Emily swung her chair back and forth in small arcs, thinking hard about the various events of the last couple of days. Neither Eidolon or Alexandria had arrived yet although she expected one or both of them to turn up any time now. She'd had another brief call from the Chief Director, who seemed distracted by something and had said that there had been an unforeseen delay.
Reaching out she picked up the national newspaper sitting on her desk, stilling her restless movements as she read the headline article once again. The Slaughterhouse Nine being wiped out almost entirely was as good a reason for that delay as any she could think of. "Good riddance," she mumbled, scanning the page and pausing on the photos of the devastation caused by three brave men. "And thank you Mr Petty, for showing how even the ordinary man can do extraordinary things. You poor bastard."
She was simultaneously impressed and pleased that it had been a normal person who had achieved something that the entire PRT and Protectorate hadn't been able to for years, embarrassed for her own organization for the same reason, and rather depressed that it had cost the life of someone she thought she'd have liked to meet, not to mention his family and nearly his entire town. But at least the nightmare of the S9 was finally done with.
Resolving to raise a glass in memory of the man when she got home, she tossed the paper to the desk and got up, walking to the window and looking out at the late afternoon scene. The days were slowly growing longer as the winter headed towards spring but it was still pretty dark even at four in the afternoon. The water of the bay looked cold and forbidding, waves running across it in the wind that had picked up in the last couple of hours. It had been a fairly good day for this time of year but nowhere near as nice as Tuesday, which had been very close to perfect.
Idly she wondered if that had been arranged as well, somehow. She wasn't prepared to dismiss any idea at the moment about the capability of whoever was behind the Family, assuming their hypothesis was correct. Weather control seemed extreme, but having seen what was moving that tanker yesterday, she couldn't in all good faith entirely rule it out. She simply hoped it wasn't true.
Shaking her head a little she went to the small fridge in the corner of the room and opened it, retrieving a bottle of water, which she opened and sipped from. After closing the appliance she sat down again, leaning back and resuming her ponderings on the long meeting, or series of meetings, she'd had with various combinations of people the day before. The report they'd come up with had covered all the important things, or the things they had any real evidence for at least, with an interpretation that was suitable for consumption by the people it was aimed at. She hoped desperately that they'd read between the lines and realize that she was begging them to stay out of it and let things settle down.
Having met with Raptaur she really didn't want to see what would happen if some idiot decided it would be a good idea to push until something snapped. The appearance of Kaiju had only reinforced that feeling. Somewhat to her surprise, she'd decided that the former was probably someone she could deal with, although she wasn't sure she'd ever be entirely comfortable with her.
She could well understand why Hannah seemed so jumpy around her, even if it was more than slightly uncharacteristic for the normally very calm and collected woman.
But the huge reptile did seem both respectful and rational, both traits she liked to see in a Parahuman. Or anyone, really. And the fact that Colin and Dragon both felt that they could work with Raptaur and clearly were both impressed by her went a long way towards making her think it would work out well. She could live with the situation even if it meant making the odd compromise on normal procedure, especially if it got her hands on fucking Calvert.
For that, she'd have been prepared to go a lot further than promising to make sure that Rachel Lindt's case was investigated fully and tried fairly if required, and to let them sit on the Undersiders. It seemed a good trade. Whether the Chief Director agreed, on the other hand, was somewhat up in the air at this point.
Being at the start of what she thought could be a good working relationship with the Family, she wanted to make sure it stayed that way, so the imminent arrival of the other two thirds of the Triumvirate in her city was somewhat worrying. With any luck they'd listen to her, agree to a pragmatic rather than a by-the-book approach to the new group in their midst, and not just jump in and start making demands, which she felt wouldn't go down well.
She was also going to have to explain why she hadn't reported any of this before, which she still felt was the right decision, but might be difficult to get across to certain people higher up. Luckily, Legend had agreed with her assessment of the situation and with him on her side of the issue, she should be able to argue her decision was correct. Hopefully the Chief Director would also agree when things were fully explained to her. With any luck the report had started her thinking along the right lines. She'd at least not blown her top the day before when the news broke.
Sipping some more water, she put the bottle down. The other thing she was still trying to get to grips with was Colin and Dragon's little side project with Raptaur. A fucking enormous shotgun powered by a fusion bomb?! That was insane even in Tinker terms.
Shaking her head she marveled at the sheer balls it took to ever think that something like that could work. But the two Tinkers had shown them the designs, calculations, and the simulations, which showed that it would at least function correctly. Whether that functioning would genuinely harm or even kill an Endbringer was something she had no idea about, it was far past her field of expertise, and the collateral damage would be spectacular whatever happened.
However, Colin had rightly pointed out that any situation in which such a weapon would be used was already at the point that the local area was probably a total loss anyway. A relatively small, directional, and if he was to be believed, essentially clean fusion blast most likely wouldn't make the situation much worse in many cases.
Unless you were in front of it. Or behind it. Or right next to it.
The simulations of the splash effects were… unnerving. Luckily they didn't go very far.
Even so, the mere idea of it gave her cold chills. As did the fact that they were seriously talking about making it hand-held and giving it to Kaiju! Part of her desperately wanted to see that, another much bigger part of her wanted to whimper and hide under the desk at the thought.
The part she'd had the most trouble with was basically giving the Family the design of a fusion explosive. At least until Dragon had explained some of the conclusions she'd come to about all the other ways just their observed matter-creation ability could cause mass destruction.
Some of the ideas the Canadian had come up with were absolutely horrifying. Emily was really hoping that none of those crazy lizards had the same sort of imagination. She'd never thought that she'd consider a five kiloton nuke the safer option, but by the end of the ten minute discussion, even Legend looked like he'd seen a ghost.
Shuddering a little, she shook her head, then picked up the water bottle again and finished the contents, dropping the empty bottle into the recycling bin next to her desk.
No, that whole shotgun of doom idea was terrifying, but she could see it was valid enough that it needed to be worked on. The political issues were the real problem. Colin had made some good suggestions on that front and when he'd recovered, Legend had made more. It looked doable, if somewhat… PR-unfriendly.
People in general didn't like the work 'nuclear' being attached to anything. A hand-held weapon, even if it required a hand the size of a garage, would certainly cause a degree of worry.
A knock on the door made her look up from her ruminations. "Enter," she called briskly. The door opened to reveal Dean Stansfield, out of costume and looking slightly apprehensive.
"Director? Can I have a moment to talk?"
She waved him in wordlessly. Entering the room and closing the door, he moved to sit in the chair she pointed at. Leaning forward in her chair she inspected him. "What can I do for you, Mr Stansfield?"
"I wanted to mention something I found out at school from Vicky, I mean, Glory Girl, ma'am," he said a little uncertainly. She raised an eyebrow. "It's nothing bad, or at least I don't think it is, but I thought you should be aware of it."
"Go on," she prodded, when he fell silent, feeling intrigued. He explained what his girlfriend had told him about her extended family being hired by BBFO as Parahuman backup for the whole Kaiju reveal the day before. Tapping her fingers together she considered the information, which she hadn't known about before. "I see," she finally replied, after a short silence. "I believe you're correct, it's nothing to worry about, but it's interesting to know."
"Is it legal?" he asked, sounding mildly worried. "Vicky said her mother checked it out before and said it all seemed above board, but it's not something I've ever heard of before."
"It's certainly unusual, but it's legal. We've checked thoroughly and BBFO found some interesting and complicated ways around some of the Parahuman laws surrounding commercial use of powers. Very clever, to be honest. Your girlfriend did nothing wrong, and her family probably helped keep this city from panicking."
He looked relieved.
"Thank you, Director. I was a little concerned that they could be setting themselves up for a problem."
"I think they're safe, and if anything they probably did themselves some favors from a public relations standpoint, I imagine. We had reports that New Wave were seen around the place with new costumes but this is the first I've heard of what the arrangement was. It's useful information. Thank you for bringing it to my attention." She glanced at the clock. "I believe you're on patrol with Missy tonight?"
"Yes, I was going to get into costume as soon as I'd talked to you." He checked his watch. "I'd better get on with it, I don't want to be late."
She nodded. "Dismissed. Good luck out there and be careful."
"Always, ma'am," he smiled as he stood, nodded to her, then left. As the door closed quietly behind him she watched, then shook her head slightly.
"Why do I have the feeling that this is only the beginning of the weird shit?" she muttered to herself, before turning back to the window and her thoughts, waiting for Alexandria and Eidolon to arrive.
Colin looked satisfied, saving and closing the final design file. "That should do it, I think. We'll need to get some up close measurements, but with only some small changes it should allow the weapon to be fired from the shoulder."
"Assuming you have a shoulder that large and we can make the recoil a couple of orders of magnitude smaller," Dragon added.
"That's true," he sighed. "Did you have any more luck with suitable inertial compensators?"
"I have a design that should get us close, but it's not ideal." His friend glanced at him. "Did Leet ever get back to you about your question?"
"He sent me an email late last night saying he was thinking about it and would be in touch soon," Colin replied. "But he didn't go into detail."
"OK. With any luck he's got something better. If Kaiju can do as Raptaur said and make the thing massive enough, in the millions of tons or so, and we add some inertial damping, it might be usable without tossing her into the next county. Or space." Dragon chuckled. "I expect that even she is going to notice it being fired even so."
"I don't know how tough she really is but if we're right that their strength and durability goes up exponentially, she'd survive it regardless," he commented with a thoughtful look on her face. "We should check, though. Hopefully we can arrange an introduction soon."
"From what I gather they're going to be cutting that ship up next week sometime, so I expect she'll be available." Dragon looked up at the sound of his door alarm, as did he. Checking, he nodded and tapped the control to open it, admitting Legend who came in and smiled at them both.
"Is your design complete?" he asked curiously.
"It is, yes, sir," Colin replied. "Subject to fine tuning and some work on the recoil damping."
"Good. I've arranged to discreetly talk to some people in the State Department and the White House about using it. We'd want to test it, at least if we have time, I think. An untried weapon, even one you two designed, isn't the sort of thing I'm wildly happy about fielding." Colin exchanged a look with Dragon, who shrugged a little.
"Probably a good idea," she admitted. "Where, though? The projectiles will go a very long way extremely fast, even if Kaiju makes them short lived. Well over a hundred and twenty kilometers a second would put them past the atmosphere almost instantly, at far past escape velocity."
"You're sure they won't burn up?" Legend asked.
"Not a chance. I know of almost nothing you could possibly do to damage EDM without the use of either an extremely exotic Parahuman power or the core of a neutron star." She made a small motion with one hand. "Those projectiles would penetrate almost anything conceivable. Hopefully including an Endbringer."
"Well, one way or another we need to find out, but it would be best to get the relevant governments to agree to it first," he said. "They tend to be annoyed at fusion warheads going off without warning. There are all sorts of treaties surrounding it aside from the sheer surprise value."
Dragon chuckled, while Colin looked at her, then Legend, before nodding slightly. He also made a note.
"The real question is how on earth we manage to get Kaiju to where the Endbringer attack is quickly enough," Legend went on as he took a seat across from them. "She's far too big for any of the teleporters we have available, or any teleportation technology we have access to. I'd suspect that if it was anywhere reasonably nearby and accessible by water she'd be able to get there quite fast, but overseas, or far inland, or both… That's more of a problem."
"It's certainly somewhat awkward," Dragon replied. Colin thought for a while, then turned to his computer, bringing up some files and looking through them for a few seconds while they watched.
"I wonder how radiation resistant the Family is?" he mumbled while flipping through a series of images at high speed, finally stopping on one and enlarging it to fill the screen.
"Why?" his superior asked.
"This is a device we retrieved from yet another of Leet and Über's exploits quite a while ago. It's an unusual form of teleportation unit, it uses principles that are quite different to any other such device we know about. In fact strictly speaking it's not teleportation at all. They were using it to transport some sort of robotic drone out of an old video game around the city, until it failed. When we went after them they abandoned the device as it was very bulky and awkward to carry while escaping. It's been in secure storage ever since behind heavy shielding as it was dangerously radioactive."
"Why?" Legend asked again, raising his eyebrows.
"It opens short term wormholes between two points in space as far as we could determine," Colin replied. "The fringe effects of the wormhole interior meeting normal space emits a rather large gamma flux, short duration but sufficient to be very hazardous to life at close range. It also is sufficiently energetic to induce radiation in many elements, such as those it was constructed from. I believe that Leet didn't know this at the time, otherwise he wouldn't have used the device in the first place. He's a villain of sorts, but not stupid by any means. I've intended to look into how the mechanism worked with an eye to repairing it and hopefully reducing or eliminating the radiation leakage but I've been waiting for the induced radioactivity to drop to a safe level. According to the last readings we took, it's not too far from that point now."
"And you think it could be modified to open a large enough wormhole to allow Kaiju to pass through it, and that she could handle the radiation?" Dragon queried. He nodded slowly.
"I suspect so. I would need to talk to Leet again and hopefully secure his cooperation in this, it would most likely speed things up significantly, but based on our first talk and subsequent events I feel that he may be open to negotiation."
"Interesting," Legend mused. "Very interesting. I suspect that is worth following up on. Discreetly, of course, but urgently. We're only two to three weeks from the next predicted Endbringer attack after all."
"I'm expecting a contact with him soon in any case," Colin told the other man, "so I'll bring this up as well."
"Good. That could solve that particular problem quite well. Could the device be shielded enough to make it safe for people not immune to radiation?"
"With access to EDM, easily. It's entirely radiation proof once you go out of the thermal wavelengths. Gamma radiation won't penetrate it at all, no matter the thickness."
Legend indicated his understanding. "It hinges on her not being affected, but assuming that's true, it's a good idea."
He got up again, checking the time. "I think Alexandria and Eidolon will be here soon," he said, "So I think I'd better go and prevent them shouting at Emily too much. Keep me up to date on this, please."
"Certainly. Are you going to tell them about the weapon?"
The premier hero of the world looked suddenly a little pensive. "I… am not entirely sure yet," he admitted apparently reluctantly after a few seconds, making Dragon and Colin exchange looks. "Until I see how they're going to approach this entire situation I'm not convinced it's a good idea. Too much fuel on the fire for the moment, so to speak. I'll have to see how it goes. I don't like keeping things from my friends and colleagues but under the current circumstances a certain amount of discretion may be required. Just in case."
"I see," Colin said slowly. "I think."
"I'll let you know what happens," Legend promised, heading towards the door. "I'm certainly sticking around until we resolve this Coil situation, whatever else happens, so I expect we'll talk again soon." Nodding to them he left, the door closing behind him.
After a moment, Dragon snickered, making Colin look quizzically at her.
"It struck me that since a particular lizard girl turned up a few weeks ago, the entire Protectorate and PRT seem to be keeping information from each other in the weirdest ways," she explained, sounding amused. "Every time something even stranger happens, we form yet another little cabal. It just seemed funny to me, that's all."
"Oh," he replied, understanding the point if not the humor. "I agree it's somewhat out of the ordinary." He sighed for a moment. "Not that I'm sure what ordinary is these days. I miss life making a certain amount of sense."
Laughing more loudly, she patted him on the shoulder. "I'm sure it will again eventually, and in the mean time we're having fun, for various values of 'fun'. It's interesting, if nothing else."
"I suppose so." Turning back to his computer, he brought up another project which they'd been working on, dismissing the picture of the wormhole generator. "Shall we get back to work? I believe I have ascertained the missing element in the actuator assembly here," he said, indicating a particular part of the complex drawing. She leaned closer, peering at the monitor, as he began explaining.
A sharp rap on the door heralded the arrival of the two people she'd been waiting for, as it swung open to reveal Alexandria and Eidolon. "Come in," she said slightly sarcastically, as they did exactly that. Eidolon moved to the side and Alexandria walked over to stand in front of her desk, looking down at her from behind her visor.
"Director Piggot. Is this a good time for you?" the woman asked in similar tones.
Emily gestured grandly to a couple of chairs. "Of course, I'm always ready to help the Triumvirate. Please, sit down. Water? Coffee?"
"Nothing for us, thank you," Alexandria replied briskly, although Emily noted with hidden amusement that Eidolon had got half-way through lifting a hand, then dropped it as his colleague spoke and somehow seemed slightly disappointed. "We'd like to discuss this report, and get your first hand impressions of your encounters with Kaiju and Raptaur. We may also want to speak to Miss Militia and Armsmaster later, and possibly any Wards who have dealt with Saurial."
"That can easily be arranged," Emily said after a moment or two. "May I ask what you intend to do while you're here? It could heavily impact on relations between the PRT and local Parahumans which is of considerable interest to me."
"We intend to investigate exactly who this Family are and what their relationship with your Dock Worker's Union, city government, and the local PRT is," the other woman replied. "We're concerned about the very unusual nature of this entire thing."
"I see." Emily tilted her chair seat back a little, looking at the hero with interest. "I hope that investigation isn't going to upset the status quo around here. Brockton Bay is a finely balanced place even now that it's quieter than it's been for years. Can I respectfully suggest that you try to avoid tipping that balance too much? It would almost certainly provoke a reaction that would be in no one's best interests."
Alexandria sat, her back straight and her mouth set in a line that looked somewhat disapproving. "Are you implying that we might… upset the applecart?"
"Your mere presence can do that as I'm sure you know better than anyone. With all three of the Triumvirate in town, people will be wondering what's going on. If you are seen to be, or perceived to be, doing things that might be considered to be working against the sudden changes the city has gone through in the last couple of days, there might be a reaction from the public that would be… less than entirely ideal," Emily replied delicately after a few moments spent gathering her thoughts. Neither of her guests said anything so she went on.
"Mayor Christner's plans are apparently wildly popular among a fairly large percentage of the working population of this city. The more those plans deliver, the more popular they'll get. All I'm saying is that if you want to keep the public happy it would probably be better not to be excessive without a very good reason. I've recently discovered that the PRT isn't precisely looked upon with the level of approval that I'd like around here in certain quarters, for quite a number of reasons, some of which are admittedly valid to one extent or another."
"I'm not particularly interested in keeping the public happy, I'm more interested in keeping them safe," the other woman finally replied. "Sometimes that requires doing unpopular things. As I'm sure you know, Director."
"I do, far better than I like," Emily sighed. "But I also know that there is a Parahuman in Brockton Bay who could quite likely give even you a serious fight. Personally, I have no wish to actually see what would happen. PHO is full of ideas about a Kaiju VS Alexandria fight and even the mild ones tend to imply destruction on a scale I'd very much never like to experience. And we have no idea at all how many more of them there are, what would happen if one of them was harmed, and so on. Just… don't overdo it. Please."
The heroine in her guest chair looked at her for a few seconds, making her wish she could see her eyes and get some idea what she was thinking. "I very much doubt it would come to any form of fight, Director," Alexandria finally said quietly. "We're not intending to start anything. But we do want to find out what on earth is going on and how this all appeared out of nowhere with no warning."
"I'd like to know that myself," Emily muttered under her breath. The other woman clearly heard and smiled a little.
Eidolon chuckled. "So let's put our heads together and learn what we can, perhaps we can work it out together," he said calmly. "I'd like to start by going over this report in more detail, and hopefully fleshing it out a bit more with everyone's personal impressions. Chief Director Costa-Brown is also very keen to learn more."
"Fine," Emily replied, relieved that they were apparently willing to listen to her and apply some common sense to the situation. "We can use the secure conference room and get whoever we need in. Dragon and Armsmaster are on the Rig, but they can be here in under twenty minutes. Miss Militia is in the building at the moment, as are most of the Wards. You'll want to talk mainly to Vista and Gallant, both of whom were the first ones to meet Saurial on her first night, Clockblocker, and Kid Win. The last two have met her a number of times and seem to get on with her pretty well."
"I saw the video of the prank she pulled on Clockblocker," Eidolon laughed. "It was very funny."
Sighing a little, Emily nodded with a tiny smile. "I have to admit I thought so as well. But don't tell him, or he'll be making jokes about it until you want to strangle him."
A tap on the door made all three of them look over at it. "Enter," she called, the door swinging open to reveal Legend, who looked around at them as he came in.
"Did I miss anything interesting?" he asked mildly, smiling a little.
The three originally present exchanged looks, then as one shook their heads. Emily stood up. "Nothing critical. We were just discussing the importance of being cautious. We're heading to conference room two, if you'd care to join us."
"Of course," he replied, stepping aside to let her lead the way.
'I sure hope they mean it,' she thought as she headed towards the elevator. 'A Kaiju fight involving the fucking Triumvirate? My blood pressure couldn't take that...' Suppressing a sigh, she got ready for a very long evening.
"Danny, your guests just came in the front gate," Mark said as he leaned in through the office doorway. "I told the men on the gate to tell them to drive around to BBFO."
"Thanks, Mark," Danny replied, getting up, then reaching into his desk drawer and retrieving a few things. Mark watched, his eyebrows going up a little, but said nothing. "Any sign of Saurial or Raptaur around yet?"
"Nope, not yet."
"OK." Zipping up his jacket, Danny headed for the door.
"You want me to come as well? Or get Zephron?"
"No, that's not needed, Mark. They're not going to do anything. I need to talk to them alone for the moment."
"All right. Call if you need backup, though."
Danny smiled at his colleague, nodding a little, then headed downstairs. Shortly he was walking towards the waterfront, greeting a few workers as he passed them. It was nearly five in the evening and getting dark and chilly, the wind picking up, but there were still a lot of people at work. He stopped briefly to inspect the distant warehouse cleanup job which seemed to be proceeding nicely, almost nothing left of them now, before resuming his fast walk.
Turning into the side alley where his daughter's building was, he immediately spotted the nondescript van he recognized as the one the pair used when they wanted to move around without notice. Approaching it, he stopped when the two occupants got out, both wearing balaclavas and normal street clothes. "Hi, Danny," Über said in his well-known voice, sounding pleased to see him. Leet nodded politely to him.
"Hi, guys. Thanks for coming. Follow me, please."
He headed for the pedestrian door to the office, unlocking it while they paused to read the sign above the main entrance. Leet chuckled while Über shook his head in amusement. "Love it," the smaller man said. Entering the building Danny turned the lights on, waved them in, then closed and locked the door again while they looked around. Leet was already curiously inspecting the nearest wall, tapping it with his knuckles, then looking up.
"The entire place is lined with degenerate matter, isn't it?" he asked in awed tones.
"It is. Ceiling, floor, walls, doors, it's all coated with about a quarter of an inch of the stuff," Danny confirmed as he walked to the table and sat in one of the chairs, waving to two more. "These are made of it as well. The Family likes using it, it stops things breaking."
"Under almost any conceivable circumstances," Leet added, looking impressed. "Very neat. I wish I could make things out of that stuff, it's incredibly useful." He sat down, Über sitting a couple of feet from him. "So, why did you ask to meet us?" the Tinker said after a moment.
"A couple of things." Danny reached into his jacket pocket and removed two thick sealed envelopes. Both young men watched him curiously. Flipping them across the table to the pair all three of them waited until the envelopes slid to a halt in front of each man. "First thing is this."
"Which is?" Über asked curiously, picking up one of the envelopes, weighing it in his hand, then breaking the seal and looking inside. His eyes widened.
Leet looked at him with a puzzled air, before picking up the other envelope.
"Five thousand each from the city via BBFO for subcontracted Parahuman services, with a personal bonus of another five thousand requested by Mayor Christner to show his appreciation for acting responsibly and helping keep everything going well yesterday," Danny said calmly. "We seem to have established a going rate for daily work when we hired New Wave for security services and it seems fair under the circumstances. Thank you both, from Roy, and myself."
Leet checked the contents of his own envelope, pulling out a thick stack of fifty dollar bills and quickly flipping through them before putting them back and staring at Danny. Über was still looking in amazement at his share.
"Thanks, man. I mean it. We didn't do it for the money but I can't say I'm going to turn it down."
Danny smiled a little. "Good."
"Mayor Christner said you'd be calling us, but he didn't say anything about this," Über commented absently, flicking through the cash with a finger, before putting the envelope away. "He said to say hi, by the way."
Amused, Danny nodded. "I thought he'd probably call you, he asked for the number this morning. Did he talk to you about the commercialization of your audio device?"
"He did," the taller man said, smiling widely. "Leet is interested. I think it's a really good idea as well."
"I'm certainly open to discussing the best way to go about it," Leet confirmed. "I'm not sure of the best way to contact Dragon though. I've had several email contacts with Armsmaster in the last couple of weeks, which I suppose could help."
"Roy told me he'd look into it. We'd all like to keep the PRT out of it for the moment and deal directly with her. While I highly respect Armsmaster, and to be honest think Director Piggot is also worthy of a certain amount of respect as well, the DWU, City Hall, and the Family all have their own reasons for wanting to avoid PRT involvement. I suspect that goes double for you two bearing in mind your… proclivities."
The two other men exchanged glances then laughed. "Yes, that's a good way to put it," Über chuckled. "While we seem, weirdly enough, to be starting to have Armsmaster at least deal with us without instantly trying to arrest us, it's probably best not to push it too much. We are still in theory on the wrong side of the law from his point of view."
"Quite. The DWU is somewhat less concerned about that part of your life, as long as it stays off Union premises and doesn't involve any of our people. The Family feel similarly."
Über looked at him for a few seconds, then glanced at Leet. "The Family..." he said slowly, sounding a little uncertain. Danny nodded, smiling somewhat grimly. "Who are..."
"...All my daughter. Yes, she told me a while ago that you'd probably worked it out, and Amy confirmed it last night."
He pushed himself to his feet, leaning on the table with both hands, staring at them each in turn. The two young men looked back, appearing a little worried. The worry grew into shock when he straightened up, putting his hands in his jacket pockets, then pulling them out. He flicked his baton out to full length with a loud snap, which echoed around the dead silent room. The noise was followed by a quieter click as he put the 9mm automatic pistol down on the table with his other hand.
Both the villains swallowed, staring at the gun, then the baton which he was now holding by both ends, then his face, which was fixed in a well practiced completely expressionless mask. There was a very long pause.
"I have some guesses about what you may want to talk to her about. Taylor is her own person, and far more powerful than anyone should be, but she's a good kid and pretty responsible even if sometimes she gets a little carried away with herself. Amy is the same. They're young, they'll learn with time. There are other factors involved which she may or may not tell you. That's up to her. She tells me that you can be trusted, and she has good judgment. I do what I can to advise her and I believe in her."
They said nothing, just stared at him with wide eyes.
"There is almost nothing I can think of that would or could injure her. But I want you to think very carefully about something. She is still a fifteen year old girl, and my daughter. If you involve her in anything that ends up somehow harming her, or for that matter Amy either, I will find you. I will hurt you. And, if necessary, I will end you. Clear?"
His voice had dropped in both tone and volume, but they seemed to have no trouble hearing him.
A few seconds passed, then they both nodded slowly, their eyes still wide. "Great. I'm glad we could have this little talk." Collapsing the baton between his hands with a quick motion he put it away, then picked up the pistol and slipped it into his jacket as well. "Just bear it in mind. I'm not fond of violence but family is the most important thing in the world to me. Please don't make me have to do something you'd regret, however briefly." Checking his watch, he smiled more cheerfully. "She should be arriving any minute now. You can wait in here if you want. Thanks for all the help yesterday and I hope we can do more business soon." Heading towards the door he unlocked it, glancing back over his shoulder to see the two capes staring at each other silently. Smiling a little, he closed the door and headed back to his office.
"Gramps would have been amused with that, I think," he snickered under his breath, remembering stories from his father. "Crazy old man."
Half-way to the main building, he met Mark coming the other way. "Thanks, Mark. But I thought I told you to get rid of this thing," he said, discreetly slipping him the gun.
The security chief grinned at him. "If I'd done that you wouldn't have had it for whatever you wanted it for. Are they still alive?"
"Oh, sure, it wasn't loaded. The magazine is in my desk. I just needed to make a point."
"Did you?"
"Based on the color they went, I think so." Mark laughed a little, as did Danny, both of them going inside.
The sound of the door closing made Kevin twitch a little. He looked away from his best friend's pallid face, what could be seen of it through the balaclava holes, to see they were now alone. Slumping as the tension left him, he rubbed sweaty hands on his jeans, trying to get the memory of the flat eyes and totally even tone the Hebert man had produced out of his mind. After licking dry lips, he said hoarsely, "You were right about him being a bad person to get on the wrong side of. Fuck me, that was terrifying."
"You think he meant it?" Randall asked faintly.
"Ohhh, yes," he replied slowly. "Let's try not to upset him, OK? His daughter's forms are horrifying. He's just a scary motherfucker when he wants to be. I suddenly see why the DWU guys respect him so much, I think."
Randall nodded slowly. "I've heard some things over the years. I think I just got proof." He shivered slightly. "Normal man or not, I don't want him coming after us. We should be careful."
"Probably a good idea." Kevin stood, noticing absently that he was shaking a little. He walked around the room studying it and trying not to think about the last few minutes. "This place is amazing. You could set a nuke off in here and it would do practically nothing except cook anything organic. I wonder if we could persuade her to do the same thing at our place?"
"Might be worth asking."
Randall joined him in inspecting the room. They looked at the posters, Kevin stopping in front of the one of the warhammer with the equation for kinetic energy across the bottom of it. He studied it curiously, then stiffened in shock as he suddenly realized the subtle message it was conveying. "Oh, Jesus Christ," he choked out.
"What?" Randall came over and stared at the poster, then his friend.
"She's got a fucking warped sense of humor," Kevin sighed. "See that?"
"Yep. Kinetic energy, right?"
"Yes. Now, how big a hammer could Kaiju swing, do you think?"
Randall thought for a moment. "Well, based on that sword she was waving around, fifty feet long or thereabouts?"
"Probably. Which assuming the same proportions would make the head about… Hold on… OK, assuming it was her low mass EDM, it would mass nearly three hundred tons. At a rough guess with that amount of leverage and her strength she could probably get the head moving at several times the speed of sound. Velocity is the important thing in that equation, the energy goes up as the square of the speed." He sighed a little. "Even at seventy or so grams per cc, that would be thirty to forty tons of TNT equivalent with each hit at least."
Randall went white again.
"If she converted it to its true density at the moment of impact, even a little amount like that javelin which we've already seen is possible, it would be in the megaton range."
Randall went green.
"Minimum."
Randall went and sat down.
A couple of minutes later while they were still thinking about the ramifications of that little gem of data, the door opened again to admit the form of Saurial, who smiled happily on seeing them. "Hi, guys," she said, closing the door and locking it. "Nice to see you. My sister told me all about you and I've wanted to meet you ever since."
They exchanged a glance, then looked back at her, both of them raising their eyebrows meaningfully. She laughed, then without warning there was a tall teenaged girl with long curly brunette hair down her back standing grinning at them. Leet inspected her, noticing something interesting.
"No tail."
The girl studied him closely. "Huh. I'm impressed." Abruptly they could see a powerful scaled reptilian tail curling around her feet. "I'm Taylor Hebert. Let's talk."