A second chance (Titans)

Footsteps pounded against the floor, sharp breaths could be heard, but these breaths were not out of tiredness, they were controlled, clearly the breaths of a man who was used to physically straining himself and running far distances while still maintaining a high speed. These skills were needed to be a hero, especially one who didn't have a mode of transportation and had to run when emergency struck. But today he was not running too an emergency, but away from police officers, who chased him with not nearly as much athleticism and speed.

Why was a hero running from the police, you may ask? What was his crime you may wonder? A few minutes ago, an acidic monster was running rampant in the city, it destroyed cars and killed police officers that tried to stop it. The monster towered over a small girl who had tripped while trying to get away from it, it allowed itself to fall towards her, but a figure that appeared to be a man made of paper got between the two and grabbed onto the girl, protecting her from the acid monster that now hit him instead.

But the man was not corroded as he would have been if he was a normal human, when the acid monster looked down at his form he discovered that the paper man was now made of gold, which was resistant to corrosion. The man turned to normal and let go of the girl, letting her run away and hug her mother, before watching the fight that started from a safe distance.

The acid monster swung for his face, but he turned into gold and the punch, both the acidity and the force of it, had no effect at all, Metamorphi grabbed the arm and broke it. The acid monster roared in pain and fell to the floor, clutching it's arm, Metamorphi turned back to normal and kicked at the monsters head, for a second it looked like he had made a foolish decision, but then he turned back to gold at the last second just as his foot was an inch away from being corroded by acid. If he had not done this he would have been too heavy to deliver an effective kick, even with the hardness of his body.

The kick knocked the monster out, who at that point turned into a normal human, which seemed to be it's original form. The remaining police officers all cheered and then looked at Metamorphi, their faces falling when they realised that their saviour was not registered and they were required by law to arrest him. Metamorphi looked at them and gave them a grave look, before turning to paper and running away.

The police gave chase, not being able to keep up with Meta and not wanting to shoot him, even though he was technically a criminal. Not that they could have since he was so far ahead they would not likely be able to get a good enough aim. They were still close enough that they could keep him in sight however, so they were able to describe his location to reinforcements, who came in patrol vehicles. Although he could not out-speed a car, Metamorphi was still fairly able to outmanoeuvre them by making sharp and unexpected movements and going down small alleyways which were to narrow for cars to go past.

All his efforts were for naught, as he could not completely lose the police and eventually he found himself surrounded with guns pointed at him by those who had not been saved by him and so were not too thankful to spare him. Metamorphi looked at his feet, biting his lip in anger so that it bled, after everything he had gone through, it was over. He was going to rot in jail, if they weren't so pissed at him for making them go through so much effort to get him that they would kill him themselves. Meta would not fight innocent police officers, not even to save his own skin, and even if he was willing too, there were too many to fight and they all had guns pointed at him, ready to fire. With no other options, he rose his hands in surrender, accepting his fate.

Now it was probably pretty confusing what was going on there for Metamorphi. So there was one other person there to explain it to him. Hotwire dropped down with the others. Instead of fighting the police officers, who would suddenly find their radios inoperable, he ran to Metamorphi's side.

"Don't panic. We're getting you out of here." He yelled over the action so he could here, he quickly turned to Red. "We need about 3 minutes. Use the communicators to get to the recon point. Meet you down there." He said before kneeling to a manhole cover. He took out a mini pocket lazer and cut the safety bolt off, opening the cover. He began to climb down and motioned for metamorphi to follow.

"This way. Hurry!" He said heading down into the sewers. He trusted Flux and Red to finish things up.

Metamorphi looked all around him, seeing endless hordes of police officers, one moved in with a pair of handcuffs in his hands and prepared to capture the hero. Obviously, Meta could fight or escape, it was as simple as turning into steel and they wouldn't be able to hurt him, he could fight them or run away or just stand there until they give up. But he wouldn't fight them, no matter what, and he wouldn't be able to lose them, as the last 20 minutes had shown.

Meta sighed, his only option was to surrender. However, just before the police officer could cuff him, a loud sound was heard, distracting the officer, Meta acted fast, whirling around while the police were distracted and kicked the officer in the hands, making him drop the cuffs. He then shoved him away to get some distance between them and turned to steel in response to the shot that was fired at him, but now he was looking at the sound that had saved him.

The sound was a hero, Red Dragon, entering the scene. Metamorphi looked at the hero who saved him as he punched out an officer with his red gauntlet and then joined Meta, giving him instructions. Meta considered it for a moment, to him it was wrong to attack the police men, they were just doing their jobs after all, but the police were no longer his ally. He realised that he had to fight, it was no longer as simple as the good guys only fought the bad guys, the rules were changing, he had to adapt to meet them.

A police officer ran at him and attempted to strike him with a baton, Meta stepped out of the way of the attack and grabbed the man's arm, the man was flipped over Meta's head and slammed on the floor so fast that the officer would just suddenly notice he was on the floor and register the pain. Meta turned into paper and ran at a small group of officers to the left, he turned to steel as he collided with them and sent them all scattering like bowling pins. He still wouldn't treat them as roughly as he would treat a villain, but they were enemies now and would not be given special treatment.

He noticed another hero, Flux, come to his rescue as well. It took him a second to remember that she was with him and Kale and had presumably fought one of the Wuxia, he had not seen the fight but he was sure it was a good one. He was distracted from his fight while noticing her and got a bullet to the eye for it, but the bullet bounced off him like it was a rubber ball. He leapt at the man responsible and punched him in the stomach, although he could have easily killed him he held back enough so that he just lost consciousness.

Seconds later a third Titan appeared, going by the name of Hotwire, they had fought together before, but that was a while ago. The important thing was that he opened a manhole cover, gave some orders to Red Dragon and motioned for Meta to follow him down the manhole, Meta crouched down and waited until Hotwire had gotten halfway down before going down himself. When they were both at the bottom he spoke as he ran after Hotwire, slowing down so he was by his side Where are we going?

"We're getting you out of here." Hotwire plainly said. "You refused the registration right Metamorphi? The new titans need all the help we can get, and we want to offer refuge to any metahuman, magical being, or vigilante who wants to fight the registration. He said as they ran into a large chamber. It was some sort of water recepticle.

"Let's just hope the others make it. Extraction in 2 minutes." He said consulting his new communicator.

Then things got complicated. There was some sort of samurai on their tail. That couldn't be good. "Flux. Dragon, Do what you can to seal up your path behind you, but be fast. The extraction will be here in 1 minute and 37 seconds." He said with precision.

Metamorphi ran alongside Hotwire, listening to every word he said, only contributing when he felt the need to Of course I rejected the registration. I know that guy stopped the Zydon's, but I don't trust him. He's just taken over the state and expects everyone to just accept it? And then he also expects heroes to 'register'. He may be genuine, but I just think he wants to control the heroes.

It seemed that some trouble was arising back where the others were, Meta wanted to help, but the reason they were here was for him in the first place. Besides, he didn't have much time for the 'extraction', whatever that meant, and to help them he would have to run back, help them and then run back without Hotwire to guide him to their location. He just had to trust them.