[NEW STORY] MY NEXT LIFE AS A PARAHUMAN DISPATCHER: ALL ROUTES LEAD TO SDN (CHAPTER ONE)

“Emergency alert. Hostage situation reported at 12th and Monroe. Armed suspect. Backup advised.”

Once her communicator went silent, Blonde Blazer flew through the night sky, wet strands of her golden hair clinging to her face and neck from the pouring rain. Below, the city was the familiar yet undeniably beautiful and chaotic mish-mash of lights, shadow, and sounds, interspersed between towering buildings and crawling streams of life. 

She closed her eyes, letting it wash over her. For a moment, there was no pressure on her to be the golden superhero; no guilt and shame over her struggles with her superhero identity; and no fear that no one would ever care who she was behind the mask. She was, for all intents and purposes, at peace. Raising her head, she breathed in the cool air, releasing a contented smile before diving down towards one of those towering buildings, a slipstream forming around her. 

She leveled off a few blocks away, scanning the streets for the source of the call.

A small storefront at 12th and Monroe came into view, its single lamppost unable to do much for visibility in the area. Thankfully, police vehicles were already on the scene, their lights reflecting off puddles and the slick pavement. She hovered a few meters above the street, letting the rain streak across her face mask as she watched the tense scene below.

A uniformed officer approached, umbrella in hand, shielding a small tablet in his other hand from the downpour. His nametag read Mendez. 

“Blonde Blazer!” he called, voice tight with urgency, though loud enough to reach her before he was close. “We’ve got five hostages inside. Two adults, one young woman, and two kids. The suspect is armed, female, and in her early thirties. She’s demanding… Well, we’re not sure what yet.”

Blonde Blazer nodded, her gaze darting between the storefront and the officers coordinating outside. “So no chance of negotiating?” she asked.

The officer shook his head. “We tried from the street, but haven't received any response yet. Instead, she alternates between aiming the gun at the hostages and us from a blindspot, so she’s definitely smart and unstable. That’s why we called you.”

She clenched her fists, feeling the familiar surge of power from her amulet. “Understood. I’ll assess from here, then plan my approach. Nobody gets hurt tonight.”

Another officer, Cagle, chimed in. He had arrived just after officer Mendez did, though they hadn't paid him much mind apart from nodding at him in greeting. “We’ve cordoned off the area, and evacuated the civilians from surrounding buildings. But… as officer Mendez said, she‘s the smart type. Be careful. We don’t know what she’s capable of.”

Blonde Blazer was silent for a moment, the rain soaking her cape as she studied the storefront. Indeed, the woman didn't appear in front of the window, but she made sure that her gun did. And though Blonde Blazer was tempted to ask either of the officers why they hadn't tried to shoot at the hand holding said gun, she rationalized it as them not wanting to piss off the unstable criminal. 

She might take that as an invitation to escalate, and with the hostages right next to her, they couldn't afford to take the chance. 

Stifling the urge to sigh, she turned her eyes back to the officers. She had a plan, and though it wasn't the smartest of plans, it was one that had a high chance of succeeding. After all, she was not only impervious to bullets, but she could move fast enough to get in the way of any attack on the civilians, if need be.  

However, just because she was superhuman, didn't mean she would be reckless. She had to approach this situation carefully. 

Finally, she spoke, her tone brooking no argument. “Keep your distance. I’ll make the first move now. Don't start shooting and everyone walks from here safely.”

The officers nodded, stepping back as she took a deep breath and prepared herself.

Blonde Blazer’s jaw tightened. ‘Another night, another mess,’ she thought, but there was no hesitation as she started walking towards the storefront. She had a job to do and lives were on the line. 

Reaching the door quickly, she pushed the door open. And the moment she had crossed the threshold, she was hit by the smell of damp carpet, sweat, and something else all at once. 

Then everything fell apart as these kinds of things tend to do. 

The criminal already had her gun pressed to the head of one of the civilians. She was a ragged woman in her late thirties, her dirty blond hair chopped unevenly as if cut with a pocketknife, and rather haphazardly at that too. Sweat slicked her brow despite the cool night air spilling in through the broken windows, and her brown pupils were blown wide—TOO wide, if one were to ask Blonde Blazer’s professional opinion—giving her eyes a glassy, feverish shine. Her hands trembled with jittery, nervous energy, but the gun never wavered. 

An older gentleman stood before her, his dark eyes wide and terrified as he stared pleadingly at her, almost as if he was silently asking Blonde Blazer to save him. He opened his mouth, perhaps to beg for mercy. 

The criminal smiled far too wide. Whether it was because the situation amused her, or really wanted to showcase her instability, it didn't matter. What did matter was the fact that the smile was the prelude to the gun going off. 

Blonde Blazer’s eyes went wide, but for all her speed, she couldn't outpace a trigger already half-pressed. The gunshot cracked through the building, and the man collapsed instantly, blood and brain matter misting the air. 

She froze. 

There had been no warning, or even hesitation, however slight, from the criminal. She had known Blonde Blazer was coming, and had moved to stop her attempts at de-escalation before it even started. And what a move it was. What sort of power was that? Prescience of sorts, or something else?

‘Damn!’ She didn't quite curse out loud, but the word sat hot on her tongue as her blood boiled. The criminal’s smile had widened now, the blood splattered on the side of her face adding a chilling undertone to the scene. It was definitely born from amusement, Blonde Blazer realized. The criminal took pleasure from her casual acts of cruelty. 

Blonde Blazer subtly moved one leg back, preparing to kick off and blitz the woman and end this now. But the barrel of the gun was already pressed against another head. She had moved faster than Blonde Blazer could react in time. 

This time it was a young woman in white, but unlike the man before her, she was neither trembling nor begging. Her expression was a strange, unsettling calm. 

Blonde Blazer’s first instinct was suspicion: ‘Is she part of this? Is she setting me up?’ But sense prevailed, especially since the details didn't add up. She had seen the genuine rage behind the young woman’s eyes when the man was killed. She had noticed the torn, burned edges of her clothes. And she had seen the tension in her jaw. A tension that could only come from holding back from doing something with sheer force of will. 

So no, she was definitely not an accomplice. 

Tearing her focus from the young woman, Blonde Blazer centered it on the criminal again. Whoever she was, whatever power she had, it was obvious that her instability didn't hamper her ability to perform. If anything, it aided it, adding an air of unpredictability to the situation. 

Knowing now that the criminal could do anything at any time, Blonde Blazer spoke up for the first time since entering the building. 

“Drop the gun. Now.” Her voice rang out with authority. 

She might as well be speaking to the wind with how little the criminal reacted, only tightening her finger on the trigger, and winking. And for one horrifying second, Blonde Blazer genuinely thought that she was about to watch another innocent civilian die. 

But then, without any forewarning, the criminal’s hands liquified. 

It sagged off her bones, collapsing into a dripping, shapeless mass as the criminal shrieked in pure agony. The first sound she made, and the part of Blonde Blazer still angry at the older man’s death relished the sound. The gun tore free from her dissolving grip, clattering to the floor.  

The young woman reacted instantly, dropping low and rolling out of the way with a practised ease. 

Blonde Blazer was admittedly confused by what just happened, though she obviously had an idea, but she wasn't one to not take advantage of a situation gifted to her. The ground crater beneath her feet as she rocketed forward, arms cocked back to deliver a wicked punch to the now-disabled criminal. 

Blonde Blazer’s fist connected with the criminal’s torso, eliciting a higher-pitched scream, and sending her flying. The abrupt impact with the mannequins in the building instantly rendered her unconscious. 

Blonde Blazer skidded to a halt, breathing hard, eyes flicking from the downed criminal to the—

Her mouth gaped open. 

The older man who’d been shot in the head lay sprawled on the floor, blood pooling beneath him, but it wasn't the scene that shocked her. No, it was the sight of his wounds closing up.

“Come on, come on, brain meat goes here… neurons go there… don’t mix those up again…” the young woman in the torn clothes muttered to herself, tongue sticking slightly out of the corner of her mouth in concentration.

The exit wound—large enough to expose the remainder of his brain—knit back together in front of Blonde Blazer’s eyes. Then the skull grew to cover it, and finally the skin and hair appeared. The man sucked in a jerky gasp, like someone waking from a nightmare.

He was alive.

Blonde Blazer stared. That couldn't have been simple healing. The young woman had turned the criminal’s hand into primordial soup and now, she had basically reconstructed the man’s head. What sort of power did the young woman even have? Biomanipulation? Time manipulation?  

The aforementioned woman clapped her hands lightly once she was satisfied, bits of dried blood puffing off her sleeves as she stood up. Without the distraction of the criminal, Blonde Blazer could see now that her skirt was torn, her sweater was singed, her hair was a disaster, and she looked like she’d been dragged backwards through a fireplace.

But she was beaming anyway.

“Yay! He’s not dead anymore!” she chirped.

Blonde Blazer’s mouth opened, then closed again. Twice.

The young woman dusted her palms together, only to wince at the blood sticking to them before wiping them on her skirt with a resigned sigh. Then, she finally turned to Blonde Blazer with a bright, awkward smile.

“O-Oh! Uh, hi! I’m Panacea!”

The young woman lifted a hand in a small, wobbly wave. Up close, Blonde Blazer finally got a good look at her, and wow, this was… a lot.

Ignoring the damage—though that was admittedly hard to do? What had the young woman been through to look like that—Panacea’s outfit looked like someone had taken a nurse’s uniform, your typical fantasy healer aesthetic, and a crafts store’s pastel aisle, and run all three through a blender on “whimsy.”

She wore a modified battle dress; pleated skirt falling to her calves, just brushing the tops of knee-high brown leather boots she had laced all the way up like she meant business… but also maybe like she was going to an oddly fashionable renaissance fair. Pastel blue highlights trimmed the mostly white dress, soft against the emergency-scene floodlights. The traditional red cross wasn’t plastered everywhere like Mandy expected, just a tidy armband on her upper-left arm.

Over everything, the young woman wore a thick white cloak with a bold red cross stitched across the back, pulling off being medical, dramatic, and cozy all at once. And in the place where a scarf would usually be placed on was a large pastel blue bandana sat around her neck like she’d gotten halfway to a western movie and then changed genres.

Finally, a belt sagged slightly under the weight of pouches and loops, each looking recently emptied as a result of some kind of emergency. 

Blonde Blazer stared.

Any one of these choices alone might’ve seemed reasonable. Together they felt like a costume committee had split into five teams, never spoken again, and then submitted all their ideas at once. It screamed hero, because only a hero could wear such and not cringe, but she had never heard of someone so powerful before. 

Panacea, oblivious to the older woman’s internal judging, continued brightly:

“Panacea of team New Wave. Healer extraordinaire. Slime matriach supreme. Brain-putter-backer.”

A beat passed.

“…That’s not my official title. Please don’t make it my official title.”

Blonde Blazer blinked.

“…Who?”

The newly named Panacea froze, blinked, then blinked again—rapidly—as her mouth opened and shut in an entire sequence of half-formed expressions. Shock. Panic. Confusion. Mild existential crisis. Determined denial. More panic.

She looked, for a brief moment, like a cartoon character buffering.

“Okaaay,” Panacea said slowly, lifting a finger like she was about to lecture a classroom of invisible toddlers. “This might sound totally random, off-topic, and straight out of nowhere… but!”

She leaned in slightly.

“Have you heard of Brockton Bay? Like… at all? In any shape or form?”

Blonde Blazer ran through every city she’d ever been deployed to, every training memo, and every briefing packet. Nothing even close.

She shook her head.

Panacea immediately sagged, pinching the bridge of her nose with a groan so dramatic it might have been rehearsed.

“Oh boy, I really stepped into it now haven’t I?” she muttered. “This is another Earth, isn’t it?”

Blonde Blazer opened her mouth, closed it, then opened it again.

From that one statement alone—and with the background noise of the older man still in awe behind them—she knew one thing with absolute certainty:

Things were only going to get stranger from here on out.