S2 - Ep 2: Summer Break Shenanigans - Part 2
The local Sheriff does everything he can to make Luz's life more difficult and capture the vigilante All For One. Luz's cousin comes to visit her, unaware she's not what she seems.
This chapter contains examples of:
- Abusive Parents: Riley's father was physically abusive towards her. Riley didn’t even bother telling her mother about it, thinking it would’ve been like talking to a brick wall.
- Accidental Murder: Riley accidentally kills her father when they were having an argument just as her Bomb Touch Quirk first activates, turning him into Ludicrous Gibs.
- Amazing Technicolor Population: Millie is described as having grayish-white skin.
- Astonishingly Appropriate Appearance: Riley wears a shirt with an explosion picture on it. This is fitting as her Quirk is called "Bomb Touch".
- Axes at School: A kid in California with the power to continuously gain kinetic energy and build it up in his body just by merely existing blew his whole school out of the ground in an unprovoked attack, killing 100s of people in the process. He was gunned down by the police for this.
- Child Soldier: According to Riley, her case isn't uncommon for many kids with dangerous Quirks to become killers for the very Corrupt Church that spread Fantastic Racism against them.
- Clothing Damage: Luz is no longer wears her now destroyed vigilante suit. Her mother is now patching it up.
- Cool Big Sis: Luz views her cousin Riley as this.
- Cop Killer: The girl with magnet powers killed off 90% of the backup police sent to arrest her before she was shot and arrested by the remainder.
- Dark and Troubled Past. Riley gained a Quirk from the Mass Super-Empowering Event, the power to turn anything she touched with her bare hands into bombs. This includes people, as she found out first-hand while having a fight with her abusive father and turning him into bloody chunks, losing her right eye in the explosion. She was then kicked out of her house by her mother for that, not believing he abused her. After that Riley was taken in by the Wittebane Mega Church, but they didn't save her from homelessness out of a Pet the Dog moment, instead there's the catch of turning her into their personal assassin. She didn't see any other option than homelessness or ending up dead in a ditch by the Church Militants.
- Dirty Cop: Sheriff Johnson is abusing his position to stack the deck against Luz and violate her human rights by bribing people to ban her from local facilities. He's also to hire criminals to do his dirty work for him.
- Drugs Are Bad: Luz certainly thinks so after seeing a bunch of drug addicts high off their marbles in an alleyway.
- Even Evil Has Standards:
- Despite being a Dirty Cop, Sheriff Johnson was sick to his stomach hearing what Governor Maxwell created a Deadly Game were 6 out 33 came out alive, comparing it to a tragedy on the same level as the Useful Notes/Columbine massacre. Especially since his nephew wasn't one of the survivors.
- She may have been quick to adjust to the assassin lifestyle, but Riley is disgusted by the Wittebanes' brainwashed bigotry and the morally bankrupt Dirty Cops running Gravesfield, wishing she didn't have to deal with them.
- Evil Pays Better: As much as Riley hates the Wittebane’s for their supposed connections with what happened at The Death Camp, they pay her good money for each assassination she does for them. Really good money. Like, seriously, 100K per job and because it was a "church job", it was tax-exempt. that's way more than her previous minimum-wage job.
- Evil Red Head: Riley has red hair and is a hitwoman for the Wittebane church.
- Exhausted Eye Bags: Sheriff Johnson has these due to lack of sleep.
- Eye Patch Of Power: Riley wears a black eyepatch and is a superhuman that turns things into bombs via touch.
- Eye Scream: Riley loses her right eye because of the explosion she made from accidently killing her dad. She only avoids Facial Horror and dying only because of her brother's Healing Spit power.
- Foreshadowing: Riley's comrade, Millie, is described as having "strange ears" and, according to the Wittebane’s, was a close ally of theirs thanks to the “connections” they had. The implications aren't good especially with the way she's dressed...
- Genre Savvy: Luz figures out that Sheriff Johnson has turned the whole town against her for her role in his nephew's death.
- The Glomp: Luz meets her cousin Riley for the first time in years across the street and the first thing she does is use her Spring Coil limbs to do this to her.
- Good Parents: Despite Shigaraki's claims, ultimately Camila is a genuinely good and loving mother for Luz, even if she isn't a perfect one.
- Hate Sink: It’s hard to feel much sympathy for the sheriff, considering he bribed businesses and schools to ban Luz and only Luz in order to ruin her life as much as possible.
- Having a Blast: Riley has the power to turn anything she touched with her bare hands into bombs with her Quirk "Bomb Touch", from inanimate objects to living people.
- Hellbent For Leather: Riley wears a black leather jacket.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: Luz gains this status after the sheriff leaks her role in The Massacre Of Fools. Luz has now become even more of an outcast in the Human World than ever before.
- Heroic Wannabe: The sheriff sees Luz's alter ego as this, despite all the good she's done.
- Huge School Girl: Riley's a senior year high school student that stands 5'9 ft. tall.
- I Have No Son!: After the Accidental Murder of her father, Riley's mother kicked her out of the house.
- Irony: Riley's next target for her to kill is All For One, who, unbeknownst to her, is her little cousin Luz who she just reconnected with. An unaware Luz thinks she's having good day now.
- Karma Houdini: The Gravesfield Sheriff sees Luz as this and intends to avert it.
- The Kingslayer: The president of China, the militarized police, and the entirety of the CCP were all killed by kid with a stressed-based Quirk after they tried to crack down on people with Quirks, leaving the country in disarray with the possibility of the country collapsing into anarchy.
- Long-Lost Relative: Downplayed. Luz hasn't seen her cousin Riley since she was 6-years old, at the day of her father's funeral.
- Magnetism Manipulation: 4 days after the Mass Super-Empowering Event, in Houston, Texas a 17-year-old girl with with this Quirk attacked a mall to steal every video game console and T.V. in the store.
- Mama Bear: Luz's mom fully intends to keep her vow to never fail her daughter again. Camila give her local Dirty Cop sheriff a piece of her mind, not knowing he's abusing his authority to make her daughter's life more difficult.
- Moral Guardians: A third wave of The Satanic Panic in the U.S. with Far Right-leaning mega-churches declaring that children with superpowers were “demons that had replaced our children”, under the guise of their right to "free speech". The worst peddlers of this is the mega church run by the Wittebanes in Gravesfield.
- Motor Mouth: Luz becomes this when happily greeting Riley.
- Mr. Exposition: Sheriff Johnson in his POV explains our the rise of Quirks have negatively affected the world.
- Never Found the Body: Cody Johnson's body was never found at the Death Camp.
- Parents as People: Camila desperately tries to correct her mistakes by standing up for Luz even as things go increasingly to hell for her daughter.
- Person of Mass Destruction: There are reports in the UK and Japan recording recorded high numbers of killings due to battles in the streets with kids who had powers to level whole cities, aged from 7 to just under 18.
- Persona Non Grata: The local Police Chief has been making Luz's life more unbearable by making her this in the local facilities in Gravesfield. He has bribed store owners, gyms, day-cares, libraries, restaurants, and even the schools (including online ones) to ban her from their shops spreading rumours that she was a crazy murderer.
- Precision F-Strike: Camila calls bullshit on the police chief's excuses.
- Price on Their Head: Luz's vigilante persona has a bounty of $10 Million put on by the Wittebane Mega Church.
- Professional Killer: Riley is this for the Wittebanes.
- Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated: Riley explained to Luz that Camila posted Facebook when her daughter was in the hospital and were in for emergency surgery updating her status. After she stopped updating her page, Riley and her immediate family all assumed the worst had happened to the girl.
- Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: If anyone said anything about the police chief's abuse of power…. Well, he was the police chief. He was the law. He was the person who enforced the laws.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The police chief wants Luz to do this on Gravesfield.
- Serial Killer: Sheriff Johnson views Luz as this for her role in The Massacre of Fools. Although she technically doesn't fit the profile.
- Shout-Out:
- The robbers that Luz caught in the previous chapter called themselves The Wet Bandits — and yes it was a reference to the Christmas movie Home Alone. Except they targeted banks instead of houses.
- A 17-year girl in Texas that went on a crime spree had the powers of Magneto.
- Super-Empowering: Luz gave away Cody's "Flame" Quirk to a chain smoker to light his cigarettes.
- Super Registration Act: The use of Quirks is considered assault with a deadly weapon by The Supreme Court.
- Super-Strength: Luz is able to stop speeding cars with one hand.
- Tailor-Made Prison: The government now have to figure out how to contain the girl with the magnetism Quirk with one of these. They're thinking of a concrete bunker where no metal could be found, otherwise she was going to escape and cause more havoc.
- Teens Are Monsters: Gravesfield's sheriff goes into detail about stories of power-hungry children attacking people on the street and using their powers to go full Supervillain. The Wittebane Church has also hired some as their personal assassin squad.
- A Tragedy of Impulsiveness: The Houston police are described handled the situation with the magnet girl as downright horrendous, it devolved into a shoot-out with the kid in a matter of moments because one of them was too trigger-happy with the kid retaliating by using cars as bullets. Nearly all the cops were killed.
- Trapped in Villainy: Riley believes she's a case of this after she was made homeless and the Wittebane church took her in. They also said they would have her killed if You Have Failed Me on a job.
- Unwitting Pawn: The Gravesfield Sheriff is this for the Wittebane assassins.
- Villain Has a Point:
- When Riley expresses surprise at Gravesfield's police force being corrupt, Millie points out that corruption can happen anywhere in any organisation.
- The police isn't wrong about All For One's vigilantism being a crime.
- Villainous Friendship: You’d think that because she's an assassin now that her social life would tank, but it was quite the opposite. As twisted as it was, Riley admits she made good friends with her colleagues. Riley and Millie both seem to enjoy working together.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Millie can shapeshift into a cat or a dog for stealth and infiltration, like a police station.
- Why Am I Ticking?: Riley's Quirk also works on people, although the victim doesn't really tend to have time to notice that they're ticking.
- You Killed My Father: Or this case you killed the sheriff's nephew, Cody, Luz.
- You Monster!: The sheriff regards Luz as this for getting away with multiple killings.
