Growing Pains Novel Chapter 10

I wasn’t too surprised to find out Batman wasn’t going to be able to train

whenever I wanted. Unlike , he had other things to do which ant he had to set aside ti for preparation, investigation, maintaining his cover identity, and then his own training.

That ant I was free to do almost whatever I wanted when he was busy.

Batman did give

a few rules I was going to have to follow if I wanted to keep getting his training. Most of them were obvious ones like ‘no blowing up a city’ or ‘no killing people’. Things that I wasn’t really interested in doing anyway so it was fine. It used to be I had to follow the law, but I started looking up all the random, nonsensical laws I could find and presenting them to him asking if I had to follow those too until he removed that one from the list and told

he would revise it when he had ti.

Which ant there was a window of ti where I could do almost whatever I wanted and had a ready excuse so he couldn’t get mad.

I was going to use that ti to rob a bank.

It bothered

that my first bank robbery got interrupted, okay?! It was a classic cri, a hallmark of any successful supervillain. I wasn’t going to let it remain a black mark on my career just because so stupid humans had to ruin it for !

Of course I couldn’t just act like the first ti hadn’t happened at all so I wasn’t going to focus on the location as much. I wasn’t even entirely sure what city I was in at the mont. Just that it was sowhere in the south east. As long as I stayed out of Florida I should get so decent news coverage and help cent my reputation. I might even be able to find a few more minor heroes too. Soone I could spar against that fell sowhere between Superjerk and Batman so I could get a fight I was capable of winning but took more effort than just raising my Ki.

And this ti I wouldn’t be nearly as nervous – not that I was nervous the first ti! – because I now had so experience. I could do this, and it would go perfectly…

-o-

I couldn’t stop smiling if I tried as I walked out of the bank.

Everything had gone perfectly to plan!

Not only was I able to break into the vault and steal a bunch of money, the teller had also managed to set off the silent alarm so I would be able to fight the police on the way out! Naturally they wouldn't be able to stop

and I would finally get the recognition as a villain I deserved.

My grin widened when I saw a bunch of police cars right outside and I was fully ready to launch into the mandatory monologue when I noticed sothing was off. None of the cops were actually looking at .

Instead they were looking at – oh co on! That wasn’t fair!

Barely two blocks from the bank there was a bird-winged woman with a mace fighting so kind of giant lizard with a laser gun. And they were kinda trashing the place which ant they were getting my attention instead of .

Shoot, the woman looked familiar too. She was Hawkgirl, or was it Hawkwoman? Were they the sa people? And wasn’t she secretly evil for a bit? Ah, whatever. Right now she should be a hero. Which ant I might be able to fight her to make up for the fact my carefully planned robbery was ruined – again!

But first I needed to get rid of the other alien she was fighting.

I flew up into the air and pointed a palm at the reptilian alien, a ball of Ki gathering there. Then I thought about it and how the alien was tanking the mace hits and poured even more Ki into the attack.

The blast caught the alien completely by surprise and sent him crashing into an abandoned car…and the one behind it……and the three behind those.

I may have gone a tiny bit overboard.

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It was fine though! I could still see him breathing so he was alive, just…very thoroughly knocked out.

My attack also had the bonus effect of making the police rember why they were in front of a bank in the first place but none of them were brave enough to actually face , they just readjusted where they were hiding so they had sothing between

and them.

Hawkgirl-woman didn’t seem to pick up on that imdiately though.

“Thanks for the help, but I had it handled.” The winged woman said as she landed nearby. “Lieutenant Shayera Thal of Thanagar.”

I shrugged. “I was just upset you guys were getting in the way of my special event. I had everything going the way I wanted and you were distracting everyone else.” I waved at the gathered cops. “Oh, and I’m Califa! Nice to et you.”

“Event? What kind of…” Hawkgirl-woman finally saw the police hiding from

and the building we were standing in front of as well as the bag full of money at my feet.

“...You weren’t robbing this bank, were you?” She asked, glaring at , well, hawkishly.

“And if I was?”

“Then, as a reward for helping detain another criminal, I would let you go as long as you left everything you took behind.”

Her mace lit up in so weird sphere of lightning and she had a very aggressive looking grin on her face. One that I was certainly matching at this point.

“Yeah? You know what I say to that? Make .”

Alright, hero fight. Ready…set…

“Don’t say I didn’t give you a chance – ragghhh!”

Go!

The winged heroine launched herself at

with a loud battle cry. Swinging her mace at my torso.

I kicked the bag full of money away so it wouldn’t get damaged and brought up both arms to block. To my surprise even when I flared my Ki to reduce the impact, the mace still really hurt when it hit. I could actually feel my bones creak a little from the impact. Hawkie certainly wasn’t holding back!

I was going to have to watch out for that.

This was not the ti to be distracted though, and I had to duck under another swing to avoid getting whacked again. Hawkie overshot and I was able to land a solid punch to her ribs that had her flapping her wings hard to avoid crashing into the ground. I waited patiently for her to stabilize and turn around so that when I shot a Ki beam at her, it was heading directly for her face.

She surprised

again by actually smashing my beam backwards with her magic mace and I had to move fast to avoid getting hit with my own energy. Of course by the ti I had done that Hawkie was right in front of

again. I tried flying backwards to get out of the way but she was faster. That didn’t an I was going to let her get a free hit though. Since I couldn’t dodge, I leaned into her swing and used the impact to increase the montum for a solid kick to her face. Unfortunately between my own shorter legs not managing to fully connect and her bird shaped helt the attack didn’t seem to do much.

This ti it was my turn to attack and I rushed forward to take advantage of the fact that Hawkie’s flight was reliant on actual wings. Two simultaneous Ki beams forced her to pull them closer since there was no way she could hit them both with her mace and left her wide open for a mid-air tackle.

I felt the air whoosh out of her lungs as I tried to push us both towards the ground, but she wasn’t making this easy for . Even with the surprise grapple, Hawkie managed to bring her knee up hard and fast into my chest so that it loosened my grip on her. Which turned out to be enough that she was able to slip out of the hold entirely and use

as a springboard to keep flying while I was sent crashing into the pavent below.

At the sound of another battle cry I looked up just in ti to throw myself to the side as Hawkie’s mace cratered into the ground where I just was. I flared my Ki to kill my montum and fly straight back at her to deliver another punch to the face. This ti it was a clean hit that sent Hawkie stumbling away, dazed but not out of the fight.

I waited just long enough for the retaliatory swipe with the mace when she tried to guess my next attack’s timing to miss before launching myself at her again, only to realize too late that she had predicted

predicting her and flew straight into a roundhouse kick.

“You’re pretty good!” I complinted as I floated back off the pavent.

“And you’re a pain in the ass.” Hawkie growled back.

“Aww, that’s not nice. Aren’t you having fun?”

I don’t think she wanted to admit she was enjoying this fight just as much as I was because she just leaped at

with another battlecry. She was sohow faster than I expected and caught

with a surprise uppercut before grabbing

by the front of my armor and spiking

into the ground.

I wheezed a bit at the force of the impact.

Once again Hawkie readied her mace to smash

further into the ground but she was too slow. A bright yellow Ki blast caught her right in the stomach and sent her smashing through a stone building’s wall.

Oops.

Still, that wasn’t enough to keep Hawkie down, even if she was looking a little rough at this point. She pulled herself out of the rubble and glared down at

looking fully prepared to keep the fight going. Sothing I was all for, but I was getting to the point that one of us would have to go down soon.

Even if Hawkie was looking pretty banged up, I wasn’t all that fresh either if I was being honest.

I wasn’t about to run away though. This was the first no holds fight I had gotten in that wasn’t against soone that outclassed

hilariously. I was going to keep enjoying this as long as I could.

Hawkie probably didn’t feel the sa way. I got the feeling she was looking for a way to take

out as quickly as possible going by how careful she was being right now.

“What’s the matter, did you want to give up?” I taunted her with a wide smile.

“Don’t flatter yourself, kid. I’m just getting started.” She snarled, flying into the air and dive bombing , mace cocked back.

Since I knew she was skilled enough that I wasn’t going to just avoid her I did sothing she wasn’t expecting and jumped closer at the last second. Using the training I did with Batman I managed to stop her next swing before she really got it going. But just because I caught her by surprise, that didn’t an she wasn’t quick enough to respond. Even as I caught her right arm her left was moving into position to block the attack she was sure was coming.

Too bad for her that wasn’t what I was after.

Batman had spent a lot of ti teaching

how to use leverage instead of strength to disarm soone. I used that training now to twist Hawkie’s arm around until she was forced to drop it and then I kicked her away.

This ti when we separated, I was the one left holding the fancy tal mace and she was unard.

“Give that back!”

I waved the weapon tauntingly at her. “No way, it’s my turn to play with it.”

“Grrrrrrr.”

“Alright. Ready for round two?”

Hawkie took a stance while glaring at . Even without her weapon she was going to keep fighting. Great! It would have been boring otherwise.

“Okay, let’s keep going!”