"Where have I been?" I asked. "I’ve been doing my duty" I said. I am Crucible.

I sat at the great oval table in the mansion created by my teammate, my ally Von Richter. In his mansion, on his estate. I knew something of estates, and property values; enough to know his kind of wealth was well out of my range. I owned some property, warehouses, tenements, that sort of thing, left to me by an old friend. Nothing like this though.

I laid down the little phial, and slowly started pacing clockwise around the great table.

"I had an… altercation", I scanned the room and looked at each of the team members in turn. I guess the whole effect was a bit melodramatic, but something about standing in a room full of demi-gods does that to me. Something about myself being sheathed in plasma hot enough to melt steel does that to me. It lends weight to the situation and something about the situation itself lent gravity.

"Several nights ago, I was on patrol. I didn’t want the attack on me to change my habits. It was dusk. I like working at dusk, they see me coming. Against the small time purse snatchers and drug dealers, I find fear a most effective weapon. I use it to my advantage.

"I had finished the sweep of the main streets downtown, and was moving in a meandering coarse throught the light industrial area and toward the river. I came across a street gang assembly. Twenty-four or so motorcycles, six cars, two small gangs. I passed, cleared their line of site, and came in low onto the top of a warehouse near them. I stood on the roof and watched them, fires dimmed to almost nothing.

"They were there, I gathered, to settle a boarder dispute. Each side sort of milling in their respective areas. I was watching one side, and then the next in turn. They were definitely preparing for a fight. I was hoping they’d keep it at knives and chains. Knife wounds were almost never fatal in the short run. I’d be able to break it up, and get the injured medical assistance.

"Oracle, can you give me playback on audio segment CR-128? Thanks." I said.

Oracle’s silky feminine voice came from the Artificial Intelligence that acted as our base coordinator/dispatcher. I realize it was made to relay human qualities, but the minutely sarcastic tone in it somehow set me at unease.

"Whatever you wish, Crucible". The audio started.

"’911, how may I assist you?’

‘This is Crucible of the Justice Brigade. I’m standing at 78^th and Waters, watching the gathering of about 50 gang members about to start what I make out to be a street brawl. Please advise.’"

The recording rolled on, but I decreased the volume, the contents weren’t important.

"As we went through the regular crap, who was I REALLY, this number was only for serious blah blah, I noticed a phosphorous blue glow from one side. One gang had broken out an industrial container filled with little phials, like this one. Each had about a teaspoon of glowing blue liquid in it."

"This is not the kind of prop that gangs normally use. Plastic baggies, pocket scales, pipes, even tin foil and toilet paper rolls, but not black anodized metal, airtight containers with packing foam cut to hold 30 glass phials."

"Now I was interested. The gang starts taking this stuff, orally. The real hardcores, and even the girls. And, as I’m watching, it’s like the old celts, they start whooping and taking off their jackets. Some are howling. Others are doing weapons kata, spinning nun-chucks, throwing roundhouse kicks. Posturing I thought." I looked around again. Now I stopped my slow circle of the conference room and sat in my seat, I looked at my hands for a moment, and then returned my gaze to my team-mates.

"The…other side returned suit, butterfly knives, chains. One had a katana, a three foot razor, and he looked like he knew how to use it."

"They gathered, each side in a rough semi-circle. The center was open, and one member of each gang stepped forward. I was really struck how ritualistic all this was. Anyway, there were words exchanged, I didn’t hear them. The ‘blue liquid’ leaders shouts ‘C’mon then motherf****r’, and he steps back and opens his jacket, bear chest facing his opponent. The other guy does a spinning backfist, only he’s got a knife in his hand. There’s this weird sound like a zipper, and the first gang member starts laughing. I think from the angle, the swipe could have spilled his intestines, but the guy’s not even bleeding. I think maybe he’s a small time paranormal. Then I catch it. The sun’s been setting, my thermal vision is pretty well adjusted, and I see he and his fellow gang members are HOT. A hundred and fourty degrees hot. Frying your brain hot. DEAD hot. They’re starting to tear off car doors, kick over stop signs, and stuff. "

"Then, ahh…" I paused. The memory was fresh, and very ugly.

"Then they broke into hand to hand. I’m talking … severed limbs, jaws torn off, crushed skulls. I didn’t act fast enough."

"When I did, too many were already dead, dismembered. I threw up a fire wall before small arms fire started. I got a man hole cover thrown at me, then the bullets. I figured I was at a safe distance, about a hundred and fifty yards, and a moving target…"

I looked about the room, at my team-mates; a difficult moment. This was a difficult profession. Admitting defeat, error, fear. These are things all concerned citizens, I believe, have difficulty with. If we are not supremely competent, then on what grounds do we base our right to be the defender of men? What moral fiber, what characteristic is it which we may hold forth as our right to protect the innocent?

" I took two rounds, nine millimeter I guess, dead center chest. The second hit knocked me out, I think. My fire burned while I fell, protected me from the fall through the warehouse roof below me, and luckily I didn’t lay smoldering on anything flammable. I landed on firm concrete. Any recollection I had faded there.

"I came to less than twenty seconds later. I could hear the gang approaching. In fact I had clear vision just long enough to realize, the leader had kicked in the door and was approaching. This was one of the secure, fire resistant doors required by fire codes, 12 gauge steel re-enforcing, flame-resistant, high-density fiberboard. Not something a hundred and seventy pound male should be able to kick in and crease in half with one kick. Others were crashing through the mesh protected, second story windows. It was frightening, watching them dive through ungracefully, landing on their shoulders, one even on his head, then watching them stand and brush themselves off, smiling like lunatics.

"Yes frightening. I had no doubt that I could take them. I only doubted that I could leave without inflicting severe damage on them. They would not back down. Even my point of entry on the roof was now plugged by several gang members which had gained access to the roof. Probably just jumped up there."

"I thought if I could take the leader down, I could intimidate the rest of the gang into surrender. I lifted off the ground to about twenty feet, not quite half way to the roof. Flared my flames and blasted the leader hard, right in his stomach. Not as hard as I could, but hard. He slid neatly into the stack of cardboard cartons I’d aimed him for. I flared again and shouted ‘Surrender!’"

"The leader laughed. He laughed very loudly."

"’Whooooo’, he said, like the blast was just strong coffee. Almost like he’d enjoyed it. Now I’m wondering, raised body temps, light natural armor, I wondered if they had something like a very minor version of my powers. He leapt to the second floor catwalk some twelve feet directly about him, grabbed the rail, and nimbly swung onto the metal grilled walkway. Then he gave the order to attack, and the air was filled with their bodies as they sprang for me. I approached the roof, but some were already deftly swinging hand over hand on the ceiling supports toward me. I didn’t consider any of them real threats until the small arms came out again. I laid a suppression fire into one of the corners, and pressed myself against it. Before they had a chance to act, I’d erected another firewall around me, and then burned a hole through the wall to the outside. By the time they’d gotten through the wall I was at a height of two hundred feet and climbing."

"That’s when I saw the police. They’d sent three cruisers, and more were in view. I could also see two APCs approaching. Swat units in the open hatches. Someone had taken me seriously."

"Then I saw why. Three dozen dismembered corpses, some still being mutilated by straggling gang members. That’s an estament. I don’t think they’re done actually assembling the bodies even now."

"It was like a war zone. No, more like a gladiator pit with lions mauling some poor peasants"

"I approached the area which was fast becoming the police command area. I landed near the officer who seemed to be in charge, introduced myself, and was in turn introduced to Lieutenant Chadeau and a Doctor Vognor, as he said it, German fellow, blond hair, tall. He’s got those little circular glasses, and is wearing a field jacket. I make him to be a high level scientist from the overall appearance, but the kind of scientist who managed to still have social and physical skills. Then I see his name tag ‘Wagner’, and realize this guy was very German, and I’m expecting this heavy accent from bad forties movies."

"He had only the accent of a well educated, East coast man. He told me that the gang in the warehouse had acquired some serum from a facility where he worked, and that they must, at all costs, be contained."

"The word ‘acquired’ in his speaking had worried me. Acquired or had been given for testing?"

"He broke me from my thinking by pointing at the intersection and parking area adjacent to the warehouse, littered with body parts."

"This didn’t feel to me like some glorious rescue of a fair maiden from distress, or the evacuation of a crumbling bridge. This was frying kids jacked up on some satanic pharmaceutical, to prevent them from vivisecting more innocent bystanders. I wondered how long this stuff lasted, if they’d go on a night long breaking and entering, and possibly murdering spree. Regardless of why it needed done, it did."

"I flew back to a height of about two hundred feet. In the next several minutes, I herded three back to the control area. As I gave up hunting for others and returned, I saw the police joined by a late-middle aged man who had probably arrived in the nearby waiting helicopter. I hadn’t heard the chopper approach. Even as I looked at it, I noticed it was very quiet. Senator, General in civvies, mega-corp head, I don’t know, but powerful."

"The police had set flood lights all around the warehouse, and were busily constructing sandbag nests for some kind of automatic weapon. A closer look revealed it to be a fully automatic, belt fed fourty-millimeter grenade launcher. I tried to get closer to see if they were using tear gas rounds for crowd control. The two men manning the nest looked really nervous until I noticed the ammo canister. Stenciled on the side was ‘high-frag’. I didn’t know they made shrapnel rounds for this particular weapon, until then. I backed away from the nest."

"One of the APCs had backed down the street, and was now picking up speed for a ram on the front warehouse doors. Then I got it. They planned to bust the door and level the warehouse with grenades, slaughtering the gang members inside. Just as my gears were clicking, the old gentleman’s gears must have been clicking too, and he orders ‘Attention men, weapons to bear on Crucible, mind your cross-fire.’"

"Now I’m thinking he’s military for sure, at least ex-military, and I see a lot of these men aren’t cops at all, not even SWAT. They look like urban commandos. There were twelve or more muzzles pointed at me. Light assault weapons, enough to kill me."

"The pseudo-military man says ‘Mr. Crucible, please remain where you are.’ Then he lifts a small hand held cell phone or something to his mouth and waits. The APC hits the door. The door buckles, and some gang members start coming out. The military man says into the device ‘Light weapons units, commence fire.’ M-16’s and shotguns start erupting, and I’m clenching my fists. The APC backs out, clear of the blast radius of the grenades, and the man says ‘Alpha, Beta confirm clear.’"

"’Confirmed’, crackles back twice, and he glances over at me, his eyes are clear and sharp, like he can read me, like he’s telling me it has to be done. He says ‘Alright boys. Rock and roll.’ And they empty the canisters."

"A couple minutes later, the smoke cleared. A fire suppression team was sent in to extinguish the flames. I looked at the man in charge and requested that he at least let me put out the fires. He agreed, and I sped off to the warehouse, what was left of it."

"There was a girl inside, under some crates. I found her because she was crying loudly. Amazingly she didn’t appear injured. She had a stain of blue down her shirt. When she took the liquid, I guess she’d spilled some in her excitement, half maybe."

"She was crying and doubled over. I carefully examined her, made sure she didn’t have a stomach wound and asked her if she could walk. She ah…. She spasmed a couple times and grasped at me. Most people don’t grasp at me unless they’re in mortal fear. I watched her temperature drop to about, what? Fifty degrees?…In seconds. I guess all the energy expent in the berserk was now being reclaimed. She went into something like diabetic shock, faster and harder than I’ve ever seen before. I gave her an insulin shot from my field kit and rushed her to the ambulances across the police lines. She was bucking fiercely and choking. She’d swallowed her tongue"

"When we landed, I cleared the airway, her breaths were ragged. Her heart stopped twice in the next eight minutes. The second time, we couldn’t revive her."

"The man in charge puts out his hand and thanked me for my assistance. He said he was sorry he had to do what he did. I felt sick and numb with the death around me"

"My God." I said, nearing tears. My voice quivered slightly, as I finished.

"He, ah.. he handed me this three page printout. He said there were many others that could be somehow endangered if any of this were to get out, gesturing at the printout. I didn’t get it at the time. When I read the list of names, mine was on it, my civilian name, and the names of my children. A not so subtle warning to stay clear of the incident"

I sank back into my chair. Sometimes I feel bad unloading this kind of emotional burden onto my team members. This however, was necessary. I didn’t feel better after telling them, but I at least had a group of peers who could possibly understand my burden. And, I could hope, stay by my side in the hellish future which was certain to come.

I am Crucible, and I would rather face the pain of events like this than the gnawing realization that I’d sat idly by and let my world crumble, crumble and burn.