Friday, February 25, 2011
Looking around from the stove, Danny smiled at Taylor as she came into the kitchen. He'd heard the shower going a little while earlier, the girl murmuring to her friend in her head while she dealt with the morning requirements. "How are you today, Taylor?" he asked, flipping the pancake he was cooking with the spatula.
"Fine, Dad. Yesterday was fun, we got all sorts of things done. Über and Leet stopped by with a load of pizzas, which was nice of them, and we just hung out for a while."
"Yes, I heard," he commented, sliding that pancake onto the stack next to the stove, then pouring batter for the next one. The baking sheet with the stack on went into the oven to warm. "You also had another visitor, I believe. Someone who didn't want anyone to know she was there." He glanced over his shoulder, smirking a little at the momentary look of surprise on her face. "Anyone like the PRT, for example."
"How did you know?" she asked after a few seconds, coming over to stand next to him.
"I have my ways," he grinned.
She gave him a look that was pure Annette.
"Mark's people spotted her sneaking around outside the fence," he admitted, flipping the new pancake. "He said she was very good, but his guys have a lot more practice than she does. Even so they nearly lost her a couple of times."
"She'd be annoyed to know," his daughter giggled. "Poor Cloak."
"Is that what she's calling herself?" he asked, amused. "Have you contaminated yet another loyal Parahuman with your weird ideas of doing good by not bowing to authority?"
"We… may have created a monster," she laughed. "Sort of. Vista was responsible for most of it, we just… kind of enabled her."
"Should I be worried?"
"No, she's a nice girl. People are safe." Taylor chewed her lip, thinking. "Most of them. Probably."
"Oh, great, now I am worried," he sighed. "Years from now we'll probably look back on this and point to it as the first salvo of the War on Sanity in which the entire country ended up very puzzled."
Laughing, she took the empty batter bowl and started washing it as he put the last of the fresh batter into the pan. By the time he'd finished making the rest of the breakfast she'd washed up all the things other than the plates the food was now on. Sitting down, he poured some coffee, then tried his eggs and sausages, finding them exactly the way he liked them.
"I had a slightly eventful trip home myself," he said after a minute or two of quiet eating, having had some time to think of the best way to broach the possible sensitive subject. His daughter was very touchy about his safety and he didn't want her running off in search of vengeance when it wasn't required.
"Oh?" she asked, putting her orange juice down with an expression of mild concern. "Something happened?"
"Something… tried to happen," he replied. "Rather unskillfully. You know the Mini-mart on Bleeker Street, just outside the docks?"
She nodded, having been there many times herself with him.
"I stopped off to get a few things, like some more eggs since you keep eating them." Taylor looked mildly embarrassed. "Raw." The embarrassment turned into amusement. "While I was in there, two Merchants tried to rob the place at gunpoint." He held up a hand as she went totally still in a very unnerving manner, staring at him, apparently not even breathing. "I'm fine, so is Emil who was at the till. Don't worry. They were both so high they could barely function. I introduced myself, asked what they thought they were doing, then used one of my birthday batons to knock the gun out of the hand of the idiot who pulled it. The other one legged it on the spot. His friend ended up unconscious on the floor, the cops picked him up a few minutes later."
Letting out a long breath, Taylor slowly nodded, looking relieved. He related the entire story to her, by the end of which she was looking proudly at him. "Well done, Dad," she smiled. "No one fucks with a Hebert and gets away with it. Not these days." They bumped fists across the table, grinning at each other. "Do I need to go and talk to the Merchants?"
"I'm… not entirely certain yet," he admitted after thinking it over for a moment. She looked worried again. "The one the cops dragged off was spouting off about Skidmark being on the warpath and aimed at us, the DWU and the Family. I don't know how seriously we can take him and he didn't give any details. He did let slip that Skidmark was apparently away doing… something… and would be back at some point."
Resting her chin on her folded hands, she gazed at him, thinking hard. "That sounds ominous. Although not entirely surprising, we've probably cost him business just by being there. And I've grabbed a lot of Merchants in the last couple of months."
"Quite. The other, more worrying thing is that Officer Bailey passed on a warning as well when that fool was being loaded into the squad car. He told me that this wasn't the first time that he'd heard something about the idiots gearing up for some sort of action. With the way that Kaiser has shut his street-level stuff off completely insofar as it might offend the Family or the DWU, and Lung seems to have vanished and taken the ABB with him, the Merchants are the biggest gang still on the street. He thinks that they might be thinking about expanding and we're in the way."
She was quiet for a couple of minutes but he could tell from her expression she was conversing with the demon.
"We don't like that," she finally said. "Varga thinks that the risk of waiting for him to try something is too high."
"What are you thinking?" he asked, somewhat worried.
"My advice would be to execute a preemptive strike on the Merchants, Danny," the demon said through her. "Eliminate the backing of the gang before their leader returns from wherever he currently is. That wouldn't reduce the risk to zero, but it would reduce the worry of collateral damage considerably. From what I understand the Merchants are not renowned as particularly intelligent but there are a lot of them and they're well armed, even if badly trained. A hundred or so armed drug addicts firing on the DWU facility would cause chaos regardless of their actual ability to aim. Better to remove that problem before it occurs."
"I was worried that would be your reaction, but I can't say I entirely disagree with it," he sighed. "I don't want anyone getting hurt any more than you do. But at the same time I'm not sure that jumping the gun and going to war against the Merchants before they start anything is a wildly PR friendly move."
"If it's any consolation, it would be a very short war," the Varga smiled.
"That's not quite what I meant," he replied.
"I understand. But Taylor and I both think that waiting until they fire the first shot is a mistake. Waiting for their leader to turn up with something he thinks is a sure-fire superweapon is a much bigger one. The likelihood that he could seriously harm Taylor is extremely low, of course, but not zero even so. However, it could well be excessively dangerous for everyone else who doesn't share the advantages of being a demon. I wouldn't like to see him try to kill Taylor and end up destroying the DWU and killing or injuring any of the Union workers there. If he did, we would be forced to retaliate in a manner that would permanently eliminate the chances of a second attack. If we go in first, we can probably reduce the risk of anyone, even a Merchant, ending up dead."
Danny thought over the great demon's words, nodding a little. He couldn't find any serious holes in the argument aside from the entire 'attack them before they attack us' part of it. Which was, to his mind, still something of a stumbling block. He said as much.
The Varga shrugged his daughter's shoulders. "This is true. However, I am unable to currently see a third course. We either wait for him to attack, lose an unknown number of people and facilities, then wipe the Merchants out once and for all in a way that no one ever forgets, or we go in before that happens, round them all up, destroy their facilities, and hand them over to the authorities. As far as I can see there's not really any other option. The vast majority of them are wanted criminals, after all, so the police would be happy enough to take them off our hands. Any of their Parahumans would be of interest to the PRT, I think."
"He's right, Dad," Taylor added herself. "I don't want to jump the gun myself, I'd rather be neutral like we are with everyone else, but the live and let live approach only works if both sides are willing to stick to it. By the sounds of it, Skidmark is going to start something and I don't want to see you or anyone else hurt when I can stop it before it starts."
"Damn." He shook his head, unable to refute the argument in a way that he was happy with. "Not what I want to hear."
"It's not what I want to do, either," she said. "But I can't take the risk."
"OK. Look, before you go and destroy the Merchants for something they might do, let me dig up some more information, all right? Mark has some interesting contacts who can probably find out some more, and I can call a few people I know that Dad thought were trustworthy. A couple of them even knew Gramps. Between them, we should be able to find out what that fuckwit is thinking of doing. And maybe even where he is. If you jumped him specifically, that would possibly be a suitable solution." He thought for a moment while she watched him. "Also, we need to get Lisa working on it. Her abilities can probably help enormously and she might be able to work out a better course of action than an all out battle."
"That sounds good," Taylor nodded. "I'm not really wanting to do this, I just have a feeling that we might not have a choice. But I'm in no hurry to go running off to jump up and down on them if I don't have to." She grinned darkly. "Getting squashed Merchant out from between your toes is a nightmare."
"Oh, thanks very much for that mental image, dear," he sighed.
"You're welcome," she giggled, going back to her breakfast. Watching her for a moment, he smiled fondly and did the same.
"I'll talk to Lisa when I get in," he added. "You're with your friends here tonight, aren't you?"
"Yep. Same as last time. I'll come back with Amy and stop off at the supermarket to get some more supplies to top up what we have."
"All right. Have fun. I'll see you around half past six, I think."
"OK." Finishing her breakfast, she jumped up, washed her dishes, then glanced at the clock. "Got to dash. See you later, Dad." Kissing him she shot out of the kitchen, the back door opening and closing moments later. Smiling to himself he finished his coffee then did the remaining dishes before getting his things together and heading out as well.
While driving, he was thinking that if Skidmark had any idea what he might end up drawing the attention of, he'd stay wherever it was he currently was and not come back to the city.
Sitting down at her desk in home room, Missy pulled out her various requirements for the first class, which took place in that room. The Math teacher and several of her classmates gave the notebook she put on the desk a nervous glance. Looking up, she saw this, causing her to smile weakly. "I'm not doing any drawings," she said.
There was a mass sigh of relief as everyone looked like disaster had been averted. Not entirely certain why her drawings evoked such a strong reaction, the girl sighed slightly, then dug out her textbook and opened it to the right page.
Oddly enough, she found that the lesson was much easier than she expected. After the previous night with Saurial, this sort of work wasn't very challenging.
When she got bored, she remembered the fun she'd had on her walk home, the thought of the expression on Max Anders' face making her snicker under her breath. It had definitely been worth the twenty minute lecture on calling when she was out with a friend her parents had given her, rather loudly. Next to her, Rachel was working on a long division problem, but glanced at her with a worried expression when she started making the little giggling sound.
"Mr Hanson?" the other girl said after a few seconds, during which Missy started remembering the look on Assault's face when she'd walked down her 'stairs' to the ground. Rachel put her hand up, calling the teacher's name again.
He looked up from his own note-taking. "Yes, Rachel?" he replied.
"Can you make Missy stop laughing like that, please? It's creepy."
"She's not… drawing… again, is she?" the man asked in a slightly worried tone. Rachel shook her head.
"Just looking at her desk and snickering."
"Miss Biron?" The teachers voice was an odd mix of relieved and sharp, making Missy twitch, then look around, not having really noticed the short conversation. She blushed a little when she saw the entire class was looking at her rather strangely. "Can you please stop causing a disturbance, if it's not too much trouble? Your… let's go with laughter… is disruptive to the concentration of your classmates."
"Sorry, Mr Hanson," Missy replied, embarrassed. Ducking her head, she went back to playing with the equations she'd been idly noting down in the margins of her work. Satisfied, the teacher resumed his work, standing up again when the timer on his desk dinged a couple of minutes later. Shortly he was explaining the next exercise with the aid of the chalkboard.
The class passed slowly, Missy rather relieved when it was over. She'd finished all her assigned work in record time and had, in the absence of making any more drawings, merely fiddled with her own mathematical puzzles. She was slowly beginning to understand more of what Saurial had written down the night before. While she couldn't remember more than a fraction of it, the bit she could recall was very interesting.
The oddest part of the whole class was when, near the end in the middle of the most complicated exercise yet, which took her about thirty seconds to complete, Mr Hanson slowly walked around the room between the desks, glancing at the various students at work. He paused beside her, watching her work another of her self-set equations, using the notation that Saurial had shown her.
After half a minute or so, he made an odd sound, almost of pain, causing her to look up at him. He was staring at one of the longer sets of symbols, his eyes half-closed and his lips moving. She watched as he apparently thought something over, got an expression like his head hurt, winced a little, then went back to his desk and pulled a bottle of aspirin out of a drawer and took two, swallowing them dry. Fixing her with a hard stare, he paused, then took a third one before putting the top back on the bottle and returning it to the drawer.
'Weird,' she thought. 'He must have a headache. Maybe he's got a cold. I hope I don't catch one.'
The man looked positively relieved when the bell went for some reason.
"That's more than a little worrying," Lisa said as Danny finished talking.
"I'm not happy about it either," he sighed. "I don't want Taylor going off on a preemptive strike on the Merchants if we can avoid it, but I have to admit I can't deny Varga has a good point. If we wait for the idiots to do whatever it is that Skidmark is planning on doing, there's a pretty good chance people are going to get hurt. If that includes anyone here, she'll wipe them out. She'd too young to have that on her conscience."
"And if she gets hurt, by some miracle, you'll wipe them out," Lisa replied wisely, giving him a significant look. He met her eyes for a moment, then looked at the table. "You'd have a lot of help."
"I'd prefer neither situation arise," he said quietly. "If it comes to a war between the DWU and the Merchants, I'm fairly sure who'd win in the end, but it would be nasty. Better to avoid the whole situation."
"We have enough contacts now in the PRT to call for help if we want to," she pointed out. "Armsmaster would undoubtedly have some good suggestions. I suspect that Director Piggot would take action if needed, if only to keep the Family happy and stop wholesale chaos in the city. Legend too. Honestly, I think that if Skidmark really thinks he stands a chance, he's deluded, leaving the Family out of it. Sure, he could cause a mess, but in the long run the retaliation would eliminate his gang completely."
"No one has ever accused the man of thinking things through from end to end," Danny pointed out.
"Good point," she said after a moment. "Damn." Shaking her head, she pondered the problem. "You know, the other gangs would probably do it for us if we made it clear we'd be annoyed," she snickered after a moment. "I bet we could persuade Kaiser to deal with the fool to get on our good side."
Danny fixed her with a hard look. "I really don't think that instigating a gang war is the ideal solution, Lisa."
"Just a thought," she smiled.
"Not the best one you've ever had."
"They can't all be as brilliant as I'd like."
Sharing a grin, they went back to thinking about it. "I wonder what it is that Skiddy is actually trying to do?" she mused. "Is he recruiting new people? Buying some weapon or other?"
Shrugging, Danny replied, "No idea, I'm afraid. I also have no idea whether it's just him, or his other capes are also involved. We don't know much about the inner workings of his gang, after all. Are there non-Parahuman members who have authority, or is it just the capes, for example?"
"Good point." She thought some more. "I think I need to do some reconnaissance. My power can probably tell us a lot about what's going on if I sneak around and watch them for a while."
"I suppose that's not a bad idea," he somewhat reluctantly replied after a moment. "Be careful, though."
"I'll stay out of sight, I don't need to get too close, and Metis is tough enough to take more or less anything they can dish out. When I get an idea of what's up, I'll let you know. It may be worth talking to the PRT even so, to see if they have any thoughts on the matter. You mentioned that Mark was given some information by a contact?"
"A little. He's had a couple of email exchanges with a particular person in New York. Guy who's… let's say he's in the same business you were, only without the powers and with a hell of a lot more experience," Danny replied, smiling. "Dad knew him pretty well, and he knew my grandfather back in the old country. They were in… a similar line of work. Quite a lot of mutual respect."
Lisa inspected him, letting her power draw some fascinating conclusions. "You have a very interesting backstory," she noted wryly.
"Oh, you could make a movie about some aspects of my family," he said. "Actually, that might have happened, now that I think about it. I'm completely legit, of course, just a simple Union man. But Dad… he was mostly legit. Sort of. Depending on your definition." He grinned at her as she rolled her eyes. "Nothing anyone could prove, I mean. But people respected him a lot. Even down in New York. Some still do."
"I see. And your grandfather?"
"He… wasn't someone you wanted to insult, let's say. A genuine war hero, though. There were a lot of people back in Europe, on both sides of the law, who were very polite to him for a long time. His name still carries a lot of weight in certain places and occupations. But his ways aren't mine. I never even met him, although Dad told me a lot of stories. While strongly suggesting that I listen to the admirable parts and try not to live up to the family ideals in the other areas. He felt it would make for a quieter life."
Lisa started giggling, looking around the inside of the BBFO office, then back to him. "That worked out, didn't it?"
He shrugged. "Kind of. I don't think he expected demons, though. I can't say I'm surprised about that."
"What about your wife's family? I get the impression that she had some interesting history as well."
"Weirdly similar in some ways," Danny admitted, smiling fondly at the memories. "We discovered long after we were married that our grandparents knew each other on each of our father's sides. Odd coincidence. But, then, historically the Sicilian and Corsican… um, native customs… aren't entirely dissimilar."
She laughed again at his circumspect way of describing something that she knew damn well was a lot more interesting. "The more I learn about you and your background, the more I respect your abilities, both now, and in managing to avoid your family pastimes."
Danny grinned. "Thanks. Although Gramps would laugh like an idiot if he saw me now. Union work is traditionally one of the areas his particular brand of expertise and mayhem tended to drift into. It still is in some areas and fields, even today. But, honest, I'm on the side of good."
"Which is probably a relief to law enforcement everywhere," she quipped. "You're way too competent, if you were in the same field as your forebears you'd be running the country by now."
"I have enough trouble keeping a lid on this nest of nutcases," he replied with a snicker. "I'm happy where I am doing what I do. Especially with Taylor having joined the fun, even with the extra headaches it brings. I'm very proud of her, and I'm sure her ancestors on both sides would have been as well, although probably for slightly different reasons. Family was important to them as well. More than anything."
"Do you think Piggot and the PRT know about that part of your history?" she asked after a moment.
He shrugged again. "No idea. It's not like I try to hide it, most of the names involved are public knowledge. Quite a few of the guys here know something about it, for a number of reasons, sometimes because they come from similar backgrounds. On the other hand, our people don't tend to talk about the past, theirs or anyone else's, outside the DWU. I guess they could probably find out if they bothered to check hard enough."
Lisa smiled, thinking for a moment. "I suspect that Director Piggot probably doesn't know. She'd look even more nervous when she turned up if she did. Guess it doesn't matter, though."
"Not really. But the family background does mean I know a few people that can find things out through less official channels. Mark's already talking to old Antonio, I'll put out a few feelers to some other people. Guy in Chicago Dad used to hang out with, someone else in Miami Gramps knew. It might take me a while to track him down, I haven't spoken to him in ten years. Mark knows a few ex-military people who owe him a favor or two as well, he's checking with them to see if they've heard anything. Hopefully we can figure out what Skidmark is planning before he gets back and starts something no one is going to enjoy."
"I'll see what I can dig up as well, it's pretty surprising how some good data mining on the internet combined with my power can turn up all sorts of things you wouldn't expect. I'll go and poke around their base as Metis as well and see what I can find out. I know where they are, I can smell them half a mile upwind." She grimaced a little. "I think I'll come in from the water, it damps out the stink a little."
"OK. Like I said, don't take chances. But the sooner we get a handle on this problem, the better, I think. Varga's right, we really don't want the first we know of it to be a shell landing in the middle of the yard or something like that," Danny sighed. "I'm heading back to the office, in that case. I still have proper work to do, aside from all this detective work, which is..."
The phone rang, cutting him off mid word. Lisa reached over and grabbed the handset, answering it. "Yes, he's here, Mark, hold on." She handed the phone to her companion.
"Hi, what's up?" Danny asked. He listened for a moment, his eyebrows going up. "Ah. Interesting. Very interesting. OK, tell her the only member of the Family around at the moment is Metis, but she can speak for them. Yes. All right. That's fine. Half an hour? Great, thanks. Bye." He handed the phone back, watching as she put it into the charger.
"Did your Amy-hearing pick that up, or do I need to tell you?" he asked slowly, looking thoughtful.
"I heard enough," she admitted. "Why does Director Piggot want to speak to the Family officially, I wonder?"
"I have no idea. Mark thinks she didn't sound angry, more a little worried."
"How… interesting."
"I sure want to know what's going on," he smiled. "You'd better go and change. I'll wait for her in my office and bring her over here."
"OK. See you in a minute," she replied, getting up, as did he. As he let himself out, she was going into the store room to adopt her reptilian persona, her power speculating on why the PRT Director wanted a representative of the Family to meet with her. All the possibilities she could come up with were fascinating, to both her and her power, which was almost rubbing its non-existent hands together in glee.
Emily watched the gate guards open the barrier, then waited as her driver slowly drove into the compound, parking off to the side in the visitor area. "Wait here, please, Gavin," she told the man as he switched off the engine of the PRT SUV. "I'm not sure how long I'll be, but it probably won't be more than half an hour or so."
"Yes, Director," he replied. "I've got a book, I don't mind." The trooper smiled a little. Nodding to him, she got out, retrieved her briefcase from the rear seat, then walked over to the blond security chief who was waiting for her at the entrance to the admin building.
"Hello, Director Piggot," the man said politely, shaking hands. "Mr Hebert is waiting in his office. He wanted a word before you met Metis. Please follow me."
They walked through the building, soon arriving in the outer office, several of the people in the various cubicles looking up briefly as they went past. She looked around, seeing that everyone present seemed hard at work, telephones ringing softly in the background, keyboards rattling, and a printer spitting out pages off in a corner. It gave the impression of a very busy place these days, considerably more so than when she'd last visited with the Chief Director.
Knocking on the door to the Hebert man's office, Mark opened it when a voice inside called out. "Thank you," she said to the man, who nodded politely to her, then closed the door behind her.
"Director Piggot, it's nice to see you again," Danny Hebert greeted her, getting up and coming around his desk. "Metis is in the BBFO building, I talked to her just now and she's waiting for us. I just wanted to make sure it was nothing serious?" He smiled a little. "Your call was somewhat ambiguous and the Family are good friends."
"It's important, but not serious, Mr Hebert," she replied. "I can assure you it's not bad. I need to deliver some documentation and have a discussion with a representative of the Family, though."
"Fair enough. OK, follow me, please." They went back through the outer office, then headed down the corridor towards the back of the building. After traveling through a number of other corridors and buildings in the complex, which she realized was a lot bigger than she'd initially thought, they came out into the small yard, the BBFO office on the other side. Crossing the yard he opened the door and waved her in.
Inside, the large reptilian form of Metis was standing near the large table, watching her with glowing eyes which contained definite curiosity, her dead-black scales showing scarlet highlights in the overhead illumination. "Metis, this is Director Piggot. Director, Metis," Danny said, making the introduction. Emily walked over to the towering reptile, holding out her hand, which was engulfed in the much larger scaly one of the Family member.
"A pleasure to meet you, Director," Metis said in her deep voice. "Please, take a seat. Would you like some coffee? Or tea?"
"Tea would be fine, thank you," she replied, putting her briefcase on the table and sitting down. She watched as Metis went over to a complex and expensive-seeming drinks machine and prodded it for a moment, coming back with a cup of tea surprisingly fast. She also had a mug of coffee which she handed to the Hebert man, who sat on the other side of the table.
"So what can the Family help you with today, Director?" Metis asked, taking a position where she could see both humans.
Putting her cup down after sipping from it, she lifted her briefcase and put it on the table as well, opening it. "As you might not be surprised to learn, the arrival of the Family in Brockton Bay, along with their association with the Dockworkers Union and the city government, not to mention all the… oddities… that have arisen from the entire situation, has caused a certain amount of interest throughout the country. And considerable confusion, especially in the PRT and the federal government."
Metis made a small sound that seemed to suggest she was suppressing laughter, but when Emily glanced suspiciously at her, the big lizard was completely impassive, still listening politely. "It has taken some time," she carried on after a moment, "for the authorities to come up with an official response that met the requirements of not offending any of the various parties in question, and also bowed to the practicalities of the situation. While none of this is precisely the way we would have preferred things to go, no one can deny that on balance, things seem to be working out far better than one would expect."
She removed an envelope from the briefcase, looking at it for a moment. "This contains a letter explaining the position the PRT and our leaders in Washington wish to take vis-a-vis the Family, from an officially recognized standpoint. I intended to get it to you yesterday, but what with aborted Endbringer attacks and the fallout from that, events rather got away from me. I decided the best thing to do was to hand it over personally to a representative of the Family. Can you speak for them, Metis?"
"I can," the creature rumbled, sounding intrigued. "Everyone else is away at the moment on various tasks but I can accept the letter."
"In that case, this is for you." Emily handed the lizard, who reached out one long arm, the crisp envelope. Metis took it from her, looked at it, then slit the end open with a quick motion of a razor-sharp claw, carefully pulling out the papers from inside. Putting the envelope down on the table, she unfolded the documents and studied them, with what in a human would be an eyebrow going up a little.
Danny and Emily both waited, watching to see what her reaction was. Eventually, Metis looked at the DWU man. "We seem to have been officially recognized as an independent heroic organization, and invited to become a Protectorate associate. In the same manner as the Guild, I believe."
"Correct," Emily nodded.
"That's a little unexpected," Danny said, looking at Metis, who went back to the documents. She leafed through the pages, stopping on the last one.
"I can't say I was expecting this myself," she muttered. "Although I can't see much in the way of a down side. Assuming that the PRT and the Protectorate both recognize that we are basically neutral, absent a definite threat. We have no intention of generally going around beating up Parahuman villains without cause." She looked at Emily, who made a motion of acknowledgment. "Although we have no problem with stopping crime when we come across it, as Cousin Saurial does regularly. And, obviously, if someone attacks us or any of our friends, we would respond appropriately."
"That is understood, Metis," Emily assured her. "We are hoping that you will agree to this and consider the Protectorate one of those friends." She made a slightly annoyed smile. "We are well aware that we have little real leverage to force you to do anything that you don't want to do. Frankly, some people are very worried about that. The fact that you are, on balance, apparently on the side of good, is the only thing that has prevented some of the more paranoid among us becoming somewhat… excessive."
Metis grinned at her. "It's appreciated. We have enough to do without fighting the entire Protectorate. It would be hard on the scenery and largely pointless anyway."
Staring at her, Emily wondered in what way she meant 'pointless.' She had a shrewd feeling that the reptile might be implying that the entire Protectorate wouldn't actually be enough. Not wanting to really know, and definitely not wanting to ever find out, she merely nodded slightly.
"I, myself, while finding the entire situation both puzzling and cause for some concern, also find you all surprisingly easy to deal with," she replied after a moment. "I am not… generally well disposed… to Parahumans, for reasons that don't need to be gone into right now. This isn't a secret, although I'm not proud of it. I do my job to the best of my ability even so. There are fairly few individuals I genuinely find myself respecting, but the Family contains a number of them. So despite the sleepless nights, massive confusion, and occasional heartburn created by having a number of preposterously weird reptiles of dubious origin running around my city, I can live with it and work with you all. And I'll deny saying that outside this building."
"I understand." Metis looked amused, returning her attention to the documents she was holding. "I think I can say that we are honored to receive this recognition of our status with your people, and will endeavor to live up to expectations." She looked back to Emily, her smile growing. "Although I cannot guarantee that we will become in any way less confusing. We have our own standards to live up to, and, of course, a strong sense of humor."
"Which is largely unique to you," Emily sighed. "I'll take it. That's good enough for me considering all the other things that could happen. Please try to not destroy my city until either I retire or get reassigned."
"We will do what we can," Metis laughed. "None of us want to see anything broken either, we prefer making things and helping out. We just have a certain inherent chaotic bias we find it difficult to avoid. By and large we like Brockton Bay, we have no intention of breaking it." She paused, then added a little gleefully, "Too badly, at any rate. Too much calm is boring."
"Oh, god," Emily mumbled under her breath. Metis produced a pen from a pocket on the body harness she was wearing, which almost disappeared against her scales, and signed the last page of the documents in an elegant hand, returning it to her. Checking it, Emily nodded, then put it into her briefcase. "Thank you. This is a Protectorate Associate handbook, it explains the relevant security codes, clearances, and other useful information for organizations with that status." She pushed this over the table, the lizard picking it up and leafing through it curiously.
"If you can email me suitable photographs as outlined in the book, I will have ID cards made up and delivered for any members of your group which can be used nationally to prove your legal status to law enforcement. Not that you're likely to be confused for anyone else, you're all somewhat… distinctive."
"Excellent. That would be be very helpful, I have no doubt," the big creature replied. "We can easily do that, we already have photos for most of us from our DWU membership documents."
"That would suffice, the requirements for both IDs are standard federal photo ID guidelines."
"I've got them on file, I'll send them over shortly," Danny interjected, both the others looking at him and nodding.
"While we have you here, Director, a matter has come up that your input on would be useful," Metis said after another glance at the man across the table.
Emily studied the reptilian cape, then the DWU man, both of whom looked somewhat concerned. "Go on," she invited, feeling worried herself.
"Information has been received from a number of trustworthy sources that Skidmark of the Merchants is currently on some form of trip, apparently in search of some way to 'handle' the problem we seem to present him," Metis sighed. She indicated Danny, who nodded. "Our information suggests that the DWU may well be included in this problem. We're not entirely surprised, we are after all going to end up removing most of his customers, but it's annoying to say the least."
"Where did you get this information from?" Emily asked thoughtfully, not disbelieving the comment but wanting to check the veracity of it.
"A friend in the BBPD, and some other contacts in New York and elsewhere," Danny replied after a moment. "I'm in the process of attempting to get more information, and confirmation of what we have already, but some of my people have also reported something similar, if not quite as specific. I'm pretty sure it's accurate. I can't go into any more detail on the sources, though, none of them would appreciate their identities being spread around. I trust them even so."
"I see," she nodded, curious but not pushing the point. It wasn't particularly surprising. She suspected that the Hebert man had a lot of different contacts in some interesting places, knowing what she did about him, which wasn't as much as she probably should. "Well, I'd say it fitted the profile we have of Skidmark. He's a cunning little shit, although I certainly wouldn't go so far as to call him intelligent. Kaiser and Lung have backed off to wait and see what happens, which is the smart thing to do. Skidmark is probably just frothing at the mouth and trying to figure out what to do to get things to go back to what he prefers."
"More or less what we think. The problem is what to do about it. The Family is of the opinion that waiting for him to start something puts a lot of people at risk, and would prefer to cut the bastard off at the knees with a preemptive strike. They raise a number of good points." She felt her stomach drop a little, glancing at Metis who shrugged slightly. "I can't say I like that option, but I have to agree at least in part. If he turns up with a whole squad of armed druggies and starts raising hell, god knows what could happen here. He wouldn't survive it, trust me, but a lot of other people might not either."
"Shit." She thought hard, trying to figure out what to suggest. Another glance at Metis told her that the lizard was quite prepared to do exactly what Danny had said, and having met Raptaur, she was damn certain that the others would as well. The results would be short and brutal, no doubt. "I would much prefer that neither scenario occur, if I'm honest. On the other hand, I can't stop you defending yourselves and your people. Or, rather, I could try, but both ethically and practically I doubt it would work."
"Most likely not, Director," Metis agreed quietly. "We don't want to hurt anyone, believe me, but if it gets as far as the Merchants starting a war against us, we will end it. Permanently."
"Understood." Emily considered the problem some more. "I take it that you're not planning on jumping the entire gang immediately?"
"No, not unless they begin an attack. We're gathering information, and I'm going to do some discreet surveillance later, to see what I can learn of their plans. We won't move until either there is no choice, or we can do it with minimum fuss."
"Would the PRT be able to handle an entire gang being arrested?" Danny asked curiously. "Between you and the BBPD, I mean. If they do have to go in, they'll sweep the entire lot up in one shot. I don't know exactly how many there are but it must be a hundred, maybe a hundred and fifty at least. Not including their capes. With Skidmark out of town, that's only Squealer and Mush as far as I know."
"It would be nearly unprecedented, but we could cope," she replied after a moment. "Although I worry about the effect such a move would have on local gang politics. That the Family has been largely sticking to street crime and otherwise minding their own business is quite possibly why the other gangs have been so quiet. If they think that you've changed policy and have become vigorously expansionist, there's a chance they'll react… badly."
"I admit that's something I'm somewhat concerned about too, Director," Metis responded. "However, we may well have no choice. If we can find enough proof that we were only dealing with an imminent attack before it happened, we can hopefully show that we're not going on a general rampage through the city. Which we have no intention of doing. I myself may not like either Kaiser or Lung, but I can respect their intelligence and as long as they stay out of our business, we'll stay out of theirs. Assuming that they don't rob a shop in front of Cousin Saurial, of course." She smiled a little grimly. "That tends to end badly for them."
"So the reports I've seen would show," Emily nodded, smirking a little. "Some of the video is… very unnerving."
Danny chuckled for a second. "I've seen quite a lot of them, they're both extremely funny and horrifying at the same time. You almost end up feeling sorry for some of the idiots."
After a little more thought, Emily turned back to Metis. "OK, thank you for letting me know. I will have my people look into the matter as well, we have a lot of sources which may turn up something useful. It's in everyone's best interests to prevent that fool from starting something he can't finish. Hopefully we can head this all off before it turns into a shooting war. I do not want another gang war in this city, the chaos caused years back between the E88 and the March was more than enough for one lifetime."
"All right, Director. Thanks. I'll keep you informed if we find out anything helpful ourselves." Metis looked at Danny who nodded.
"Likewise."
Picking up her tea again, Emily took a sip. "On the matter of our underground friend, we've been cleaning out various surprises he left for us," she said with some satisfaction. "We will hopefully be ready to give him a surprise in return in the not too distant future."
"That would be… good," Metis said after a pause during which she looked abruptly rather more dangerous than normal. "My cousin has told me quite a lot about this person. I'm looking forward to meeting him and shaking hands." She held out a hand, finger and thumb half an inch apart, a crackling arc of electricity jumping the gap and making Emily twitch in shock.
"I'll let you know when you can do that," she replied, feeling that her old comrade was going to have a very bad day when he finally met the Family.
In her opinion, it couldn't happen to a more deserving recipient. She hoped that they'd remember to take the cameras along, that was one video she was going to watch over and over.
"Oh, I've also retained a lawyer for Rachel Lindt," Danny said suddenly. "I was intending to talk to you about it at some point soon anyway, but as long as you're here, why not now?"
"Who did you hire, if I can ask?" she inquired curiously.
"Carol Dallon." He grinned at the way she fumbled the cup for a moment. "I thought you'd appreciate that."
"You just live to make my life difficult, don't you?" she growled, looking at both of them. Metis seemed amused and Danny shrugged. "God, I thought Roy was a pain. OK, so you've got Carol Dallon working for you. I suppose that's good, she's more than competent."
"It's not like you actually want to prosecute the case, is it?" Danny pointed out reasonably.
"True enough. I'd probably be more annoyed if I did, but from the initial investigations, I believe that the girl really was the victim of some rather underhanded activities and a certain amount of Parahuman hysteria," Emily admitted after a few seconds. "We're still investigating the full extent of how much was incompetence and how much was maliciousness, but there were more of both than I feel happy about regardless."
"So you don't think there's much likelihood of the young woman having any real case against her? At least from that particular source?"
"If we hadn't received the information we did from Tattletale, it's likely no one would have investigated, and in that case the evidence as presented would have been more than enough to prosecute Miss Lindt for murder. As it is, I think a good lawyer can probably get most of it thrown out immediately, and what's left reduced to something fairly minor. Possibly to a complete acquittal, but I can't promise anything. I'll have the rest of the information we currently have passed along to Mrs Dallon in the next couple of days, and keep her updated as we uncover more."
"Thank you." Danny looked pleased. "The girl has had a bad time of it, and I'd like to help her. She's made a surprising number of friends around here despite her slightly odd attitude."
"Probably fits right in," Emily sighed, "Odd seems to be a pretty common thing around these parts."
"I can't actually deny that," he chuckled.
Shaking her head, she finished the tea, then put the cup down and glanced at her watch. "If there's nothing else, I need to get back before the city implodes or something."
Walking over and holding her enormous hand out, Metis shook Emily's hand as the woman stood up. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Director."
"Likewise, I think," Emily replied. "Please pass on my regards to your family, and if possible refrain from killing all the Merchants. I wouldn't miss them personally but people would talk."
"We'll do what we can, but it sort of depends on them. I'll make sure you're kept informed about what we find out."
"Thank you." After a moment, Emily turned back just as she was about to head for the door. "One last thing. There's a new Parahuman on the street, she debuted last night. Calls herself 'Cloak.' Our reports are… peculiar, even for around here. Is she one of yours?"
Metis grinned widely. "Cloak is a good friend, but we don't claim ownership of her. Let's say she is currently an associate of ours in a somewhat similar manner to the way we are now associates of yours."
Emily fixed her with a hard stare, which had no visible result. Eventually, she nodded a little. "I see. Does she, perhaps, come from the same place you do?"
"I'm afraid I can't say any more on the subject, Director," Metis replied in a tone that made it clear she wasn't going to give up more information. "It would be betraying a trust. I hope you understand."
Thinking, she slowly nodded. Emily suspected she'd been given her answer anyway. "All right. I was just curious. We seem to have had a lot of unusual Parahumans in the last couple of months and one way or another they always seem to end up back here."
Metis just shrugged, still grinning.
"I'll walk you back, Director," Danny said, standing after finishing his coffee. "See you later, Metis."
"Later, Danny," the large lizard smiled, watching them leave.
Shortly Emily was back in the SUV heading back to the PRT building, mulling over what she'd learned, and hoping Skidmark just dropped dead of an overdose and made everyone's lives simpler. She didn't think anyone would actually miss him.
She certainly wouldn't.
At the same time, she was wondering just how many weird new relatives and friends of the Family were likely to arrive out of nowhere. 'No aliens, then too many aliens,' she sighed internally. 'Life is getting very strange these days.'