Luke Cage

Luke Cage/Bartender

"Back again," Luke walked up to the woman who was lying her head on his bar counter. He smirked at the growling sound she gave him as she lifted her head to look at him.

Jessica Jones was gorgeous. It was the first thing someone would notice about her, the long black hair, big eyes, and general beauty. She was also-

"What, you wanna send me to an AA meeting?" Jessica growled.

Abrasive as hell.

Luke chuckled. "No, just noting a fact."

"I'm pretty sure your job is to pass be drinks," Jessica drawled.

Not one to be put off by rudeness, Luke only smiled. "Only when someone actually orders a drink, as opposed to using my bar as a pillow to sleep on."

Jessica scowled, but Luke thought he could note a hint of humor in her eyes. She pointed at a random bottle on the shelf lazily. Taking that as a request, he took the whiskey down and poured a shot, passing it to her. She downed it immediately and gestured. Chuckling slightly, he passed her the bottle, watching with some fondness as she started to drink.

With no one else in the bar, he was able to lazily walk around the bar and enjoy the quiet.

Then a vehicle outside went spinning past with a squeal. Luke and Jessica both looked out at it. The red van was speeding with no regard for any rules of traffic. They both watched curiously as it spun around the corner. Then another squealing sound filled the air. Luke turned to look at it.

A man was leaning out of a lowrider from the back passenger seat. In slow motion, Luke got a good look at him. He was a big man, with skin as dark as Luke's, and a smile filled with gold. He was clearly laughing as he hefted the weapon in his arms.

For a moment, Luke stared at the weapon the man was leveling. A rocket launcher. An honest to god rocket launcher. Pointed right at them.

"Down!" Luke dived over the bar to pull Jessica to the ground. She rolled with the movement and yelled out indignantly when he shielded her with his body. He ignored her, closing his eyes as he braced himself.

The rocket flew in and exploded against the bar. Fire and shockwaves surrounded them. Luke roared as the building fell on top of him. He could hear Jessica doing the same in his ear.

When the shaking stopped, Luke opened his eyes. He was surrounded by rubble, gray dust falling about their heads. He could smell smoke beyond the debris. Rising slightly, he looked down at Jessica.

"You okay?"

"Fuck no I'm not okay!" she shouted. "What the hell happened!?"

Luke scowled. "Someone was trying to blow up that van."

"Well they fucking missed!" Jessica shouted. She stopped moving. "Do I smell smoke?"

"I think a fire started," Luke looked around again. The rubble had fallen around them in a small pocket. He gently pushed upward and felt the building above him move. "...I think I can move this."

"You?" Jessica scoffed. "Yeah, no. Move out of the way, I can get us out."

"You?" Luke replied right back. "Jessica, let me-"

She raised a fist and punched upward. Her fist embedded into the rock behind his head like a nail into wood. Luke stared at her as she smiled smugly. "See? I got this. Just move out of the way and I'll-"

Luke pushed upward, his large palms on either side of her. Slowly, tons of weight was lifted up in a complete disregard of reality. Jessica stared at Luke's face a few inches from her as he smirked. "Yeah. I think I can't help you there."

She continued to eye him. Then a slow smile came to her lips. Together, the pair began to push together. Stone, wood, metal, and glass were moved with little to no effort by the two superhumans. Soon they had dug their way out of the rubble. The pair rose to their feet, Luke's yellow shirt and Jessica's black leather clothes covered in dust.

"Goddamnit," Luke stumbled as he walked off the pieces of what had once been his friends bar. "This is just-"

He stopped speaking, clenching a fist in anger. Jessica was standing behind him, watching silently as he stared at the remains of his workplace. All gone. Burning to nothing. Along with everything that had mattered about it. The time he'd spent making sure it was clean and cared for. Wasted.

"I'm sorry," Jessica said, drawing his attention. When he looked over at her she looked away but continued to speak. "I-I know it meant a lot to you."

...For some reason, he could believe that.

The sound of someone laughing drew his attention. He froze.

Further down the block, he could see the red van had been overturned. He could also see that his wasn't the only building hit. Four more had the signs of an explosion, a window high on one billowing out flames, another shuddering, people screaming. The man laughing was tossing aside his rocket launcher as more men were rummaging in the red van. Six men grabbing boxes from the van, two carrying guns, and one insane lunatic laughing as he stood on the roof of a lowrider, another one parked nearby.

"Come on boys, get a move on!" the large man in a gray tank top laughed from the roof of his car. "Avengers ain't going to be distracted for long!"

"..." Luke stared at the mess before him. People were screaming, running out of burning buildings. The group of men were still working on robbing the truck. The man on the lowrider saw the running people. He smiled, a gold tinged, deranged smile, and gestured to one of his men, who tossed him an SMG. The man raised the gun to aim at those running away.

"Hey!" Luke heard. It took him a moment to realize he was the one who had yelled. The man heard him, looking over at Luke.

"Luke," Jessica protested, moving to stand next to him. "What are you doing?"

"...I can't let them hurt anymore people," Luke said slowly.

He wasn't a hero. He'd never claimed to be.

But apparently, there weren't any Avengers coming just yet. So how could he stand aside while others might die? How could he not step up?

"Well, lookie here now!" the man hopped off the lowrider and grinned at Luke. "What is this nigga!? You wanna piece of this with yer white girl there? Maybe let us have a piece of her too?"

Luke scowled at of one of his most despised words being used, then strode forward. He was surprised to find Jessica joining him. "You don't have to do this," he whispered to her.

"Yeah, I do," Jessica sounded positively enraged. She pointed down the street, where two more buildings a long way down had been hit by more fire. "I'm pretty sure that fuck hit my building."

...Well shit, what were the chances of that?

"Get behind me if they start shooting. I'm bulletproof."

God bless Jessica for not being as fazed by that as he would have expected.

"Oh now look at this," the man sounded almost polite as he strode forward with his men. "Muthafucka, what exactly do you think you're doing?"

"No one has to get hurt!" Luke called as he and Jessica strode toward the group. "Just leave these people alone!"

The man blinked. "Fuck man, you serious? New York's changed since last time. Used to be muthafucka's ran from Barracuda! And explosions, come to think of it," he grinned. "Well fuck, I like you! Hey, how fast can you dodge!?"

He raised his gun and started shooting. Jessica ducked behind him as the bullets started hitting him.

Small bits of metal rained down on the asphalt along with bits of yellow cloth. For a long moment, the sound of gunfire filled the air.

When it was over, the man was staring in shock at Luke. His men lowered their weapons in sheer awe as Luke wiped at his chest, more bullets falling on the ground. "What the fuck is this nig-?"

Before he could complete that sentence, Jessica spun out of cover and grabbed the hood of a car. With a twist and an ear-wrenching pull, she ripped the hood off, then spun to toss it at the group.

The hood spun like a disk across the space between them, then hit two of the men like a giant frisbee, both men screaming as they were sent flying.

"Shit, light 'em up!" the man yelled, his gold teeth flashing as he spoke. The other men, who hadn't been knocked down by an enraged woman with a car hood, unleashed hell.

Luke ignored the bullets, instead running toward the group. Jessica ducked behind the car, only to come back up and toss a piece of the engine, shattering one of the men's legs.

The leader of the group ran for one of the crates, opening it up. As Luke ran toward him, he came up with a large RPG, one with the words 'Hammer Tech' written on the side. "All right you tough muthafucka, lets see what you got!" he screamed as he pulled the trigger.

The RPG flew towards Luke before he could make a response. He tried to dodge. But contrary to what some thought, dodging a rocket-propelled grenade was impossible. It hit him hard and exploded in a burst of fire, sending him flying. Luke rolled after his airborne flight, shouting as he bounced off the pavement before slamming into a parked car with the sound of shattering glass and steel.

"You fuck!" Jessica, enraged, pulled out the engine block from the car she'd been using as ammo.

"Oh damn," one of the men said in awe as the small woman lifted 300+ pounds of steel over her head.

"Raaagh!" Jessica tossed the block. It flew with baseball pitcher speed, bouncing once on the ground.

"Oh goddamn!" the leader shouted as the engine block barely tagged one of his mens arm, then hit the red van, sending it skidding across the pavement.

"GRAH!" Luke roared as he exploded out of the car he'd been embedded in. Soot rested on his pectorals from the recent explosion. He stared at the leader of the man who had shot him, who was hopping into his car. The leader smiled a gold toothed smile.

"Damn, muthafucka, you tough as shit!" he said jovially. He laughed while revving up his engine. Jessica and Luke rushed toward to try and chase him. "Catch you later, bulletproof muthafucka! HAHA!"

Jessica poured on the speed, outpacing Luke by a wide margin, but she still was unable to catch up as the car began to speed away. She stopped to crouch, then exploded upwards. She cleared thirty feet, reaching out for the car as she fell towards it. The leader gunned the engine further. Her fingers stretched out.

And barely smacked the back of the car. The strength of the impact ripped off a chunk off the trunk. Jessica hit the ground hard, cursing loudly as she rolled with the impact but still scraped her cheek against the asphalt.

"Damn, that girl is hot!" Luke could barely hear the driver say over the roar of the engine and Jessica's caustic cursing.

She looked up at him she rose to her feet, her eyes flashing with rage, blood dripping slightly from the scrape on her cheek, an ugly thing that had him wincing in sympathy at the sight of a patch the size of a round playing card that had been scraped to the muscle.

"...So, you can fly, huh?" he said as she glared at him.

Her glare faded just a bit before she could control it. Luke would have said more, but the sounds of sirens in the distance drew his attention.

"God damnit," Jessica said as the sirens came closer. She turned to walk away.

"Where you headed?" Luke asked.

"Well," Jessica glowered. "I was going to head to my apartment. But now I need to see what the hell is left of it."

"Let me help," Luke immediately said, following her.

"Don't need it."

Luke chuckled, his eyes following her. "No, you don't. But I still want to."

She didn't turn to acknowledge that. But that was fine. He could live with that.