Notes: Starfox – Glad you like the bonding between Madison and her new guardians. That's... important this update. ;) And Tattletale appears again as well, so hopefully you'll enjoy it. (But yes, Trevor is... not the brightest)

Imageination – Trevor is TOTALLY in over his head, and he's not exactly dealing with it in the best way. As for the latter, if it helps, Pandora does appear in this update, to hopefully make up for not appearing in the last one. :)

12.01

"I shouldn't be doing this," I announced as I stood, staring at the rows of shops that lay stretched out before me. It was the day after the incident with the Undersiders and Mr. Hase, and I had returned to the same mall.

Beside me, Jess looked up from her wheelchair. "Hey, I said you were probably more likely to find what you want in one of those little shops downtown, but you suggested the mall."

My head shook. "Not that. I mean any of this. Trevor's in..." I trailed off and lowered my voice. "Trevor's in the Birdcage, Jess. And what am I doing? I'm... I'm... goofing off."

The other girl swatted my arm. "Don't be stupid. You're not goofing off. You're getting a present for your... your girlfriend, and then going on a date, a real date. Your girlfriend who happens to be one of my best friends, so there."

I sighed a little. "But Trevor-"

"Will survive another day," she said firmly. "Look, you said that Tattletale and Reach are going over the details of the break-in, right?"

"Yeah..." I said slowly.

"And that the earliest they could possibly get in there would be tomorrow, right?" She prompted.

My head nodded as I bit my lip. "Yeah, true, but still-"

"But nothing." Jess looked at me seriously. "Honestly, Madison, it's all right. Your brother has Miss Militia with him. I'm not going to lie and say he's safe, but can you do anything right now to make him safer?"

Opening my mouth to respond, I hesitated. "I... I could... say something..."

"To who?" The other girl shook her head. "You could start a panic by saying that your brother is trapped in there with one of the Protectorate heroes, but what would that accomplish, other than letting you feel for just a minute or two like you're actually doing something?"

I flinched, but she wasn't wrong. Blunt, but not wrong. "If anything happens to him while I'm... stuck..."

"Don't punish yourself before you even know anything about how he's doing." Jess scolded. "The last you knew, Miss Militia was keeping him safe. Let's just... assume that's continuing for now. What else can you do to help, that you haven't already done?"

Sighing, I waved a hand. "Nothing. I know. This still feels kind of wrong. He's suffering in there, and I want to spend the night being... happy."

Rather than respond to that, Jess poked my side with her hand. "Incoming."

Looking up and over to where she had indicated, I saw Dennis approach. The red-head's thin lips were stretched into an infectious smile. "Well, hey there, Mads. Who's your friend?"

I opened my mouth to point out that they knew each other already, but caught myself. "I—uhhh... this is... ummm..." Crap, I was drawing a blank. They both knew each other, but not like this.

Openly smirking now, Dennis focused on Jess. "Okay, judging by poor Maddy's deer in headlights impression, you would obviously be Jess, from the other night."

"And you would be Mr. Time," Jess guessed. "Considering you're a guy, and your hair isn't brown."

"Nah," Dennis replied dryly. "I'm Reach. Do I have a great disguise or what?"

I threw my hands up then. "Do secret identities just mean nothing to you two?"

Dennis raised an eyebrow at that. "Hey, it's your fault. Who do you hang out with that's not a part of all this?"

My mouth opened as I raised a finger to point at him. "That... that..." Sighing, I lowered it and sulked. "I hate you."

Laughing, Dennis put an arm around me to pull me into a hug. "No, you don't. Besides, I figured it out before I even came over here. Girl in a wheelchair makes projections of monsters. Just makes sense."

"Only in our world." I muttered, returning the hug briefly. "What's that for?"

Releasing me, Dennis shrugged. "I figure you've gotta feel pretty bad about Trevor being stuck where he is. Just want you to know it's not your fault. Cassie and you-know-who are are still going over the floorplan."

"Will they be ready for tomorrow?" Jess asked.

He nodded at that. "They say they will, so... hopefully? I'm still not sure about working with bad guys, Mads."

"They're not bad anymore, remember?" I pointed out. "They're free and clear."

His eyes rolled. "Yeah, because that doesn't stink of corruption. If they didn't bribe, bully, or blackmail their way into those pardons, I will eat my hat."

"Do you even have a hat?" I had to ask.

"I will buy a hat and then eat it." Dennis amended. "Anyway, what are you guys doing here? Getting me an early birthday present?" His eyebrows waggled at the suggestion.

"Well, clearly she knows what you need now." Jess smiled faintly. "A hat."

Snorting, I explained, "Actually, we're here to find a present for Marissa."

"What's the occasion?" He asked, looking between us.

I smiled ruefully. "The occasion of, 'I really do like being able to call myself your girlfriend, even if our lives are really fucked up right now.'"

"Aha." My friend nodded sagely. "A very important occasion indeed." Considering for a moment, he finally grinned once more. "I've got a few ideas you might want to check out. If you two don't mind company."

I looked at Jess, who shrugged and replied, "I'm just here to let her know if she's buying anything that Mars won't like."

"Perfect." Dennis gave us a thumbs up. "Let's go shopping." Pausing after that announcement, he looked at his thumb and then lowered it with a mournful sigh. "I have got to start hanging out with more dudes."

Any doubts that I'd still had about the evening were mostly erased at the sight of Marissa's beautiful smile when she opened the little jewelry box that held her present. We were standing in the kitchen of my parents' home, getting ready to go out for the evening when I'd given her the gift that Dennis and Jess had helped me pick out earlier. Jess herself had made herself scarce for a few hours, saying she had other things to do.

Marissa's surprised gasp when she saw the contents of the box made me tingle. "Ohhh... Mads, they're... they're beautiful."

Flushing, both from pride and from the feelings that her smile was giving me, I explained. "They're Mars earrings. See, the stone inside is all red and orange and firey, like the surface of Mars. Or like your suns. I... I know they're not much, but... you really like them?" I asked, hopefully.

Marissa tenderly ran her finger over the pretty red stone of the stud earrings. "I love them, Maddy." Holding the box in one hand, she used the other arm to pull me close, kissing the top of my head, then my cheek before whispering, "You didn't have to get me anything."

I shrugged, self-consciously. "I just wanted you to know that... that I like you, and I... I appreciate you."

Her finger tilted my chin up, and then she was kissing me with a kind of intense hunger that took my breath away. My knees tried to give out, and I had to reach up quickly to catch onto her arm before I lost my balance.

When Mars finally pulled back from the kiss, I whimpered a little bit, eyes fluttering open. "O-oh... I... Ummm... uhhh...W... wow." My thoughts were drifting away like dandelion seeds on the wind, and for a moment, all I could do was stand there and smile goofily, repeating, "Wow."

Looking proud of herself, Marissa straightened. "Thank you, Mads. Seriously. You didn't have to get me anything. I mean that. I just like... being with you."

"And I like being with you." I assured her, taking Marissa's free hand and squeezing it. "I just... wanted you to know that... even though our lives are really messed up, and... and weird, and... crazy... that... I like you. I like spending time with you, whenever we get a chance."

For a moment, the two of us just stood there and smiled dumbly at each other. Marissa recovered first, shaking herself. "Speaking of spending time, are you going to tell me what we're doing yet?"

"Weeelll," I drew out the word, smiling. "Since I'm free all evening, I thought we'd start with dinner and then go see... a play."

"Wow." Mars blinked as she digested that. "A play, huh? Big stuff for a first real date."

Blushing, I shrugged. "It's just a production that the university's putting on. It's really not a big deal."

Shaking her head as she brought my hand up to gently kiss my fingers, Marissa spoke quietly. "You're wrong, Maddy. It is a really big deal. Thank you."

We walked out of the house together, hand in hand, heading for the simple sedan that Mars was using ever since she'd lost access to the other car she'd had. It didn't look nearly as cool, but it did blend better.

Unfortunately, we'd barely reached the car before the phone in my pocket started to buzz insistently. Stopping short, I blinked down at it and then closed my eyes, groaning. "Just have a question, just have a question, please just have a question." Wincing, I slipped the phone out of my pocket and looked at it, sighing at the number before answering, "Please tell me you just have a question."

"Sorry." Dennis, who was on console duty that evening, sounded truly regretful. "I know. I know we're interrupting, but something's up."

Flinching as I looked at Marissa, who had actually taken the time to get dressed up for this, I let out a sigh. "What is it? And are you sure Kid and Glory Girl can't handle it?" They were the two scheduled for patrol.

"Not unless you want to make them fight two against five," Dennis replied. "That Duelitist guy showed up, and he's got friends this time. Glory's tanking them while Kid keeps them pinned with potshots as much as possible, but they need help. Reach and Vista are already on the way, but since we don't know what exactly this new group is capable of..."

I shook my head quickly. "No, no, of course not. I'll be there. Err, where are they?"

"Benny's Electronics," he answered. "Apparently they just got some big shipment in yesterday. Duelitist and his group had a truck backed up to the doors and everything."

"That's... five minutes away the way I travel. I'll be there in seven." I promised, before disconnecting. Then, flinching, I turned to face my girlfriend. "Mars... I-"

She stopped me with a finger against my lips. I could see the disappointment, but also acceptance. "I know. It's okay, Mads. I get it. Besides, you know you're not dating a civilian, right? Why don't we go together?"

My mouth opened and then shut. "You want to go with? I mean, in costume and everything?"

"Sure." Marissa shrugged, already pulling me back toward the front door. "I do have powers too, you know. And if I'm going to convince people I'm not a bad guy anymore... well, then I should start doing good guy things." After a second, she added, "Besides, there's no way I'm letting you be the only one that gets to hurt these guys for interrupting our date."

I grinned, starting to sprint toward the door rather than leave Victoria and Chris waiting any longer when they needed help. "You know we'll have to travel my way to get there in time."

"Eh," Marissa replied. "How bad could it be?"

A scream pierced the air just before the line that I had attached to Sundancer deposited the girl onto the broken cement behind the overturned van that Kid Win was using for cover. I landed just beside her, while Kid glanced up from where he had been taking a few shots around the corner of the vehicle and toward the store, where the doors had been completely caved in.

When he saw us together, Chris took the time to tease, "Aww man, is it Bring Your Date To The Crime Scene Day already? I thought that was next week."

"You can't see it," I informed him. "But I'm sticking my tongue out at you. Just fyi." I took a peek around the other side of the van, seeing Glory Girl fly down out of the air, straight toward a white guy in his twenties, whose right leg was clearly a prosthetic. Just before Victoria would have hit him, the guy raised his hand, manifesting a glowing blue forcefield that her fist did nothing to. "And f-my-i, what're we dealing with?"

"Well at least we know what they call themselves." Chris gestured toward a bit of graffiti spray-painted onto the nearby wall.

"Outliars?" I raised an eyebrow at that. "Did they misspell it, or is that supposed to be clever?"

Kid's response was a shrug before he pointed off to where I could barely make out a couple of figures in the far corner of the lot. "Vista's over there, keeping their superspeed guy occupied. Calls himself Pursuit. The guy Glory Girl's tangling with said his name's... what was it... Right, Bulwark. Forcefields, apparently. Reach is-" A terrifying crash came from inside the building, and he winced. "Reach is inside, dealing with Duelitist and some woman that calls herself Scintillant. Best we can tell, she can take any source of light and reshape it. Lasers, weapons, random animals, she turned the glow from that traffic light over there into an elephant. That's what took out the doors."

"That's..." I counted briefly. "four. Clockblocker mentioned five."

As if on cue, a tiny figure abruptly came charging around the side of the van, knife held high. Without flinching, Kid Win let the right barrel of his jetpack point down, blowing the figure in half with a laser.

It was a puppet, a marionette. The broken figure had barely hit the ground before the top half started to try to crawl toward us once more, but Chris shot it again, blowing it into wood splinters.

"That would be my playmate." He jerked a thumb back toward the doors. "Some guy just inside there. He's got a dozen of these damn things, all moving around and shit. Calls himself Geppetto."

"Geppetto?" Marissa put in. "Seriously? Man, first they ruin our date, then they fuck up one of my favorite movies for me."

"Guess we've gotta make 'em pay for it," I said, before adding, "Think you can help Kid clear out the mad puppets while I give Reach a hand inside?"

"You got it." She gave me a thumbs up, before looking at Chris. "Assuming you don't mind the company?"

"Pfft." He shook his head and leaned around the corner to fire another shot. "Please, feel free. I've had all the murderous evil puppets I can handle. I don't even like those movies."

Leaving those two to deal with Geppetto, I used a line to launch myself upward and toward one of the windows, while muttering to myself. "Okay guys, you really, really picked the wrong night to start shit."

On the plus side, at least I no longer had to feel guilty about going on a date while Trevor was still trapped.

12.02

As I came through the shattered window, avoiding the doorway where Geppetto was, I brought myself down on top of one of the checkout counters. After landing, I took in the scene within the store, adjusting to the large room that was only dimly illuminated by less than half of the available lights.

The center of the sales floor had been cleared entirely, the shelves and rows of merchandise having been flung to the sides in order to make a wide circular area. A tall, black woman with her hair cut into cornrows, wearing what looked like bronze and red colored SWAT-style armor with flashlights mounted onto the shoulders and the arms, stood in the middle of the open area. I could also see a dark metallic mask over her face that covered her eyes, forehead, and nose before splitting around her mouth and chin to leave those exposed, carrying on down across her cheeks on either side.

While I was orienting myself, the woman (Scintillant, apparently) did something with her hand. The flashlight on her left shoulder flared up, brightening the somewhat dim area around her. Almost as soon as the flashlight turned on, it went off again. But the beam of light remained, splitting into what looked like three miniature boomerang shapes that went spinning off across the room and toward where I could make out two figures near the customer service/returns area in the back of the store. Before the solid-light boomerangs could hit the smaller figure, she flicked a hand up and one of the nearby shelving units flew up into the air to intercept them. The boomerangs melted the shelf into a twisted, burned piece of junk, before it flew straight toward the other figure, who had been coming forward with a sword raised. The weapon cleaved through the flung shelf, scattering the remains.

Before the two criminals could continue to gang up on my teammate, I activated my com to warn her. "Coming in to join your party, Reach. Got the light chick." Then I brought up a pair of lines, attaching them to the flashlights on either of Scintillant's shoulders before giving a sharp yank. Both lights were torn free of their housing, and were sent clattering along the floor.

The force also yanked the other woman backwards, but she caught herself before she could fall. Spinning toward where the flashlights had gone, she activated the one on her right arm, sending a beam of light out that transformed into a bird-figure, sweeping through the air as she searched for where the attack had come from.

That was my cue. Yanking myself to the floor behind the woman, I lamented aloud. "Ohhh I'm sorry. Were those yours?" As she spun to face me, I adopted a scolding posture, wagging my finger. "I have got to learn to stop stealing other people's things" With my head cocked curiously to the side, I asked, as though it had just occurred to me. "Maybe I should talk to someone about it. I don't suppose you've got some kind of Pathetic Thieves Anonymous number I could call?"

Scintillant made some kind of growling sound of annoyance, lifting both of her arms with the mounted flashlights pointed at me. "I'm gonna enjoy making you shut the fuck up."

While she spoke, I attached lines between the metal balls on my shoulders and the bulbs of each flashlight. The lights had barely flicked on before I sent the balls crashing into them, blowing out the bulbs and destroying each flashlight.

"Really?!" I made myself sound excited. "Well that's good to hear. Most people get all upset when they're trying to shut me up. Good to hear you're enjoying the endeavor."

In response, Scintillant lifted her arm. I saw a tiny penlight under her wrist come to life. Its weak beam apparently wasn't enough for her to do a lot with, but she did manage to shape it into a blade as she came for me.

I started to attach new lines, but before I could, the woman dropped out of my sightline, disrupting the line-forming process. The next thing I knew, my legs were being kicked out from under me, and I landed hard on my back. A second later, Scintillant was on her knees next to me, bringing her arm down. It was all I could do to twist aside before that little light-blade of hers seared through the floor where my shoulder had been.

"Fucking cunt." She cursed, dragging the blade across the floor toward me. I raised an arm to block her elbow, then lashed out with my other hand to punch her in the face, nailing her with the gauntlet and sending her head reeling backwards.

I tried to follow up with a second punch to get her away from me, but she caught my arm and I found myself yanked up and over, face pressed to the floor as she put a knee in my back. "Can't move what you can't see, can ya, bitch?" She asked while keeping my face firmly away from her.

"You'd think so, huh?" I asked, just to confuse matters. Then I attached a pair of lines between the front of my costume and the floor beneath it, both of which I could feel just fine. I used the lines to launch myself upward, knocking Scintillant off me in the process.

Flying up about a dozen feet, I oriented myself back toward the floor. My opponent spun to intercept me with that blade of hers, but I quickly attached a line between a nearby cash register and the woman's costume, using it to send the register flinging toward her with enough force to knock her out of my way. She managed to use her pen-light blade to cut the thing, but it at least made her stumble backwards and gave me room to land.

Right as I landed, Scintillant recovered. She came at me with her foot raised to kick at my side, but I hurriedly tethered her ankle to the ground, yanking her off balance so that she was forced to stumble right into the gauntlet-covered fist that I put into her stomach, doubling the taller woman over with an explosive gasp as the air ran out of her. Finally, before she could recover, I attached two lines from the back of her neck and the seat of her pants up to the ceiling, and had them yank her up a short distance before releasing her so that she fell heavily onto her stomach.

I had the ziptie cuffs out in one hand when the woman rolled over. She was staring past me, up at the... Realizing where she was looking, I flung myself sideways, using a line to propel me faster. Landing hard on my side, I saw three different light-arrows that she had called down from one of the ceiling lamps hit the floor where I had been.

I rolled back to my feet in time to see the woman's back for half a second as she disappeared through the manager's office door after leaping over the checkout counters. Cursing under my breath, I held a hand out and put a line against the wall next to the office, using it to yank myself there. My foot hit the door and kicked it open, and I entered just in time to see a flash of the woman disappearing out the window, too short to get any kind of line attached.

I'd barely started toward the window before it, and some of the wall around it, were broken through by a grasping hand made of light that was big enough to thumb wrestle King Kong, probably crafted from one of the nearby streetlamps. I managed to drop flat onto the floor with a yelp just in time before the groping fingers broke through the wall behind me, shattering a display case of trophies and sending plaster dust raining down on me.

Either she was unable to sustain something that size for long or she was focused on leaving, because the hand vanished a second later.

Reach came through the door while I was lying on my back, recovering. Several parts of her costume had been cut, and I could see blood dripping from between her fingers as she held her hand tightly over her other arm. "You know we're not supposed to take naps on the job, right?" She asked, quirking an eyebrow at me. I couldn't see the lower part of her face through the half-mask, but I knew the girl was smirking.

"Oh, well, now you tell me." I managed before heaving myself back to my feet. I looked around, surveying the destruction of the manager's office before glancing back to her. "Mine got away. What about yours?"

In response, she cursed under her breath. "Gone. Threw some kind of fucking dust in my face, then did this shit with his sword." She nodded down at the cut on her arm. "By the time I could breathe again, he was out of there."

"Shit." I sighed before shaking my head as I picked my way through the debris-laden office. "Let's go see how the others are doing, and get you a bandage or something."

As we started back toward the doors, Reach glanced to me. "So, how's the date going?"

Glancing around the all-but-destroyed store, the shelves that had been hurled back into random heaps or just plain melted into scrap, the piles of broken electronics, the shattered front doors, the demolished manager's office behind us, I finally shrugged. "About the same as always."

As it turned out, we'd only managed to get two of the five. Sundancer and Kid Win had taken out all of Geppetto's little friends (and done a bit of damage to the parking lot with Marissa's mini-sun), but the cape himself had disappeared.

Thankfully, Glory Girl had figured out how to trap her guy by pretty much copying Reach's trick. She had picked up a nearby dumpster and brought it down on top of the man to trap him inside, letting him make all the forcefields he wanted while she held it in place. As it turned out, the guy's forcefields were unable to move or grow once he made them and they couldn't intersect space taken up by anything else, so he was unable to use them to push the dumpster off himself.

Vista too had fared better than we had. She'd easily exhausted her opponent by making him run in circles, trapping Pursuit in a twisting labyrinth of space that he couldn't find a way out of until Vista finally took pity on the guy and accepted his surrender.

"But see, I thought the kid couldn't affect space that other people were moving through," Marissa remarked as the two of us walked along the quiet, dark street on the way back to Ethan and Sam's house. By the time I'd finished being debriefed by Photon Mom and changed clothes, the play had been half-over. We'd scrapped the idea of going to it, and spent the time we had left getting burgers and milkshakes at a nearby diner.

I grinned around the straw of my strawberry shake. "She didn't. Apparently she set the whole maze up before she even got his attention. Then she just goaded him until he tried to get at her."

Chuckling, Mars shook her head. "Tell Win I'm sorry I wasn't more use."

"Hey, you took out all those little puppets," I pointed out.

She snorted disparagingly. "Sure, and there's no way he can ever replace a bunch of wooden toys. Geppetto himself got away."

"So did Scintillant." I reached out with my free hand to take hers, interlocking our fingers as we walked together down the sidewalk. "And Reach lost Duelitist too. We were two for five. Not exactly a stellar record."

"Still," Mars shrugged one shoulder while squeezing my hand. "I've been getting better with my sun, but not enough to risk sending it indoors."

"Yeah, I meant to say something about that." I glanced sidelong at the other girl. "Have you been practicing? Because, well, for summoning a miniature sun and sending it flying back and forth to chase down two foot tall puppets, that parking lot wasn't nearly as damaged as I'd expected."

Marissa blushed a little at that. "A little bit. I don't know, it just feels... ummm... I guess it feels a little bit more... in sync? I mean, I'm still scared of it, but for the last... I don't know, since Leviathan, I've felt more... aligned with it. It's like... it's like learning how to whistle."

I blinked at that. "Learning how to whistle?"

She nodded. "Yeah, see, when I was a kid, I tried to learn how to whistle. My mom wanted me to do it for some talent show. But no matter what I did, no matter how she or anyone else tried to explain it, I couldn't do it. I just could not whistle for the life of me. Mom was so pissed off at me. She thought I was goofing off. I wasn't, I just couldn't get it. Then one day, it just clicked. I don't know what did it, but I could whistle. And I've been able to whistle ever since."

"So you had your whistling moment with your power?" I asked, curiously.

"Not that dramatic," she replied with a shrug. "I'm still not really... confident. But I've been trying, ever since I took that damn formula, to figure out a way to limit the damage it does. I've been fighting against it the whole time. I hated it."

"You were working against your power instead of with it," I offered after a moment.

Mars nodded. "I guess I was. I just wanted it to stop hurting people. I was so terrified that it was going to kill someone, that Iwas going to kill someone."

"So what happened with Leviathan?"

We walked in silence for a few moments before Marissa replied, "I guess it was the first time that I really let loose, the first time that I was actually trying to do as much damage as I possibly could. And when I did, it felt like I was... like I was twisting the knobs on an old stove to turn the burner up as high as it would go. I was pouring on the gas, forcing it to get bigger and to spread that heat out as far as I could make it go. I wanted to kill the damn thing. Didn't work, but... after that, I realized that if I could twist those mental knobs and make the heat go up..."

"You could twist them the other way," I finished. "And make the heat go down."

Marissa nodded. "Exactly. So, I've been practicing with that a little bit. It's not perfect, but I've basically figured out how to draw in the heat that my suns give off to within a foot or so of space around them."

I whistled at that. "See, you're getting there. Ready to join the Protectorate yet?"

Her eyes rolled. "Doubtful. I'm pretty sure they'd still rather have someone who actually has a stun setting, not just a smaller lethal setting."

"Hey, I think you're very stunning." I grinned and poked her with the hand that held my milkshake.

Giggling, clearly in spite of herself, Marissa shook her head. "That was terrible. Cute, but terrible." We had stopped walking, and she gestured to the nearby street sign. "This is the street you said to drop you off in front of."

I hadn't wanted to walk with Mars all the way to Ethan and Sam's house. They were cool, and I totally trusted Marissa, but it still felt like it would have been a breach of trust to let her know exactly where they lived. "Yup. Here we are."

My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I freed my hand from hers to look down at the screen. "It's from Tattletale. We're on for tomorrow night."

"You gonna be ready for it?"

"Ready to break into Peesips headquarters and find out if the plans to build something that might let us teleport into the single most secure prison in the world are there, so we can rescue my brother and everyone else that doesn't belong there?" I asked before shrugging. "Sure, why not. I'm not doing anything else then."

"Peesips." Mars shook her head ruefully. "They really should've come up with a better acronym than P-C-I-P-S."

I snickered in spite of myself. "Yeah, I think they're kicking themselves now."

She kissed me then, gently. "Whatever happens tomorrow, I'll be there with you."

Smiling faintly, I shivered a little. "Thank you, Mars. I... thanks."

Backing away, Marissa shrugged while teasing, "Hey, I've gotta keep an eye on you. After all, you still owe me a real date."

I watched until she'd walked out of sight around the corner. Then I stuck my hands in my pockets and started for home.

My key was barely in my hand to let myself in once I arrived at the house before the door swung open. Ethan was there, looking more upset than I'd ever seen him.

"She's gone." He announced, his voice sounding strained.

"Huh?" I stared up at him, eyes wide. "What—Sam?"

"She's gone. She disappeared." Ethan looked down at me, his mounting frustration and tension obvious. "She was sorting through the mail. She said something about someone sending you... crystals or something. Then I heard this loud pop and... when I came into the hall, she was gone."

My mouth opened and shut, as the mounting realization came over me. "They tried to get me again." I said aloud, my voice small and weak against the thought of what had happened. "Whoever's doing this, they tried to get me like they got Trevor... and... and..."

"And they got Puppy instead." Ethan's voice was a growl, all humor gone from it. Now all I could hear in his words was the unspoken promise of pain to the person who had stolen his wife. "They took her... to the god... damn... Birdcage."

12.03

"So what did he say?" I asked Ethan a couple of hours later, as the two of us stood just outside of Armsmaster's office and workshop. I had been waiting in the hallway for the two men to get done talking.

Ethan, looking understandably agitated, kept walking past me. "Talk about it after we're out of here. I don't really feel like standing in here." He made a point of looking straight up at a camera in the corner. "Too many people paying attention to things that are none of their business."

I followed along, and Ethan didn't say anything else the whole time we were on the private ferry that led from the floating Protectorate base to the mainland. He didn't actually speak again until we had reached his truck and were pulling out of the lot. Then, he finally looked at me. "I just had to sit in there and pretend I had no idea where Sam was. I had to lie and act clueless while Colin promised he'd ask Dragon to go over the footage of all the mail you got, and who sorted it until they find out who managed to get the teleport device or whatever it was past the screening process. My wife is in danger, I know exactly where she is, but I couldn't tell him because there's nothing he could do about it anyway."

I was quiet for a moment before saying, "Maybe we should have told him. You could have had me come in with you. I would've told Armsmaster what I knew. We could both have told him about Professor Haywire's notes." I had already told both Ethan and Sam about what we had learned from Mr. Hase. Battery had said that she had someone else that she wanted to talk to about that, but I hadn't heard anything else before now, when it was too late. I didn't even know who she'd wanted to talk to.

Ethan's hands were tight on the steering wheel as he shook his head, and I saw him brush his thumb over a rubber band that had been wound around the gearshift. "No. Colin's a decent guy, and a good person to have in your corner. But if we put this in his hands, he's going to want to be all official about it. And if he hears that Dragon and Costa-Brown are behind it staying hush hush, let alone that your info comes from the Alcott girl and Pandora, he'll clamp down on anything we could actually do. Not just to be an ass, he'll think it's the right thing to do. Like I said, he's a good guy, but he's a company man. He'll toe the line, and he definitely won't take risks like going behind Costa-Brown's back. Too rigid and stuck in his ways, the Protectorate's ways."

"So, what are we gonna do?" My voice was quiet as I looked at the man, knowing just how much he was hurting, how angry he was.

"You've got something going on, don't you? You told us some of it, the facts, but you've got more planned."

His wife was missing. I wasn't going to pretend that I didn't know what he was talking about, or make him explain further. "Something to rescue the people like my brother... and now Sam? Yes, we... we've been working on something."

"The responsible adult part of me is supposed to tell you to leave it alone, and just give everything you know to the adults that are supposed to take care of situations like this."

"And the rest of you?"

Ethan took in a long breath before letting it out. "Tell me what you've got planned, how you were planning on dealing with this before Sammy disappeared."

I proceeded to do just that. I told him that we planned on breaking into the PCIPS building with the help of the Undersiders to try to either find the lost plans, or find out if they'd been taken and by who.

When I finished talking, Ethan nodded slowly. "Sounds to me like what you might end up needing is a distraction to keep people busy and eyes off their security screens."

Blinking, I pointed out mildly, "You know, I'm pretty sure that they'll notice if you or your previous alter-ego start attracting attention. I mean, I get needing to help, but Assault or Madcap making waves is going to cause more problems than it solves. And for the record, I wouldn't really feel like explaining to Sam when we get her out why you're going the other direction on your way inside, for good."

"Hey," Ethan glanced toward me. "I can be subtle when I need to. When I've got a good reason to be."

"What do you have in mind that's going to get enough attention, but not be linked to you?"

For the first time since I'd found out about Battery, he smiled. "Just trust me. I'll take care of it."

"So tell me again why you guys get to go in and we're stuck sitting out here babysitting the Junior Villain." Victoria demanded the next night, as both our team and the four Undersiders stood in the park across the street from what had been the building belonging to MedHall, Kaiser's civilian identity's pharmaceutical company, and was now the headquarters for PCIPS.

"Hey!" Both Grue and Freezetag objected. The former went on to say, "We were cleared of all crimes."

Meanwhile, the girl continued with, "Who you calling Junior?"

Roughly half of us, those going inside the building, weren't in our normal costumes. Instead, we wore simple black infiltration suits and masks that Tattletale had procured from somewhere. They came with night-vision lenses that I was already planning on asking to have incorporated into my actual mask.

Sighing, Victoria looked at me pleadingly. "Don't make me sit out here with her. I'm gonna kill her."

Freezetag muttered, "Not if I put you in time-out and go get a burrito, you're not."

I shook my head at the blonde girl's renewed pleading. "Sorry, Glory, you know how it goes. It's gonna be hard enough to get through this place without having everybody coming along with us. You, Clockblocker, Freezetag, and Kid Win have to stay out here to play backup just in case."

Victoria turned her attention to Dennis, who shrugged. "Sorry, I may be the leader on paper, but this isn't a Wards mission. Her brother and her guardian are the ones that are missing. It's her call." That said, he still looked at me with what I was sure was a frown behind his mask. "But I'm still not sure about the choices of who you're taking inside."

"Like I said before," I adjusted the fit of my unfamiliar mask while explaining again. "I need to go in just in case we run into any traps that Kaiser left behind, Reach has to direct us as much as she can, Tattletale has to fill in where Reach can't, Vista and Vacate can both help us get through areas quicker, and Grue can black out any cameras they've got. You and Freezetag, your powers are too well known and obvious when they're used. Victoria's... well... less than subtle. Plus there's the fact that her aunt runs the place. And none of Kid Win's inventions are good for infiltration. But they are good to cover us if we get into trouble and need help."

"What about Assault?" Chris asked. "Didn't you say he was going to make a distraction for us?"

"Yup." I nodded. "That'll be starting any time now, and as soon as it does, we've gotta move."

"But just in case anything happens that he can't handle without giving away who he is," Tattletale put in from where she stood with her team, wearing a suit not that different from my own. "There should be people out here to play cover."

Victoria scowled at Tattletale. "I haven't figured out what your other angle here is yet, but when I do..."

I couldn't see the Undersider's face, but I knew she was smirking as she replied, "What exactly is it going to take for you to accept that we're on the same side?"

"A lobotomy," Victoria answered flatly. "Poorly done, with dull instruments and a blind surgeon."

"Be nice." I coaxed my teammate. "The way we have it now it's three of us and three of them going in. That's as fair as we can make it. We chose who goes based around who can get in and out the easiest, without leaving any idea of who was there."

Then I leaned in closer to Dennis and whispered, "And because I need to know that if anything happens to us in there, you're going to keep pushing any way you can to get Trevor and the others out."

"You know we will." He confirmed with a nod. "But you're all coming back out. Just make sure you don't use your powers in a way that lets them know for sure who you are."

Victoria stepped over to me then, taking me by the arm to walk a few steps away. "Hey, I know I said I'd be there for you, and I am. I totally am. But I don't like the idea of working with these guys. I'm not just saying that. I don't trust them, and I think we could do better by just talking to Aunt Sarah and letting her know what's up."

"Maybe we could." I acknowledged. "But if we do, and she has to put in an official report, that puts her in danger. This way, she has complete deniability."

The other girl hesitated before sighing. "Fine. But... be careful. Don't take your eyes off of them. I don't believe that they've stopped being bad guys for a second."

From where she was standing, Vista spoke up. "Hey, I think that's the signal."

Looking to where she was pointing, I saw something that made me glad that even though the mask I was wearing wasn't mine, it still hid the fact that my mouth was hanging open in surprise.

"Wow," Chris said slowly. "When that guy says he'll cause a distraction, he really means it."

Up and down the street, we could see every single car within several blocks had floated off the ground, hovering anywhere between a dozen and twenty feet in the air before they began to lazily drift back and forth, bumping against one another while horns blared and lights flashed on and off.

"How did he... how is he... that's not even what he..." Dennis was obviously gaping as well, hand raised to helplessly point at the floating vehicles.

"Hey," I shrugged. "He's good at his job."

Even as I said that, several of the vehicles floated through the air on a collision course for the building, breaking a few windows on a couple floors and setting off the alarms. The main parking lot was rapidly filling with security guards and PCIPS agents trying to figure out what was going on.

"And that would be our cue to go ahead and set off other alarms while they deal with the first ones." the fact was, even with Tattletale, breaking into a place as busy and as secure as the new PCIPS building wasn't going to happen without being noticed. Doing it this way, we hoped, would give the people too much to deal with before we could get in and out.

Or at least that was the plan. Turning to the others, I asked, "Everyone ready?"

"Ready." Grue gave a short nod for his group, raising a hand to cover Freezetag's mouth without even needing to look and see that she had been starting to say something.

"Sure, why the hell not?" Reach put in. "I've been a good guy long enough. Let's spice things up with some felony breaking and entering."

Pointing at the the cameras above two different lamp posts and the one by the side door that we were focused on, Grue summoned little clouds of darkness over each of them. Then Vista did her thing, shortening the distance between us and the doorway until the six of us could take a single step and arrive right next to the door.

The second we arrived, Reach put her hand on the door. It ripped inward off its hinges, falling to the floor with a heavy bang that was lost amongst the deafening sound of all of the other alarms already going off.

We moved in, and then everyone reached out to catch hold of Vacate. Fully rested since Vista had taken care of getting us across the long, empty street and parking lot, he was able to make his time-stop corridor immediately. Reach had described this corridor well enough that he already knew just how long to make it, and where we were going.

As soon as the tunnel was made, we sprinted forward, heading for the unlabeled door a hundred feet away that Reach claimed would lead to stairs. Once we made it, I took a moment to look around to see if we were clear.

"Two guys there," Tattletale pointed to a pair of men standing thirty feet away, facing the opposite direction as they stared out the windows at the floating vehicles. "Nobody else with sight line to us."

Grue cautioned, "Everyone stay quiet. Let's just get through this door before they realize we're here."

Vacate dropped the tunnel and we were as silent as possible, standing a few dozen feet away from the PCIPS agents. There was a keycard reader next to the door, but Reach ignored it and simply put her hand against this door as well. Instead of tearing it off its hinges, she behaved more subtlety by forcing it open at the doorjamb just as yet another window was shattered by a floating vehicle.

Grue went first to black out the cameras in the stairwell. Then, one by one, the rest of us backed through the open door before the distracted agents could notice us.

"Stop right there!" A voice demanded. We twisted around, finding a man in a security uniform, holding his pistol. "Nobody... nobody move."

We'd planned for something like this, fortunately. Grue extended his hand. As soon as he did, I attached a line between his glove and the gun, yanking the weapon out of the man's grip and giving it to Grue. That way, it looked like he was the one performing the telekinetic trick, throwing suspicion off of me while they looked for a male around Grue's height that could do something like that.

Once the gun was disabled, I yanked the man's radio off his belt, then pulled him toward us. Once he was close enough, Tattletale stepped in and injected him with something in a syringe. The man immediately dropped, slumping to the floor.

Noticing my look, she held the syringe up. "He'll be fine, it'll just knock him out for a couple hours."

I glanced toward Vista, and she nodded, scrunching her nose in concentration as she gazed upward, past all the flights of stairs before making a twisting gesture with her hands. "Done."

Curiously, I gave a little hop, then immediately yelped as I found myself a good eight stories higher than I expected to be. Reaching out, I caught hold of the nearby railing before I could fall back down (not that it was a long drop given the way that Vista's powers worked) and hauled myself over it.

The others followed suit, and we continued up that way, Vista compressing the space so that we could jump seven or eight floors at a time. In no time at all, we had reached the top floor, where Reach said Kaiser kept his true trophies. Not in his office, as I'd expected, but in a room down the hall that had ostensibly been used for conferences.

We had to go through two more security guards on our way, carefully leaving each unconscious with more prepared syringes from Tattletale. I felt bad about it. After all, these guys were just doing their jobs. We were breaking the law, after all.

Eventually though, we reached the room in question. This one Tattletale opened, using a keycard stolen from one of the now-unconscious guards.

It was a truly massive conference room, probably large enough to play a regulation basketball game inside. There was a long table that took up most of the room, flanked by comfortable leather chairs. At one end of the room was a smaller, more personal desk with a computer mounted on it, and behind it there was a projection screen.

Without wasting time, Reach put her hand on the table and focused, ripping the thing off the ground and pitching it sideways.

As she knelt by the floor, Vacate asked, "Yo, how you know all this shit anyway, huh? Wouldn't think some little girl like you would be in the big man's main confidence, know what I'm sayin'?"

"You guys aren't the only ones that know how to find out secrets." She replied, focusing on the floor. As she pressed her hands against it, there was a rumbling sound. Then part of the floor was torn up and out, revealing a large safe mounted onto some kind of hydraulic contraption that was obviously meant to push up and out when it was used correctly.

"Ready for this?" I asked Cassie, already starting to put lines between the ceiling and the door of the safe.

In response, she cracked her knuckles and nodded, brushing her hand over the safe itself before leaning back and out of the way.

We worked together, each of us yanking upward on the safe door. But even with the force that the two of us could expend, it still would have taken too long to force that safe to open.

Fortunately, we still had Vista. While we worked at tearing the safe door up, she focused on creating small spatial distortions around it, breaking it up here and there.

Together, the three of us managed to do enough damage to finally tear that door off, revealing... an empty safe.

"Damn it!" Reach glowered at it. "This has to be it. Someone beat us to it."

"Probably the guy that's been using the plans in the first place." Tattletale put in from where she sat at the smaller desk, using the computer there. "And I think I've got something."

"What?" I asked, stepping that way. "We really need to hurry."

"Yeah, yeah." She waved that off before continuing to type away. "There's a camera in the corner up there, behind the mirror." Her hand gestured vaguely up into the corner. "It's not connected to the main security, so it was obviously something from Kaiser's era that they haven't found yet. I already shut down the feed and erased the recording, but look at this."

We gathered around the computer as she went on. "Looks like the camera pops on whenever that safe gets accessed. And look at what we have for the last person accessing it..."

As we watched the screen, I saw a thin, clearly drug-ravaged white guy standing in the room. He was rubbing his hands together nervously as he stared down at the open safe before reaching out to grab a briefcase that was in it.

He was familiar. I was trying to figure out why, when Vacate blurted. "Dude! That's Eddie!"

The rest of us turned to stare at him, and it finally clicked. "You know him?" I knew he did. It was the guy that Vacate had been with when I first met him, out of costume. The Merchant tinker who had shot Pandora with his cobbled together laser pistol.

"Sure, yeah, course I know him." Vacate was nodding. "We ran for awhile, but last I knew Wetdream was taking him in. I didn't know he got out again. I wonder why he ain't called me..."

"Can we focus on what's important?" Grue pleaded. "Is he a tinker or does he know anyone who could use those plans?"

"Sure." Vacate shrugged. "I mean, he was never all that good at making his own stuff. Eddie's ahhh, whatcha call it... focus, his focus was on making other people's stuff. He could like, study something someone else made, or like, their blueprints or whatever, and copy it."

We all stared at him. Grue was the first to find his voice. "Do you mean to tell me... that you knew we were looking for a tinker that somehow reproduced and improved on another tinker's plans... and you didn't think that this could be relevant?!"

As annoyed as even I was at that, I noticed something. "Look." I pointed at the screen, where the video had still been playing. "He's calling someone."

Staring intently, Tattletale watched him dial, before taking out a phone of her own. "And... got it." She hit the same buttons he had, then set the phone to speaker.

It rang three times before an annoyed voice answered, "This better be good. What is it?"

Behind the mask, my eyes widened. I knew that voice. I knew who Eddie the copycat tinker had been calling just as he stole the plans that would eventually lead to teleporting people into the Bird Cage.

It was Trickster.

"He did what?!"

I winced at Marissa's furious bellow, holding up both hands. "I'm just telling you what we know. The guy who stole the plans for the teleporter called Trickster while he was doing it."

It hadn't been difficult to escape the building. Reach had blown out the window of the conference room, and then I had used tethers to yank each of us to the roof of the building across the street. We'd met up with the others and shared what we knew. Then I gave Ethan a call to let him know he could stop whatever he was doing, and what we had found out, before going back to my parents house to talk to Marissa and Jess about Krouse. Meanwhile, the Undersiders were going to see about finding Eddie, since Vacate knew him.

Poor Mars just stood there on the other side of the kitchen table, gaping at me. Silence reigned for a minute before her attention turned slowly to the girl next to her. "You don't... have any idea what..."

"Of course not." Jess shook her head firmly. "I would've said something, Mars. I don't know what the hell's going on. But if Krouse is behind this whole thing, if he's the one that's been teleporting people into the Birdcage..."

"If he is, I'm gonna make him wish the Simurgh killed him when she transported us here." Marissa growled, pushing away from the table. "That son of a bitch just went too damn far."

"Marissa-" Jess started to say.

"No, Jess." Marissa turned back to her friend. "No. We've put up with enough of his bullshit. I'm not gonna say that Cody was right, because he was a psychopath too, but that doesn't make Krouse better. Just because they hate each other doesn't mean one is good and the other is bad. They're both crazy pieces of shit, we just happened to choose Krouse's specific brand of crazy. We let him convince us we were doing the right thing, that slowly moving across the country and using our powers to get money so we could save Noelle was the right thing to do. But what if there is no saving Noelle? What if we just made everything worse, compromised our morals and did... did all of this for nothing? And now he's... he's doing this garbage."

Breathing in and out a few times to steady herself, Marissa gazed at her friend. "I'm done, Jess. I'm done protecting him. I'm done convincing myself to give it more time, that we have to be loyal. That was when the group, the team, were the only people we had, the only people we could trust. But that's not true anymore. I trust Madison." She gestured to me. "And I don't trust Krouse."

Jess remained quiet, looking contemplative for a few seconds before her head slowly nodded. "I know. I know what you mean. I just..." She sighed and looked to me. "No offense, I believe you. I just hoped that... somehow we could have the best of both worlds." A wry smirk touched the girl's face then, as she shifted in her wheelchair. "So to speak. I hoped we could leave Krouse, but still stay... at least somewhat allies. Because... Noelle..."

Her eyes turned away from me, and I nodded. "I get it. Believe me, I wish I didn't have to tell you about this. I wish it was some other guy. But Trickster is where the trail leads. It was his voice, I swear it."

Slowly nodding, Jess rubbed a hand over her face briefly. "Then, I guess we have to talk to him."

"Oh, we'll talk all right." I had never seen Marissa as angry as she clearly was now. Her fist was clenched tight. "We'll make him tell us what the fuck he did, and un-the-fuck-do it, or he's going to find out exactly how bad of a sunburn he can get and still survive."

Jess reached out to put a hand against the other girl's side, bracing her before she looked at me. "I guess that explains why they kept trying to get you into the Birdcage. Krouse and Noelle hate you. They think you... well, that you stole their friends away from them."

Flinching at that, I shook my head. "That's not what happened. If they'd just... if Trickster would just... if he wasn't a..."

"I know." Nodding, Jess slumped back into her chair. "Trust me, I know. Noelle... I don't think it's her fault. This... whatever's happening to her, it's messing with her head. But Krouse, I don't know if the Simurgh affected him more than the rest of us, or what. But he's out of control."

"Then it's time to go put him back under control," Marissa said sharply, looking at me. "He's been going after Mads. He trapped her brother in the worst prison in the word, because he was trying to trap her there. No more loyalty, Jess. We have to stop him, whatever that takes."

"You're right." Jess let out a low sigh. "I'll send Luke a message, and find out where they are right now." Her gaze moved to me. "Unless you want to sleep first?"

I shook my head. "Couldn't sleep right now even if I tried."

She nodded, before taking her phone out and sending a text.

While Jess was doing that, Marissa came around the table and took my hand with the one that she wasn't clenching into a tight fist. "I'm sorry, Madison. I didn't think Krouse would go that far. I never even considered that the person behind your brother and Miss Militia, and now Battery, could be him."

Squeezing her hand, I managed a weak little smile. "I know, Mars. He didn't occur to me either, even though I figured he wasn't very happy with me stealing one and... well, now two of his friends away."

Marissa opened her mouth to say something else, before frowning. "Huh..." She thought for a moment before cursing. "That son of a bitch."

"What's wrong?"

"When did Trevor disappear?" She prompted, a scowl settling into her features.

Blinking, I hesitated before offering, "During the Leviathan fight..."

"And what happened between you and Trickster right before that?" Mars asked.

"I threatened him," I said, slowly realizing what she was getting at. "I told him that if he tried anything to get at you, I was going to see it as a violation of the truce."

"And then Battery disappears days after Jess leaves him." Marissa's voice was hard. "That piece of shit thinks he's being fair. They didn't accidentally get Trevor when they were aiming for you. They were trying for him, because Krouse decided that if you 'took his friends', he'd take your family. He couldn't take your parents because of Coil, but... god... damn it!" Her fist hit the table and she turned toward the other girl. "Where are they, Jess? Tell me Luke replied."

I bit my lip, frowning. "But what about Miss Militia? Why would he take her?"

"We'll ask him that once we bounce his face off the pavement a few dozen times."

Jess finally looked up from her phone. "Luke's ready for us. They're still at the church." She glanced to me then. "Hey, umm, you sure you're okay to go with? I mean, somehow going to pick an argument with the guy that we think has been transporting people into the Birdcage somehow seems like... well, might be a bad idea for you. I don't think Krouse will do anything to Mars and me, especially since I won't actually be there physically, but you..."

"I'm going," I said flatly. "If he is the one doing this, I owe him. And no way I'd leave Marissa and you alone, even if you don't think he'd try anything. Neither of you thought he'd do any of this either." I smiled a little. "Besides, I've got an idea of how to deal with that..."

The church that Jess had mentioned was an old, rundown place that probably hadn't seen a congregation in at least five years, if not longer. It was a dark, damp place, where the weeds had long-since overgrown the actual grass, and what had been a nice wrought iron fence surrounding the property was rusted, with half of it already missing, probably scavenged for the metal.

Marissa and I walked through the entrance together, both in costume, with Jess's newest creation prowling up behind us. She had made what I thought probably looked like a panther, but it was hard to tell for sure, because of the fact that its fur kept changing colors, blending in with its surroundings like a chameleon and making it difficult to make out details.

When we came through the doors together we found ourselves in what had clearly once been a beautiful room, full of dozens of rows of ornate wooden pews facing the alter at the front. Most of the wood was rotted through now, and I could smell things I really didn't want to know anything else about.

Right after we entered, a voice called out from the front, where the priest would have been. "You know, when Luke said that you guys wanted to talk, he didn't mention that you were bringing along your pet."

Trickster was standing up there, in full costume. A few feet away, in the west corner near the stained glass window, I could see Ballistic standing with his single arm gripping the railing next to him.

"Don't fucking call her that. And you're a liar anyway." Marissa couldn't keep the scorn and distaste out of her voice. "Why else would you be all dressed up?"

Trickster gave a little bow of acknowledgment. "I said that he never said you were bringing her. Not that I couldn't figure it out." Stepping down from the pulpit, he added, "Besides, you haven't exactly come wearing party hats. What about you, Jess?" He was gazing past me. "That form supposed to let you stay out of my sight?"

"Speaking of out of your sight, where's Sophia?" I interrupted, stopping halfway up the aisle. "I thought you were keeping her with you.."

His shoulders raised in a shrug. "I sent her downstairs. I didn't think our meeting needed to be... plagued by that bit of drama."

"Drama?" I glared at him. "You mean the 'drama' where I take her back to prison where she belongs, for killing my parents?!" Try as I might, I couldn't stop my voice from going up. I'd told myself that we were focusing on getting Trevor and the others back, but just the thought of being near where Sophia was made me want to damn everything else and find her. One way or another, I'd put her back in the cell where her psychotic ass belonged.

"That was Coil's order." Trickster said quietly. "Sophia had no choice-"

"No, see, that's where you're wrong." I took a few more steps that way, eyes centered on him. "She had every choice. Every decision she made led her to that. She chose to be a vicious, crazy little bitch who doesn't care about anyone but herself. Maybe Coil made her make that one decision, but every choice she made before that led to her being in that position, and even then, she could have chosen not to kill innocent people."

"So she should have chosen to die then?" Trickster asked, idly. "Would you have chosen to die?"

"If it was between that and killing innocent people..." I nodded. "Yes."

I couldn't see Trickster's expression through his red face-mask, but I had the feeling that he was staring at me like I was an alien or something.

"Is that why you're here?" Ballistic broke the silence, stepping closer. "To take Shadow Stalker to justice?"

As much as I wanted to say yes, I shook my head. "Actually, we thought we'd start with Krouse here. Maybe get a little justice for the shit he's been doing."

"Excuse m-"

I let Trickster get that far before opening my glove, which had been clenched into a tight fist. A blue washcloth that I'd grabbed from the bathroom lay in my palm. I connected two lines between the cloth and either side of the man's mask. Then I sent the rag snapping that way, letting it slap against his face, pinning it there so that it completely covered his eyes, cutting him off from using his power.

While he was prying at the washcloth, trying in vain to remove it, I used a third line to yank Krouse straight to me, before driving my fist into his gut, driving the air out of him in a rush as he dropped to his knees, choking for breath.

"Hey!" Ballistic was striding toward me. "We never agreed-"

The lithe, almost invisible form of Genesis dropped into his way. "Stop, Luke. You don't know what he's been doing."

Beside me, Marissa had grabbed Trickster's mask, and she nodded at me. I obliged by removing the blindfold, and Marissa yanked mask up and off, revealing a man with light brown skin and a long, thin nose. There was also a star drawn in marker on his forehead. "Use your power and I swear to god you'll regret it, Krouse. I want to look you in the eye while you tell us why you attacked Madison's family."

From somewhere to the side, I could hear Ballistic blurt, "Wait, what?!"

Sucking in air as he struggled to breathe, Krouse blinked a few times, looking back and forth between the two of us. "I... what exactly am I being acc-"

The sound of Marissa slapping Krouse filled the room, and he pitched over sideways, holding his hand against his face. "Fuck! Mars, I never attacked her family! What the hell?!"

"Come off it, Krouse." I shook my head. "I know it was you that had my brother and the others teleported into the Birdcage."

As planned, Genesis added from where she was, "And if you try that shit here and now, Krouse, I will take my own physical body and call the Protectorate to tell them exactly where you are, where Noelle is. So don't try it."

From his position on the floor, Krouse stared up at me. "You... you're crazy. Teleporting people into the Birdcage? If I could-"

"I heard your voice," I informed him. "It was you. Remember when you got that call a couple hours ago and no one said anything? I was there. We dialed the same number that the guy who built the teleporter that's sending people into the Birdcage called while he was stealing the plans for it, and you answered the god damn phone."

"Whoa, whoa." Ballistic held his remaining hand up. "One sec. You called a couple hours ago?"

"Yes." I didn't look away from Trickster. "He answered the phone and said, 'this better be good.'"

"Uh, no he didn't." I shot a look at Ballistic, and his head was shaking. "Sorry, but look, I haven't left his side all night. We went out for dinner around seven, and I've been with him the whole time since then. He never used the phone."

I blinked, looking from Ballistic back to the unmasked Trickster. "That's impossible. I know it was his voice."

Abruptly, Krouse started to laugh. He tipped back over onto his side, chuckling as his shoulders shook with amusement. "Oh. That's what he was doing." Lifting his gaze again, he shrugged. "It wasn't my voice that you heard. It was my clone's."

While I stared in shock at that, Marissa actually slapped him again. "God damn it, Krouse! You let Noelle make a clone of you?!"

"We had to test it!" He shouted back at her, starting to pick himself up off the floor. "It was after Panacea did her thing. I had to see if it worked or not. Guess what, it didn't. The healer failed, and another me popped out."

"And you didn't think to mention that there was another, even more psychotic, you running around? " That was Jess, prowling up on the other side of him. "Maybe you could have let us know something about that."

"It was none of your business." He shot back. "We were handling it."

"Handling it?!" I resisted the urge to punch him again, barely. "How is this handling it? He's working with some tinker from the Merchants to teleport people like my brother into the Birdcage! Why would he be doing that?"

Krouse shrugged. "Who knows why the clones do what they do. Anyway, his power's different from mine. Somehow he can switch places with anyone, anywhere in the world. But only people who match his general description of adult male, and only for a limited time. Usually anywhere between two minutes and twenty. Seems like the length is random."

I paused, squinting before pointing at the star on his forehead. "That's what that's for, isn't it? That's why you're keeping Sophia around, so she can stun him if he switches places with you and doesn't have that mark on his head."

Smiling faintly, Krouse nodded. "Different symbol every few hours, just in case."

"I wondered about that," Ballistic observed quietly. "Just figured it was Krouse being Krouse."

"Why haven't you taken him down yet?" Marissa demanded, still glaring at her former friend.

"Ah, well, it ended up being a little more complicated than I thought it would," Trickster gave another shrug. "Somehow, the other me managed to pick up some tinker skills of his own."

I blinked at that. "He... what do you mean he picked up tinker skills of his own? How does someone just 'become' a tinker?"

"Hell if I know, why don't you ask him?" Trickster scowled at me briefly. "No, really, go bother him for awhile and take that headache off my hands."

"I would," I growled. "If I knew where to find him. I haven't seen 'another you' running around."

Chuckling again, Trickster met my gaze. "You've seen him, you just didn't know you were seeing him. Like I said, he's picked up some tinker skills somehow. So who do you know that's a tinker whose face you haven't seen, who showed up riiiight around the same time that the other clone did?"

I thought briefly before realizing who he meant. "Defiant. The independent in the white and gold power armor with the laser blade. The guy who refused to join the Protectorate. He's..."

"My clone." Krouse acknowledged with a nod, still smirking even as he rubbed his face where Marissa had slapped him. "So go bother him."

This time, I couldn't help myself. I punched Krouse, knocking him back to the floor with a cry. "Fuck! I told you it wasn't me!" He held his now-bleeding nose.

"I know." I said flatly, while turning to leave the church before I did anything worse. "But you're still an asshole."

None of us spoke again until we were far away from the church. Finally, once the three of us (well, two and Genesis's creation) stood in a field behind a trio of houses in a cul-de-sac about four blocks away, I turned to look at Marissa. "You think he bought it?"

"Sure, of course he did." The other girl replied easily. "If there's one thing Krouse is sure of, it's his ability to manipulate others. He definitely believes that he's convinced you to leave him alone, at least for now."

Sitting back on the panther's haunches, Genesis asked, "Do you believe the clone story?"

I hesitated before nodding. "Yeah, I do. I mean, I still think he's a lying piece of shit, but about that I believe him."

"Yeah, it sounds like something he'd do, and then never tell us about," Marissa agreed. "But if he's telling the truth about that, do you still want to go through with the rest of it?"

"I do." I looked at the other two seriously. "Just because Krouse didn't actually attack my brother and the others doesn't make him any better. He created the guy that's doing it, and then kept lying about it. He knew what the guy was doing, hell, he knew what his cover identity was. He could have said something at any time, and he didn't. Not to mention the fact that he's hiding someone like Noelle in a basement and using someone like Shadow Stalker as a bodyguard." My head shook. "No, he might not be the bad guy in this instance, but he's far from innocent."

Girl and panther looked at one another, before turning back to me. Marissa nodded. "You're right. And—gaaaaaaah!"

She jumped while yelping, and I turned to look the way that she was staring.

A lone figure stood behind me, having somehow appeared out of thin air. She blinked at Mars. "Are you in pain?"

"No." Marissa shook her head quickly. "You just scared me, damn."

"We frightened you?" Pandora seemed to consider that for a moment, before her mouth turned up and she showed her teeth in the most threatening and dangerous smile I could ever remember seeing.

Poor Mars shrank back reflexively while I managed, "Uhh, P-Pandora? What are you doing?"

She kept showing her teeth. "We are smiling. Dinah-Friend says that smiling assures others that we mean them no harm."

"Sure..." I nodded slowly. "Tell her to keep working on that with you. For now, could you... sort of... stop?"

On request, the clone immediately dropped her expression back to neutral. "It is done, we are in place."

"Are you sure you're okay with this, Pandora?" I asked, hesitantly. I still wasn't sure exactly how to talk to the all-too-dangerous clone. She was... better about the whole omnicidal thing. Clearly her promises meant more to her than they did to most normal people. She had made the deal with Crystal that she wouldn't kill innocents or anyone who wasn't a threat to her, and thus far (as far as I could tell), she had kept that promise.

Her head tilted as she stared at me with that blank, emotionless look. I'd realized before that it wasn't that she didn't have emotions, but rather, she lacked the understanding of how or when to express them properly. Like the whole smiling thing. She was an alien, trying to understand human nuances."We do not understand the question. We have agreed to your request. Is there now a problem?"

"No, no problem," I assured her quickly. "I was just expressing concern for your other self, that's all. I wanted to make sure you... she... you were going to be all right."

"We will not fail in the task you have requested of us."

We had never really planned on being able to make Krouse tell us the truth. Especially not in time to actually accomplish anything. Marissa and Jess had impressed upon me his ability to lie his way out of any situation. With that in mind, I had come up with the idea of confronting Trickster just to see what story he told, while leaving a Pandora clone behind. That Pandora would stay hidden and let us know who he contacted, what they said, and so on. The goal had been to jar him with a confrontation, so that after we pretended to let him convince us it wasn't him, he'd then proceed to contact the person or people he was working with (like Eddie), and the Pandora that we left behind could let us know (through this Pandora) what he was up to.

Instead, I'd ended up actually believing Krouse's explanation. It fit, and it explained why Ballistic wouldn't have seen him answer the phone earlier.

"Okay, Pandora, slight change of plans." I glanced toward Marissa before continuing to address the clone. "Can your ummm... other-self just keep an eye on Trickster and the others there, let us know if they say anything important, who they talk to, if anyone visits, where they go... that sort of thing?"

Her head gave a short jerk that I interpreted as a nod. "We are capable of that for you, Tether-Friend. You have assisted us in removing the threat that Coil-Man presented, and you have maintained your part of our agreement. You have proven trustworthy. We will do as you ask."

Genesis spoke up through her creation. "Are you gonna be okay around Noelle? The other clones kind of go... nuts when it comes to her."

Regarding the panther-creature briefly, Pandora answered, "We have removed the compulsions biologically implanted within our mind that would force our servitude toward the primary progenitor. She means nothing to us."

That seemed... kind of sad, somehow. But I shook it off. "Okay, well, just let us know if anything important happens for now?"

Pandora gave that short, jerky nod again. "Keep our finger with you. We will find your location when a report is necessary."

"Yaaaaay." I managed weakly, repulsed by the idea of keeping the finger that was already nestled inside the dart compartment of my costume. "Seriously, Pandora. Thank you."

She blinked twice. "Why do you profess gratitude before we have accomplished the goal you have requested?"

"Because you're... sort of... kind of a friend, Pandora." I shrugged. "And when a friend agrees to help, you thank them just for trying."

I had the feeling that she still didn't quite understand, but she said nothing else about it. Instead, the strange clone-girl turned away. "We will go now. Our other-selves are busy, and we dislike being spread too thin."

It was the first I had heard of a possible limitation to how far she could duplicate herself, but I didn't jump on it. Instead, I nodded. "See you later, Pandora."

She was gone then, and Marissa let out a long breath. "Well, that was... tense. Does she always give off that 'I'm being nice now but any second I could murder everyone in the room if you tick me off' feeling?"

"Actually, she's getting better," I pointed out. "It used to be everyone in the building."

After everything that had happened that night, I was exhausted by the time I reached home. I'd left Jess and Marissa back at my parents' house, with the promise to call in the morning once I had some sleep. I figured the next day would be spent getting everyone on the same page so that we could find either Defiant or Eddie (If the Undersiders hadn't managed it already), and get the device they were using to transport people into the Birdcage.

For now though, there was one more person I needed to fill in. As I came through the back door, I called, "Ethan? Hey, I've got some stuff we should talk about!"

Opening the fridge, I took out a bottle of apple juice, reaching up to tug my hood back and my mask off so that I could drink it. "And you totally have to tell me how you managed that car thing. That was-" I had just swung the fridge door shut and turned, when I came face to face with Krouse.

Jerking backward in surprise, I managed to spill the apple juice on myself while nearly falling over. My back hit the island counter. "What-"

"You just had to do it." Krouse lamented, head shaking. "You just couldn't... you couldn't leave me alone. We were fair, we were even... and you..." His hand came up to rapidly tap his fingers against the refrigerator in clear agitation. "You couldn't leave it alone. You had to go and... and bother them. You had to go and bother them and then I couldn't leave alone because-" He bellowed the next words, using his hand to sweep across the face of the fridge and knock all the magnets and papers into a brief flurry before they fell to the floor. "-IT WOULDN'T LEAVE ME ALONE!"

"You're him." I realized, holding my mask in one hand while dropping the now-empty apple juice bottle. "You're not Krouse, you're his clone."

"I am who I am!" The clone shouted, taking a step toward me. I planted a line from the middle of his shirt to the floor, and he came up short, glaring at me. His eyes twitched a little. "I am who I am. I'm trying to be who I am, but they won't let me. You won't let me. It won't let me!"

Grimacing, I used the line against his chest to throw the clone backwards, making him fly into the living room with a crash.

Quickly, I used the opening to pull the mask back on so that I could use the built-in comm. "Clockblocker, threat in Ethan and Sam's house." There was no response as I threw myself into the living room after the clone. "Clockblocker? Glory Girl? Control?" The last command should have connected me to the on-duty PRT officer in the control center.

Instead, I got nothing but silence. In the other room, I found the Krouse-clone—I decided to think of him as Defiant to avoid confusing myself- picking himself off the floor, chuckling. "No help. No help for me, no help for you, less help, much less. No calls, no interruptions, no breaking the plan."

I stared at him. "You're jamming the signal somehow. What... what are you doing here?"

His glare turned murderous. "You think I wanted to come? You think I like..." Laying one hand out flat, he used two fingers from the other hand to pantomime legs walking across his palm. "... being walked walked walked like a stupid little dog? You think I like you MAKING ME COME HERE?!"

"How did I make you come here?" I shook my head. "Why are you sending people into the Birdcage? Why are you doing any of this? What do you even want?"

The rage in his face immediately vanished, replaced by a contemplative look. "What do I want? She asks what I want. It asks, and I... and I answer... I say..." His expression fell into one of the saddest, most morose and helpless looks I had ever seen. "I just want to be me. I want to be my person, mine. My choices, my decisions, my actions. Everything me." Abruptly and without warning, he laughed out loud. His laughter nearly overtook him, making the man stumble a little as he guffawed. "But—but it won't let me, will it? Noooo it won't—it won't let me." Just as suddenly, his laughter stopped completely and he proceeded to stare at me flatly, his voice monotone. "Wanna be myself. Wanna make my choices, my decisions, but you won't let me. Why? Why won't you let me be myself?"

"I'm... not doing anything to you." I said slowly, confused. "Just... listen-"

"NO!" He screamed the denial so loudly that his voice echoed through the room. "You! You listen! You listen. I talk and you listen!" He pointed at himself, then me with each demand, finger twitching back and forth demonstratively. "I talk, you listen, I talk, you listen, I talk, you listen. Me! Mine! My decision. My words, your ears. My words, your ears. You shut up, just shut up!"

Realizing that this was going nowhere, I raised a hand, attaching a line between the man's shirt and my glove to yank him toward me. My other hand raised to punch the clearly crazy clone, but before I could, a literal forest of black lines popped up, leading in every direction.

Stopping short, with Defiant still trapped on a line right in front of me and my fist raised, I glanced around with a gasp. The tangle of black lines faded then, once I stopped trying to hit him. "What..."

Defiant gave a weird little giggle then. He held his hand up, and I saw some kind of remote. His finger held the red button on the top depressed. "You see? You see now? I talk, you listen, or boom." Smiling, he leaned in closer to me to whisper the word again. "Boom."

"A detonator... " I breathed. "What did you do?"

In response, he just waved that remote back and forth in front of my face. "Boom. You don't listen, you don't hear, and boom. Hurt me, I let go, and boom."

Bombs. He had bombs planted, probably everywhere in the neighborhood given the number of lines I had seen. I swallowed, slowly releasing him from my line. "Look, what do you want?"

Keeping that deadman's switch remote in one hand, Defiant scowled at me. "I told you. I told you before. I keep trying to be myself, I keep trying to be me, just me. Not him, not what he wants, not what she wants. I try to be me. But it... it won't-" His free hand slapped the side of his head several times. "It won't let me!"

"Who... who won't let you?" I was confused, trying to figure out what I could do to get that detonator away from him without making it go off. Where was Ethan? Was he even home? Was there any way that I could bypass whatever signal jammer Defiant was using and get a message out? What about Pandora's finger? Could I get at that so she could hear what was going on?

"The... the voices... the things... they say..." The clone scratched at his forehead so hard it was almost like he was trying to claw his way into his own brain. "Do this, do that, must do that, can't think for yourself. Must must must MUST!" His last word turned into a scream before he just as suddenly started to laugh. "You see? You see how it works? You do something to make him mad. You ruin something for him, and then I... I have to do something to hurt you, to make it even, so they shut up, just shut up! I have to make the voices stop so I can do my own thing, be my own person, make my choices." His eyes turned downcast and his head shook, his voice falling into clear depression. "It's not my fault. It wasn't my choice. I do things and they leave me alone. They let me be what I want, what I choose. But they come back. They always come back. Do this, do that. It's my choice, it's my brain, it's my body! Mine! But they come. His voice, her voice, have to listen, have to do... have to follow, have to help. Have to make you hurt so he doesn't hurt so I don't hurt!"

"Krouse..." I said slowly. "He's mad at me for going there? For hurting him?"

"Father and mother! They're mad! Very angry, very... very bad! Bad!" Licking his lips as his eyes twitched, Defiant's head shook. "Can't do this, can't keep hurting. Stopping you now, for good."

Drawing back, I stared. "Excuse me?"

"Choice! Always a choice, must be a choice. Can't be a hero. Two ways. Two ways to not be a hero." He ranted, waving the detonator. "Run." He pointed at the open front door. "Leave, bombs go boom. You leave, you are safe. But..."

"But you'll detonate the bombs." I said slowly. "You'll kill everyone in the neighborhood if I choose to leave."

His head bobbed, before he pointed at the nearby table. "Or..."

I glanced that way, and saw a small, innocuous looking purple crystal sitting there. "Is that what you're using to send people into the Birdcage?" I asked slowly, trying to buy time to think.

"Choices, choices, choices." He explained. "You will stop being a hero because you let people die to save yourself, or you will stop being a hero because you are not here! That's it. That's all. Tick tock, tick tock. Ten seconds. I count to ten and release this, then boooooom! Do it. Make your choice. Stand, flee, do it. One, two, three-"

"Listen to me." I said quickly. "We can talk about how to free you from whatever-"

He continued. "Four, five-"

"You don't have to be this way!" I shouted at him. "You can choose to be better! There's already another-"

"Six, seven."

"You can be a better person! You can choose to-"

"Eight, nine."

My hand shot out, and I grabbed hold of the crystal on the table. As soon as I did, Defiant stopped counting. He looked at me, and smiled. "Goodbye." He waved, almost pleasantly.

I felt a sudden, violent lurching motion that threw me backward with a cry. My stomach heaved, and I nearly threw up inside my mask before landing hard on my shoulder.

When I looked up, I was surrounded by blank, featureless metal walls in a dimly lit corridor. The smell of sweat, blood, and worse was everywhere. In the distance, I could hear shouts of encouragement, punctuated by the sound of some kind of fight. Despair, hopelessness, and depression filled the air.

I was in the Birdcage.

Interlude 12 – Reach

Earlier That Day, Before The PCIPS Infiltration

"Come on, you pussy. Stop being such a little bitch and hit me." Cassie Herren goaded the pudgy boy across from her while she held her hands up in front of herself. She wore a pair of focus mitts, the padded targets that boxers trained against. "Hit the mitts, damn it. Make me feel it. You wanna be a little coward your whole life just cuz your daddy was mean?"

To her annoyance, the goading didn't serve the intended purpose of making Theo Anders hit the target any harder. He gave a weak little jab, flinching even as he did that much.

"Fuck, you call that a punch? Come on, Theo, you can hit harder than that. The mitt isn't gonna break and neither is your hand. Just hit it!"

"Sorry." The boy mumbled, shaking his head. "Maybe we should stop. It might upset Aster."

"The baby's fine, Theo. She's playing with her cheerios." Cassie's head shook. "Don't use her as an excuse."

"Sorry."

"And stop apologizing so much!"

"... Sorry."

Sighing, the short-haired blonde girl lowered her hands and stared at the boy. Theo was older than her by a measure of months, already fifteen while she still had a few weeks to go. He was also extremely, annoyingly, passive. His father had made sure that his son would never, ever question him. "Look, dude, you asked me to help you learn how to take care of yourself, right?"

Hunching his shoulders a little nervously, the boy's head gave a short, almost unnoticeable nod. He didn't speak.

"Well, okay then. I'll help." Cassie shoved the boy's shoulder with one of the mitts. "But you have got to learn how to actually punch. Make a fist the way I showed you and hit the mitt. Put some weight behind it."

That time, he actually punched hard enough that she could at least feel it through the padding over her hand. "Good. See, no one died just because you threw a punch. Nothing exploded, and you haven't suddenly become some slobbering beast. Now do it again." She instructed while holding the second mitt up. "This side."

Theo still looked uncertain, but he punched again. It was light, pathetic really by any real standards, but Cassie refrained from saying so. The old her would have. Rune would have mocked him for being so weak, for being Kaiser's son and yet hitting like a little kid. Now... now she just held up the first mitt, shook it, and said, "This one. Harder. Come on, you've got this. Ten more, Theo. Ten more hits, then we'll have dinner."

"Pepperoni rolls?" Theo asked. His voice was, as always, mostly neutral, but it did finally betray a tiny hint of enthusiasm. For Theo, he might as well have been jumping up and down and pleading with full-on puppy eyes.

"Tell you what, if you hit my gloves as hard as you can for the next ten hits, I'll make the pepperoni rolls that you like so much." Cassie promised him. She never exactly advertised the fact that she knew how to cook, but she'd been living with Aunt Kayden pretty much since everything with Kaiser had gone down. The woman had actually convinced the PRT to pull her out of the prison-bound van and let the girl stay with her on a trial basis. Somehow, Aunt Kayden (not that she was really her aunt) had convinced them to let Cassie join the Wards. It was a tentative arrangement, she knew. One real fuck-up, and there were at least a dozen guys in suits and probably as many in costumes who wouldn't hesitate to throw her straight into a juvenile detention center and toss away the key.

Aunt Kayden, in that moment, had her back more than pretty much anyone else that Cassie could ever remember. Whatever her earlier betrayal of Kaiser (And honestly, Cassie had never really cared all that much about the so-called 'family business'. It was just where she'd ended up), and the Empire, it had been Aunt Kayden who had made sure that Cassie didn't go to prison. That was something that she wasn't going to forget, no matter how aggravating certain people tended to be. Besides, it wasn't like the she'd constantly gotten along with, or even really liked, some of the people she'd been around before.

The following ten blows were, naturally, nothing to write home about. The boy was still flinching and pulling back rather than following through with his punches. But he was, at least, somewhat trying. Cassie figured she'd get him more accustomed to throwing any punch at all, then work on putting real force behind it. One step at a time.

As promised, once they were finished and Theo went off to change clothes, Cassie stripped the focus mitts off and headed for the kitchen. On her way past the high chair where little Aster sat playing with the sticky cheerios that were spread across her tray, the girl reached out to tickle the baby's neck.

Aster gave a squealing giggle and picked up two of the little bits of cereal in her little hands, thrusting them upward in an attempt to throw them at Cassie.

"Oh is that the way it's gonna be, huh?" Cassie made an exaggerated scoffing noise. "Is that the way it's gonna be?"

Though she clearly didn't understand, the baby still giggled at the voice, throwing another cheerio.

"Hooookay, that is it, buster." Reaching out, Cassie undid the the high chair, pulling the tray back before scooping the baby out of it. Turning with the baby held out in her hands, she made a slight swooping motion. "Whatcha gonna do now, huh? Iiiii gooootcha. I gotcha, Iiiii gotcha." Pulling the baby up and then back with each pronouncement, she finally brought the giggling, squealing figure close enough to raspberry her tummy. "Aaaaaaaaaaaahhaaaaa, miiiiine!" Kissing Aster's stomach and then blowing her lips against it again, she announced, "I've got my dinner. Iiii've got my dinner. Yum yum yum."

Finally, she kissed the top of the baby girl's head and bounced her a little. "You're a good girl, aren't you? Yes, you are. Yeeesss you are." The laughing baby brought a smile to her face, which fell away when she felt a presence in the doorway. Turning quickly, Cassie blanched at the sight of Theo standing there staring. Self-consciously, she placed Aster back into her high chair and replaced the tray before stepping over to where the counter was. "I umm, I thought she needed to burp or something." She muttered the excuse half-under her breath while starting to take down the supplies that she'd need for the promised pepperoni rolls.

Still trying to hide the blush that had overtaken her face, Cassie waved a hand toward the cupboard across the room. "Stop standing there gaping like a fucking idiot and bring me one of the mixing bowls."

As soon as she said it, the girl flinched inwardly. Turning, she saw the fifteen-year-old boy trudging across the kitchen, eyes downcast, and sighed. "Hey, Theo." When he reluctantly looked up, she managed something resembling a smile. "I'm sorry, okay? I didn't mean to call you an idiot. That wasn't what I meant. I was just... look, ignore it when I say shit like that. Or yell back at me, whatever."

The boy's eyes averted away from her as he spoke quietly, "It's okay."

Part of Cassie wanted to scream at him that it obviously wasn't okay, that he had to stop being so damn passive and just tell people when they were being assholes, that he had to stand up for himself.

Instead, she took a long, deep breath and thought of what Madison might say. "Okay, bring that stuff and... I'll show you how to cook these. Trust me, Aunt Kayden'll love you forever if you make them."

As requested, Theo began to bring the supplies over to the counter, and Cassie started the process of teaching him how to make the pepperoni rolls.

Hours later, after everything had gone down at the PCIPS building (formerly Kaiser's company headquarters), Cassie was landing on the roof of Aunt Kayden's apartment building, having floated herself over from the next building using her shoes. As she'd told Tether, it wasn't the most comfortable or easy way to travel, but it worked in a pinch.

She was lost in thought about what they'd seen earlier. Apparently whoever was putting people into the Birdcage, that Eddie dude most likely, was working with the guy from the Travelers? Were those guys even considered a team at this point? How many of them were left?

The thought of what Tether and Sundancer did with each other still made Cassie want to shudder, but she recognized that as an ingrained reaction given her own upbringing. Still, just the very thought of two girls... Sighing inwardly at her own inability to completely suppress her reaction in spite of herself, Cassie was just starting to head for the roof access door when she heard a noise coming from the far side of the roof, beyond the door and past several air conditioning units and other bits of roof-related equipment.

Curious, the girl started across the roof, picking her way to the other side. Eventually, she came around the wall of the roof-access room and blinked at the sight before her.

Theo was there, and he had set up some kind of make-shift punching bag using old clothes and a basket set up on top of a couple chairs that were stacked against the nearby wall. As she watched, the boy threw several quick punches, just the way she had been trying to get him to do earlier.

Grinning, Cassie clapped a couple of times without thinking. The second she did, Theo's gaze jerked upward and she saw his eyes widen. It wasn't until the boy stumbled back reflexively that Cassie realized her mistake. She was still wearing the infiltration suit, with the black, featureless mask, rather than her real costume. Hell, it was made worse by the fact that the mask purposefully distorted her voice so that they wouldn't be caught by anyone recognizing an audio recording.

"Wait, Theo, it's-" She got out before the boy backed up too far. With a cry, he pitched backwards off the edge of the roof.

"Theo!" Cassie yelled, sprinting that way and diving off the roof without thinking. She dove, like she would into a swimming pool, plummeting the distance toward the ground of the alley below. Trying not to think about what would happen if she was too late, the blonde girl caught hold of the thrashing, screaming Theo and twisted around to put herself underneath him. Then she focused, using every bit of her power on every part of her clothing and everything of the boy's she could reach.

She couldn't bring enough of her power to bear to stop them completely in the time that they had, not with the boy's extra weight. But she did manage to at least slow them down enough that, when the cement did come up and smack her in the back, it just bruised and knocked the wind out of the pair, rather than killing them both outright.

Laying flat on her back, with Theo sprawled out on top of her, Cassie tried to catch her breath. Before she was anywhere near ready, she felt the boy jerk as he realized where he was. His eyes were still wide and he tried to spring away, only managing to slip and nearly elbow her in the gut. Clearly desperate, he made his hand into a fist as though he was going to try punching her.

"Whoa, whoa!" Cassie managed, reaching up to grab hold of the mask and finally pulled it off. "It's me, Theo, chill, chill!"

Fist raised awkwardly, Theo stared down at her, his mouth working in surprise. "C... Cassie?"

"Well who the hell else would dive off a roof to catch you, dumbass?" She spat without thinking.

Shifting a little, the boy raised both shoulders in a shrug. "I... umm... I didn't exactly think you'd dive off a roof to catch me."

Flushing a little, the former Nazi shrugged self-consciously. "Yeah, well, I guess I didn't really think it through. Don't get used to it though, because I-"

Abruptly, her words were silenced as something pressed against her lips, turning her speech to a muffled yelp of surprise which, in turn, faded to a little noise of confusion at the feeling. It felt... good. It was... nice, and she found herself slumping a little.

It wasn't until Theo pulled back, face red, that Cassie realized what had happened. He'd... he'd... kissed her. She'd never kissed anyone before, not a single person other than family, and Theo, the boy who never raised his voice or even really expressed an opinion about anything, had just... he'd just...

"Sorry. Sorry. Sorry." The boy kept repeating, staring at the ground after he'd picked his way to his feet. His face was still bright red, and he clearly didn't dare to look at her.

"I... I... I..." Cassie was blushing just as much as the boy was. She had pushed herself up, and now the two teens stood facing one another, neither daring to look the other in the eye. As tough as the blonde considered herself, this was... the feeling that... the weird tickle that... the taste of his-

"I've gotta go!" She blurted suddenly. Spinning, she started to sprint down the alley, ignoring Theo's call for her to wait. She had to run, she had to get out.

She wandered for a couple hours, eventually putting the mask back on to avoid being recognized. More than once, she ran across a would-be mugging and put a stop to it. Part of that was that the actions were almost ingrained by that point after the training she'd been through, while another part was the fact that she really, really wanted to hurt someone so that she could avoid thinking about how badly she'd fucked up back there.

He'd kissed her! Theo Anders had kissed her. And she... hadn't hated it? What did that even mean? Worse, she'd run away. She had practically called him a coward earlier that same day, and when he kissed her, she was the one who had run off like a dumb little girl.

Fuck. What the fuck was she going to do now? She was living there. How could she face him after her reaction to his kiss had been to run away? How could she face Aunt Kayden? Fuck fuck fuck. God damn it.

Eventually, Cassie found herself migrating toward the neighborhood that Madison was living in with Assault and Battery. Well, just Assault now. The girl was probably asleep, but maybe she wasn't. Maybe she was awake, and Cassie could talk to her about what had happened.

Hell, it wasn't like she had a lot of other options for someone to talk to about it. She didn't have any actual friends. Tether and, to a lesser extent (in some cases much lesser), the other team members were the closest thing.

Instead, when she reached the house, Cassie found a strange, brown-skinned man leaving through the back door. His hair was long, and he had a hook-like nose.

"Hey!" She called out after landing on top of the nearby garage roof. "What the hell are you doing here?" He wasn't Assault, that much she knew.

The man whirled to look at her. "No. No no no!" He looked... really upset about something. "Free! I was supposed to be free now! Free to be me, to be myself. Don't be here. You aren't here!" His hand covered his eyes, and then he moved it, looking hopeful until he saw her again. Then his face fell and his shoulders slumped. "Can't be me, can never be free."

"I said..." Cassie jumped from the roof and landed in front of the man, glaring at him from behind her mask. "What... the hell... are you doing here?" She frowned, as something nagging at her memory caught up. "Wait a second, I know your voice. You're... fuck! You're Trickster, aren't you?!"

"Am I?" The man stared at her, his eyes pleading. "I want to be. Can I be? Please? Pretty please, let me be. Let me be me, just that. Just let me be. I don't want to. She didn't do anything. She was just here. no. No! I won't, I can't! Promised. Leave me alone!"

She punched him as hard as she could, making the taller, older man stumble a little with surprise. Then Reach put a hand against his chest and his pants, then used her power on his clothes, sending him flying backwards into the nearby wall as she growled, "Where's Tether? Where the hell is she? What the fuck did you do?"

The man's response was to giggle as he was held against the wall. Moving one hand just enough to pull something from his pocket, he bounced a purple crystal up and down in his palm. "All gone. Gone gone gone. No more problems. No more hurting me. Leave me alone, Mommy, leave me alone, Daddy. I can make my own decisions!"

"Gone?" Cassie felt her face pale. "W-what do you mean, gone? Where is she?"

"She went to live with the birdies." The man informed her, his voice informed her. "Chirp chirp!"

"No..." Eyes wide, Cassie felt herself slump, unable to maintain focus on keeping the man suspended against the wall. "No... not the Birdcage. You... you..." Feeling a sudden, bottomless rage boil up and take over at the thought that she wouldn't see the closest thing she'd had to a friend again, Cassie lunged forward with an inarticulate scream. Her foot lashed out, catching the man in the knee, just before her fist took him in the face. He stumbled, and she kicked him again, even harder, then drove her knee into his gut, propelling it faster by using her power on her own shoe and giving it a push.

"DAMN IT!" She screamed as the man fell prone to the ground and curled up in the face of the onslaught, before kicking him again, repeatedly. "She was my friend! She was my only! Only! Fucking! Friend! I could talk to her!" Rearing back, she kicked again, as hard as she could. "Fuck you! Fuck you, you son of a bitch! You cock sucking piece of shit!"

By the time she finished attacking the man, he lay bleeding and groaning on the ground, mumbling something about being who he was and making his own decisions.

Panting, Reach stomped down on the man's arm that held the crystal. "This. This is what you used to send her in there?" Getting no response from the man, she glowered before reaching for the communications device on the belt of the suit.

"Hey, anyone out there. Fuck, I don't know. Tattletale, Vista, whoever has this shit on still. Call the Protectorate. They took Tether. They sent Tether to the Birdcage, and the fucking son of a bitch is outside Assault and Battery's house. Get them here, fucking now."

That said, she stared down at the broken, injured man, and repeated her earlier question. "The crystal. That's what you used, isn't it?"

This time, the man gave a short nod, staring pleadingly up at her through eyes that were bruised and blackened from one of her stray kicks.

For a moment longer, Cassie stood there and glared down at the man, her mind racing. What should she do? What else could she do? Fuck, Rune wouldn't do a damn thing. Rune, the person she had been, wouldn't give a shit about any of this. At most, she would consider catching the man and calling for help to be all she really needed to do.

But she wasn't Rune anymore. She was... better? What should Reach do?

What would Tether do?

With that thought, Cassie reached down automatically. Her hand grabbed the crystal, while she activated the comm. "I'm going in after her. I'm not leaving her alone in that hellhole. Don't you sons of bitches dare leave us in there."

A response started to come through, but before she could even tell who was talking, a sickening, nauseating feeling came over Cassie, and she felt herself flung sideways.

Then, she was gone.