Sometimes work was easy.

  Sometimes you saw the guy fighting a woman for her purse and you could just scoop him up and get an easy pay day out of the way.

  Sometimes.

  The ecosystem of heroes and villains rarely allowed that however.

  Like right now, I was currently chasing down a speedster who liked to take purses and run.

  He was a Middle F, meaning the bastard could run at about sixty miles per hour. My suit could fly faster but that was me in the air. And my suit had a lot less flexibility and precision than some speedster’s feet.

  He was turning corners and cutting through traffic. Down allies and into backyards.

  And I was floating up here, watching him do it.

  “Come on,” I groaned.

  He was trying to lose me. He was running in and out of big buildings and under porch shades and everything.

  All in all, it wasn’t a bad plan.

  “Is he even worth all this?” I wondered.

  “Head in the game Burt. That fast bastard is worth a grand, at least!”

  I sighed and kept following him.

  The problem with hunting criminals is three fold. One, you had to actually pin them down. Two, you had to employ violence to a certain level, and problem number three came barreling down the street at near Mach speed.

  A clean streak of bright purple came in and pinned down my pay day in an instant.

  Purple Streak, Major C and non-native to this neighborhood.

  Somebody had called the Hero Union and they had used my position in the sky to pinpoint the location of the speedster.

  The purple suited lady turned to me and gave me a look. Then she grabbed her ear, as if someone was communicating with her and nodded. Then she gave me a thumbs up.

  “Thank you for your work!” And a wave.

  I waved back and then flew off into the distance, turning on my general camouflage.

  That was the third problem. Heroes. I’d get an assist for that. Maybe a couple hundred dollars, but nothing more.

  This was why I preferred investigating my own cases. That always guaranteed money, especially if I could uncover a crime the Union hadn’t looked into.

  “THIEVES!” Mochi screamed.

  “Its fine Mochi. I don’t think I could have got him without endangering the civilians anyway. And besides, he was doing a lot of property damage.”

  “We had him cornered!”

  I chuckled.

  “We’ll get him next time.”

  “Assuming those damn heroes don’t beat us to it!”

  I flew across the city scape, still a little upset about the whole thing but easing up by the minute.

  The sun was setting and the bright red glow of the horizon lit up the whole of Oak City. I could see the Pier in the distance connecting us to the Atlantic. Ships were coming in, even at this hour. Heroes flew miles away, indistinguishable from birds. Snow fell on us all, a light dusting of white from the thin grey clouds.

  I never got tired of flying.

  “Hey Burt?”

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  “Mhm?”

  “I’m going through that guy’s social media stuff and he sure talks a lot about Dandanail. Is he a fan?”

  Dandanail was one of the smaller mmos with a very loyal and active community online.

  “Pretty sure, yeah. Why?”

  “Well, I play Dandanail. But its a tough game to get into and requires countless hours of grinding.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Not just grinding, Burt. It requires teamwork. Like a lot of it. That’s why the player base dwindled over the years, but its still such an important part of the game. Its a little much for me but the hardcore fans say its what makes Dandanail stand out from so many other mmos. They call it the game that keeps friendships alive.”

  I thought about it for a second. Any lead was a good lead at this point.

  “Any account recently deleted from his friends list or greyed out convos?”

  “I don’t actually have access to his account yet, but I’m guessing his password was the same one he used for everything else.”

  “Careful how you get in.”

  “I always am.”

  Mochi was great with software. She liked logic problems, programming, games, and hacking. Which would be great if it weren’t for the modern day pile of firewalls and privacy laws making hacking a borderline impossibility. But Mochi had enough to work with. She had a clone of Jace’s phone after all, along with most of his recent passwords.

  And more importantly, his biometrics data which had been stored on his phone. Fingerprints, facial recognition, and retina scans. Those would get you into most of his personal stuff.

  I had made him give them to me while I was scanning his phone.

  I found a tall building and perched on it. It was a skyscraper overlooking a downtown market area. The sun blazed down in the distance and the city lights started to turn on, and I just watched.

  This was the best part of my day. There was something about watching the city come to life that just breathed to me. The trains hummed through in the distance, traffic slowed down as the commutes back home came to a halt.

  The city glowed.

  The exosuit was actually super comfortable. I had designed it like that. It was meant to keep me safe, but most of the time I wasn’t really fighting. I didn’t get calls from the Union nor did I have any contacts to inform me of criminal activities.

  Most of the time, I perched on some building and stared out into the world.

  “Uuhh, Burt?”

  “You get in?”

  “Yes, but it’s not that. I’m still looking through his friends list.”

  “Make sure to copy down all of his friends and contacts on the game, along with when they were last active. I’ll look through it when I get home. Its a short lead but its something the Union might miss.”

  “Yeah, I will. But its not that.”

  “What is it?”

  Mochi was silent for a second. Then she forwarded me a message.

  A Save The Date, for a wedding.

  Caleb and Kayla, January 20th, to be married at Oak City Park.

  I laughed.

  “They sent that?”

  “You’re not mad?”

  “Not really.”

  “Really?”

  “Yup.”

  “Why not?”

  I shrugged, even though Mochi couldn’t see it.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You should get a date and go to the wedding with a really attractive woman! You can find one from the Red Light District!”

  “I’m not bringing a prostitute to a wedding, Mochi. And I’m not going.”

  “Why not? Show them up! They’re rushing to get married like this and inviting you? That’s just disrespectful.”

  “They’re not doing this for me, Mochi. They’re doing this for Nana. They want to get married while she’s still around.”

  “Oh.”

  Mochi was quiet for a moment. .

  “She’s not putting them in her will is she?”

  “She might.”

  “Wha-”

  “They don’t need the money, Mochi. And while they’re not her grandkids, she still cares for them. It’d be unreasonable for me to ask her to hate them, especially on her deathbed.”

  “I guess.” Mochi grumbled. “How long does-- you know?”

  “A few more months. Two at least, five at most.”

  “You think she’ll go?”

  “Absolutely. Nana loves them. That’s the point of family, Mochi. No matter what, they love you and care for you. Grandpa did that for me, and so did Nana. I can’t hate them for doing the same for others.”

  And at that, Mochi howled into my ears.

  “Mochi!”

  “That’s sad, Burt! Your grandparents are so nice!”

  “Don’t howl!”

  “Its in my genes to cry like this!” She yelled.

  Then she continued howling.

  “If you stop, we’ll get some Dragon’s Dinner tomorrow, okay?”

  The howling stopped and I could hear Mochi’s chair squeak as she jumped on it.

  “Okay!”

  I smiled and kept staring down at the city.

  I really loved being up here. There couldn’t be much that compared to this, I think.

  New chapter later today as well. It's mostly all written out.

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