Unheroic Life of a Certain Cape-Chapter 43 Under Arrest?

Chapter 43 Under Arrest?
There were a lot of reasons I could’ve been arrested.
Starting with Eclipse, my so-called villain persona, and the trail of bodies tied to that name. People I’d killed cleanly. People I’d killed messily. Alfred’s face flickered through my mind,  another name I’d crossed off while wearing my civilian skin. I told myself I didn’t regret it, that it was part of the game, but my gut twisted all the same.
Still, none of that showed on my face. I couldn’t afford it to. So I breathed deep, slow, and let my Enhancer traits take over.
According to the SRC, Enhancer classifications were broad. Anything that amplified human traits fell into the category: speed, endurance, precision, reflexes, and even emotion regulation. Mine was bodily coordination, everything moving in sync with perfect efficiency, my brain and body in constant dialogue. It made me good at everything I touched, from combat to driving to keeping my pulse steady when I should’ve been panicking.
The cop leaned down, voice steady but sharp. “Get out of the vehicle, please.”
I did as told, stepping out with deliberate calm. Silver followed, her heels clicking softly against the pavement, the morning air brushing past the hem of her frilly dress. Two of them, one older, mid-forties, the other younger, fresh-faced and smug. The type that thought a badge turned them into gods.
“Hands where I can see them,” the older one ordered. I complied, expression blank, muscles loose. The younger one circled around, eyes dragging along Silver like she was some trophy on display.
“Damn,” he muttered under his breath, not quiet enough for me to miss it. “Markend girls, huh? Guess even the rich kids got good taste.”
Silver stiffened beside me, her face neutral but her shoulders tense. She didn’t say a word, didn’t break character, but I caught the faint tremor in her hands.
“Frisk her,” the older one said flatly.
My jaw clenched. “The fuck you just say?”
“Procedure,” the younger cop said with a smirk, stepping forward. “She’s a potential accomplice. We gotta check for weapons. Relax, kid.”
Silver met my gaze, looking unreadable, but there was trust there. Then, without a word, she raised her arms, letting him pat her down.
It wasn’t a frisk. It was an excuse. His hands lingered too long, sliding along her waist, her thighs, brushing against skin he had no right to touch. And she let him. Because we both knew how this worked. Escalation meant exposure, and exposure meant danger.
Still…
I snapped anyway.
The punch came fast and brutal, my knuckles cracking against his cheek with enough force to spin him half around. “That could’ve been your sister or someone else’s daughter, bastard!”
The older cop shouted, hand going for his holster, but I was already moving. Enhancer reflexes turned the world into sharp, perfect clarity. His gun came up; my thumb wedged itself between the trigger and the guard before he could even think about pulling it. I drove my fist straight into his jaw, felt the satisfying crunch of bone, then hit him again, harder.
The younger one stumbled back, shouting something, yanking out his taser. The prongs shot forward, and Silver stepped in, her hand flashing up as she caught the wires midair. Electricity arced violently, her body convulsing as the shock tore through her.
Something inside me went white-hot.
I didn’t know why it pissed me off so much. Maybe it was the sight of her jerking against the voltage, or maybe it was the quiet way she didn’t even scream, didn’t even flinch away. Maybe it was because deep down, I knew I’d failed again.
The bystanders just watched, one of them taking a phone out, whispers rising like static in the background.
“What the fuck was that for?” the older cop groaned, clutching his jaw.
I didn’t answer. I just hit him again, harder this time, then tore the gun from his hand, field-stripping it in seconds. The pieces clattered against the pavement, harmless now, nothing more than scrap.
Ah, shit. This was bad. This was really bad. The spotlight I’d been avoiding for a month had just found me, bright and unrelenting. I turned sharply, scanning the crowd, and spotted the only guy holding up his phone. He had an average build, wore a cheap jacket, and eyes wide like a deer in headlights.
“Hey, you,” I called, tossing him my phone and my wallet, the thick designer one, stuffed with more cash than he probably made in a month. “You’ll have more after this. Here, take a video of us. Will you?”
He blinked, stunned for a moment, then nodded rapidly, thumbs-up trembling in his grip as he started recording. The poor guy didn’t even know I had just turned him into an accomplice.
I hunched my shoulders, adjusting my posture. I made myself look smaller and weaker, the perfect picture of a scared, cornered teenager. My eyes flicked around the area, analyzing angles, blind spots. I saw the cameras, estimated its field of view. Street CCTV was barely catching the scene from a distance. And we weren’t in frame. I'm certain, because they were among the earliest subjects Mom taught me to avoid. These cops pulled us to a dead zone on purpose.
My stomach twisted.
I shuddered deliberately, backing up until I was in the line of sight, until the cameras could see every inch of me. My voice cracked with just the right mix of fear and fury as I spat, “You fucking pigs! How dare you touch my girlfriend like that?”
I crouched, helping Silver to her feet, guiding her so the cameras could catch the tremor in her steps, the marks where the taser had dug into her skin.
“How dare you point your gun at us and threaten to rape my girlfriend?” I shouted, voice carrying. “I’ll have my lawyer bury you six feet under! We’ll settle this in court… just you see!”
Gasps rippled through the crowd. The narrative was already writing itself, just the way I needed.
I dragged Silver toward the car, shoving her gently into the passenger seat before sliding behind the wheel. The tires screeched as we tore down the street, my pulse steady despite the chaos roaring in my head.
A block away, I made a sharp U-turn, pulling up beside the bystander with my phone. I leaned out, snatched my phone back, then tossed him another wad of cash from the compartment of my car. The wad of cash was thick enough to make his eyes widen.
“Keep your mouth shut until you see the video online,” I said. “And just to drive the point home, you only tell the others what you recorded, do you hear me?”
He nodded so fast I thought his neck might snap.
I slid the phone open, my thumbs flying as I encrypted the file and shot it off to an anonymous burner account. Within seconds, the upload bar blinked green. Then I sent it to one person who could make the mess disappear or turn it into a weapon, BunnyBlade.
As we tore down the street, I caught it in the corner of my eye as Silver’s hair darkened, a slow spill of shadow until it turned black as ink. Onyx sat in the passenger seat now, posture loose, and lips curled in a grin sharp enough to cut glass.
A smirk played on her lips as she turned to me, her dark eyes glittering with an intensity that Silver rarely showed. “Oh, Silver was such a crybaby,” she finally said, her voice a low purr. She leaned back, stretching languidly. “Honestly, I let her have her little moment in the sun, but she just couldn’t handle it. Too fragile. So, I figured, why not just step in and have a little fun myself?” She punctuated her statement with a hearty laugh, slapping her knee with an almost masculine force.
My concern for Silver immediately surfaced. “Can I talk to her?” I asked, my voice betraying my apprehension.
Onyx merely waved a dismissive hand. “She’s asleep, honey. Snoring peacefully, I assure you.”
I narrowed my eyes at her, a knot forming in my stomach. From what I’d understood, the two personalities, Silver and Onyx, were supposed to have equal control, a shared existence. They were supposed to operate on a kind of unspoken agreement, a balance. Yet, I’d also learned that it was possible for one to overpower their counterpart in certain scenarios, to push them aside and take the reins completely. It felt like Onyx was cheating Silver, not just taking her turn, but actively suppressing her.
“She’s really asleep?” I pressed, my suspicion evident.
Onyx chuckled, a dry, mirthless sound. “Asleep, dead to the world, whatever you want to call it. More importantly, she’s blaming herself.”
“It wasn’t even her fault,” I countered immediately, the words feeling righteous and true. Whatever had happened, it couldn't have been her fault.
Onyx merely shrugged, a gesture of profound indifference. “That wasn’t what she thought. Let her grieve a bit on her self-loathing. It’s good for character development.” Her tone was so flippant, so utterly devoid of empathy, that it chilled me.
A sigh escaped my lips. “I guess this date is canceled then.” The thought of spending an evening trying to connect with Onyx while Silver was in distress felt… wrong.
But Onyx wasn’t having any of it. Her dark eyes, full of mischief and a dangerous glint, met mine. “It didn’t have to be.”
Before I could even process her words, her hand dropped from her knee. It was a swift and deliberate movement. My breath hitched in my throat as her fingers casually and confidently found the zipper of my jeans. With a smooth and practiced motion, she pulled it down.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
Onyx answered back with a question of all things. “What do you think?” Her gaze remained fixed on me with a predatory challenge in her eyes as her fingers worked their way inside, finding me.
My pulse hammered. It was a frantic drum against my ribs, as she leaned over, her breath hot and knowing against my ear, before her lips, full and demanding, replaced her hand, sending a shockwave through me as I sped down the highway, held captive by the immediate, undeniable pleasure and the terrifying thought that I was truly, completely, under arrest.