The buildings are taller than Metropolis's, and the streets are narrower and don't have cars.

Well that's weird! If it's a vision or illusion it's a good one. Did he get transported somewhere? But where? Is it something experimental? Did he accidentally time-travel at some point in the last ten minutes? Have aliens kidnapped him again? Do any foreign countries have cities like that? 

He glances over it with x-ray and telescopic vision before getting lower, looking for signs and people and cultural landmarks and evidence that someone's screwing with him.

The people are visibly human, mostly various shades of brown with very few Asians. They are doing an array of normal things: teaching children, running shops, working in factories, treating the sick at a hospital. There's rather a lot of crying and more people biting themselves than he'd expect. 

...and over here someone seems to have taken hostages. 

Why are people biting themselves! He should figure out what's causing that right after he figures out where he is which he'll do right after diving into action to save the day. (Some situations are pretty much always clearcut.)

You don't want the bad guys to notice what you're doing before you've done it, that's how you get dead hostages. How many hostage-takers, how many weapons, how many hostages, does he have a clear enough path to use heat rays or is he relying on super speed here? The victims are top priority but if there's only one or two aggressors it'll go faster to just take them out.

One hostage-taker, three hostages, aggressor has a gun and two knives. There are... what are probably police?... out in front, all of whom are wearing brown robes.

One of the police officers is talking to the hostage-taker over the phone. "--the guy got shot in the leg at the beginning of this thing, but all kinds of unexpected things can happen in a stressful situation like this, yeah? You’ve done a good job of keeping the peace. No one else has been hurt. Everybody here is proud of you for that. Let’s see if we can get everyone out of here with no one getting hurt, okay?"

Is this... what is this? Do they know this guy? Should he not be interrupting whatever that is to arrest this guy?

Well, the most recoverable option seems to be removing the weapons. The hostage-taker feels the gust of wind and his gun disappearing in the same moment. The door is open now. There's a brief purple blur and then his knives are gone too.

"SOMEONE TOOK MY GUN!" the hostage-taker yells. "You STOLE it. WHY DID YOU STEAL MY GUN."

...why is the door open, thinks Brother Hope, who would definitely be thinking I'm not paid enough for this job if he hadn't taken a vow of poverty. 

"I don't know what happened to your gun," Brother Hope says, "but if I thought someone had stolen my weapon, I would feel mad and scared. Yeah? You're relying on that to feel safe."

The hostage-taker sniffles.

"I wonder if we can think about some other things that will help you feel safe," Brother Hope says. "Do you have a self-care* box at home? Should I send someone to get it for you?"

*The Language's connotations for this term are much less like "Instagram" and much more like "running water."

Now seems like a bad time to interrupt the brown robes. He was thinking about removing the hostage-taker, but they've clearly got something working there, and jumping in again might make things worse. If the hostages are in danger he's getting them out, but they don't seem to be. Maybe he wants to find out where this guy's self-care box is and then run over and grab it for him. He could smooth things over and introduce himself while also having some fun with it.

The other brown robes are sitting near Brother Hope, drinking tea. He can catch bits of conversation. 

"--don't know how the hell he got a gun, what the fuck is the Weapons Control committee doing, sitting around with their thumbs up their asses?"

"You could go out for it next year."

"Fuck that--"

"--it's going to be Colorado for him, he has priors."

"Man. Poor guy. One bad day and you're hoeing peas in a monastery for the rest of your life."

"Could happen to anyone--"

Meanwhile, Brother Hope has gotten the hostage-taker to say his address and the location of his self-care box. (It's under his bed.)

Zip zip zip figuring out local address standards zip zip zip house bed box zip zip zip back. The guy they sent to retrieve it hasn't made it a block.

Hostage-taker seems volatile, guy on the phone seems stressed... what if we give it to the brown robe who's heading off to the house. He lands nearby, not directly blocking the path but not about to be missed, friendly disarming smile on his face. "I think this is the box you're looking for?" he says, holding it out.

Blink blink blink. 

"...what," he says. 

"You were headed over to that man's house to pick up a self-care box. This is the box." He says like everything about this is entirely reasonable.

"HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT."

"Well, it was right where he said it was and it looked just like I'd expect a box like that to look." He holds it out. "I think you're supposed to be taking it back over there, now? Or I can do it if you need a minute."

Unable to process this particular information, the brown robe bites their wrist hard. 

...You know what he is just going to get the hostages out one two three and then leave the self-care box in front of its owner and close the door. "Everyone alright?" he asks the hostages, calm and gentle in the way you're supposed to be in these situations. "It's okay, you're safe. I hope that wasn't too startling."

...the hostages all break into tears. One of them starts hitting themself; one throws themself on the ground and rocks back and forth; one pulls at their hair.

Brother Hope, who was selected for this job because of his high scores on emotional-regulation assessments, says, "excuse me, soulbearer, who are you?"

"...Superman," he says, more than a little nonplussed. "Sorry, this isn't... the usual response I get when I try to help out. Uh. Are they alright?"

One of the other brown robes is gently guiding the hostages. 

"Being taken hostage is very stressful," Brother Hope says, "and then you... teleported? Which is a violation of the conventional laws of physics."

"Maybe I went a bit too fast," he says apologetically. "I really didn't intend any harm. Is there anything I can do for you guys that won't, uh, freak everyone out? ...One of your guys started biting himself a minute ago, should somebody go make sure he's okay?" He steps out of the way so a brown robe can get by, to avoid confusion about whether he somehow thinks he is the man for that job.

"Oh, they'll be fine with just a bit to calm down," Brother Hope says very soothingly. "Can you normally go that fast?"

"I can. It's not actually breaking any fundamental laws that I know of? If I try to go faster than light I just time-travel." Humble sheepish grin.

Blink. Blinkblink. 

"...I'm sorry, I'm not a physics monk, but I think there are several reasons that we don't expect humans to be able to run faster than humans normally do."

Brother Hope is very confused but he has had a lot of training in how to react to confusing situations; his voice is being reassuring and soothing and saying agreeable validating things while his mind is going WHAT.

"Oh, I'm not human! And I'm also not running. Here, let me--" He flies in a loop and touches back down.