Vigilante

1. Patty Parker

One

There was no place worse than a dark alley in Conrad City. But parking had been scarce, so Patience Parker hadn't had a choice. As she walked to her car, a cheap little red Jetta, she became aware of footsteps behind her. She froze at the sound. Her article about the Conrad City bomber had been the front page of the Conrad Gazette that day. She knew there were plenty of people who were pissed at her then. After all, she had suggested that the city's own mayor had been involved with the incident from five years ago.

Admittedly, that same mayor had also ended his term not long ago. But calling out people who had power like that wasn't something you did lightly.

"Whose there?" she called, trying to ignore the shakiness in her voice.

"Your worst nightmare," a deep, gravelly voice said. She felt the gun press into the base of her head.

"Let her go," said another voice, this time raspier, muffled.

There was the sound of swift movement behind her. From the shadows, Patience saw a figure all in black. What the hell?

"She knows too much," said the gunman behind her, "she has to die."

"She's not on my list," said the man in the strange costume, "but you are."

Patience made no move, unsure if either party was friend or foe. All she really cared about was getting away from the gun pressed to her head. But she was a city girl, whose only fighting skills involved a can of mace.

She closed her eyes. This was how she was going to die, in the middle of a dark alley, at the hands of two weirdos. Then she heard it. The cracking of bone. She didn't see the fight. The Stranger moved too fast for that. And she heard his leather boots against the concrete.

Then there was the snapping of her attacker's neck, and the splashing of the nearby puddle that her attackers body fell into. She was still unable to move as she heard the man in leather as he came around to face her.

"Miss Parker," he asked, "are you alright?"

"I.... I don't...." she ran a hand over the back of her neck, half expecting a bullet hole to be there. None appeared. She let out a sigh of relief. "I'm alive. I suppose that's all I can ask for right now."

"Good," said the stranger, "I'd like to take you home now, if that's alright."

"I have my own---"

A green gas surrounded her, making her cough. Her eyes watering was the last thing that she remembered as the gas overtook her.

When she woke, she was back in her apartment. She found herself staring into the brown eyes of her cat, Bruce, a big, fat, tabby with a mean disposition who hated everyone but her. Mostly because she fed him. "Meow."

She groaned, a piercing headache having over taken her. The events of the night seemed like a strange dream. The man attacking her in the parking lot, the stranger in the mask that had saved her. Part of her had hoped that it was all some bizarre stress dream.

As the newbie reporter on The Conrad City Gazette, Patience had been given the one assignment no one wanted. Coverage of the upcoming trial for the Conrad City Bombings that had taken place five years ago. No one wanted it because no one was crazy enough to go up against the players involved.