The Boy in the Bodysuit

Narrator: Ragdoll

I turned on the dingy little recorder: “Alright, day in the life let’s do this. My name is Amir Assaf. I recently got superpowers (don’t ask), and for like a month I’ve been the one and only Ragdoll. I’ve got a really awesome power, and I met some cool people in the life. Dropped out of school. Got back into school. Joined a dojo. Got the crap kicked out of me like five times, but it was fine. I met the Vanguard, that was cool! But the thing that matters is that no matter what happens, what I come up against, what the world throws at me I’ll take it and give it right back. The Undefeatable Ragdoll!”

I paused for a minute after I gave my big opening speech. I didn’t really plan more to say. Then I shrugged. It’s my recording right. I should just talk about what’s on my mind. So I did.

“I actually didn’t mind being a cape. You’d think that you’d hear that more often, y'know with us having superpowers and saving people? But uh, Not in my experience. At least, like, a lot of the adults seem tired, or sad, or resigned to being a hero? How does that even make sense? Being a hero is awesome!

The kids my age are like. Some of them are cool. Earworm. She’s cool. But like, a lot of them are pretty fucked up too. It’s not like I blame them, it’s not their fault. It just seems like a lot of us go through shit situations when we get our powers, and I don’t know, it makes them not fun to be around sometimes. That’s why I’m here on my own. Patrollin’ the streets.” 

I make a little arm wave that no one else can see because I’m alone on a rooftop talking to myself. Like a cool guy.  “You’ve probably heard about my power. Lets me stop stuff from hitting me. Well, I guess that’s not really true, it lets me absorb impacts. 

Yeah! So, someone tries to hit me BANG. Another person would get bruised or battered. Y’know, big dude like Gavel? With the Hammer? Just BRRSHH Smashes into someone. They’d get knocked out. Me? I don’t take that shit. He tried to knock me down. I’d go into my breaker state, slam into the wall, bounce straight back, slam him in the face. Yeah!

Basically, I’m indestructible while I’m in my breaker state. Downside is I can’t really move. My body. Ragdolls. That’s why I’m called Ragdoll. So it’s a bit more fun for me to be in cape fights and all that. Y’know, not having to worry about being bruised. That probably sucks. Like Sports players spend a lot of time in the hospital for injuries, it's gotta be worse for capes.” (it’s waaaay worse for capes.)  

“Oh I guess I haven’t explained why I use the word Breaker. Ok so this big government agency that works with capes has a set of ‘classifications’ for superpowers. My power is a ‘breaker’ power because I go into an alternate state of reality. Normally I’m me, but then I can be all ragdoll and be all indestructible. Yeah. Oh there’s a poem for the classifications so you remember them. I didn’t remember it.”

I stopped for a drink of water and a snack on my usual patrol route. My boy Tommy at the corner store had me hooked up with free food as long as I kept coming around and let him post clips of my tricks. He was hella cool. Y’know, a phrase that real cool teenagers totally say. I was rounding the street corner to go find a fire escape to climb when I saw it out of the corner of my eye. I almost spit out my drink.

“What the fuck? Oh C’mon really?”

There’s this house in my neighborhood, among all the big city stuff, most of it’s about three to six stories but there’s some old houses that still stick around from before this area all got really developed. Holdin’ on. This one used to have this ridiculous rose-vibe goin’ on. Everything’s covered in pink and red rose tiles. They had a yard with rose bushes and this elaborate, white 1500’s looking fence on the outside with rose patterns. It was so extra, never saw anything else like it man. Crazy. And now it’s gettin’ torn down. Getting sold probably. Gentrification am I right? My dad would probably say some shit about America not having any more room for hard-working immigrants like him. Like I said, gentrification or something.

Like V-Tek. Huge Tinker company, they employ a lot of capes. Those guys have been headquartered in Halcyon City for a while but they just built a huge campus, they tore down a whole city block to build it. My dad was pissed. Well, I mean that’s not what Osmium would say. But fuck that guy. Nah, he was cool, he’s alright. I don’t know he’s like sponsored by them or something? Never has a bad word to say about V-Tek. Which is stupid because they’re a corporation. Like yeah Iron and Gold and Silver and Zinc are heroes, and even Osmium but like. C'mon man, you think they aren’t doing that shit for profit? 

Getting stuck in my head like this was the kind of thing I’d do when there wasn’t anything interesting happening. All my friends were busy and I wanted to do some more hero work. Still it was hard to get stressed when you’ve got my powers. I can take a hit, I can take ten, I can take a hundred. I can take whatever life’s got for me and give it right back. I could go into a warzone right now and I’d be fine, bullets would just bounce off of me like I’m nothing. Boredom’s the worst thing. Oh! Yeah, fire escape. I clambered up the five stories and onto the building’s roof, getting a nice view of the city and setting up for my big stunt.

Jumping off of roofs is actually really cool. If you have my power. If you don’t it probably sucks. I got my trajectory, lined up. “Watch this shit” I said to the camera, before I tied it to my wrist. “Whhhhhhheeewww!” I dived off of the roof and activated my breaker state almost immediately. As I hit the ground the energy of the impact was slingshotted through my body and back into the concrete, pushing me back up just a fast as I jumped. I soared onto the next building over and sprung up from Ragdolling in a swift motion. It was practiced, but practiced implies a grace that you can’t have while getting up from having your limbs splayed in five directions. 

“Wasn’t that fucking awesome! I don’t even walk on sidewalks anymore, when I can’t help it. Just roof to roof to roof. It’s fucking great.” 

OH shit. Shit shit. Shit. was that an explosion. Oh ok. Probably. Looks like two blocks south? Ok. cool video over, I’ll have to finish it sometime later. I kept up my jumping routine, picking up the pace. Alright, Alright Cape Fight! Oooh explosions, I haven't dealt with a guy that does explosions before. “That’s gonna be fun, that's gonna be fun” I whispered to myself as I continued my ‘run’ towards the noise. There was a noticeable smoke trail now.

Y’know what’s the other thing about having my power. I ain’t gotta rely on a team, man! Like I love Earworm and she’s got a sick power. But she basically needs someone else to clean up after her after she rolls in. She’s dealing with another master psssh. Or some guy whose power doesn’t require them to physically move their body? Like that one cape, Razorburn who could psychically control metal.  Me? I can go right in there and fuck anyone up with the best of them and I’m only 15. Extra cool part? Doesn’t even affect my costume. These jays? I’ve taken into ten fights and they haven’t even got a speck on them. It’s awesome. 

Another explosion. Miiight want to be paying more attention to that situation. Still about half a block out but I should be able to get pretty close pretty easily. There’s even a convenient apartment building so I won’t need to do my jumping trick for a couple seconds. It is a little disorienting to like, actually focus on something while I do that repeatedly. 

Oh no. NO NO. Agh. Ok. So. Explosions? Not something that happened because of a power, but because there was a gas station which just recently got demolished in a fight. A fight with Crimson.

Crimson as a fucking stupid cape name. It was also a stupid name for him. Ok, Ok let me back up. From what I could tell on the Forums, his power had something to do with manipulating…cloth, all fabric, just woven material like textiles? Or maybe it has to do with the material itself? If it was just woven stuff could he control a sheet of woven metal fibers? Anyway he had a whole thing about banners. 

He ran a gang called “Crimson’s Banners” I think. But I think I’ve also heard them called the “Crimson Chorus”? Maybe they reformed and changed their names at some point? I dunno. Not my department. 

Anyway my point is that Crimson is fucking stupid name for him because it has nothing to do with his power. He just like…is. His costume is red. Well- it’s made from red cloth, like rugs? Like you know those ornamental..Not ornamental. Oriental rugs! Yeah, he had a bunch of those woven across his body, covering him from head to toe, along with a few others forming a thick poncho/cape around him. Anyway, fucking stupid name for a cape.

Also, fucking stupid situation I’m getting into where I’m fighting Crimson, because he’s really jacked. He’s taken down capes ten times as famous as me. Now the good thing about my power is that I can’t really get hurt by him. The bad thing about my power is that I definitely can suffocate and he definitely can suffocate me.

So why the fuck am I running right towards him

The gas station was still partially intact but an explosion had claimed about half of it, and destroyed the wall of an adjacent building. Crimson was standing with another villain, Arc, a member of his team I could tell. Arc’s power let him create copies of himself and split his body into pieces. But only one was on the battlefield. Arc’s costume was dominated by a red banner in the same style as the ones crimson wore, and he was flying. It looks like the two are fighting someone, a hero? She was wearing a metal mask over a black business suit. She’s got a gun, looks like a revolver but it’s got a bright glowing strip on it, and the revolver barrel was rapidly spinning and whirring before firing a burning shot into Crimson, which the cape interrupted with a banner. The gun was probably tinkertech then, and he’s using it to burn some of Crimson’s banners as Crimson telekinetically threw them at the guy. 

Dude was kind of getting run out. Arc’s chasing her down the alley but Crimson is staying here, looks like he’s sending more banners in instead. I’ve only been watching this fight for a little bit I promise. It’s just kind of hard to run across city blocks quickly. If you don’t have flight. Or super-speed or something. But I made it to the edge of an apartment building overlooking the scene. Crimson was floating about 6 feet off the ground above the former gas station, and looking away from me. This was a stupid idea. I got a huge, dumb grin on my face that my blank mask would hide from any onlookers. And I dove off the roof aiming right at Crimson’s head.

Bang!

I slammed into him in my breaker state and knocked him to the ground. I tumbled on him, absorbing the impact of hitting the pavement and redirecting it into him. I hit the ground running, he kind of didn’t. He looked hurt, but not by much. That cloth armor he wore looked pretty thick and he didn’t scream. Still, he was in the process of getting up. Another punch!

I quipped as I kicked Crimson. Before my hit made any impact I felt my leg get swept under me and I instinctively used my power. 

“Waaagh!” I yelled, lamely. He’s got me by the leg! One of his banners was wrapped around it and he sent me into the air, spinning me around so that I was hanging upside down, facing him as he stood.

“And who, pray tell, are you?” Crimson spoke calmly. What do I tell him? Play dumb!

“Who me?” Not that dumb! I’m wearing my costume, he’ll know who I am! Cover! He glowered at me. Perfect. “Haha. Gotcha. I’m Ragdoll. Y’know. Up and coming hero.”  I put my hands behind my back like I wasn’t about to get thrown into a wall.

“I take it from the punch that you’re a hero.” Some of his cloth started unwrapping from his costume, removing pieces that I had damaged. Every exterior section with a hole or tear from my attacks had another, perfectly intact, beneath it. Great. Why didn’t I just call for backup?  Because I’m the undefeatable Ragdoll, that’s why, I thought. 

Ok, I need a plan. I started rubbing my chin as if I had a beard. I’m upside down, being held by my foot. Oh, here we go, ok. So, he works with banners and cloth. Cloth can burn just like the guy with the tinkertech gun was doing. And we’re right next to the remains of a gas station. Which is currently burning down. All I need to do is make sure the fire gets on him, and his costume will burn up in the flames!

Crimson slapped me out of my scheming. “Listen to me... Whoever you are, you have two choices. Actually, I’m nice. I’ll give you three.” He held up three fingers. “One. Join the Banner. Two. Die. Or Three, surrender and leave. Flee.”

“Gonna be honest,” I replied, donning my casual-mid-fight-quipping-voice “I’ll take the third one!” Crimson kind of scowled at me. It was hard to tell, his face was covered in a multi-layered cloth mask, there were some moving parts, as if he had cloth eyebrows knitted into it. 

“Stay out of my way.” His voice was soft, quiet, even. It was strange, but there was an intimidating edge to it. Not something I wouldn’t expect from a supervillain but also something I would expect from a principal when he was pissed but couldn’t get that mad in front of a kid. I didn’t like that.

My power has this thing where when something starts to impact me, it’ll auto-activate. Keeps me safe from unseen attacks. Which is great cause I just got dropped, splaying me out on the street. The cloth wraps up one of my hands, moving from suspending me in the air to passively keeping me on the floor. Crimson turns away, and puts his hand up to where his ear would be, says something.

“Arc, do you have the payload?” A pause. “Good. Disengage, our job is done.”

Fire plan. Ok. I could use my power in short bursts as a basic striker power, like when I punched him. Since it redirected energy some strikes were a little better, but I’d lose all my technique because my whole body would ragdoll. But, I could do some cool stuff like this trick. Flicking my fingers right as I activated my power to shoot a rock or something way farther than normal. Maybe I could shoot a piece of rubble and explode another gas tank? It wasn’t that useful but it was something. Man, why did I decide to fight this guy? I couldn’t have found a big punchy Brute or something?

The tinkertech gun charged with a buzzing sound that quickly got louder and louder until it fired. Bang! I felt my leg getting hot. The banner almost twisted as if it felt pain. In the opportunity I grabbed it and swung it at Crimson, who was only a few feet away. The flame was licking at the cloth. He dodged back before the swing even finished, but the fire scared him a little. I waved it around like I was threatening a tiger with a lit torch. I made sure to wave it in front of his face a couple more times. In the back of my vision, the tinkertech gun girl was still fighting Arc. 

“What are you doing?” Crimson spit at me, almost more confused than angry. Almost. He still had that calm in his voice. I swung my fire-banner at him again, he dodged again. “You said you’d flee, child. Only two options left now!”  He pulled my improvised weapon away from my hands and into a ball, to reduce the flame and smacked me straight in the chest with it. He could get pretty scary momentum with these things. Good news is, I could give it back. 

I ragdolled and fell to the ground, one of my legs kicking into the air to catch the ball before twisting and slamming all of the force back through it and into Crimson. It konked him in the head and he fell to the ground. Another flash and that tinkertech gun fired into his side, flame bursting out from the wound.

“AAAuuggghh” Crimson screamed, and he made a kind of swooshing motion. I could hear the fabric severing under his finger as the burning clump of his costume was ripped away from the rest. It was surprisingly thick, like about an inch thick. That doesn't sound like a lot but imagine wearing inch-thick clothing! Crimson turned his attention to the Tinkertech gun girl, and banners swept across the street to catch her. But she flashed for a second and then disappeared. Guess she was a teleporter? Or maybe she turned invisible? 

Either way, I figured that was my opportunity to get the hell out. Or I could do the stupid thing.

 I reached into my pockets, picked out a lighter (No I don’t smoke, yes I think carrying around a lighter makes me look cool), and sprinted towards the gas station. There it was, I could smell the leaking gas. Ready for me. I checked one last time to make sure no one was around. No one, seems like everyone fled around the time of the first explosion. What’s another one, really? I turned on the lighter right as I jumped up and used my power.

As I lost control of my body, explosions erupted all around me. Pressing force from every direction except up. So that’s where I went. I got launched right up into the sun. What I just did would have killed any normal person. But thanks to my power I was fine. I skydive the fun way. Without a parachute.  

 I could see the whole city splayed around me. The skyscrapers of downtown. The sprawling docks, the slowly thinning streets until the lights stopped and the wilderness began. As I reached my zenith, I was far above the explosions, safe to leave my breaker state for long enough to adjust my path. I pulled myself into a midair jackknife, like I was taking the world’s most reckless waterslide. I positioned my feet right towards the tiny dot on the street that I knew was Crimson.

I like to imagine he was dumbstruck, looking at me falling at him from terminal velocity. If he was, it didn't last. By the time I was about halfway down, banners were flying up at me. I had to leave my breaker state to dodge, but it wasn’t too bad now. As one headed right into me though, I realized dodging was futile. So I used my power before I crashed into the fabric hard enough to tear it apart. 

I realized too late that that was Crimson’s plan. The impact messed with my trajectory, and now I was spiraling. What do I do about that? If I miss this is all for nothing! Then I saw it. A telephone pole, if I swing around it, I can use it to preserve most of my momentum while I get my aim back. 

I briefly stopping using my power so I could put my hands in a hook, before reactivating and slamming into the telephone poll, redirecting my energy to circle the pole about 15 times in a second and just as quickly barrelling into Crimson, who was commanding a truly enormous number of banners towards me and around himself in efforts to stop the impact. It still came.

His banners took a significant amount of the force, but I still hit him, my neck twisting at a weird angle as it slammed into his chest. We were both knocked through the window of a building across from the now completely ruined gas station. The force knocked him further through the floor, but I stayed consistent, crashing through another window, through an alley, and between Arc and Tinkertech gun girl. My limp body smashed through the melee weapons that both were wielding, Arc had a metal pole and gun guy’s was a cleaver. My momentum took them with me as I smacked into the concrete and brick wall of the next building with a thunderous crushing sound.

After a couple moments of absolute stillness, I fell from my impact crater in the wall and onto the floor. Arc ducked into the broken window and tinkertech guy glanced at him before disappearing into thin air. 

I hopped up to my feet, everything ok. My suit was still intact, my shoes pristine. I paused for a second to consider, but then dashed back through the window following Arc. The building was an office, a detail I did not have time to notice earlier. But It was empty. Covered in torn and tattered red banners, but empty. There was a crater where Crimson had fallen through the floor, and I glanced down. No sign of him.

“Hey.” A deep, gravelly voice spoke from one end of the room, Arc appearing through a doorway, brandishing a knife. He wasn’t wearing a banner.

I got up in a boxing pose, excitedly tapping my feet and mock-hitting the air in front of me. “Want to dance?”

Hmph, he grumbled. “No. Just a message. Crimson’s marked you, Kid.” And with that his body dissolved into black dust. I said he split into pieces right? Well one of those pieces was his “main” piece, the rest of them were just copies or echoes or something? He could choose to just have a piece dissolve into dust. Made him really hard to capture. I remember Osmium talking about it, they’d caught him like maybe 5 or 6 times. Every time he’d just POOF disappear out of the hands of the dude who got him like it was nothing. Pretty good trick, apparently made him a good scout. Didn’t doubt that. 

That wasn’t too bad. I mean I didn’t even die! What about teleport-y guy? Not sure where she went. Oh and I should probably call the cops and firefighters if someone didn’t already. I picked up my phone. 

“Ayo it’s your boy Ragdoll. There’s a fire at 15th and Redwood. Small fight with Crimson and Arc, beat them, they ran off, no big deal, yeah I know I’m cool. Didn’t see anyone get hurt. Also tinkertech guy with gun. Teleporter. Black suit, metal mask.  Don’t know if you know her but she might be there. Byeeee!” I hung up before the responding officer could say anything. They could deal with that stuff.  

Some other capes had shown up to the actual scene of the fight but I was happy to stay away. Doing paperwork sucks, and I’ve got a cool guy to find. I searched the alley for a couple minutes but I couldn’t find tinkertech gun girl anywhere. That’s a shame. I wasn’t that broken up. I mean, she was cool but I didn’t know that much about her. 

I did pretty good. I got Crimson to run! Tinkertech gun girl did a lot of the work, but I distracted him! I got him down so she could make that shot, that was cool. I heard a whurr behind me. The familiar sound of the tinkertech gun charging up before it fired. I sighed. There she was.

I turned around, raising my arms. “Eyyyy, tinkertech gun girl! We work pretty well together right? I mean I tie him down so you can hit him, you hit him. He gets set on fire…” My voice raised as I finished the sentence.

“Stop talking, or I’ll shoot.” She responded, in a gruff, garbled voice.

“C’mon mannnn. Aren’t we cool? It’s not everyday I scare off a big name like Crimson. We did good work right there.”

“Get out of my way.” she paused, “Why did you come?”

“What do you mean, ‘why did I come’,” I did finger quotes “I heard the explosion, duh. And I’m a hero. Can’t you see the-” I gestured at myself. “Costume? Aren’t you wearing a costume? I don’t see many people going around wearing masks like that.”

“I am a Cape, yes. Do you know who I am?”

“I’m going to be honest….Noooo”

She sighed. “And you are?”

“You don’t…” my turn to sigh. I spoke quietly “I’m…ragdoll. I’m Ragdoll. I got the…ugghhh.”

She clearly didn’t know who I was either. “C’mon, shoot me”

“What?”

“Just, just do it, c’mon.” I beckoned. ‘C’mon, c’mon”

She seemed like she might be raising an eyebrow, but it was hard to tell. From this light I could tell her brown hair was tied up behind the mask with an ornate hair pin.

“C’mon, C’mon it’ll be fun, I promise! Just do it. Shoot me.”

She did. I went into my breaker state. The bullet bounced off of me and ricocheted, making me whirl around before it violently hit an adjacent wall, lighting a flame for a second, before there was nothing left to burn. Just concrete. She kind of flinched. Then tension for a second? And then.

“Hahaha, Haaahah. Hah” She cackled, and put her hand to her neck. “Hehehheeee. Hhheheeh.” A lighter, more feminine voice came out of the mask now. “Ah man, that’s fucking hilarious.”

“Pretty poggers right?”