Secrets Revealed [Open]

[A.G.]

"You're not trying to outrun me, are ya? You must not know who I am."



"Crap, crap, crap..."



That was the mantra of the day, or well, night, for our stellar protagonist, Ellie Cullington... Or as she was more commonly known (not really) while in her favorite all-black leather suit and iconic (not really) headlights, The Most Super Awesome Super Heroine of All Super Heroines, Hotline (a title she totally did not invent for herself). Unfortunately, tonight wasn't going quite as super awesome as she'd hoped it would, not by a long shot. What started out as simple reconnaissance over a typically dirty area of Jump City's industrial district had somehow taken almost every possible wrong turn it could have for Hotline, who was now running with great haste to make a stealthy-esque getaway from a steel mill factory swarming with thugs. Almost literally, if you could see it from the overhead view she originally had before a leaky pipe gave way beneath her, ironically giving her a-way.



Of course, this wasn't exactly the best time to pat herself on the back for her own genius wordplay, so for the time being, the junior information broker let it slide.



The thugs weren't that big a deal; There were a bunch of them, but not so many that the elusive Ellie couldn't escape, at the very least. Losing them was the hard part, but by the time she took to the rooftops and made her transition from the industrial areas further into Jump's more commercial districts, there wasn't a bad guy to be found. Which, honestly begged the question of why she was still running-- or rather, who she was running from. The answer was... complicated.



It was her brother.



Of all the nights that dimwitted half-hero could have chosen to go out patrolling Jump City without telling anyone, he chose the same night that Ellie had decided to gather some intel. The extremely improbable, yet inevitable collision itself occurred in the darned steel mill, just before she fell-- In fact, if she hadn't been sneaking about on that faulty piping to begin with, she might not have ever been seen by him! Life was a lemon, sometimes. And now, just to protect her identity, she found herself trying to outrun a bona fide Streak; Something she'd never been capable of before. First time for everything though; Especially with the stakes set so high.



Through the back alleyways she sped, left turn by right turn by left as she attempted to counter speed with maneuverability in tight spaces; Something not too many Streaks (save Gramps, but he was the maaaaaan) were good at when moving top speed. She needed to find a rooftop she could grapple-hook her way onto, and try to lose him with height; Of course, she had to distance herself away from him enough to pull that off, which was proving increasingly difficult due to the fact that HE WOULDN'T STOP CHASING HER LONG ENOUGH FOR HER TO TRY IT. It took the patience of a saint not to just turn around and smack him something fierce like only Ellie could; Even when he didn't realize it, he was being an annoying older brother.



She eventually got her chance in the form of Blake 'The Streak' Cullington accidentally tripping over a couple empty store totes and crates that Hotline may or may not have accidentally knocked into his path as she passed them. Taking immediate advantage of the distraction, she reached down into her utility belt, grabbed her grappling hook and fired away. The building she'd chosen was at least three stories high; He wasn't getting up there. By the time she was being lifted up onto it's rooftop, he was only just recovering from the fall. He'd had to forgive her for that later.



With a nimble vault and flip, Hotline cleared the side of the rooftop with ease, before looking around. She had to figure out her next move now; With Blake down below, it was important to move in a direction that... wait.



The dreadful sound of running footfalls closing in echoed in the heroine's ears as she looked to the side of the building she'd just cleared. Blake, in a show of ingenuity that even Ellie hadn't seen before, was running in a circle; A perfect circle, moving fast enough to not only create a streak, but literally use it like some insane staircase, dropping layer after layer of streaked afterimages to 'climb' his way up.... all the way up to the rooftop Hotline now stood dumbfounded on. His landing wasn't as graceful as hers, but who cared about that; He was legit hax mode at the moment, as far as Ellie was concerned.



"...Crap," She muttered once more as a bead of sweat slowly made it's way down the side of her face. Blake, in white-and-blue-clad tights (she was never a fan of his take on the original design), simply smirked semi-victoriously, full-arrogantly.



"Still think you can outrun The Streak? Why don't you do yourself a favor and just come along quietly."

[Kenni]

“The Streak, eh? Jump’sake man, that better not mean what it sounds like.”

It was a meeting of 3 egos, but from the little dialogue so far it was Streakman over there for Ego #1. Seriously, it had taken him a good half hour to stop laughing years ago when he’d first heard of The Flash, and now this guy?

Ego #2 cleared his throat, got his giggles under control, and pulled a little candy-roll out of his utility belt, offering it to the cornered, caught-up-to Hotline.

“We meet in the weirdest ways, ma'amselle. Life Saver?”
Whether that would be Speedy’s role in this meeting of the 3 or not had yet to be determined.

It had been a relatively peaceful patrol that evening.
If you counted coming across an altercation between and involving hired thugs in a warehouse, then for curiousity’s sake keeping tabs on the absconding of a seemingly unrelated party who was soon followed closely by a blue-white blur as…peaceful.

The archer had witnessed it all; the chase, the falls, the triumphant one-ups they’d had on each other, and after barely keeping up with the speedster and his quarry, it had come to a standstill.

Maybe it was just some harmless courting ritual, or a easily a’righted dispute between comrades, but when a young lady was involved, Speedy was more than interested.
This one didn’t seem to like being chased, for one thing. 

“I’m not gonna pretend to know what’s goin’ on with you two, but it’s been quite the Tom and Jerry about town I’ve gotta say. Bravo.”

The ginger archer slid down from the neighbouring skyscraper, recalled his own grappling apparatus into the arrow which cased the components as soon as he made land a little ways in front of Hotline, or, as he affectionately remembered her, ‘Alleygirl’.

With the (mostly) nimble display of gymnastics she’s taken to make it this far, however, maybe he’d demote? graduate her to Alleycat., though.

“So on to my question; this dude bothering you?” Speedy popped a pineapple candyring into his mouth, then tossed her the rest of the roll and rolled his shoulders a bit from his continuous grapple-slide-chasing activity.
Alleycat had been pretty resourceful in that impossible struggle against the Super Mario baddies once upon a time, and while Speedy wasn’t 100% yet on either her motives or affiliations, Hotline didn’t seem to warrant too much suspicion.

Maybe he was just soft on the ladies.
Well, he’d have to play fair until more facts were laid bare.

“Or maybe it’s the other way around..? Tell me a story, kiddos.”

[A.G.]

Hotline rolled her eyes beneath the headlights that concealed them. Blake couldn't be a cornier cartoon hero if this was a saturday morning show with popcorn included. If she didn't already feel absolutely horrible about the fact that no matter how this ended she was probably going to lie to someone somehow, she'd have smacked him for that 'outrun The Streak' bit. However, just as she went to retort, Hotline found herself cut off by a seriously familiar voice-- Or, well, a laugh.

And THEN a familiar voice.

"Speedo!" Hotline practically yelled in relief, turning to spot the avid archer as he made his way on over to standoff central, Hotline edition. A relatively familiar face was so darned welcomed right about now... Hotline had officially had enough of familiar relative faces, at this point. With a quick meet and greet, she took a piece of candy from Mr. Archer, but decided to play with it a bit rather than eat it; Goodness knew she could use the distraction to keep her hands busy. "Just admit it already; You've totes been stalking me. Well I'll have you know that I normally like my dates to be within visual sight from the start, if you don't mind?" The black-clad broker of secrets teased, mockingly placing her hands on her hips as if she were actually upset.

Meanwhile, a dumbstruck Blake 'The Streak' Ellison could only watch, completely confused as to what was going on, until Speedy SORTA brought things back on topic. Slightly miffed, The Streak stated his case. Well, sorta. "...Wait, you saw me chasing her? Did you see where I CAUGHT HER? Or heck, metric ton of thugs I found her with? I'm just as confused as you, and Little Black Riding Hood here won't stop running long enough to touch basis!" He complained, pointing to a very mockingly innocuous Hotline who, for the fun of it, gave her best 'Well, yeah, but you just started chasing me out of the blue, so who's fault is it REALLY when it comes to that-- Plus, you're sorta someone I can't really be seen with/by since it'll blow my cover if you get too close and figure something out, so just chill out dude' shrug.

...She was really good at expressing herself like that. "Yeah, well that's not important. What IS important is, Speeeeeeedo, this guy's bothering me. Do some of your famous Archery-fu on him!" The young superheroine countered, taking a step or two back as The Streak took a step or two forward. She was doing a very, very good job of staying just far away to avoid Blake getting a good look at the lower, exposed part of her face.

[Kenni]

"That name should bother me more, but I just look so good in one," mused the archer, tapping his chin.
With a flourish, he assured her that the nextime they met, it certainly wouldn't be like this.

"Apologies, apologies~. No better than your Streakerstalker am I? I'll whistle atchya nextime, Hotstuff. Like a kettle! It'll be our signal."

Well. He didn't make any promises, but he'd make an effort to at least alert her it seemed.

"I dunno, man; did we go over our Possible Captive checklist? If she was makin' a break forrit, surely she's not totally if at all friendly withe baddies, right? Why not round them up first with your nake--ermn Streakin' Speed first, gethem to shore up your intel?"

All joking aside, and after a surprisingly informative shrug from the boys' mutual object of stalking, he and Streak's mutual object of in jest or in actuality ire was suddenly giving them a whole lot of space to dance. Speedy could always appreciate a good workout, and guys liked to settle matters between them with a heavy hand, didn't they? Maybe after he smacked some sense into the other guy..

"Let's make some progress here, buddy. We've gotta reach an understanding sometime, eh? Welcome to Speedy's Why Chasing Skirts--ermn, Leather--Without Consent or Cause, Is Rude, 101."

A gesture to Come At Me, Bro later, and he was fully relaxed, ready for the testy tightclad unknown to him to advance.

[A.G.]

From two different ends of the building, the siblings gave two very different reactions to Speedy's eventual decision to stand up to the Streak; Hotline's already rather amused smile widened further as she sunk even further into the background, whereas the Streak, equally amused (and still somewhat irritated by this whole farce) took a step forward, aggressively. "Wait. You wanna fight me? You sure about that? Or maybe you just don't know what I'm about." Blake was always the cockiest Streak known to the family, and arguably one of the fastest. Sure, this was Speedy, one of the more renowned Titans in Jump City, but the Streaks had never been too concerned with rank and status; They were 'pure' heroes, and (at least in Grandpa Godric's case) didn't really see any hero as better than any other.

Blake, in particular, just thought he was better than most heroes. As if to prove this fact to Mr. Speedy, he took the initiative the guy was waiting for; Quickly dashing towards him, but not on a collision course. Instead, he dashed past him, and made three sharp, right-hand turns-- the trademark semi-solid blur following behind him-- until he came to a sliding stop, just short of the blur marking where he'd started. Yes, he was pretty quick; He'd formed an almost complete square around Speedy, just to show off if the grin on his face and his crossed arms were anything to go by. It'd disappear in a few seconds, but that was totally not the point (probably). The point was to show up the smart alec. "I don't think you can keep up, kid." He noted, leaning against the wall he'd formed. 

Good for Blake. In his hubris, he'd cut off his and Speedy's view of Hotline both, which she took as her cue to exit, stage right. She'd have to apologize later for bailing out on their second date, she mused, while leaping off of the side of the building's edge. He'd probably forgive her for it; After all, it was his own fault for cheating on her with Raven, or so the rumors went. Hell hath no betrayal tendencies like a Hotline scorned, as the saying went!

[Kenni]

"What you're about..? You're 'The Streaker'. Of course I know; 9 o'clock news, Jump Penitentiary's newest tenant."

As he took more digs at who he may or may not ever find out was Hotline's brother, the archer had no doubt that as soon as their backs were turned and the opportunity presented itself, the goggle-laden lady of the three would hightail it out of there. Hotline was often a disappearing act waiting to happen.

But that was fine.

"They may call me Speedy, but you're right; it's not for my track and field skills, I'll admit."

Track aside, his tracking skills were pretty decent, if the little sample of Cyborg's ingenious tracking tech the archer had slipped into Hotline's candyroll was any indication. Disguised as one of the fruit-flavoured treats and nestled snugly into the end of the roll, depending on how quickly she worked through the container, he'd have her exact location set and plenty of time and means to find her for a follow-up.

On the off-chance she decided to be different and quirky and eat the roll backwards, not only would the signal drop, but Hotline'd either get a toothache, or a new sailor in her stomach juices for a few hours.

Back to his little challenge.
He simply waited for the speedster to get comfortable, then windmill-flicked the faster guy four times in a row, starting with his pinky and on 'til his pointer finger.

Square in the forehead.
To just plain get a rise, pick a fight.

"But hey, iddisn'a total misnomer~."

Speedy wasn't interested in speed match with this joker. He did feel like letting loose a liddle; it had been ages since he'd tried matching brawn with the enhanced speed of the likes of the Flash family, after all. If anything, it would keep turn his hitherto humdrum patrol mission into an interesting anecdote to tell the others, and Kid Flash, when next they met.

Besides, if Hotline had just been barely escaping the guy ( and she seemed to have more experience getting scarce when he was tailing her), Speedy or not, the ginger didn't think he'd be having much luck outrunning this Streak anytime soon.

Speedy immediately lowered his stance after the onslaught at Streak's forehead, one fist a few centimetres in front of his mouth, the other hovering over a raised knee. An imbalanced stance, in some respects, but for now, he was just messing around.

He also favoured his arms and wasn't about to risk them getting ripped off at the speed of sound while lashing out at his opponent.