Decker Chapter 8

Hero Diary:

My dad used to say that being a hero is about responsibility, not about popularity.  Yes, I do know where he read that.  Thank you very much Hero Diary.  It doesn’t matter where he got it.  It’s true.

The news that evening talked about how White Knight and Black Hat had located a theft ring and broken up a giant underground party.  Reporters speculated about the battle that must have taken place between the two great heroes and the thugs that were running the operation.

Decker flipped from channel to channel, trying to catch every reporter’s opinion.  She didn’t mind that there was no mention of White and Black having help.  It wasn’t a surprise that the news was giving the two full credit.  Decker had convinced herself that she didn’t mind that much.  After all; she wasn’t a hero for the fame.

Besides, Decker had been long gone when the cameras had shown up, and neither White Knight nor Black Hat had stayed to be interviewed long.  They had important hero business to do, most likely, so it wasn’t like they would stop and thank her on camera.

They had stayed long enough to give reporters the short version of the story; where there was a party underground for thieves.  They also stayed long enough to suggest that Mr. Task was directly involved.  They mentioned Task with a level of disgust that belayed a former meeting.  Perhaps several.

Despite this, none of the reporters blinked when Task was mentioned.  The bottom scroll bar on one news channel said that Task’s office had been unavailable for comment, but beyond that, nothing.  It seemed odd.  Odder still; there was no mention of X being arrested.  Decker flicked off the TV, and flipped open her laptop. 

Online research always looked easier on TV.  Just type in what you want to find, and voila; there it is first link.  Trying to Google ‘X’ didn’t go very well for Decker, and adding ‘Big’ and ‘Fast’ to the search only took her to parts of the Internet she didn’t want to visit.  Decker wisely decided that adding ‘Fun Zone’ to the current search would turn out badly, and instead searched for information on Mr. Task.

Information on Mr. Task was much easier to find.  He had his own Wiki page and everything.  It turned out that Mr. Edgar Task was the owner of a small software company that mostly made apps.  Decker considered the potential for evil in this, but couldn’t find much beyond overcharging for Flash based games. 

Beyond his software company, what Mr. Task seemed most famous for was his stand against masked vigilantes.  Task was vocal in his belief that super heroism should be outright illegal.  He’d often complained that these heroes answered to no one, and that they, by nature, would become corrupt.  He’d even said that White Knight and Black Hat were the worst of the lot for this very reasons.

Task had history with the two heroes.  He’d been brought in on several occasions by the pair on various charges.  Task had insisted that White Knight and Black Hat were continually after him with baseless accusations to shut him up.  No charges against Mr. Task had ever stuck, and he’d successfully sued the various news channels over their coverage every time.  This was the reason not one reporter had followed up when White Knight had declared Mr. Task to be involved.  He’d become untouchable.

Decker shook her head.  There was an undertone in the wiki article that implied that Mr. Task was guilty, or at least that the writer thought so.  Still, there had been no proof in any cases against him, and Decker had even less proof that he was involved in the Fun Zone.  Yes, she’d heard Big call him by name, but that wasn’t proof.  Not by legal standards at least. 

Even if it was enough proof, Decker wasn’t sure what she’d do with it.  She couldn’t just fly over to Task’s office and demand he turn himself in.  Decker stared at her laptop.  Finding information on Mr. Task was an admitted break in her case; she just wasn’t sure what to do with it right now.  She was about to close her laptop, when suddenly she considered one more search.

Decker had heard that no one should ever Google themselves.  It was a thing apparently.  She paused for a moment over the keys.  It couldn’t be that bad; Internet wise.  After all, she was looking up Decker, not her real name, so it didn’t really count.

Decker held her breath as the search engine loaded, and sighed when it seemed ok.  There were some sites focusing on power tools, which was fine.  A bit about a British chocolate bar, but again, that was fine.  There was even a woman actually named Decker, but considering how she filled a bikini, Decker wasn’t concerned that anyone would mistake the woman for her.

Decker began idly flipping through site descriptions.  She found a football player, and a comedian.  There was an entire run of kittens, a section on buses, and a badly spelt review of Bladerunner.  Decker was several pages into her search before something really caught her eye.  It was a forum thread labelled ‘That Girl in the Blue Scarf’.

Decker nearly dropped her laptop in excitement.  That had to be about her; who else could it be?  She clicked the link, and connected to a forum simply known as Zone Chat.  It was a pretty basic site:  a few gifs, a simple beige background, nothing more.  Despite this, the forum was busy.  New posts were popping up every few seconds.  More exciting was that most of the new posts were following That Girl in the Blue Scarf. 

Decker had a smile when she’d started reading the thread, but it vanished pretty quickly.  That Girl in the Blue Scarf started by mentioning that some new super hero had busted up the Fun Zone, and that White Knight and Black Hat had had nothing to do with it.  Everything went downhill from there.

“Girl’s name is Decker,” one poster explained.  “I was outside when she laid into Big.  You can tell by the way she talks, and the way she acts, that she’s a total…”  Decker covered her mouth in shock as she read the rest of the sentence, and the rest of the thread.

The thread was full of terrible language, and horrible suggestions of violence to visit on Decker.  For some reason, the fact that most of the posters couldn’t bother with proper grammar made the whole of the thread more hurtful.  New posts were pouring in, all with awful suggestions of what to do to Decker.  Decker bit her bottom lip till she tasted blood, and forced herself to read all of it. 

Decker attempted to be professional about it.  She tried to stay detached.  Decker attempted to remember that these were kids that had been at the party she’d ruined, and that they were venting.  It didn’t make it any easier.  Reading posts by a group of strangers that wanted her dead, or worse, was difficult. 

Decker rubbed her eyes, and bit back a sob.  She was about to finally close the page when the comments took a sudden and surprising turn.  One of the posters had just finished a horribly creative rant about what to do the Decker’s scarf, when they switched subjects.  “On top of that, she ruined the Fun Zone?  Thanks a lot; I was just making The List.”

“Wut R U, new?” another poster had replied.  “Fun Zone fine.  The List s still up.” 

“But the Fun Zone can’t be fine,” Decker told her laptop.  She turned to Ms. Fibblesworth.  “I mean, it can’t be.  I found it.  I went in, and broke it up.  White Knight and Black Hat even showed up.  It has to be gone.”  Decker shook her head.  “Also?  What’s The List?”

She looked back at her laptop, hoping to find some more information.  She actually found less.  The last two posts had been removed, and both users banned.  A new post, by a mod called ‘BIG GUY’, explained.

“That’s two gone,” Big Guy typed.  “Anyone else wanna chat about private venues on the public chat?  Anyone?  Yeah, I didn’t think so.  You break the first two rules, you get banned.  You all know this.  I don’t expect I’ll need to say it again.”

The board went silent for awhile after that.  A few more posts showed up in the thread about Decker, but not with the same fervour that had been shown before.  Decker stared at the site.  She wasn’t going to get any more information here; not tonight at least.  She closed her laptop, and opened her diary.

Hero Diary.

I thought maybe I was going to cap off my first big adventure tonight.  You know, see the news, tie some loose ends, stuff like that?  Instead, I’ve uncovered something huge.  My first case isn’t over.  Not by a long shot by the looks of it.

So I’m totally back to step one right?  Like, I know there’s things I have to do?  Only, just like when I started out, I have NO idea what I’m supposed to do next.