Chương 46: A Path Less Traveled By.

I looked down and groaned. A large circle stared back at me.

"Please tell me that you disguised your super clean and sanitary tunnel as a sewer entrance?"

"Nope." Rigel shook his helmeted head.

"You would be surprised at how extensive the sewer systems are, they reach just about every corner of Chicago." My feet tapped nervously on the lid that would soon become my gravestone.

"That's just a commentary on the dirtiness of the city. And its people. Are you certain you can't just make me an invisibility cloak?"

"Sorry. My powers have yet to cross the barrier of made up magical systems in books." I let out a long, aggravated breath.

"Alright, fine! But the second I see a homeless man pooping or a lizard person, I'm done with all of this. Okay?" His helmet nodded.

"You'll have to beat me to the exit." Something black and small was thrust in my direction by his gloved hands. It was a mouth mask with a small circle embedded in it.

"Is this for the smell? It better have the world's biggest Christmas tree air freshener in it." I started putting it over my face. Rigel had a knife out, sliding it into the tiny crevice to lift the lid.

"It's for the toxic air. That's a carbon filter so that you don't pass out from all of the hydrogen sulfide, methane, and carbon dioxide down there." He pushed up the top, the heavy metal scraping against the sides with the kind of noise that made the hairs raise on my arms. Even with the infrared, just visible in the hole were a few rungs to climb and the rest disappeared into murkiness. His head gestured to get in.

"Ladies first." I let out a shaky laugh, sitting down and placing my legs into the fathomless black hole. Several seconds passed without anything biting them off, so that was a good sign.

"If I'm a lady, the world's in deep trouble." I took a deep breath and glared at him.

"You're absolutely certain there aren't a bunch of radioactive mutant turtles waiting for us down there?"

"If there were, wouldn't they be on our side?" I growled, so he sighed.

"Look down and zoom." I did. The infrared allowed me to see the white outlines of the rungs going all the way down, the flowing stream of… let's call it water for the sake of my stomach, and the narrow walkway beside it. But not a single rainbow colored thermal-indicating creature showed up, not even a shrieking rat.

"Alright, no Splinter so far, so we're good." The cold rungs of the ladder were slightly damp. My heart ached for gloves. Just because my hands were indestructible didn't mean I wanted them coming in contact with anything sewer-related. When we got to the floor, he put a hand on my elbow.

"Now, the only thing that we do have to worry about is that villains and their minions do come down here."

"What?!" I whisper-shrieked. Rigel began walking us forward.

"It's pretty standard. Heroes and sidekicks use the rooftops or fly if they can. Villains go underground and use the sewer." He strode past me and began making his way down the tunnel.

"Many of them actually build their underground lairs down here." I followed tentatively behind. There was a small path on the right side of the sewer while the majority of the space was occupied by a slow moving current of foul… water.

"First of all, this is information that you definitely should have given before we came down here. Secondly, why would anyone want to live in a sewer?" I creeped after him.

"They probably have a lot in common with the rats down here. Speaking of, watch out on your right." Scurrying out from under a goopy pile of what looked like hair and a giant clump of "flushable" wipes was a drenched, screeching rat the size of a football.

"You. Said. No. Rats!"

"I said they would be on our side. Look at the little guy go. He won't cause any trouble." It crawled into a pipe, turned its mottled fur head around and chittered harshly at us. I'd dealt with rats before, of course I had, given where Gran and I lived. Cockroaches too, who hasn't? There's a big difference between finding a little intruder in your home and going into the pit of despair where rats and cockroaches could crawl all over you, probably by combining forces.

Not to mention what they were already crawling in.

"Little? That thing was bigger than a Chihuahua and I'm pretty sure it just swore vengeance against us for disturbing its rest." Rigel kept walking.

"Believe me, there are far worse things to worry about here." It took several whole body shivers to get my disgust out. Then I caught up to him, running on my toes to try to keep my footsteps from echoing off the walls. The circular tunnel was pale white with a dark hole in the middle. You'd think it would be less creepy without the dark, but it just made me feel like I was locked up in a psych ward. And considering its inhabitants, that wasn't far from the truth, except this insane asylum had no guards.

"You'd think the villains would try to make things a little more accommodating if they're going to set up shop down here." Rigel's head kept looking around.

"I'd guess they do for their own places, but a whole tunnel of filth and noxious gases makes a nice barrier and keeps out intruders. And their lairs pretty much act as traps for anyone trying to break in. There is a whole network of villains down here; they have their own cabal, remember? They do fight each other fairly often but they absolutely will protect each other from outsiders. That makes it about as easy to infiltrate for us as them trying to take down the Academy." I lifted up my hands.

"Well, why are we able to take a stroll down here then? Don't they have a non-evil alarm that should be going off, warning them that good people are afoot?" He shrugged.

"They've never come after me while down here, so I'm guessing they have a laissez-faire viewpoint on the matter." My arms crossed over my chest. It wasn't cold at all, but my surroundings made me want to tuck into myself.

"Or maybe you don't trigger their goodness meter enough." This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"Very probable. I'll admit, when I'm down here, I don't feel good at all." We settled into silence as I trudged behind his steel clad frame. The thermal vision on the mask lit up the parts of his body not covered in metal in orange and yellow. It created a center of bright color in the otherwise black and white tunnel. The tunnels themselves were a maze with branching paths and intersections. Rigel either had the path memorized or more likely had a map displayed in his visor telling him where to go.

"How much further? It feels like we have been down here for hours."

"Just a little further and it's only been five minutes."

"Five eternal minutes."

"Let me remind you we had to take this route because you refuse to do any squats or–" His voice cut out as he froze mid step.

"What's wrong?" My voice was barely a whisper as nerves gripped my stomach. I kept glancing around, looking for a giant pile of squirming rats or the heavy footsteps of an R. O. U. S.

"There are voices ahead of us. Follow me and stay quiet." Rigel turned around and moved back down the tunnel slowly, his armor creaking with each step. We went down a side tunnel that extended about fifty feet before reaching a dead end. Liquid poured from pipes out of the walls and luckily there was a bit of extra space as the tunnel widened slightly before ending. We stepped into the small alcove and crouched against the wall.

There wasn't enough space to completely hide us, but it felt like we were mostly obscured from the tunnel behind us. My heart sat in my throat as we waited. The sound of water splashing out of the pipes around us filled my ears, but I heard no voices. If this was his idea for a joke, I was going to freeze time and shove him into the toilet river that flowed next to us. A minute passed before I heard them. Faintly at first then louder, their voices echoing down the sewer tunnel.

I pressed my frozen body against the wall, my cheek against the cool concrete. Rigel did the same and the lights on his suit all dimmed before going completely dark. I could still see back the way we had come. Our little alcove was only slightly wider than the tunnel we came from. Soon a light began to shine at the end of the tunnel. My hand slid up to my mask and clicked off the night vision setting. Their voices were clearer now, they were not worried about being heard or found.

This was their territory and they knew it. A high voice echoed as the light grew closer "Who cares! We got the numbers. I'm not scared of some roid freak." Another deeper voice answered "You weren't there, Probie. If they dope up and you don't have a Lieutenant there to handle it, start shooting and run." I felt the beat of my chest in my ears and tried to breathe as little as possible just to not make a sound. They were about to pass our tunnel.

They were clearly busy talking, maybe they were drunk and wouldn't think clearly, wouldn't notice if they saw something off or heard a small noise. The high voice answered.

"Just wait until I awaken. Then those freaks will see what real power looks like." Okay, one of them wasn't a super, that meant we outnumbered them in that respect. I tried to turn my surroundings into Mr. Cheng's courtyard, sending my mind into a zen place to get ready to find chi points, but honestly, it was hard to think around the knowledge that we were deep underground, next to some villains, literally surrounded by human waste.

A deep chuckle bounced off the sewer walls as two figures with flashlights stepped into my vision. One big and burly with wide shoulders and no neck; the other was gangly and looked like he just got out of high school. They both wore dark green pants with white shirts. The top half of their face was covered in a lizard-themed mask that hugged their face. Well, I'd gotten my lizard people afterall, but unfortunately I couldn't escape like I promised I would.

The pooping homeless man was probably just round the corner, too.

"Probie, the day you get powers will be the day I hook up with Glamour Gal." The small one gave a short, bleating laugh like a little goat.

"Good one, Ping." They were one step away from walking right past us when the big one stopped in his tracks and spun to face his companion. His large arm lashed out and slammed him against the tunnel wall. His voice came out in a growl.

"The Chem Heads might kill you in a scrap, but if you use my name again while on the job I definitely will. Do you understand, Probie?" Ping's back was to us as he pressed his face close to his little friend.

"Probie" let out a small squeak and replied in a shaky voice.

"Yes sir, I understand."

"Good," He stepped back and Probie's feet dropped a few inches to land back on the ground, his flashlight dropping from shaking hands and rolling a foot down our tunnel. Ping turned and strode off out of sight as he continued as if nothing had happened. Probie scrambled to pick up his flashlight. As he stood with it in his hands, the light shined down our tunnel but didn't quite reach us. Still, he stopped for a moment and squinted. I could feel his eyes searching for my shape in the darkness.

My body stilled while it felt like my pulse would jump out of my wrists. They had mentioned shooting, so they definitely had guns. If I stopped time at the right moment, I could grab any speeding bullets or probably better, take the gun away in the first place. Then, Rigel probably had some kind of device or gadget to zap him with or something. Dealing with only one at a time was certainly better than before, unless of course Ping had some super ability that would instantly kill us.

Silence felt suffocating as I waited for him to yell out that he'd found us before Ping's deep voice echoed down the tunnel, barking a command.

"Hurry up, Probie!" The little man shook his head and turned to hurry after his larger boss. My heart began to slow with each footstep that faded into the distance. I turned to Rigel and flipped my infrared vision back on. His body was still lit up where it wasn't covered in armor, but now the center of both gauntlets were glowing white. He stepped close and whispered, "Just minions for The White Dragons. We could have taken them, but they wouldn't be worth much unless they were committing a crime.

Besides, fighting villains down here can get dangerous real quick." He paused to listen.

"We should go." I took a deep breath.

"Good idea." We headed back to the main tunnel and went the opposite direction that our two "friends" had gone. The stream of sewage still flowed by as we walked in silence and a rat the size of a cat ran into a hole in the wall, but I was no longer worried about getting splattered by human filth or small creatures I could easily get rid of. I could at least console myself that I was headed to practice my powers, increase my skills.

Someday, I would get to a point where I wouldn't have to be afraid of strangers walking down the sewers, they would be afraid of me. But, I would need to live through training first. Finally, another ladder came into view. My tentative steps along the trash-littered path quickened as I rushed forward.

"I thought about what you said earlier.

'Ladies first' is a wonderful tradition and I appreciate the sentiment." I scurried up the rungs like a squirrel up a tree.

"You're a real gentleman and I appreciate that about you," I called over my shoulder. The manhole at the top was heavier than it looked. I had to brace myself on the ladder, pressing my shoulder into it to lift it with my legs before shifting it to fall to the side. Clean, cool night air caressed my face as I climbed free of the hole of death. Ripping the respirator from my face, I gasped down as much feces-free oxygen as I could. In a far more dignified manner, Rigel exited the manhole behind me.

He looked me over as he pulled his own breath mask down.

"I didn't know you were claustrophobic. That's probably another reason to use the rooftops instead." I shrugged.

"I'm not. I just have this irrational aversion to being in underground tunnels filled with so much diarrhea that the air will literally kill you. And people who are okay with putting themselves on the dark side of morality." He shook his head.

"That's an oversimplification… but not entirely inaccurate." My eyes glanced around me, seeing the usual tall buildings and bright lights. There was a slight quietness to the area, like the city sounds came from a distance.

"Where are we?"

"We–" Rigel stood up, hands raised to the building in front of us.

"–are going to the mall."