform inside my car.”

“Do I look that dumb?” she said, rolling her eyes.

As we got in my car, I expected to get an earful from Shell. We had a good forty minutes before we’d arrive, and I wasn’t really looking forward to getting nagged. But at least she wasn’t physically going to try and stop me. It turned out, though, that Shell felt she’d made her point enough; instead, she had questions for me.

“Control cocks, huh?” she said.

I smiled a bit. In my experience, other women were either repulsed by the idea, or they were absolutely fascinated. “Yeah.”

“So, what’s that like?”

“It has its uses.”

“I bet. How many men would kill to be your boyfriend, huh?”

“A lot fewer than you’d think. Sure, I can give them the orgasm of their lives, but knowing I can also crush their balls or make them piss their pants with a thought tends to intimidate most guys.”

“I see. That’s a shame.” She chuckled as she looked at me. “Zebra told me about your other ability, that you can sense men’s pervy thoughts. I told him to make sure he doesn’t think about you and me and him in a threesome next time he sees you. Let me know if he does. If he thinks of it in the first ten seconds, he owes me twenty bucks.”

I chuckled. “That’s just not fair. You know how guys are.”

“I know,” she said. “It’s just funny to see him blush! Seriously, though, do guys really think about sex all the time? You must feel like you’re on the set of a porno 24/7.”

“Not really,” I said. “I can tune that stuff out for the most part. Besides, that whole ‘every seven seconds’ thing is a myth. Even teenagers don’t think about it that often. Guys are just keyed to be sensitive to sexual signals. They don’t constantly think about sex out of no where, but they certainly notice every nice set of tits and ass in their view.”

“As if women don’t also do that,” Shell said with a smirk.

“Right,” I said. “Of course, once a guy gets sex on the brain, he can get hung up on it. Harder to knock them off the rails if they’re in the mood.”

“I see,” she said. “So, I have to ask, how did you even get your powers?”

I hesitated. “Are you asking what my origin is? That’s a bit intimate, don’t you think?”

Shell shrugged. “I got bit by a magic turtle.”

I blinked. She didn’t elaborate. I waited a few seconds to see if she would, or if she was just trying to bait me into a joke. When she didn’t proceed, I found my curiosity winning out. “Really?”

“Really. When I was a kid, I fell into a creek in the woods behind my house. Put my hand on a rock trying to climb out. Only it wasn’t a rock, it was a snapping turtle.” She held up her left hand and wriggled her ring finger. “Chopped my whole damn finger off. But its eyes flashed blue as it did, and as I was falling back, bleeding like a stuck pig, I transformed.”

She shook her head. “I was completely freaked. Spent three hours just trudging through the woods, not sure if I should try to get help or hide for the rest of my life. Eventually I got tired, though, and changed back automatically. Only my underwear survived the transformation; turns out only skin tight stuff changes with me. Hence the yoga outfit. I had to try and sneak back into my house without getting seen.” She chuckled. “But hey, I got my finger back out of the deal.” She wriggled her finger at me again.

“Wow, what an epic story,” I said flatly.

Shell waved me off. “I know, my origin was really banal. No lost parents to avenge, no getting kidnapped by aliens. So, how about you?”

I paused. “It’s not something I really want to talk about.”

“I see. Can you at least tell me this: were you born with the powers or were they gifted?”

“Um… I’m not… sure? They weren’t gifted, like, I didn’t get bit by a magic penis or anything.”

She laughed. “God, that would be a story! So, did they develop on their own, or was there a triggering incident?”

I paused for a long while. When Shell opened her mouth to repeat the question, I just said, “An incident.” I hoped my tone was sufficient to convey that I didn’t want to elaborate.

Shell tapped her chin in thought. “But you’re sure it wasn’t given to you?”

I shrugged. “I’m pretty sure. I think the potential was always there, and my origin, or whatever, just gave them the jumpstart.”

“I see.”

Prior to my powers manifesting, I’d always had a really keen intuition about guys. I was always able to accurately guess if they were a boobs or butts kind of guy, knew when they had the hots for a particular woman, definitely knew when they had the hots for me. I was also a very fast learner in bed; even guys who usually had trouble getting off, I had them blowing their loads in record time (often to their embarrassment; I learned a lot about teasing just by having to properly pace the foreplay so as to avoid bruising their egos).

I used to figure that I was just naturally observant in that area. After my powers manifested, though, I wondered if I’d always been subconsciously tapping into them on some level, and “the incident” just turbo-charged them into genuine super powers.

“Why do you want know, anyway?” I said.

“Mostly just curious. Trying to figure out what category you fit in.”

I cocked an eyebrow at her. “Category?”

“What kind of super you are.”

“Oh.” There were a few officially recognized classifications of superhumans, sorting us by origin and power type, but I only knew some of the more common labels. “I dunno, I guess I always figured I was some kind of Esper, just a strangely focused one. My powers manifested from a very mentally stressful incident. I just figured it was limited to men’s sexuality because of the circumstances.”

“I see.” Shell nodded sagely. If she still couldn’t figure out what kind of incident I was alluding to, I wasn’t going to give her any further clues.

“What about you?” I said. “You’re a Zoanoid, right?”

“Zoanthrope,” she corrected. She looked at me studiously, then shook her head. “I guess you could be an Esper, but I pegged you for a Paramour.”

“A what?”

“Paramour. Lover.”

“That’s a category?”

“A new one. The past few years, superhumans keep popping up with specifically sex-related powers. They always seem to gain them through sexual encounters. Funny thing, too, almost all of them are women.”

“Huh. That’s weird.”

“Hey, you’re the one who can give psychic handjobs.”

“I mean, weird that there are so many it warrants its own category.”

Shell shrugged. “It’s not official yet, I think. And there’s really not that many compared to all the other types. But the sex theme is a solid common factor.”

“Huh,” was all I could say.

“I’m surprised you wouldn’t know about it, frankly. Didn’t you do any research?”

I shrugged. “I guess I didn’t figure I’d actually be getting into super fights, really. I was only planning on busting up drug sales and street crime and stuff.”

She shook her head. “Honey, in this line of work, you need to be ready for anything. Things escalate with lightning speed. Superhumans tend to find each other all the time; even if you never ran into us or that Broad chick, I guarantee you, you’d be running into a super-criminal within your first month.”

“Is that how most supers get killed so early? Encountering another super they aren’t ready for?”

“Yes. Or getting gunned down when it turns out they aren’t as fast or as durable or as well hidden they thought.”

I brought the car to a stop at a red light and frowned. I looked down in thought for a minute. We were about halfway there. I could easily turn around. I could even drive all the way there, drop off Shell, and have plenty of time to go home before the action started.

“You don’t have to do this, Phallica,” said Shell. “You don’t have powers cut out for combat. You’re not a trained fighter or soldier. I’m not sure what’s gotten you all worked up to be a vigilante, but you’re very much at risk of throwing your life away.”

I thought it over. I had several reasons I could point to if I wanted to justify it. A desire to protect my community. Revenge for the incident that triggered my powers. Some inner sadism or instinctive dominant streak I wasn’t willing to admit to, but that I could rationalize unleashing on men I felt deserved such punishment.

The truth is, none of those reasons really weighed that heavily on my mind as some burning motivation. Yes, I did genuinely want to protect my community, but there were less dangerous ways I could be doing that. I had gotten over “the incident” a long time ago; the awakening of my powers had stopped things from going too far, and I wasn’t the type of person to let myself be consumed with revenge. I certainly wasn’t some secret psycho femdom. Ask my previous lovers; despite having complete control over their cocks, I never used my powers to forcibly dominate them. So why become a superhero?

“It just feels like the right thing to do,” I said, continuing forward as the traffic light turned green. “Isn’t it the same for you?”

Shell smiled. “Yes, but I can turn into a super-turtle that instantly recovers damage when I transform.”

“And I can disable whole teams of gunmen from three blocks away.”

Shell considered this. “Well, I guess I can’t fault that.” She pulled out a smart phone from a waistband pocket I hadn’t noticed before and started texting. “Alright, here’s the deal. Zebra and Cinder Wolf are tracking down another drug sale lead from the Dispos site you gave us. Ring Mage is going to meet us at the museum, and we’ll take on this smash-and-grab together. Assuming it isn’t a dud job, of course. If it is, we’ll teleport over to help Zebra and Cinder.”

My eyes widened a bit. “So you’re going to work with me?”

“Yes” said Shell. “On the condition that you do exactly what we say. We’ll figure out a plan, and you stick to your part. Understood?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said. I couldn’t help but smile a bit. To tell the truth, I was very relieved. I had really just planned to try and spot the crooks as they broke in, disable them with ball squeezes, and alert the police. I’d just hoped that would be enough. And I had just hoped the superhuman that was supposedly part of the job was also a guy.

This would go much smoother if I had other supers to back me up, especially someone as versatile as the Ring Mage and as tough as Shell. A pity Zebra couldn’t also be present, but the other two would be more than enough.

Wait who else did she mention? “Who’s Cinder Wolf?”

Shell grinned. “He’s another member of our group. Actually, he and Ring Mage were already partners before they met up with me and Zebra. He wasn’t at the drug bust because he was sick that night. I think you’d like him. He’s feisty.”

“Ah. Cool.”

“Yeah. Let’s make sure you survive long enough to meet him.”

I let out a nervous laugh. “Yeah, that would be good.”

***

I parked a block away form the museum. Shell gave a thumbs up towards the sky, and we were suddenly teleported to a nearby rooftop by the Ring Mage. The museum had a wide field around it as well as a sizeable parking lot, so that even the nearest building had some sizeable distance between us. Even as the sun was starting to set, there was no way someone would be able to run across the field without being spotted by any look outs.

I glanced around. People were still exiting the building, the last of the staff taking off. However, I could sense a few cocks in at least three unmarked vehicles, men staying in cars parked around the perimeter. I informed Ring Mage of this. As I did so, I noted that he had one of his rings resting just in front of his left eye, almost like a monocle.

He nodded. “Cops,” he said. “We’ve tipped them off that we will be handling this situation. Due to the presence of a super, they are willing to hang back until the threat is taken care of, or back us up as needed.”

“Wow,” I said. “I didn’t know you were that coordinated with the police.”

He shook his head. “We’re not like the Protectors. We don’t exactly work together. But considering what we’ve done for the city recently with all the drug busts, we’ve proven ourselves to be trustworthy enough. They are willing to work around us.”

“I see.”

“So, are you going to change into your costume or stay in plainclothes?”

I smacked my forehead. “Shit! I forgot my backpack in my car!”

“No problem,” he said. He teleported me down without giving me a warning. I jumped a bit, startled at the sudden shift in scenery. I pulled out my backpack. As soon as I locked the car door, I was teleported again.

“Ugh, stop that!” I said, putting a hand to my head. The teleport wasn’t physically disorienting in itself, but the instant shift in location was a bit disorienting. “Warn me first, at least!”

“My apologies, I was trying to time it so no one was looking.”

“How could you even see where I am?” I asked, looking around. My car wasn’t in sight.

Ring Mage pointed upwards. I craned my neck to see a glint of metal hovering in the sky. He then tapped the ring in front of his eye. “Vision link.”

“Ah. Neat.” I glanced around. There wasn’t really anywhere to duck behind on the roof. “Um… can I get some privacy?”

Despite his stoic expression not changing, I caught Ring Mage imagining me changing for a moment. “Sure.” He and Shell turned their backs to me.

“No peeking with your rings, now,” I said with a smirk. Shell chuckled and the Ring Mage made a little grunt. He hadn’t been planning on it, but now he had the thought in his mind, and was quickly trying to silence the temptation. I quickly changed into my all-black outfit and slipped on the domino mask. It really wasn’t much of a costume, but it would at least keep me better hidden at night.

After I was done changing, I asked, “So, what is this ruby they want? Did you check the museum out for it?”

“There are three ancient rubies on display, actually, in different sections of the museum,” said Ring Mage. “I cannot detect any sort of special qualities about them. I presumed our target may have been after a Relic, but if any of the rubies are one, I’d be surprised.”

“A Relic?”

He held up a hand and a bracelet-sized ring appeared, spinning in his palm. “Like my rings.”

“Oh,” I said. “Well, if it’s not for power, is it for money?”

He shook his head. “Unless they are working for an especially picky collector, I don’t see why they would only being going after a few gemstones. There are far easier and more reliable ways to make cash than breaking into a museum. Moreover, if a museum had to be a target, there are far more valuable items within than the rubies.”

“Strange,” I said. “Well, this is a big enough job for a superhuman to be hired, so there has to be something significant about them.”

“Guess we’ll find out soon enough,” said Shell.

“We got plenty of time before they’re supposed to show up,” I said. “I was planning on going in before they closed and just hiding in a corner somewhere, but I guess I missed the window for that.”

“No need to put yourself at that much risk,” said Ring Mage. “I’ve got a Vision Ring watching each of the rubies, and three more circling the grounds.”

My eyes widened a bit. “Just how many of those things do you have?”

“Enough,” he said, folding his arms.

“Hey, I spilled the beans about my powers, you can at least give me some details on yours,” I said.

He made another small grunt. “Ten. Each can have a separate effect going at once, or can be linked. Speaking of…”

He motioned to Shell and myself. I felt something cool and metallic touch my left ear. I reached up and felt a small, smooth ring just hanging off the lobe, as though it were magnetically attached. I pulled at it, and it came off, but when I let go, it snapped back to my ear.

“What the heck?” I asked.

Ring Mage tapped his own ear, where another small ring was now attached. “Touch it when speaking to talk to us like we’re on a radio.” He held his earring. “Like so.” His voice came to me in stereo, from his own mouth, and from what sounded like a little speaker next to my ear.

I followed suit, touching my earring. “Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.”

Shell touched hers. “Loud and clear.” Again, I had the stereo effect of hearing her from two sides.

I grinned. “Huh. Neat!”

“Yeah, he’s pretty useful,” said Shell.

“So, between your vision rings and these, that’s all of them, right?” I asked.

He nodded. He didn’t really look at me, staring at the building. I figured he was keeping one eye on the grounds, while the eye covered by the ring must be cycling through what the vision rings were seeing.

I pulled out my phone. “Okay, well, just let me know when you need me to do anything.”

Both of my companions nodded. Ring Mage kept watch, while Shell pulled out her own phone to mess around on. With nothing else to do, and not feeling quite chummy enough with them yet to make small talk, we just hung out in silence.

***

Three hours later, even Ring Mage was reading something on his phone. He was still watching the grounds through his vision rings, of course. I was starting to get antsy just sitting on the roof, and was about to suggest we go sit in my car for more comfortable seating, when something finally happened. I looked up as I sensed a tight cluster of men rapidly approaching. Their proximity to each other wasn’t the unusual thing, however; the first thing that tipped me off was that they were approaching the building at high speed, faster than any car should have been driving in the area. The second was that I sensed them coming from about five hundred feet below the street.

Shell noticed as I got up and went to the edge of the roof, peering down to the ground. We were three stories up, but my fascination with what I was sensing let me forget my normal wariness of heights.

“What’s up?” she said, quickly putting her phone away as she joined me at the roof’s edge. Ring Mage stepped up to the other side of me, focusing his gaze on the museum.

“Underground,” I said, pointing towards the street. “They’re tunneling. Fast.”

“Great. Guess we know what the superhuman can do,” muttered Shell.

“What are we looking at?” said Ring Mage. “How many?”

“I’m sensing five pe—five men.” I focused on them, trying to see any sort of hints of sexual thoughts about anyone else in the group. Put any group of guys near a woman, and at least one was likely to be checking out her ass or tits at any given time. From their immediate thoughts, I could sense a degree of sexual interest in two of them. One was thinking another of the guys was pretty hot. From the image in his head, I agreed, but that wasn’t the sort of information I was after.

However, the second man was indeed sneaking glances at the ass of a woman in front of him. She was wearing a very tight black bodysuit with thorny vine designs running up the sides in a way that drew attention to her curves; the vines ended in roses covering her breasts and crotch like a bikini. I scanned the men’s thoughts several times, but I couldn’t sense the male gaze on any other women.

“Alright, I think they have at least one woman with them, she’s definitely the super going by what she’s wearing. Plant-themed suit.”

“Not familiar,” said Ring Mage. “But good to know. Anything else?”

“Not really,” I said. “If it doesn’t have anything to do with sex, I can’t really see it, so I couldn’t tell you what weapons they have.”

“Is the woman doing the tunneling?” asked Ring Mage.

“I can’t tell,” I said. “Probably?” I sensed the thoughts of the man who was checking out of his fellows. He had noticed the other men, but they were all dressed in normal clothes, going by his thoughts. “Yeah, it doesn’t look like the other men are dressed up. Doesn’t necessarily mean one of them isn’t also a super.”

“True,” said the Ring Mage.

My eyes followed where I could sense the men. “Okay, they just passed by us, on the left. And now they’re going up to the museum’s basement.”

Three little flashes appeared in the sky; I figured Ring Mage was recalling his exterior vision rings. “Alright,” he said. “We don’t want to tip them off immediately. Since you can’t disable the super woman, we don’t want to warn her we’re coming. Can you separate the men somehow?”

I opened my mouth to speak, but paused. “I don’t think I’ll have to. They’re breaking up already. Two men going to the right…” I pointed to that side of the building. “Two going to the left…” Again I pointed. “And one… he’s heading upstairs. The woman is with him.”

“How can you be sure?” said Shell.

“His eyes a glued to her ass,” I said with a smirk.

Shell chuckled and even Ring Mage made a small smile. Then his expression shifted to stern again. “I see them now. Interesting. They’re going for all the rubies.” He raised his hand. “On my signal, take down the five men. Shell, I will teleport you to the woman just beforehand.”

Shell nodded. There was a surge of soft blue light around her, and suddenly, her human form was instantly replaced with the hulking alligator snapping turtle monster I had first seen her as. A moment later, a teleport ring whisked her away.

“Now!” said Ring Mage.

I psychically sent five very hard kicks to five vulnerable, unsuspecting sets of testicles. The five men throughout the building instantly collapsed onto the ground, clutching at their privates, and dropping whatever tools they were carrying. I sensed them rolling and squirming on the floor. While I could only sense their penises and testicles directly, I had enough practice to generally guess what a man was trying to do based on how their genitals shifted as a result of the rest of their body moving. I could guess they were trying to reach for their weapons.

Suddenly, one by one, I sensed them get thrown back, and go still. I blinked in surprise; within a couple seconds, all five men were completely disabled. I looked to the Ring Mage with confusion. “What happened?”

“I hit them with my Stun Beam,” he said. He paused for a moment. “And now, the woman is neutralized.”

“What… the…?” I was shocked. It was over that fast? Holy crap!

Ring Mage turned to me. “Shell got the drop on her and had her pinned, so I was able to use the Stun Beam on her right after.”

“So they’re just… out?”

The Ring Mage nodded. There was a flash, and the golden Teleport Ring whirled into view on the front lawn of the museum, blinking in and out of existence several times. I saw that each of the men and the one woman were lying prone. From the unmarked cars, a half-dozen police burst into action, quickly coming over and handcuffing the unconscious suspects.

“Um, should they do something more about the woman?” I asked.

“Stay here, I’ll handle this.” Ring Mage disappeared in a teleport. He reappeared near the cops and crooks, hands up to indicate he wasn’t about to start trouble. A moment later, Shell was returned to the roof next to me, and in another soft blue glow, she converted back to her human form.

“Whew, that went much easier than last time!” she said with a grin.

“No kidding,” I said with a grin. “That was too easy. I’m expecting something to explode now.”

“Hey, don’t jinx it,” said Shell.

Ring Mage teleported up to us. “Police said her name is Thorja. She’s able to control plants and earth. It’s good we caught her at unawares; she could have sunk the whole building into the ground if she’d wanted.”

“They able to do anything about her?” I asked, warily glancing to the ground. The would-be thieves were starting to come out of their stupors, the costumed woman included. However, though she struggled, thrashing in her cuffs and trying to kick at the officers, she wasn’t using her powers.

“They brought Zeronium restraints,” he said.

“Zeronium?” I gave him a curious look.

“Neutralizes powers,” he said.

“Oh,” I said. “I guess that’s it, then.”

Ring Mage nodded and gave me a small smile. “We certainly appreciate your help, Phallica.”

I waved him off, feeling sheepish. “Nah, I barely did anything. You guys would have spotted them and taken them out without me.”

“Well, we wouldn’t have seen them coming from under the ground,” said Ring Mage. “And without your initial salvo, it would have been harder to take them down; they could have dodged my Stun Beams, and a few might have very well escaped.”

“We might not have gotten the drop on the woman as efficiently as we did,” said Shell. “And it would have turned into a real super fight.”

The two shared a glance. “I think she passes,” said Shell.

My brow furrowed. “Passes what?”

“There’s another reason we worked with you tonight,” said Ring Mage. “It’s clear to us that you’re just going to keep doing this. Your power has its uses, but it is no match for the superhuman dangers that exist out there. However, in tandem with our own abilities, we think you could be an asset to our group. As this mission just proved, there are elements of your power, despite their limitations, that can supplement our efforts. We, in turn, can provide you with the battle support necessary to survive the sorts of conflicts you will end up in, and defeat those foes you cannot affect.”

My jaw dropped. “Are you… are you seriously… offering me a spot on your team?” I couldn’t believe it. Powers like mine were so ridiculous, I was shocked these two weren’t just laughing me off.

Ring Mage nodded. “We don’t want to pressure you, but if we can’t discourage you from being a vigilante, we can at least ensure your talents are put to efficient use.”

Shell grinned at me. “Just don’t be grabbing up on the guys’ dicks all willy-nilly.” Then she grinned and gave Ring Mage a nudge with her elbow. “Although Cinder would probably like that.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yes, probably.”

“I… I don’t know…” I said. Despite their help, they were still strangers to me.

“We know it’s sudden,” said Shell. “But please give it serious thought.”

“Okay, um, can I have a few days?” I asked.

“Sure,” said Shell. “Just contact the e-mail Zebra gave you.”

Ring Mage nodded again. “Speaking of, we have to go help Zebra and Cinder. They’re probably getting shot at right now, if the job they found wasn’t a dud. You should head on home.”

I almost nodded back, but hesitated. “Is there… I mean… can I come along?”

Ring Mage and Shell traded a glance. “This is likely going to be much more dangerous,” he said.

“Drug sales usually means dudes, and I already showed you I can take a bunch of guys out from a distance. If you can let me use that vision ring to let me see who to target, I can still lend assistance.”

The two shared another glance. Shell shrugged. “I don’t mind.”

Ring Mage frowned, stroking his chin in thought. “Alright,” he said. “But same as before. You act when we say, and otherwise, stay out of it.”

I smiled and gave him a salute. “Yes, sir!” And with that, we were teleported away.