Meanwhile, a few blocks away...

Under a jazzy neon sign announcing Pakistani food, a slim guy with spiky hair and a heavy dude with a mini-afro observe attentively as a grey cat pukes on the sidewalk.

"Dude, you were right!" exclaims mini-afro with genuine excitement, as the cat stumbles away. "Your power works on animals! You could... take over a pet store! Or even a Zoo!"

Spiky hair chuckles. "Yeah, so you better remember not to mess with Da Vertigo Man, porky. I'll fuck yo ass up so good, you gonna think the floor is the muthafuckin' ceiling."

"Yeah well, I'll... um..." the rotund one struggles with his own words, as his face turns slightly red. "If you ever shoot fire at me, I-I'll turn it into air. Yeah!"

"You GOTTA come up with some new tricks, bro..." Vertigo Man laughs. "You could use your powers to turn oxygen into fucking beryllium if you wanted, but you're stuck on this lame fire-air routine. Whatta fucking disgrace you turned out to be! Hahahaha!"

"LAUGH IT UP, FUNNYBOY!" yells mini-afro, trying to sound menacing. Of course, his hurried and nervous 'angry' speech only makes his partner laugh even harder. "You're not gonna be laughing so hard the next time you try to light the oven with a match and, and the flame keeps going off! I could make sure you NEVER cook again buster, so, so WATCH IT!"

"That's okay, I'll just order in..."

"I wouldn't recommend calling this place, then," the black haired chick walking out of the restaurant says. "The chef's not gonna be doing any cooking for a while, having just 'misplaced' both his thumbs..."

The two young men feel the air drop a couple of degrees when their female partner approaches them. She calls herself Ice Queen for more than one reason. The obese one ineffectively tries to hide how upset she makes him. "Y-You didn't bring me the burger I asked for, then...?"

"They don't serve burgers in Pakistani joints, Circle Jerk," she coldly replies.

"Haha. Yeah, Circle Jerk..." Vertigo Man adds.

"THAT'S NOT MY CODENAME, GODDAMMIT! I told you I decided on The Flicker! I AM THE FLICKER!!!"

"You're better off with Circle Jerk, trust me," Ice Queen says. "But enough teasing the fatty... Let's get back to business. Did you ask in the store across the street?"

"Yeah, they never saw 'em either," VM replies. "I'm guessing you didn't have much luck in the restaurant, either."

"No, the guy would have told me if he knew anything after the first thumb. You did lean hard on the storekeeper, didn't you?"

"Uh..." Circle Jerk looks at Vertigo Man, and finds his hesitant look reflected on his face. "We made her cat puke."

Ice Queen lets out an annoyed sigh, and the vapor coming out of her mouth could freeze a mosquito to the death. Ice cold death. "We're never gonna find these Strikeforce rookies if you two lamers don't grow some balls!"

"WHY do we wanna find 'em, again?" VM asks. "Didn't we kick their asses already?"

"Yeah, so we know we can beat them!" IQ exclaims. "We figured it'd be a piece of cake for a senior member like the time-stopper to--"

"You mean Martin," CJ interrupts. "His name was..."

"Whatever! We told our bosses about these two new hero guys because we wanted to score some points with them. Now, since a senior member of our little society failed to kill them, if we succeed in doing that we'll probably be upgraded to full memberships!"

CJ nervously scratches the back of his head. "That's fine, but, uh... do we really wanna be upgraded? I'm cool with being a newbie, you know..."

"Yeah, I'm rollin' with fatty on this one," VM adds. "Have I mentioned our bosses gimme the jeepers? Let's go back home."

Ice Queen looks at her partners with deep hatred. As if her look alone wasn't intimidating enough, a sudden rush of cold air makes their nipples erect.

"You pair of fucking losers! We're not leaving this neighbourhood until we find those two! They've been spotted here a lot according to the database... SOMEONE had to see something!" IQ grabs her two partners and pushes them down the street. "We're splitting. You two take a block each this way, I'll break some fingers on this side myself."

"But..."

"GO!"

As Vertigo Man and Circle Jerk hurriedly walk on the direction she pointed them to, Ice Queen sighs again. "I can't wait to freeze their heads off once this is over..." she mutters under her breath, before turning away.