Daemons 2.4
If you looked at Brockton Bay as a patchwork of first class and filth, upper class and lower class with no middle ground, then downtown was one of the nice areas. The streets and sidewalks were wide, and that meant that even with skyscrapers in every other lot, there was a great deal of blue overhead.
Following my retreat from school grounds, I hadn't been sure what to do. My sister worked an unreliable schedule, being an intern therapist, so I couldn't spend the rest of the afternoon at home unless I wanted to risk having to explain what I was doing home on a school day. She would've understood why I was home, but probably not how I earned my way out. I didn't want to hang around the general area of my school, so that had left me the options of the half-hour walk to downtown or a trip to the Boardwalk. Between my morning runs and the previous night's escapades, I had seen enough of the Boardwalk, so I'd decided to head downtown. I headed into an alleyway quickly, and transformed into Agloolik. I turned invisible, and began my flight to downtown.
I didn't want to dwell on the subject of school or Hannah Farrow, so I turned my focus to the recent message from Tattletale. She wanted to meet, presumably to repay the favor she felt she owed me. I considered the possibility that it was a trap, but I couldn't imagine any angle where it would be. She just didn't have any reason to go after me. The worst case scenario was that it wasn't Tattletale, but that wasn't the impression I'd gathered from her. What she said in the message seemed to flow with what I had seen of her last night. I would still be careful, nonetheless.
It was perplexing. These guys were, in large part, virtual unknowns. From what I knew of Grue & Bitch, they were both marginally successful B-list villains who had been barely scraping by. Tattletale & Regent were practically invisible in the hero world. Now both were all on a team that was pulling high profile heists and confounding even the likes of Armsmaster. The four of them seemed totally different in methodology and style, and if I was remembering right, both Grue & Bitch had lived in different cities prior to teaming up and setting roots in Brockton Bay, and Tattletale & Regent could've come from anywhere. That raised the question: who or what had drawn these four very different individuals together?
It was possible that Tattletale or Regent were the uniting factors, but I couldn't really imagine it, having seen what I did of their group dynamic. Grue had poked fun at Regent rather than treat him like a leader. While I couldn't quite voice it, the more I imagined Tattletale uniting that group of unconnected people with powers, the harder I found it to picture. In fact, when I thought about it, hadn't Grue said they had fought for a considerable amount of time over how to deal with Lung? It didn't really sound like they had any leadership worth speaking about. The most likely scenario was that Grue was the 'leader', since he had done the most talking to me.
It wasn't hard to sympathize with Armsmaster. The whole scenario there was just bizarre, and it was made worse by the fact that there were practically no details as far as Tattletale or Regent went. Information, as it seemed, was a major factor when dealing with capes.
The streets were busy with people on their lunch break. Businessmen and businesswomen were heading to fancy restaurants and fast food places. My stomach growled as I flew over a line of people waiting their turn at a street vendor. I checked my pockets and winced at the realization that I didn't have enough for even a hot dog. I lowered myself, invisibly, and stole a pre-prepared hotdog. If I was posing as a villain, I could do a few criminal misdemeanors, right?
I chewed on my delicious, ketchup-y hotdog as I thought back to the circle of villains and Tattletale's message, the amusing thought crossed my mind that I could ask them to repay the favor by buying me lunch. It wasn't a serious thought, but the ridiculousness of the mental image – me eating a burger with a group of supervillains – put a dumb smirk on my face. I was pretty sure I would've looked like an idiot if anyone could've saw me.
What I had decided to do, and what I talked with Jazz about, was that I would become a supervillain to see what was going on with the Undersiders. It wasn't much of a dream to become a villain, as much as it was a goal to help people that drove me to do this. I lazily floated in the air, above the hubbub of commotion, savoring the last few bites of my hotdog. But if I was going to take these guys up on their offer, I was going to need a computer. Preferably a traceable one, so if they did trace it, they didn't think I was a Tinker. I briefly pondered the idea that Tucker was a Tinker, seeing the tech that he had given to me as a going away present. But I shook those thoughts out of my head, dismissing them; Tinker-tech was impossible to replicate, while Tucker-tech was simply complex as all hell.
I turned around mid-flight and headed in the direction of the public library. It was only a few blocks away.
The library was busy, which made sense, given the number of offices and businesses around, the number of people wanting some quiet during their lunch hour, and people doing research or casual browsing they couldn't do at their workplaces. I would have included Brockton Bay's biggest and fanciest high school, the nearby Arcadia High, in that generalization, but I doubted many students were spending their lunch breaks at the library. And if they did, it was at their own fancy shmancy library.
The Central Library looked almost more like a museum or art gallery than anything else, with tall ceilings, pillars and massive pieces of artwork hung to frame the hallways between the major sections of the building. I headed up to the second floor, where there were about twenty computers and a line of people waiting their turn to use them. I anticipated a fifteen or twenty minute wait, but as the clock approached one o'clock, people headed back to work and the line rapidly thinned out. A free computer came up within a few minutes of my joining the line. I let the person behind me go on ahead, waiting a bit longer so I could get a station with a little more privacy.
By the time I sat down, I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to write. I found the message with the search function and clicked on the username 'Tt'. A drop down menu appeared, and I chose 'send private message'. It gave me the option of making an account, signing in with an already existing account, or sending the message as an anonymous guest. I chose the last option, then typed:
Subject: Re:Agloolik
Yo. I'll meet, but I want some proof that you're Tt. Gimme something and I'll meet up.
I didn't send it right away, taking a moment to consider. Getting decent proof would prevent any potential problems like the message turning out to be a trap laid by, say, Bakuda. Leaving the burden of proof on Tattletale and leaving it up to her to decide if she wanted verification I was indeed Agloolik meant I didn't have to worry about coming up with exactly how one might prove their identity. If she had information gathering powers like I thought she did, I shouldn't have to wait long. Confident, I sent the message.
The reply came only two or three minutes later. It was fast enough that I couldn't imagine Tattletale taking the time to trace the message. Was that her power, or just intuition?
I closed the tabs I had opened in the meantime and checked to see what she had written. It was a private message, from her to me, and it confirmed her identity
Subject: re:Bug
Proof? Last night you beat up that big guy, hurt his balls, and talked to G a lot. Good enough?
G R and me will meet you at the same spot we crossed paths last night, k? Don't have to get gussied up if you catch my drift. Rest of us will be in casual wear.
If we meet at 2 will that give you enough time to get there from library with everything you need? let me know
Ta ta
A grin formed. 'Interesting,' I thought. She knew where I was, and she was letting me know. Why? More to the point, how? I knew my way around computers, my mom and dad had made sure I had one since before I could read and write, I could tell if I was being hacked or not. She had managed to gain that information by using her power, probably
I would have interpreted the casual mention of my location as a veiled threat if it didn't run contrary to everything else in her messages to me. Besides – Tattletale was talking about meeting me in casual clothes. I took that to mean they wouldn't be in costume. I couldn't understand why, but at the same time, it was hard to imagine her threatening me with one breath just a sentence after she'd offered to meet me in a way that made her totally vulnerable.
As I pondered the message, the screensaver came up. The words 'BROCKTON BAY CENTRAL LIBRARY' scrolled across the screen in varying colors. This was my only chance, so I had to go…
"Excuse me?"
Startled, I looked up. A middle aged woman in a red jacket stood just behind me. As I met her eyes she asked, "Are you done?" She gestured at the computer, where the screensaver was still scrolling.
Heady with the relief that she hadn't been, irrationally enough, Tattletale, I smiled and told her, "Give me thirty seconds."
Subject: Re:Agloolik
See you at two.
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I showed up in costume. I didn't care if they thought it was rude or paranoid, I would rather be capable of surviving having a knife pulled on me than play nice. Besides, if it wasn't a trap, which it probably wasn't, it was just a quick lightshow to turn human again.
I had changed and flown to the alleyway shortly after leaving the library. What could've been a long fifteen to twenty minute trek was a short five minute flight. Once arriving at the alleyway, I looked around. Everything was still the same as last night, give a cigar here and there.
I checked to make sure no one was coming before splitting myself into five. There was me, the original, and four clones. When I split myself into clones, my mind started working in overdrive and splitting/dulling sensations. Most of the sensations my clones received were stored in their own brains, while certain ones they wanted me to see were 'sent' to me. I received the senses, those overlaying my own like a video recording. For the purpose of scouting, i created four clones. I named my clones based on Greek letter, and when they are formed. Today, there was Alpha, the first clone; Beta, the second; Gamma; the third; and Delta, the last clone. I sent them out invisibly in the respective directions of north, east, west, and south. When I split my clones, I could transfer energy between us. As of now, the most my clones could do were fly and turn invisible, which was all I needed them to do.
It was Gamma who informed me of three individuals, two guys and a girl, who were arriving from the west. None of the three were wearing masks, which I deemed reason to believe Tattletale had been telling the truth. They weren't in costume. There was no guarantee that the three were really Tattletale, Grue and Regent, but I felt confident let my invisibility drop, and absorb my invisible clones, as they stepped into the alleyway.
It was them, no doubt. I recognized them even without their costumes. Two guys and a girl. The girl had dirty blonde hair tied back into a loose braid, a smattering of freckles over the bridge of her nose and the same vulpine grin I recognized from the night prior. She wore a black long sleeved t-shirt with a graffiti-style design on it and a knee length denim skirt. I was surprised by the bottle-glass green of her eyes.
The smaller and younger of the two guys – about my age – was undoubtedly Regent. I recognized the mop of black curls. He was a fairly good looking guy, but not in a way that would make me say he was handsome. He was pretty, with a triangular face, light blue eyes and full lips pulled into a bit of a scowl. I pegged him as having French or Italian heritage. I could see where he would have girls all over him, I didn't swing that way, myself. I was fairly heterosexual, if I said so myself. And I did. He was wearing a white jacket with a hood, jeans and sneakers, and was perched on the raised lip at the edge of the roof, a bottle of cola in hand.
Grue was startling in appearance, by contrast. Taller than me by at least a foot, Grue had dark chocolate skin, shoulder length cornrows and that masculine lantern jaw you typically associated with guy superheroes. He wore jeans, boots and a plain green t-shirt, which struck me as a bit cold for the spring. I did note that he had considerable muscle definition in his arms. This was a guy who worked out.
"And he's come," Tattletale crowed, "Pay up."
Regent's scowl deepened for a second, and he fished in his pocket for a wad of bills, which he forked over to Tattletale.
"You guys bet on whether I would show up?" I ventured.
"We bet on whether you would come in costume," Tattletale told me. Then, more to Regent than to me, she said, "and I won."
"Again," Regent muttered.
"It's your own fault for taking the bet in the first place," Grue said, "Even if it wasn't Tattle, it was a sucker bet. Showing up in costume makes too much sense. It's what I would do." He had a nice voice. It was an adult voice, even if his appearance gave me the sense of a guy in his late teens.
He extended his hand to me, "Hey, I'm Brian."
I shook his hand, he wasn't shy about shaking my hand firmly. I said, "Agloolik, I guess. At least, until I come up with something better, or until I decide this isn't an elaborate trick."
He shrugged, "Cool." There wasn't the slightest trace of offense at my suspicion. I almost felt bad.
"Lisa," Tattletale introduced herself. She didn't offer me her hand to shake, but I think it would have felt out of place if she had. It wasn't that she seemed unfriendly, but she didn't have the same aura of geniality about her that Grue did.
"I'm Alec," Regent informed me, with a quiet voice, then he added, "And Bitch is Rachel."
"Rachel is sitting this one out," Grue said, "She didn't agree with the aim of our meeting, here."
"Which raises the question," I cut in, "What is the aim of this meeting? I'm a little weirded out with you guys revealing your secret identities like this, or at least, pretending to."
"Sorry," Brian apologized, "That was my idea. I thought we would make a token show of trust."
My eyes narrowed, flicking from Lisa to Alec to Brian. I couldn't draw any conclusions from their expressions.
"Why, exactly, do you need my trust?" I asked.
Brian opened his mouth, then closed it. He looked to Lisa, who bent down and picked up a plastic lunchbox. She held it out to me.
"I said we owed you. All yours, no strings attached."
Without taking the box, I tilted my head to get a better look at the front. "Alexandria. She was my favorite member of the Protectorate when I was a kid. Is the lunch box collectable?" I asked, teasing edging my voice.
"Open it," Lisa prompted me, with a roll of her eyes.
I took it. From the weight and the motion of the contents inside it, I immediately had a pretty good idea of what it was. I undid the clasps and opened the box.
"Money," I breathed, caught off guard by suddenly having so much in my hands. Eight stacks of bills, tied with paper bands. Each of the paper bands had a number written on it in permanent marker. Two fifty each…
Lisa answered before I had the number totaled up in my head, "Two grand."
I closed the box and did the clasps. "That's a lot of fucking money," I stated.
"You have two choices," Lisa explained, "You can take that as a gift. A thank you for, intentionally or not, saving our ass from Lung last night. And maybe a bit of incentive to count us among your friends when you're out in costume and doing dastardly deeds."
Her grin widened, as if she'd said something she found amusing. Maybe it was the irony of a villain talking about 'dastardly deeds', or how corny the phrase was. She elaborated, "Between territory disputes, differences in ideology, general power struggles and egos, there's a rare few people in the local villain community who won't attack us on sight."
"And the second option?" I asked.
"You can take this as your first installment in the monthly allowance you're entitled to as a member of the Undersiders," Brian spoke up, "As one of us."
I shifted my gaze between the three of them, inwardly smirking. Lisa still had a bit of a smile, but I was getting the impression that was her default expression. Alec looked a little bored, if anything. Brian looked dead serious. Cool.
"Two thousand a month," I said.
"No," Brian cut in, "That's just what the boss pays us, to stick together and to stay active. We make, uh, considerably more than that."
Lisa smirked, and Alec chuckled as he swished the contents of his coke bottle. I made mental note at the mention of this 'boss'.
Not wanting to get sidetracked, I quickly thought through the earlier part of our conversation in the context of the job offer.
I asked, "So Bitch didn't come because she was against the, er, recruitment?"
"Yeah," Alec said, "We voted on it, and she said no."
"On the plus side, the rest of us voted yes," Brian hurried to add, giving Alec a dirty look, "She'll come around. She always votes against adding new members to the group, because she doesn't want to divide the money five ways."
"So you've done this recruiting thing before," I concluded.
"Uh, yeah," Brian looked a touch embarrassed, he rubbed the back of his neck, "It didn't go well. We tried with Spitfire, and she got scared off before we even got to the job offer. Our fault, for bringing Rachel along that time."
"And then she got recruited by someone else," Alec added.
"Yeah," Brian shrugged, "She got snagged by Faultline before we got a second chance. We've made an offer to Circus, too, and she told us in no uncertain terms that she worked alone."
"Taught me a few new curse words while she did it, too," Alec said.
"She was pretty vocal about how she flies solo," Brian admitted.
"So you're going the extra mile, with no costumes as a show of trust and a cash bonus up front, to get me to join," I said, as the pieces came together.
"That's the gist of it," Brian agreed, "Long and short of it is, especially with Lung taken out of action and the ABB diminished by his being gone, there's bound to be some pushing and shoving over territory and status among the various gangs and teams. Us, Faultline's Crew, the remaining ABB, Empire Eighty-Eight, the solo villains, and any out of town teams or gangs that figure that they can worm in and grab a piece of the Bay. If it comes down to it, we want firepower. We haven't screwed up a job yet, but the way us three figure it, it's only a matter of time before we end up stuck in a fight we can't win, with Bitch as the only one of us who can really dish out the hurt."
"And you want me to join you," I stated.
"You fucked up Lung," Lisa shrugged as she spoke, "Good enough for me."
"I suppose," I relented, "but I'm just an Alexandria package, with a few extra bits and pieces."
"Honey," Lisa said, "Entire teams of capes have gone up against Lung and got their asses handed to them. That you managed as well as you did is fantastic. The fact that the asshole is lying in a hospital bed because of you is the icing on the cake."
I didn't hear about that, actually. "What do you mean, 'lying on a hospitable bed'?"
"You froze him solid."
"Yeah?" I questioned, more then said.
"Do you know what happens when a penis gets frosbite?"
I blanched, feeling a bit sick.
Tattletale grinned, "I can't believe you didn't know."
"But he regenerates!" I protested, dropping my hands, "Can't he regrow it?"
"Let's just say that even with the ability to heal several times faster than your average person, Lung is going to be sitting down to use the toilet."
"Okay, that's enough," Brian stopped Lisa before she could go on, "Lung is going to recover, right?"
With the look Brian was giving Lisa, I thought she might lie, regardless of the truth. She shrugged and told me, "He's already recuperating. lowly, but he's on the mend, and he should be in good working order in six months to a year."
"You'd better hope he doesn't escape," Alec said, his voice still quiet but bemused, "Because if someone made my man bits fall off, I'd be out for blood."
Brian pinched the bridge of his nose, "Thank you for that, Alec. The way you two are going, our potential recruit is going to run off to have a panic attack before the idea of becoming an Undersider even crosses her mind."
"How do you know this?" I asked, within a heartbeat of the thought crossing my mind. When Brian turned my way with an expression like he thought he had said something to offend me, I clarified, "Tattletale, or Lisa, or whatever I'm supposed to call you. How do you know this stuff about Lung… or about the fact that I was at the Library, or that the cape was on his way, last night?"
"Library?" Brian interjected, giving Lisa another dark look.
Lisa ignored Brian's question and winked at me, "Girl's gotta have her secrets."
"Lisa's half the reason we haven't failed a job yet," Alec said.
"And our boss is a large part of the rest," Lisa finished for him.
"So you say," Brian grumbled, "But let's not go there."
Lisa smiled at me, "If you want the full scoop, I'm afraid the details on what we do only come with team membership. What I can tell you is that we're a good group. Our track record is top notch, and we're in it for fun and profit. No grand agenda. No real responsibility."
I pursed my lips. While I had picked up some info, I felt like I had a lot more questions. Who was this boss they mentioned? Was he or she setting up other teams of highly successful villains, in Brockton Bay or elsewhere? What made these guys as effective as they were, and was it something I could steal or copy for myself?
It wasn't like I was signing the deal in blood or anything. I stood to gain so much. I transformed back to my human form. Rings of light traversing my body. Lisa watched with a bit of awe, while Brian and Alec jumped a bit in surprise. I let myself grin a vulpine grin, not unlike how I saw Tattletale grin last.
"Okay then," I said. "Hi. My name is Danny Fenton.
"Count me in."
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[A/N]: And the bank job grows closer!
~Slenderbrine