Heroic Villains: Toxic Hero

Headline Nine: The Way Plans Go Wrong

Kieran (Vast) Winters

Vast left Clover with Mave under Marguerite's watchful eye and went straight to work, heading to a small apartment that was used mostly for storage. It was the first place he and Clover crashed at after Heather's, the moment Vast walked in and flicked on the light he found the place in an abandoned state. A few jackets hung on hooks in the foray space, dirty dishes sat in the sink, and a stack of mail left on the coffee table. The bedrooms were no better, both being in various states of disarray.

Vast tried to remember the last time he was here and came up blank. Clover had said that he'd been here recently to drop off the cache of goodies Vast was now there to pick up, but Vast found it irritating Clover came here saw this and left it as is.

He wasn't surprised, just irritated.

Vast definitely had somewhere to be but as he looked for the supplies, he also absentmindedly spent twenty minutes picking up, it got to the point that he washed the dishes in the sink. Once finished, Vast went back to looking for the things Clover left behind, since there was no sign of anything useful in the common spaces Vast headed into Clover's room. He dug through the few boxes in the closet and found one of his old masks. The one at the top was once identical to the other smooth full-face masks but this one was partially melted, and the white plastic was blackened from an explosion, it was the one Vast used to make his grand change from one outfit to another, the entrance hadn't gone as planned and Clover had forbidden the use of anymore pyrotechnics. Though he was still mad Toxic was confused in the first place; Clover was the one who looked like a copy of their father, not Vast.

Tucking one of the good masks and leaving the burnt one in the closet, Vast continued to dig through the various boxes before hitting on the bag of fireworks, mostly just fountains but they would work for what Vast had planned. Delay timers were in the same bag, though Vast couldn't remember why. He was pretty sure they'd used the fireworks for birthday celebration, so the timers were an oddity. Not that Vast was complaining. He'd planning on setting really long fuses and just hopping they went off at the correct time, so the surprise timers were a bonus.

Once he was sure he had everything packed into his backpack he locked up and headed out on the heist alone.

The clouds overhead hid the light of the celestial bodies as the storm that broiled threatened to soak the city, but that's exactly what Vast wanted. He needed the night to be dark and maybe even a little wet to help in case something went wrong with unattended fireworks that were nearly a year old. Vast was sure a few would go off at least and that's what mattered.

Things went smoothly until Vast was on his way to set up the last firework, he was halfway there when he spotted Glimmer in the sky. heading towards the precinct. He watched long enough to see she was in a search pattern. Vast groaned as he kept an eye out for Toxic, but kept to the plan, the fireworks were sure to distract the heroes first.

Vast ducked into an ally and began setting up the firework. Setting the bag down, Vast crouched and set to work rigging up the timers to the fuse. When the timers ran down, they'd trigger an electric spark to light the fuse. Vast was busy taping the very bomb like looking abomination together when he heard shouting down the alley, somewhere on the street. Glancing down the way, the villain frowned and slunk into the shadows as he fully expected someone to have noticed him and raised the alarm. He wasn't in his uniform yet so he'd only get flack for setting up dangerous fireworks, but he's sure he could play it off as something planned for like a proposal or some such gushy nonsense. At least as long as it wasn't a cop.

But then it was much worse.

The shouting was one thing but then there was shooting and the sound of growling, growling that Vast was almost certain was familiar that it stopped the villain in his tracks for a half second. No, it couldn't be. That mutt promised to stay hidden while he was in the city. Narcissa didn't have a way to contact him, did she? No, no it couldn't.