Interlude of a Speedster Part 2

To Bree's complete disbelief, the guy gave her a look, flashed his middle finger at her, and then turned to stagger away down the alley.

Was he… Did he seriously think that she was just going to suddenly let him go? That she would be impressed by the fact that he could tank a pretty light kick from her, and that would be enough to let him hobble away? After giving her the finger?

"Well screw you too, buddy," She snarled.

In what would have been the blink of an eye to anyone else, Bree ducked down to the ground into a sprinters start, accelerated as quickly as she could, and ran straight over the gangster that had disrespected her. Literally.

She pushed him down to the ground and trampled over him in one fluid movement.

This time, the gangster didn't move.

"Oh no," She murmured, turning to see him face down with a pool of blood slowly forming from his head. No… no no no."

She sprinted over to him and tapped two fingers to his neck, and then let out an aggrieved sigh.

She sprinted again, this time to the end of the street to get the street name, and back again before grabbing her private radio from her utility belt.

"Hey uh… Yeah, Yeah I got him. Well, that's kind of the issue, to be honest. Okay. No don't. Oh come on, you don't need to put it like that. Alright. Thank you. It's uh, down where Lothian Road meets Camberwell New Road. Alright, thanks bro."

Bree walked back to the unconscious and still bleeding gangster, took his pulse once more, and then listened to his incredibly raspy breaths stall and stutter. The five minutes it took for her brother to arrive felt like the longest five minutes of her entire life.

"Damn it Bree, this has to stop," Came a disappointed sigh from behind her.

"Hey, hero name thanks," Bree snapped.

"It's not like this guy's conscious enough to remember," her brother snapped right back.

"It's the principle of the matter," She said, her hands on her hips.

"Oh, it's the principle of the matter, is it?" He retorted, his voice dripping with acrid sarcasm. "How many times is it that you've nearly killed someone now? Eight? Nine? And those are only the ones I know about!"

"I can run at faster than Mach 3… sometimes it's a little hard to hold back against normals," Bree muttered, not able to meet her brother's eye.

"Oh yeah, Mum would totally eat that one up," He snorted. "But you and me? We've shared everything for years, I know you better than anyone else in the world. The problem isn't holding back, it's the fact you don't think you should."

"Leo, could you just fix him, please?" Bree pleaded.

"So much for hero names," Leo shot back. "Anyway, what if I didn't?" He asked, much quieter.

Bree turned to look at her brother in a flash, her eyes pleading, "What do you mean?"

"You gotta learn one way or another, Bree, there are consequences damn it," he sighed. "If I do this now, again, then what's going to stop you from going out and doing it, again? If we got him to a healing tent quick enough, which you could do I might add, then they could probably deal with it."

"Hey now… Bro... If he went to the hospital, people would start asking some very… difficult… questions," Bree stammered, panic flashing through her eyes.

"Yeah… Yeah I guess they would," Leo's voice was a whisper.

"No, Leo, you don't get it. They'd try me. They'd probably send me to the Barge at the least for disproportionate use of a power on a normal. That'd mess with everything, not just me, but everything mum and dad have fought to build up."

It was Leo's turn to look away, but his eyes only fell to the man on the ground.

"Look, I know you don't really get on with the whole hero thing. I know you'd rather just be sort of on your own doing your own thing. But would you really do that? To mum? To me?"

"How dare you!" Leo yelled suddenly, "It's not me doing anything to mum or anything to you. You're the one who batters people almost every single night. You're the one who's going too far with people who can't take it!"

He started pacing up and down as he ranted.

"This is what people on the forums complain about when they talk about Futurescape. We're not like the PHA. We don't have backing like that, and we don't share the luxuries of their regulations damn it. We have to be careful, because we can be held accountable and branded villains."

He stopped pacing and looked his sister dead in the eye.

"The responsible thing for me to do right here, right now, would be to walk away and let you take him to the healers. Let the law do what it will."

Bree couldn't believe what she was hearing. Her brother had never spoken to her like this, not even when they'd gotten into fights before. It was like she was seeing a completely different side of him.

She did the only thing she could think of. In three easy steps she strode over to him, faster than he could register, and wrapped her brother in a head.

"I'm your family, Leo," Bree said, her voice wavering slightly, "You wouldn't do this to your family, would you?"

Leo struggled for a moment but realised there was nothing he could do against the much stronger speedster bar using his own power against her, and that was a step that he really didn't want to take, a line he didn't want to cross.

"Yeah… My adopted family maybe," He mumbled. "It's a dirty trick using that to try and use that against me, you know. Really mean. But… fine, this is the last time. I'll reset this idiot's clock for you."