The Beach Episode: Part 2 [Recommended Listening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGnrRCxLbv4 ]
Sally holds Noah's hand as the boy clutches the hem of his skirted bikini bottom with his other shaking hand. A cold fury builds up inside the slightly taller girl as they walk toward the girl's restroom.

"Noah, wait right here and don't move. Just try to act natural too, okay?" She says in a poor attempt at a reassuring voice.

"N-Natural? Noah... Noah will try his best..." he says with a beet red face. Sally gives him a small smile as she runs into the girl's room, looking in all the stalls and on the wet and sandy floor. Plenty of the other women give her stares like she's gone mad, but Sally's gotten those since her classmates saw she uses her hands to eat sushi and most other foods that aren't piping hot.

She lets out a frustrated groan as she looks in the mirror and smooths her hair out. She hears a Noah-pitched gasp outside, which distracts her from preening her long brown hair. She looks straight outside, where two tall Japanese men with dyed hair stand close to Noah, complimenting his wings and his eyes. The second Sally steps out of the ladies room, Noah runs to her. Sally thinks on her feet, mustering all of her Japanese vocabulary:

"Little Sis! What's wrong?" She says as she draws the cute boy close, hoping he picks up on her train of thought.

Noah can't bring himself to speak, simply biting his lip as one of the blonde guys steps forward, his spray-tanned skin and leering smile making his intent obvious.

"{Come on girls, we've got a really nice spot you can tan in. Drinks too.}"

"{Fuck off.}" Sally says back as she lets a low growl out. A low clicking sound is heard in her arm as Noah starts to try to lead her away.

"{Where you two going? This beach is pretty crowded, you know; might help to have some muscle.}" the other one says as they both pose.
Sally is about to point her palm forward, her teeth gritting as some defensive measure in her mind is activated.

"S-Sorry... Noah and Sally are late for something, but thank you..." The boy manages to say in Japanese, using a more feminine and polite way of speaking as he slowly drags the fuming Sally away.

"{Turn the other cheek, Sally.}" he whispers to her, stunning the gun nun into being dragged to a concession stand where the two sit down. The two sit in silence.

"...Sorry about... all of this, Noah. I insisted we take just one bag..."

"It's not your fault, Sally. Noah should have been more assertive..."

Sally tries her best not to look at Noah as the wind blows around the frills of his bikini, a blush forming with every stolen glance.

"...Noah knows he looks cute... Noah's mom always tells him he'd make a very pretty girl..."

"You've still got your manly charms, though!" Sally says quickly. "You're patient, kind... a model... person in general! It's just... I feel dirty looking at you like a horny old man..."

"Noah understands... He notices the stares too... I don't know how you wear your swimsuit, especially with your prominent... bust..."

Sally blushes intensely and looks away. "I-I have a t-shirt in my bag we can cut some holes in for your wings... But where the hell is it!?"

Noah tries to focus himself as he crosses his legs: "Noah... heard metal on the floor before the bag was taken. Do girls' sandals usually have metal soles?"

"No... but you know who does have metal feet?"

"Takara!" They say in unison.

They both sigh as they look over the crowded beach. Everybody and their dog was here today...

Then they heard it: rap-tap, rap-tap, rap-tap... the sound of metal on the path behind them.

They both get up, ready to catch the thief to protect each other's dignity.

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[Recommended Listening: https://youtu.be/WqlP9pjeX1Q - Imagine it's muffled through a slightly tinny speaker.]
Akagi sits at a beach-side bar watching Aiko's students while they hold a diving competition against the wishes of every lifeguard and their ancestors.

Ryusei was off emptying the ashtray out in a garbage can, mostly for himself since she was nearing the end of the pack she bought with Aiko's money.

Her next beer came, nice and cold, as she pushed her messy blonde hair aside. Akagi's phone rings, and she taps her home screen. An old picture of herself with some kids she rescued years ago as the phone's wallpaper. She answers Aiko's call.

"How are things going, Akagi? Found everyone okay?" The teacher says with cheer in her voice.

"...Yeah, they're doing a diving competition. Might want to arrange a lesson about surface tension for the black-haired boy. He's been doing belly flops trying to soak the judges for about 20 minutes straight."

"Oh, Jugo will learn on his own... eventually. Is everyone there? I'd be surprised if Sally was participating in something everyone else was doing. Same with Christopher."

"...Huh. Christopher's the kid with the weird glasses, right?"

"Yeah! Did he come?" Aiko asks excitedly.

"Yeah, he's sittin' by the skirt chaser and the hydra girl as judges for the whole thing. Seems happy enough."

"Yay!!! Get some photos for me, please, Akagi-chan?" Aiko says, fluttering her eyelashes through the line.

"Don't call me that." Akagi sighs, snapping a low-effort picture of Son Jugo slamming into the water after being dropped by Hifumi, splashing Orochi all over.

"Thank you so much! You're a good photographer, as usual. I know things have been rough, but you're already doing better. Just a few pushes, and you'll be making Funny Business just like old times." Aiko says reassuringly.

Akagi hangs up the phone and stares into her beer. It was probably just the buzz... but she felt something she hadn't felt in a long time. It was confidence, like remembering an old joke. She laughed to herself, her tired eyes showing some sign of life.

Unbeknownst to Akagi, Aiko had put in a little extra something in her final sentence before the end of the call. A little pick-me-up to help uplift the depressed hero.

As she takes a deep breath, Akagi starts to think that maybe this wasn't such a waste of a day after all.

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Hattori ignores the stares of the other women as she puts on her plated gloves and breastplate. It turns out she was pretty handy with a pile of scrap metal from the dump and a rented arc welder, along with some other fairly easy-to-find tools. She was done selling TVs and waterbeds. No more listening to her manager bitch and moan about a crease in her tights. No more stupid business parties where she has to waste money getting drunk; now is the time to take her life into her own hands!

She slaps herself on her cheeks and puts her newly decorated, but old, sunhat on. She had played a bit with its extension mechanism to make it go further than usual so she could utilize her own sharpened sun rays easily.

She steps out, attracting the stares of the beach as she heads toward the dig site and the large number of people surrounding it. Archeologists stare in wonder at the golden trinkets looted and stashed by Imperial Japanese soldiers.

She grins widely as she looks around; not a single pro hero in sight in the crowd or in the periphery. She waits a few minutes for the haul to get loaded onto a large truck and for the driver to reveal themselves. This is her moment, to break free from her rent and take what she's owed by this rotten world!

She activates Sharp Distance and feels her brain spark in pain, a pain she had grown used to over her years of accidentally activating it when she was angry, but this time she held it with wrathful intent. The people around her started to get cut out of nowhere, a few having quirks to abate it but most having to crowd under whatever shade they could as she approached the truck, her dress blowing in the breeze. The driver tries to start the car in a panic, but Broad Daylight is faster than he is turning the key. He has just enough time to throw it out a window before getting dragged out of the driver's seat and running for shade like everyone else as they crowd under concession stands and call for emergency services.

Lost in the moment, the villain faces the crowd and grabs a microphone left around the area. "You're safe for now from me, Broad Daylight! Just don't assume your heroes will arrive in time to stop my liberation of these artifacts from the tyrannical clutches of the state into more worthy hands!"

She could get used to this feeling of power and control!

She starts digging around in the sand for the keys for the truck, a smile still broadly on her face as the cover in the area slowly started to break down, small holes allowing for single sharps ray to inflict little cuts and keep the crowd in a panic...

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Most of Shiketsu's Class 1-D ran into the shade when they realized what was happening was now their problem while the pros arrived. Following protocol, most of them help LocaLoca organize evacuation efforts to get people as far away from the villain as possible. While most got to safety to let the pros handle confronting the new villain, some sought to assist in the fight out of confidence or assuredness that their quirk could counter it.

Under a shaded table, four students sit in varying emotional states as Inigo uses his loud mouth and Gigan to get people farther away, while shouting for Sally. They did not have a good view of the dig site, something that gave Hifumi some pause.

"...It's area-based, probably around her." Bobby Sampson says, drawing a rough diagram in the sand below them.

"That means we're gonna need some way to get close and blitz her down before she finds those keys." Hifumi says as Ashleigh raises her hand with a determined face. "I can give you a window, I'll just need a minute" She says as wind ruffles the frills on her pink and white bikini.

Chihiro nods, bearing her sheathed blade as her yukata's sleeves dipped downwards, ready to take a chance to move up on the villain.

Ashleigh lets out a breath as she focuses her vision on the flashy villain rummaging through the sand in front of her. The minute seems to last an hour for the heroes-to-be, but eventually, Broad Daylight looks around with a disoriented look.

Hifumi and Christopher take their chance to teleport, Hifumi readying to take Chihiro with him despite the roughly 15 seconds needed to lock the location. While they get ready to move silently through space, Bobby Sampson bravely steps out into the sun.

"Stop where you are, Broad Daylight!" He shouts as she steps closer.

"W-What? How are... how are you!?" The villain says, shocked that her trick isn't working.

"They call me Sunlight Man for a reason, evildoer. Now, prepare for a clean pummeling!" He says as he starts running toward her.
Then he coughs up blood and collapses onto his knees, an expression of horror and pain on his face as the villain lets out a laugh.

"Hah! Sunlight Man? It seems the sun has turned its table against you, wouldn't you say so?"

It doesn't take more than a moment for Hifumi to react. His focus on getting to Broad Daylight forced onto Bobby instead. "BRO!" He cries as he grabs Bobby in a blink, then teleports the two back to the cover of the shaded table.

Broad Daylight turns around to see Christopher skulking around the shadows of a digging machine, having slowly crept forward to be able to blink his way into striking distance. But he rethinks his strategy as he sees Bobby collapse and need an emergency evacuation, instead opting to hide.

"Come on out, already. I could-". The villain grabs her head, the pounding pain of using her quirk beating out her tolerance for a moment.
Christopher smirks as he sees the reaction, turning to Chihiro as she approaches some other nearby cover. "Let's get out of here."

Chihiro shakes her head as she dramatically climbs over the digging machine, her katana in both of her hands, before the villain could even see the maneuver. She went for a dead-on strike as she ignored the pain of the cuts inflicting her body, hoping her qi could outlast the damage. Her strike lands, denting the metal-plated sunhat and knocking the villain on her butt. "Y-You can't withstand my sun blades any longer!" Broad Daylight tries to boast to the girl, who desperately tries to take a stance and follow up, but the damage is stacking up.

Chihiro has a brief lapse in her focus from the pain of being cut rapidly for every small ray of sunlight, allowing Broad Daylight to grab the weakened girl by her hair and holds her wrists in a vice grip. "Now get your friends to back off, and you'll be able to walk out of this, samurai girl!"

Chihiro gets a smirk as she looks toward Christopher. "Inform the responders of our dilemma and this villain's inevitable arrest." She says as Christopher backs away.

Broad Daylight begins to feel woozier, like she's being drained of energy. She fights through it as she looks for the truck's key in the sand by kicking it around while Chihiro slowly rebuilds her strength off of her.

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Sally and Noah hide out with the life guards, with the gaijin girl doing mental math on how much she'd have to move up to land a shot on the villain that held Chihiro hostage. She looked like she was looking for something, and all she had to do was get closer before she found it: Sharp Distance's range. She turns to Noah, who clutches the patchless bag that Takara turned in.

"...I'm gonna make a break for it."

"What?! Noah can't let you do that! You'll get hurt!"

"I just have to move from cover to cover till I get within range, then it's lights out..."

"Noah... has to insist! We're supposed to get out so the professionals can handle this safely, and we'll help if we're asked!"

Sally looks at him, knowing that's what they're supposed to do according to the text book... but her gut tells her that it's now or never.

"Did Jesus wait for the Pharisee's permission to preach and heal?" She asks with narrowed eyes.

"But he would consult the elders of his temple." Noah replies quickly.

Sally bites her lip as Inigo can be heard shouting for her, using Gigan's construct body as cover for a crowd of people to flee under and dragging a heavily injured man behind him.

"What!?" Sally shouts back towards Inigo.

"He needs medical attention!  You're a nun, so... heal him, please?" He asks with a serious look.

Sally stares at him and growls. "Have you EVER seen me heal anything? My quirk is GUNS!"

"Let me, please." One of the lifeguards says as he starts cleaning the various wounds on the sharp light's victim and wrapping his wounds.

"Sally... don't hurt her too much." Noah says toward the girl.

Sally nods back to him as she starts making her way from cover to cover, determined to stop this before more victims appear.

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The once peaceful parking lot has become a large medical camp, full of support heroes healing the major and minor wounds of the beachgoers while the combat heroes that could make it in time deliberate on a course of action given the clearly wide range of the quirk. The process was slow; Impakt wanted to simply rush and act as a running distraction for Majestic (who hauled ass in a rental car to make his way over to help). The only person who could reliably block any light was Smokin' Sexy, and he was busy making sure the last wave of evacuees had a safe route to the medical base. They were still deliberating on whether or not to risk conscripting the Shiketsu students that assisted in the evacuation, with the group's patience thinning.

On the sideline, sat Akagi, hero name Popsy. Her quirk was unreliable, so she was excused from needing to help in this situation. Not that she had much of a recent record of it working at all. She had been watching the evacuation, her usual melancholy setting in over the spark of pep and inspiration that Aiko put in her.

That's until she saw a transfer student cough up blood and get rushed to a medical tent. She thought the previous injuries had been fairly light, nothing you could sue over. What she saw was a kid who was close to dying from the villain's uncontrolled quirk.

Akagi narrowed her eyes, and stood up. She may have not bothered with bringing her costume, but she had an idea she could thank the kids she drove over for.

Popsy snuck back onto the beach, moving slowly. She had heard from some of the support heroes on standby that the range on Broad Daylight's Sharpened Sunlight was 100 meters, and she was hoping the diving board the kids were misusing was around that area. By a stroke of luck, it was right on the edge of the villain's range. Popsy swam over to the tall diving platform and climbed the ladder. She could see the American girl she picked up skulking about in the shadows, moving like a tall, scantily clad raccoon from shade to shade.

For the first time in a long time, she felt Funny Business act up in response to her unusual mood. She acted on the chance, causing a brightly colored cannon to appear, not unlike one you'd see at the circus. Popsy takes one last drag of her cigarette before using the tip to light the cannon's comically long wick.

"Never thought I'd say this again, but it's showtime."

She jumps down the barrel of the cannon and fires herself high into the sky over the beach, above the 100 meter radius of Broad Daylight's quirk. At the apex of her arc, two items appear in her hands: a comically large parasol, which blocked out a significant amount of sunlight over the beach, and a colorful megaphone.

"Looks like someone's having a bad flare day!" She says toward the villain with a confident smile, like an entirely different person was speaking for her.

"W-Where the hell did you get an umbrella that big?! How did you set up a canon without me noticing!?" Broad Daylight exclaims as Chihiro cracks a small smile, still her "hostage" due to the woman's smug confidence.

"We'll have that mystery see daylight soon enough! Just keep a sunny attitude while the heroes circle you, Broad Daylight!" Popsy says through her megaphone.

Broad Daylight has to fight to keep herself awake at this point, with the yukata-clad heroine draining her stamina by the second. "S-Shut up! I've got the leverage here! This girl's my..."

She almost falls asleep again. "H-Hostage... yeah! I've got a hostage!"

"Wow, that's a new one! Your act is so boring, you're even putting yourself to sleep!" Popsy chuckles. "As for your hostage..."

The clown hero leans to the side, her lightly drifting parasol moving with her and bringing its large shadow over Broad Daylight and Chihiro.

"Maybe not your brightest idea."

Broad Daylight fumes as she is demeaned and sapped of her energy even more.

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Sally saw the spectacle of Popsy, some hero she'd never heard of before, pulling some aftermarket circus stuff out of her ass and chose not to question the logistics of it, given the distraction and shade it offered.

The girl dives for the umbrella cover as she tilts her palm up and loads a rubber-tipped 9mm round. She didn't want to get an irritating powder in Chihiro's eyes by using a pepperball and trusted her aim enough to dome Broad Daylight as she took a kneeling position.

The gunshot rang out, but it was off by a hair. It takes Broad Daylight's sunhat off, which lands in the sand. The villain quickly panics, her instinct to avoid the same kind of grievous injury she had done to others forcing her to cancel her ability.

Chihiro easily breaks out of her grip and retreats, quietly apologizing for her theft of qi. The villain realizes that things are about to get really bad for her, so she moves to escape, only to find that she can't. In confusion, she looks up to the beach once again to see a brown-haired man with his feet planted in the sand in front of her.

"H-Hey! How dare-" Broad Daylight tries to say something in frustration but has to swiftly raise her arms to block a laser coming from a smug-looking blonde man.

Broad Daylight grunts from the pain, only avoiding being knocked down because Floor's quirk conveniently keeps her from losing her footing. But before she could even think to consider herself lucky, an uppercut from out of nowhere blasts through her guard. The last thing Broad Daylight sees before she's knocked out is...

Broad Daylight's fall is cushioned by hot sand. Impakt quickly puts her in handcuffs and moves her to the parking lot to be placed in a shaded police car.

From up above, Popsy watches the action go down with a small smile.

"I haven't felt this good in years! Maybe I should... oh- oh woah..." Her smile swiftly fades, and she groans to herself as Aiko's quirk finishes running its course. "Oh... there's that good old existential dread again... holy guacamole, I need a drink."

"HELL YEAH!" Sally yells as Popsy lands beside her, the parasol fading into nothingness. The woman looks drained from coercing herself to be funny. She tries to walk away, only to have a grateful Sally grab her wrist.

"Popsy, that was your name, right? You saved our asses... Thanks." The American asks in her most polite tone.

"Just... doing my job." Akagi says as she pulls away, her eyes going back to their tired and lifeless look.

However, the cameras and reporters were faster than the clown hero, beginning a media circus.

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Sally did her best with dealing with the media as she walked back to the evacuation area, the plastic smiles of the heroes who she was sure were pissed at her for taking the biggest cut of glory of the day staring back at her.

"And Miss McCathy, or Last Rite as we should be calling you, how did you manage to subdue Broad Daylight?" The reporter asks in quick Japanese.

Sally stammers, desperately trying to understand the question, and unthinkingly spitting out a response: "Well... the whole class helped; wouldn't have intervened without them."

Class 1-D and Akagi are roped into a picture with Bobby sitting up on his stretcher and giving a smile with a thumbs up after he was fixed up with Hifumi by his side. Sally was sitting near the back of the class due to her height, giving a smile that came off as creepy. And Noah was thanking God that only his head and wings were able to be seen in the photo as he stood in front of Sally and gave a much nicer smile.
(Author's note: Most of the class would have been interviewed by news crews about the attack; feel free to write what they would have said.)

News stations in Osaka and Kyoto would run the story as their prime time coverage: "Retired Hero and Shiketsu Freshman Stop Osaka Beach Robbery: Save Thousands of Lives and a Truckload of Buried Treasure!"

And of course, with fame... would come unwanted attention...