Rocksy dragged her rocky fingers along the brick wall, cutting grooves into it as the sound filled the air. She slowly stepped forwards, clothes rippling in a soft breeze as she watched the so called hero on their patrol. As she got closer she yelled out to get their attention, cracking her knuckles with a sick grin on her face, not bothering with a mask.

"Oi fucking hero. I got a question for you!" She snarled. "Wanna sign my fucking fist before you go back to licking boots! I'll bring it nice and close to your fucking face so you can't ignore that the fuck is happening!" She paused, waiting for the hero to act and giving the crowd time to run.

Neptune, for his part, was having a relatively nice patrol.

A flight around town, a couple of selfies for awestruck bystanders that wanted one with a hero, assistance with helping children cross roads...to quote a certain Cubicle of Ice: Today was a good day.

He reckoned he would end patrol with two vegan chocolate chip cupcakes. His treat to himself, given that it was a cheat day and he thought he'd deserve a nice treat once in a while.

He bit into half of the chocolate chip cupcake and was about to finish chewing when the rock clad parahuman dropped in to say hi.

It was going so nicely.

Striker held out one finger, telling Rocksy to hold on a minute, hurriedly attempting to swallow the contents of his cupcake. He then held aloft the other unopened cupcake packet towards her and smiled, his left cheek still crunching through a lump of the cupcake. "Would you like one?" he politely asked, mouth quarter full.

Changing her full right arm to stone she tried to sock striker straight in the face as he ignored her and instead just ate a fucking cupcake of all things infront of her. She moved in closer as she struck, going for another punch into his chest, big heavy hits as she screamed in anger and frustration. "TAKE THIS FUCKING SERIOUSLY. I AM GOING TO BEAT YOUR FUCKING ASS" She yelled petulantly

Striker sighed. One look at Rocky's eyes and it's the same look he's seen in close to, what, 13 years in the Protectorate? An angry child, looking for repose, and attempting to achieve it by taking it out on the rest of the world.

This job never changes.

With his hand already stretched out in his attempt to offer his cupcake, he impeded the trajectory of Rocksy's punch. A wild, untrained punch, fueled by anger. He saw that coming.

Still, she was moving, so he took the opportunity to add to the counter. The trick with punches like these is to use the opponents own momentum and weight against them. Brute Judo, as he liked to call it. Neptune shifted his footing to Rocksy's side, before pushing her with the right amount of super strength in him, and further directing that punch into the concrete. He quickly backed away, flying 8 feet or so above Rocksy.

Rocksy was easily tossed to the ground, the concrete cracking under the force of Rocksy's punch. Catching her first punch in his hand probably hurt with that kind of force behind it. The teen yelled in pain and anger as cracks started to form up her stone up, quickly pulling herself up and glaring at the other cape. "Take this fucking seriously! Fight me you ass!" She growled, rolling her shoulders as she ran over to a car, grabbing the edge of the metal frame.

As she did, her body started to shift, metal with angry red streaks of pain streaking across it formed a new body, slightly taller with her left hand forming a serrated blade, her stone fist morphing as her thumb and pinky became metal hammer heads. Slamming into the car with the metal blade she rended the roof off, tossing it towards the other cape.

Damn, it did hurt.

But what hurt Neptune most was...

It made him drop his cupcake

And now it was mushed into smithereens.

Aw.

Striker folded his arms and watched with intrigue as he floated. Touch based changer depending on what she held on to. Durability was going to be an issue. Maybe the hidden aspect of his powers could hamper her down?

He's going to have to get up close.

As the roof hurtled towards Striker, he calmly stretched one hand out, and from it, a light-blue construct of a baseball glove matching the colour of his cape emerged, catching the roof mid air. He gently set it down.

"Hey! No littering!"

"I'LL LITTER ALL OVER YOUR FUCKING FACE YOU FUCKING HERO PRICK FUCKER" She yelled, charing in as striker set down the roof, swinging the serrated blade with reckless abandon, trying to hit their limbs, aiming only enough to be sure she wasn't going to decapitate or maim the hero, just hurt him, hurt him real fucking bad.

This time she was ready for him if he tried to catch or block the blade, swinging her hammer hand down a moment after swinging with the sword, trying to force it to cut in deep to whatever she hit,

Striker frowned. "Hey, language! Jeeze, kids these days don't know the art of banter."

First, Striker quickly clad himself with armour. He needed to. The kid doesn't know it, but that bade was definitely going to kill him if that landed.

Neptune didn't block or catch the blade, but simply ducked slightly below his larger opponents field of vision.

He immediately tried to follow it up with an uppercut across her chin. Though he avoided the blade with his uppercut maneuver, the hammer got him, sending him soaring into a wall.

He coughed, spitting out a bit of bile. Now that hurt like hell.

Rocksy grinned to herself as the hammer blow send striker flying. "THATS WHAT YOU FUCKING GET!" she cheered, pulling her blade from where it dug into the ground slightly, the end of it getting ripped off. She bent down, using the hammer to crack the stone around it and dig out the loose bit, reconnecting it. "Fuck that shit fucking hurts." She mumbled, looking up to see Striker pulling themselves out of the wall.

"You want some more little fucking hero bitch, or are you gunna stay down like the lapdog you are! Huh!" She taunted, grinning as she let the other cape collect themselves. No fun it it if they won't fight back.

Striker got off the wall and brushed his shoulder pads. He sighed.

"Nah. I think I'm done for the day."

He began to walk away, whistling. His armour form was still on though, and one eye silently kept looking at his six.

Rocksy laughed, turning to what little of the crowd was left watching and recording the fight as rubberneckers are ought to do. "See this fucking bullshit. Hero gets hit once and fucking gives in. Decides you all can fucking get murked for all he cares. They're all the fucking same, lapdog bitches and bastards that couldn't give a fucking rats ass about helping people who need it."

Her back was turned to the crowd. He bet on her being the showman gladiator type. He had seen so much of these capes that it made too much sense with all of her taunting.

Perfect.

Striker rotated his heel and kicked off from the ground, flying straight towards the debutant. If Rocksy turned, her face would be greeted by the construct of a big blue fist.

Rocksy turned almost in slow motion as she heard the sound of striking kicking off the ground to see the sight of Neptune rocketing towards her. She tried to bring up her hands to block, forcing the blue construct to cut itself on the serrated metal, but couldn't tell how much effect that had as she got throw through a car and into a building.

She stepped out, holding her left arm with the right and grunted as she reattached the blade She stabbed the remains of the car and let herself grow to full size at 8 feet tall, big metal jaws and spiked feet digging into the ground. "YOU'LL FUCKING PAY FOR THAT BITCH."

Neptune flew up 14 feet, shaking his hand. Even through his construct, landing that punch felt like striking at a wall bare knuckled.

There was a measure of anger in Striker when Rocksy's words finally clicked. "You do not get to judge who is a hero and who isn't. Until you've worked 36 hours non-stop to remove rubble after an Endbringer attack to save a crying mother and her son from being crushed to death, until you have to fight an A-class villain holding kids hostage in a maternity ward, until you have to survive having your throat ripped out by a terrorist Parahuman to stop them from tearing an entire city apart, until you know what the satisfaction of saving a life feels like while being content with throwing away your own, you are in no position to decide what makes a hero. What is a hero to you anyway?"

He exhaled, calming himself down.

"Wow, don't I sound so very self-aggrandising?" He chuckled and shook his head dismissively. "My apologies. Besides, if you wanted to murk someone, you already would have done it! Maybe there's some good in you there kid. You're definitely hero material, whether you realise it or not. No pun intended..." he smiled, readying himself for the next onslaught.

"SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP" She screamed, wildly swinging her hammer arm around as she charged forwards, spiked feet leaving holes in the road. "ALL YOU KNOW IS HURTING PEOPLE, PRETENDING YOU SAVE THEM, EAT MUFFINS AND FUCKING LIE" She yelled, leaping forwards at him, too focused on attacking to realise that her trajectory would smash her into civilians if she sailed past Striker

Where did it go wrong for this child.

Neptune is left to wonder if a Protectorate hero had done her wrong somewhere down the line. He would have to look into it, for her sake.

But right now, she was bull-rushing without care. Straight towards....

Oh no.

Striker crossed his arms over each other and created a riot shield, which was burning brighter than any other construct he had created tonight. He charged forward, dauntless. She was going to hurt people. She needed to be stopped.

Rocksy's eyes glinted deviously as she slammed into the shield the serrated dirk scratching across it hooked over the top as she grabbed it with the remaining fingers in the hammer hand. "JUST LOOSE ALREADY!" She snarled, as her face started to take on a familiar blazing blue tint, her body slowly absorbing the material from the shield and transforming her head and torso into the forcefield. The whole prosess would take about 4 seconds, unless neptune dropped the forcefield early, ending the attack and letting her slice him. "FUCKING SURRENDER, SAY I WIN. TELL THEM ALL YOUR A FUCKING COWARD"

"Leave! Now!" he shouted with a ragged breath.

He noticed Rocksy was absorbing his energy. Was this going to make life hell? No time to consider. If the child was going to be reckless, she would end up hurting people while trying to satisfy whatever misguided sense of justice she felt when pummeling Protectorate heroes. This wasn't going to pan out well.

He pushed back for four seconds and worked as hard as he could to extend it for three seconds more. If she wanted his energy, she could have it.

It was time to employ a wrestling maneuver.

Once he was certain there were no civilians behind him, he dramatically loosened his pushing force in the bullfight, using his arms to redirect Rocksy's momentum and quickly slipping behind her. He tightly grabbed her leg, forcing her to trip on her own.

After four seconds of transforming her chest and head into the hard light, with veins of the energy running across her arms and legs she started hammering the shield, her strength apparently being increased by the tougher material forming her body. As the forcefield fell either from Rocksy's attacks or Striker dropping it he tried to trip her.

Unfortunately Rocksy might be a dumb brawler, but she adapted to the judo moves already, having made her feet into metal spikes to dig into the ground. As Neptune attempted to trip her, she was planted firmly in the road and instead she just attempted to brutally slam him into the ground with both fists cupped together. "Stay down you fucking lapdog"

When Striker wasn't able to pull at Rocksy, he could've sworn he did a cartoon gulp.

He saw the shadow of two fists hurtling at him and rolled, dodging just in time. However, his cape got ensnared by the fists. This affected his stride, causing him to clumsily tumble rather than roll away. He crashed into a garbage can.

Neptune got up and dusted himself. In a twisted way, he was proud that the child was learning. "You saw that coming! Nicely done. Don't let anger get to ya kid. The tunnel vision's gonna cost ya."

Striker re-armoured himself with his energy now, creating a construct of a spear and a shield along with it. Did he tussle with Rocksy back there for the requisite amount of time needed? He had to find out.

As striker rearmoured themselves they would see Rocksy barrelling down on them, no matter how big or unwieldy Rocksy got they still seemed able to mauver just fine. Lucky Stikers choice to keep the barrier up until she physically broke through it and hit him resulted in her getting weakened.

This was likely of little comfort to him as she lashed out with aggressive sword swings and hammer blows, mixing in the occasional kick or elbow to try and overwhelm him with the sheer amount of attacks.

Spear and shield, a combo's he's been practicing with lately. An offensive and defensive mix. He's still rusty with this combo, and his entire power as a whole, which was the reason he was taking a few cuts and gashes.

But he wasn't going to be a complete punching bag. He would try to block with his shield and counter with a spear jab. He hoped the weakness would tear Rocksy down. He was probably going to be running on fumes from his own power soon.

Whilst Striker was flagging, Rocksy seemed intent to carry on with pure grit and determination, even when each blow she landed was met with two or three from Neptune, she simply refused to go down, her arms speckled with holes and torn away pieces of rock and steel falling to the floor.