Set 11 years before chapter one

The night in the city was a perfect one...To rob a store. The police knew this. Firefly had made sure of that. And now he and Koi were going to preform their last heist together. Their last heist...ever.

"You know the plan," Koi said to him, a steely yet excited look in her eyes. "Did you remember to bring all the supplies, or did you forget like that one Friday night?" Firefly groaned as he recalled the night, how terribly wrong it had gone, and the endless weeks of teasing that he had endured. "I forgot two things! Two!" He said in an annoyed yet affectionate tone.

"And those two missing things were the things we needed to pull the heist off," Koi said as they approached the store. "I just want to make sure everything's in order."

"Yes, yes, I have everything in place, now are we gonna do this or what?!" Firefly asked impatiently. Oh, how he hated to do this...He and Koi had been partners in crime for so long (too long?) it hurt...

Almost.

He knew it was the best thing to do. So he pulled out one of his tools, a heavy metal pole(About two feet long), and approached the window. He wouldn't need this tool again. 

He smashed the window with the beam and immeidately the alarm went off. "We only have so long before the cops come!" He called to Koi before entering the store. "This is one of the most heavily guarded stores in Lumenaria!" Koi snorted. "They'll never take us alive!"

It took barely five minutes before the cops showed up, five minutes in which Firefly and Koi had been collecting various valuables from inside the store. 

"This is the police department, come out with your hands up! We have the place surrounded!" 

"How dumb do they think we are?" Koi scoffed, turning to Firefly. "Anyways...Want to give this place a parting gift?" Firefly knew exactly what she meant.

"Oh, you know I do." His hands lit up with fire and he grinned, a spark in his eye. "We're burning this place to the ground!"

The store was alight in no time. Firefly was actually impressed with the size of the blaze...There was no way the cops would be able to get it under control. Shrouded in smoke, he and Koi stepped out of the store. Koi was carrying a strong steel staff, but her water powers were so devastating she didn't even need it.

Meanwhile, Firefly held the hilt of a sword in his hand. One of his fighting techniques was to form a blade out of fire and use it to attack heroes and vigilantes, and- holy crap, the cops had gotten Corvid and Hel on the scene.

"Put your weapons down- PUT YOUR WEAPONS DOWN! Ready men?!"

Firefly met Koi's eyes and they both knew what was going to happen.

"FIRE!" 

The skies were black with lead that almost looked like rain and Firefly knew that they would never perform another heist again. Well, not as a villain, anyways.

The smoke had filled the area and he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his arm before Koi pulled him down into the sewers swiftly, closing the entrance to the sewers before anyone could see what happened(Or, that was what it was meant to look like).

 The blood from the bullet wound trailed down into the manhole and into the sewers.

And then the pain hit. There was a bullet impaled in his arm. Looking over at Koi, he noticed that she had no new scars on her whatsoever. He smirked, despite his pain. "I always knew you were better at dodging bullets than me." She scoffed and grabbed his arm, rolling up the sleeve of his villain outfit to see the bullet. 

"Oh...yikes." She murmured. "That went a bit deeper than necessary."

Firefly almost tripped over the two bodies that they had dragged down there a day or so previously. Hey, if they were going to fake their deaths, may as well make it convincing.

Koi's movements caught his attention as she moved to grab tweezers from a handy side pocket on her outfit. "This is going to hurt a bit, fair warning."

Firefly scrunched his eyes shut, not wanting to watch as the tweezers gently yet painfully pulled the slightly bloody bullet out. Barely ten seconds later, Koi announced; "It's done." She then continues in a joking tone. "You can open your eyes, ya know."

Firefly opened his eyes and laughed a bit sardonically as he saw the inside of his flesh. Koi was wrapping the wound already, but he couldn't help feeling a bit queasy. He was alright with blood, that was a no-brainer, but bullet wounds were different to him.

He sighed mournfully. "I'm gonna miss it a bit...You know, being a villain. Seeing our names on the front page of the paper after a particularly good heist..." 

"I know..." Koi responded. "Me too. It's going to be weird, going out in public and not being constantly worried about being found out." She then took on a funny expression. "Gods, Firefly, we just faked our deaths!"

A weird expression came across Firefly's face as he reached a hand up to scratch his head. "Primes, we did... Holy crap."

"We can never wear these suits again..." Firefly said mournfully, looking down at his suit. 

It was two parts. The pants were extra-baggy dark red jeans with tie-dyed splotches of bright amber dotting the areas near his ankles. He also wore a basic black long-sleeved shirt on his upper half. 

No one but him and Koi knew that there was a firefly emblem sewn onto it because of his chest armor. The arm-sleeve-cuff thingies were shaped like flames and faded from yellow to orange to dark red. The rest of the chest armor was an off-orange color, similar to a sunset color except metallic. 

He also had a headpiece that he now took off to look at. It was sort of like a helmet in the sense that it covered the back of his head and strapped onto his chin. However, it had a visor sort of thing  - Like goggles, sort of. 

The colors(One red lens and one blue lens) blocked people's vision of his eyes from the outside, but he could see exceptionally well from the inside. The helmet itself was a bright red and he often set it on fire in order to intimidate others. He tossed it down next to one of the corpses.

He glanced over at Koi and how awesome her outfit looked. They were equally cool, of course, she had made them both. 

Her outfit, unlike his, was mostly blue. She had knee-high boots with wave patterns on them and wore tight blue leggings. They had their fair share of holes, though, mostly around the knees and lower legs. 

She paired the prominent lapis blue leggings with a denim mini skirt  that was too short to be worn without pants underneath. Well, too short for his taste, at least. And the skirt went good with the leggings.

Koi wore a tight long-sleeved blue shirt on her upper half. Usually, she strapped armored plates on her arms and chest, but if they just wanted to run around and jump across the rooftops, she would relinquish the armor for sake of mobility. 

Her mask was arguably cooler than his, not that he would admit it to her face. It was a simple blue masquerade mask made of metal that tied at the back of her head. Small, silver fish patterns were engraved on it and the lenses covering the eye holes were blue with a silvery tint. 

He sighed. "...Let's go home." 

∞ ∞ ∞

'Home' was not a house. Home was their bunker, hidden deep under the city. Home was filled with weapons, secret exits and entrances, and of course, basic house essentials. They were rich, after all.

Koi stepped out of the sewer system on a random street, pulling Firefly out after her. They had taken off their masks and put hoodies on over their costumes, hopefully that would be a good enough disguise for now.

"Gee, I sure do love the feeling of the wind through my non-existant hair," Firefly joked, elbowing Koi who snorted. He had hair...Just not a lot of it. And that was by choice. He wasn't old.

They walked along the street silently, sticking to the shadows. A few times, Firefly was suspicious someone was following them, but every time he turned around, no one was there. But he still got the eerie feeling they were being watched. 

The walk was silent as they both reminisced of good times...Punching heroes in the face, breaking into banks, posing like badasses on rooftops... Firefly knew he was going to miss it. Then, something crashed in the alleyway next to them. Still on edge, Firefly jumped nearly a foot into the air.

"Koi..." He muttered nervously, but her eyes were already trained in the direction of the grimy alleyway. She began approaching the alleyway and Firefly, for the millionth time, admired her bravery and curiosity. Noticing he wasn't moving, he quickly speed-walked to her side, approaching cautiously next to her.

Koi stepped into the alley, casting a quick glance back at Firefly to make sure he was there with her. There was a rustling noise from behind a trash can and a small head popped shyly into view, her eyes wide and scared. 

Firefly drew back instantly. It was a fucking kid. And she looked... Well, to put it plainly, she looked terrible. Terrible and extremely young. Seven at oldest. She had long auburn hair that would have looked pretty if it hadn't been tangled and dirty. Koitook a step towards her and she took a step back, sage green wings coming around her body to protect her-Holy fuck, the child had wings. 

They were...Bird's wings? It was hard to tell, they did not look well cared for. The child - girl - spoke in a small voice. "Who are you...?" Her voice was laced with fear, mistrust, and innocence.

Koi skipped straight past introductions and asked in a concerned tone, "Do you have family?" The gir's eyes widened and she shook her head silently, auburn hair falling in her face slightly. Firefly recognized the look on her - Koi's - face. The impulsiveness. Koi looked from him back to the girl and spoke to the girl in a soothing tone.

"Okay, sweetheart, we'll just be one moment, just stay here, mmkay?" The girl nodded mutedly and Koi grabbed Firefly's hand, tugging him out of the alleyway. Firefly knew what she was thinking. It was basically written on her face.

"Listen," She began. "I know you're going to think this is impulsive and all, but this is a child on the streets. I would die if I didn't do anything." Firefly considered this, potentially for too long, because Koi broke out the real names.

"Listen, Jack, I hope you know that you don't really have a say in this." She said in a slightly warning tone. Firefly held his hands up in surrender.

"I was going to agree with you anyway..." He mumbled. "Just trying to think out the logistics..." Koi gave him a teasing warning look and pulled him back into the alley where the kid was waiting quietly.

"Okay," She began in a soft tone, speaking to the kid. "You said you didn't have a family, right? Well, do you want one?" And Firefly's nonchalant face cracked into a helpless smile as the kid's eyes widened slightly, filled with excitement and surprise.

"Really?" The child asked in a small voice, looking up at them with a shocked expression.

"Really, kid." Firefly said, moving a tentative step closer to the kid and holding out a hand. Damn, he was going to get too attatched to this small child...

The girl took his hand and her small one fit nicely in his larger one, almost too perfectly. And Koi was smirking at him and he couldn't care less.

"Let's go home now." 

Words: ~2000

Are you proud of me, @YayaZa_B33_? I think that you are canonically my mother...? Or am I being disowned?

...Anyway.

What did you think...?

:')

I'm so excited to write the rest of this even though I barely know what I'm going to write about lmao

Have a great day!

-ITCFWI