THE MOMENT
"What a hero, took down as many innocents with them as they could." Tina's ears perked up at the possibility of being appalled. She'd been on her lunch break, ready to order alone in a diner, when she heard the snippet of conversation. She turned quickly to see two teenage girls behind her. They were too young and too female to be idolizing such an atrocious hero. This wouldn't do at all.
"What a horrible thing to say, young lady," Tina stood and spun around to address them. She focused on the teen with long, dirty blonde hair and ignored the other one, a teen with dark hair and a yellow hair band. "It's severely unladylike to look up to a murderous hero, not to mention the fact that anyone like that shouldn't be considered a hero at all! I demand to know who you're talking about to report them to the Heroe's League. The teen she'd been focused on returned the stare for several seconds, then she turned back to her friend without acknowledging Tina.
"You should've seen it, there was fire everywhere," she giggled at her friend.
"EXCUSE ME," Tina wasn't going to be ignored.
"Yes, what is it?" The teen looked up at her again, this time with a friendly smile.
"I demand to know the hero in question!" she said.
"Huh? Oh, sorry, I hadn't realized you were talking to me," she said. "You know... because I wasn't talking to you."
"There's an evil hero out there killing innocents! Is this a game to you?" Tina asked. The blonde, Christine, shook her head.
"No. Do you want to make it into a game? What are you betting?" she asked.
"I gotta ...," the other teen, Karin, mumbled something quietly and moved to leave, but Christine held out her hand.
"Hold on, Karr. This nice lady won't bother us for too long," she smiled at her friend, then focused on Tina again, without a smile.
"So are we gaming, or are you leaving us alone?" Christine asked.
"Where are your parents?! Do they know what a little ingrate they raised?" Tina scowled as she walked away. She wasn't going to put up with them any longer. If they were talking about it, it was probably already known. She would visit the Heroe's League herself just to be sure someone was addressing the villainous hero taking down innocents.
She had only just made herself comfortable in the booth when she heard them talking and decided not to stay after all. She walked out in a huff as the girls started talking again.
"You okay?" Christine asked Karin, and she nodded.
"Thanks," she said.
"No sweat, she's an idiot anyway," Christine giggled again. "Can you imagine? She created a whole fiction in her head just from a single overheard line out of context," she smiled and straightened her back while bobbing her head up and down to mock the woman that had already left. "WhO'S the MURDereR!??" they both laughed for a bit longer, and then Christine continued the story.
"So, anyway, yeah. He's the real deal. The fire had pushed everyone to the rooftop, and he flew them down with him, as many as he could at a time, to save them. He did it in like four trips while the other heroes were dealing with the fire and keeping the structure up."