Speed defines my life.
I'm far from the only one who could say that, of course. Race Car drivers make their living by going faster than their competitors. Fighter Pilots live or
die by the choices they make in how fast they go and when they accelerate or decelerate. My issues with speed, I daresay, are slightly more personal.
Unlike a normal person, I can actually move fast enough to dodge a bullet fired directly at me. And yes, that happens to me on an almost daily, even hourly
basis. I'm in a unique line of work, you see. My birth name is Peter Brady, and I'm a registered Hero in Paragon City, but the populace at large and
even most of my teammates in the Legendary know me better as Cyberman 8.
Most people, even very quick heroes, think of themselves as "dodging a bullet" when they are avoiding gunfire. Not so, at least most of the time.
You're just moving faster than the man shooting at you can change his aim to compensate. You're not actually dodging the bullet itself. It's a
pretty rare ability, even among the hero community, to dodge the bullet after it's been fired.
In this case, the man in question is a member of the Skulls street gang, and the bullet in question is a .357 Caliber pistol round. It says so right there on
the bullet casing tumbling away.
My skin sensors pick up the specific heat of the air as the bullet passes by the left side of my face. In combat, all my sensors log these sort of details that
I normally ignore. The buffer erases it after 5 minutes. But if it becomes important later, I can call the information back.
I can see the beginnings of the expression of surprise, mingled with dawning recognition of who I am, in both of the two young punks body language. To them,
the bullet seemed to pass right through me. Even though in reality, I simply moved my head the exact distance I needed to safely evade the shot, and no more,
before moving right back into the exact position I was in before. To them, the movement was as invisible as the bullet.
The partner of the Skull with the gun is already starting to back away, the woman they'd been trying to drag back into the alleyway is on the ground with
her hands coming up to instinctively protect herself.
"Put the gun down, son. No one needs to get hurt." I say the words, even though I have little hope they'll have the desired effect. Always give
them the choice. You have to at least do that much. It even works sometimes. Not often. But sometimes. Some enemies I don't give the opportunity. Malta
Sappers, for example. I can't afford to give them the consideration. But then, I know they already made their choice. But Skulls? Some of them are still
just street punks looking for acceptance and protection. Some of them are salvageable. I have to give them a choice.
He hesitates, then aims the gun at me again, taking a two-legged stance. He must have convinced himself that I got lucky, or that he fired too soon. He may
already know, but not admit to himself, that it's already too late, and that he's going to jail. But figures he has nothing to lose by hoping for a
lucky shot to take down a hero. It's happened on occasion. There are memorials all over the city to dead Heroes after all.
This time, he can see when I move, though there's not a thing he can do about it. I jump above the line of fire as the gun goes off and toward him, doing a
backflip and then extend my leg forward to tag him across the jaw. I only use enough force to knock him out, not enough to break his jaw, though it's
probably a near thing. I slap an Arrest Beacon on him as he starts to fall, then reach out to lay a stunning blow to a pressure point on the base of his
friends skull (his own skull, not his mask) as he turns to run away. I follow up with a relatively light tap to the side of his head with my foot and a second
arrest beacon. Total elapsed time: 4.43 seconds.
"You'll be alright, ma'am. It's over." I give the girl a hand up.
"Thank you so much! I thought I was done for!"
I make sure she'll be alright. She lives just around the corner and promises me she'll go straight there and call the PPD to file a report. Smart girl,
and tough. But then, they tend to be like that in Kings Row.
Then I'm off (at 92.5 MPH, the limit of what my Hero License authorizes me for within city limits). My team is running an investigation into weapons
smuggling that turns out to have been a shipment for Nemesis - a new prototype Nemesis soldier bot. This may be a piece of info that leads us to the real
Nemesis. If we could take him down, we could save a lot of lives.
Sometimes my friends in the Legendary tease me (in a friendly way) if a team member shows up before I do to the scene of the crime. I don't worry about
that. The path to justice sometimes takes the (high speed) scenic route.
I'm far from the only one who could say that, of course. Race Car drivers make their living by going faster than their competitors. Fighter Pilots live or
die by the choices they make in how fast they go and when they accelerate or decelerate. My issues with speed, I daresay, are slightly more personal.
Unlike a normal person, I can actually move fast enough to dodge a bullet fired directly at me. And yes, that happens to me on an almost daily, even hourly
basis. I'm in a unique line of work, you see. My birth name is Peter Brady, and I'm a registered Hero in Paragon City, but the populace at large and
even most of my teammates in the Legendary know me better as Cyberman 8.
Most people, even very quick heroes, think of themselves as "dodging a bullet" when they are avoiding gunfire. Not so, at least most of the time.
You're just moving faster than the man shooting at you can change his aim to compensate. You're not actually dodging the bullet itself. It's a
pretty rare ability, even among the hero community, to dodge the bullet after it's been fired.
In this case, the man in question is a member of the Skulls street gang, and the bullet in question is a .357 Caliber pistol round. It says so right there on
the bullet casing tumbling away.
My skin sensors pick up the specific heat of the air as the bullet passes by the left side of my face. In combat, all my sensors log these sort of details that
I normally ignore. The buffer erases it after 5 minutes. But if it becomes important later, I can call the information back.
I can see the beginnings of the expression of surprise, mingled with dawning recognition of who I am, in both of the two young punks body language. To them,
the bullet seemed to pass right through me. Even though in reality, I simply moved my head the exact distance I needed to safely evade the shot, and no more,
before moving right back into the exact position I was in before. To them, the movement was as invisible as the bullet.
The partner of the Skull with the gun is already starting to back away, the woman they'd been trying to drag back into the alleyway is on the ground with
her hands coming up to instinctively protect herself.
"Put the gun down, son. No one needs to get hurt." I say the words, even though I have little hope they'll have the desired effect. Always give
them the choice. You have to at least do that much. It even works sometimes. Not often. But sometimes. Some enemies I don't give the opportunity. Malta
Sappers, for example. I can't afford to give them the consideration. But then, I know they already made their choice. But Skulls? Some of them are still
just street punks looking for acceptance and protection. Some of them are salvageable. I have to give them a choice.
He hesitates, then aims the gun at me again, taking a two-legged stance. He must have convinced himself that I got lucky, or that he fired too soon. He may
already know, but not admit to himself, that it's already too late, and that he's going to jail. But figures he has nothing to lose by hoping for a
lucky shot to take down a hero. It's happened on occasion. There are memorials all over the city to dead Heroes after all.
This time, he can see when I move, though there's not a thing he can do about it. I jump above the line of fire as the gun goes off and toward him, doing a
backflip and then extend my leg forward to tag him across the jaw. I only use enough force to knock him out, not enough to break his jaw, though it's
probably a near thing. I slap an Arrest Beacon on him as he starts to fall, then reach out to lay a stunning blow to a pressure point on the base of his
friends skull (his own skull, not his mask) as he turns to run away. I follow up with a relatively light tap to the side of his head with my foot and a second
arrest beacon. Total elapsed time: 4.43 seconds.
"You'll be alright, ma'am. It's over." I give the girl a hand up.
"Thank you so much! I thought I was done for!"
I make sure she'll be alright. She lives just around the corner and promises me she'll go straight there and call the PPD to file a report. Smart girl,
and tough. But then, they tend to be like that in Kings Row.
Then I'm off (at 92.5 MPH, the limit of what my Hero License authorizes me for within city limits). My team is running an investigation into weapons
smuggling that turns out to have been a shipment for Nemesis - a new prototype Nemesis soldier bot. This may be a piece of info that leads us to the real
Nemesis. If we could take him down, we could save a lot of lives.
Sometimes my friends in the Legendary tease me (in a friendly way) if a team member shows up before I do to the scene of the crime. I don't worry about
that. The path to justice sometimes takes the (high speed) scenic route.