Sherrel listened to the three reptilian creatures conversing in a low voice, in that weird alien-sounding language, once more. She'd ended up telling them practically her entire life story, not holding anything back, good or bad. Mostly bad, she was somewhat ashamed to admit to herself. Metis had asked quite a few questions, probing ones that elicited more detail about many of the things she'd been involved in than she'd thought she remembered. Saurial had also asked quite a few.

She got the impression that they were assessing her truthfulness as much as anything, by whatever means they were using. As they'd talked she'd slowly relaxed, and now was nervous but no longer terrified. The shock of seeing all three of them at once had been fairly unpleasant, especially Saurial as she'd heard a lot about the lizard-girl over the last couple of months and knew how dangerous she really was. Metis and Ianthe hadn't come to her attention, probably because they were relatively new arrivals, so even though they were much larger than the slender blue girl, they didn't seem quite so worrying.

They were also obviously taking their lead from Saurial, who despite a very calm and surprisingly gentle manner, was definitely the one in charge. Even with the non-human look and attitude, though, all three of them genuinely did give off an air of wanting to help.

She wasn't used to that.

Now, she waited to find out what the next step would be. Her stomach betrayed her with a growl, making Saurial look over, then smile. "The poor woman is starving. Why don't you guys go and get some food for all of us? I'll keep her company."

"OK," Metis said, also in English rather than whatever the hell they'd been speaking. "You said you were going to make me a proper sized mug as well."

"Oh, yes, sorry, I got distracted. Here you go." The smaller reptile held out a huge mug-shaped object that was closer to a bucket with a handle on the side, which appeared from nowhere like magic. Sherrel gaped at it, then her. Saurial winked at her as Metis took it from her with a nod of thanks, then nudged her sister and headed for the door with Ianthe behind her. Seconds later they were gone.

Pulling a couple of cans of soft drink out of one of the small fridges under the computer bench, Saurial joined her at the table, spinning one of the chairs around with the end of her tail then sitting in it. She handed one of the cold cans over. "Here, this should give you a sugar and caffeine boost until they get back with the food. The cafeteria here is pretty good, you should find something you like in it."

Accepting the can, Sherrel popped it open and sipped the cold fluid within, her host doing the same. "Thank you," she said quietly. "For everything, especially listening. I know you weren't expecting this."

"It wasn't quite what we had planned for today," Saurial admitted with a small grin and a shrug. "But plans change. As you're probably aware."

"Fucking right I am," Sherrel sighed, leaning back in the comfortable chair and putting her head back. "I still can't understand quite how I ended up here. Or what I do next, for that matter. Or why you guys are helping me like this."

"You ended up where you were because life can be a bastard sometimes, and Parahumans see the worst of it more or less by definition," Saurial replied after a long pause, putting her elbows on the table. "It's pretty common. I know several 'villains' who never wanted to get into crime at all, but because of the way the world works, certainly in this country, didn't really have a choice about it. Armsmaster told me it wasn't at all rare, and neither was ending up dead because of it regardless of what side of the equation you fell on. The fact that you're still alive after several years of this sort of thing is fairly impressive, really."

She wasn't quite able to avoid smiling for a moment at that, although the smile went away soon enough. "Not for any good reasons, though."

"No, probably not. Drugs aren't very helpful if you want a life that makes any sense at all," the reptilian cape noted, looking mildly depressed for a while. "I can sort of understand that people who had nothing to lose might want the escape, I guess, but in the long run it almost always ends in tears. If you're lucky. Once it goes from intermittent recreational use to daily 'I need a hit' use, you're probably not coming back in most cases. Certainly based on what I've seen since I've been here and from talking to people around this place."

"It's… incredibly hard to give up," Sherrel sighed, rolling the cold can on her forehead for a second or two, then sipping from it again. "Without Metis I'm sure I couldn't have even begun to do it. And to be honest, I didn't want to. Not for a long, long time. Back in the old days there was a short time I might have escaped this, but with my home life… Skids was actually a better choice, I thought. Now, though, I'm totally stone cold sober for the first time in fucking years and I can see what a train wreck the entire thing has been."

Saurial put a hand on hers, smiling sympathetically at her. "Everyone makes mistakes. Not everyone gets a chance to recover from them. I've learned that much. To answer your question of what you do next, a lot of that is up to you. I can guarantee that you'd need to permanently give up the drugs. Do you think you can do that?"

"I think so," she replied after a long hard look at herself. "I hope so. I don't want to go back to what I was. I love Tinkering, I always had a knack for mechanical stuff even when I was a kid and my talent improved that so much it's unbelievable, and in a way the drugs made me more creative, I thought. But looking back on it, that's only partly true. I ended up sort of doing the same thing over and over, trying to end up making it right. I could see it because of the drugs, but at the same time, the same fucking thing stopped me reaching it."

She shook her head. "I'm not explaining it right. I don't really know how to put it into words, I'm not good with them. Didn't even finish high school."

"You're doing fine," the lizard-girl replied with a small smile. "And not swearing every second word any more."

Sherrel looked embarrassed. "Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you."

"Don't worry, you didn't, I've heard much worse around here. This place is entirely full of dock-workers, after all," Saurial chuckled. "But it's best to reserve the really good swear words for the right occasion, I think."

They shared an amused look, then Sherrel finished her can and put it down. Saurial picked it up, crushed it into a tiny ball of metal in her hand, then ate it.

She stared in disbelief.

"I like the taste of aluminum," her companion grinned. "Most people seem to find me doing that a little strange for some reason."

"Yeeahh..." Sherrel gave her a long look. "I wonder why?"

"No idea. Humans are a little weird, but they're good fun," Saurial laughed.

Sherrel pondered the comment for a couple of minutes or so, the lizard-girl not talking, apparently content to let her think quietly. Eventually she asked, "The way you say that, you don't think you're human, right?"

"Pretty much," Saurial agreed readily.

"Oh." She thought some more. "Heard a few things about you guys, even if I missed hearing about Metis and Ianthe. Couldn't really miss Kaiju, though." She smiled a little. "She went right past our place, Skids nearly had a heart attack." After a moment, she added, "Word on the street is that you're not from around here."

"Oh, I'm from around here, don't worry," Saurial replied. "Not too far away. Most of us were born locally."

Thinking about that for a few seconds, Sherrel finally said, "But some of you are from somewhere else, right? Not… this world."

Saurial leaned back in the chair and studied her silently for some time. "It would be fair to say that in part the Family originates from a place other than Earth, yes," she eventually said, as far as Sherrel could tell totally honestly. "We've been around for quite a while. Like I said, I was born here. So were my sisters and cousins. But..." She shrugged with a small smile. "Not every member of the Family was."

"Holy fucking hell."

Despite what she'd heard, she didn't expect to have it casually confirmed that they were actually fucking aliens! Even ones that seemed to have moved in some time back. If what she'd heard was even vaguely accurate, a really fucking long time ago, come to that. She stared at the reptilian form in the other chair, who looked back, seeming amused. "Jesus. I… don't know what to say."

Her companion smiled more widely. "You don't have to say anything. We don't spread it about, and we'd prefer that you don't mention it outside this building at least for the time being, but quite a few people have worked it out. The PRT probably knows, for various reasons, and several other Parahumans do, I'm sure of that. PHO is full of rumors along those lines as well, of course. Along with some really funny other ideas as well." She grinned. "Apparently I'm a demon according to some people."

Sherrel stared, then started loudly snorting with hilarity. "Demon. Fuck, yeah, I can see it, but… Alien is bad enough." She shook her head, laughing madly. "I'd have gone with weird Parahuman easily enough, god knows there are some crazy looking ones around, but you guys really have this lizard theme going on. Makes sense if you're all related and from the same place. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone."

Saurial nodded calmly, smiling in satisfaction. When Sherrel finally stopped guffawing, she had a sudden thought, staring suspiciously at the lizard. "Hey… Wait a minute…."

"Yes?"

"That was a test, wasn't it?" Saurial kept looking at her. "Both to see if I'd freak out, and to see if I can keep my fucking mouth shut."

"Would I be that sneaky?"

"Oh, hell, yes, I bet you would, in a second," Sherrel said with a wry grin. "I figured out you're the brains behind all this some time back. I get the impression you're hard to fool, and easy to underestimate."

"Nice of you to say so," Saurial smiled. "I can't take all the credit, my relatives are all very smart and skilled. But I was here first and most of this is my fault one way or another. I have to take responsibility for a lot of people, just from being in the position I ended up in, and I take that responsibility very seriously. The whole Family does. We protect our people, from anyone or anything. So I have to keep alert."

She shrugged again. "I try to see the best in people, and so far that's worked out well. But I'm more than aware that I could make a mistake, and I don't want to have to clean one up, although I'm prepared to if necessary. By whatever means are required." The girl fixed Sherrel with a look that made her shiver a little. "I have many options, believe me."

"I do," she replied faintly. "Whatever happens next, I won't tell anyone what you said. I owe your entire family my life for what Metis did, twice now, so if nothing else my lips are sealed."

"Thank you." The apparently alien reptile smiled again, the slight air of menace that had come over her disappearing without trace. "I don't mean to be threatening when I don't need to, but it's very important to me. Family is everything."

"Not for some people," Sherrel sighed. "Really, not for some people."

Giving her a sympathetic look, which was easily readable even on the reptilian face, Saurial nodded a little. Tipping her chair back Sherrel closed her eyes and relaxed, finding more than a little to her surprise that she wasn't scared any more. Worried, yes, unsure what she faced, definitely, but not scared.

Which was weird but she could live with it for now. Despite the sheer craziness of the last couple of hours, she couldn't help but think she was among friends. Big, scaly ones.

{Poor guy,} Amy giggled as they walked back to the office, each of them laden down with a cardboard box full of packed meals, enough for Sherrel, them, and the other people who would have to be brought in soon. Lisa was sipping from her outsize mug as she walked, looking smugly amused. She'd spent about five minutes laughing like an idiot when they'd left the cafeteria after surprising that poor trucker, but wouldn't say why. {How did you know his name?}

{Not hard to work it out, my power is getting freakishly effective for things like that even compared to what it was,} her friend replied. They were deliberately using Famtalk, both to keep their conversation private, and for the practice. All three of them were getting very fluent in it to the point it almost came naturally now.

Although it did seem to make a lot of people very uncomfortable the first time they heard it. And if you put the right emphasis behind it, even the second, third, and fourth, Amy thought with a mental grin.

It was pretty good for casual intimidation among other uses.

{Still not going to tell my why you started laughing?}

{No. It's much funnier to keep it to myself for now,} Lisa said with a sly sideways look. Her reptilian face was ideal for that sort of thing, actually, now that Amy considered the matter.

{Be like that.}

{I intend to.}

Lisa grinned as the other girl sighed theatrically. {Oh, while I think about it, I was wondering if you can tweak my scales so I can turn off the scarlet highlights?} she added after a moment. {I meant to mention it earlier but things sort of got complicated. It would make hiding in the water better.}

{Sure, that should be easy enough,} Amy nodded. {Not a bad idea. You'd just be a cutout in the world without them, though, so it'll probably make people even more worried. I'm very pleased how black I managed to make them.}

{Blacker than a black thing covered in black, at night,} Lisa chuckled.

{Or even blacker than that.}

Moments later they entered the side yard, Lisa opening the door, both of them going inside. Locking it carefully behind her, Amy followed her friend over to the table, where they found Taylor and Sherrel quietly chatting about mechanical engineering, the blonde woman looking much less terrified although still a mess and very worried. "Here we go. We got some of everything, it should still be warm, if not we have a new microwave over there. Let's see… There's beef stew, some sort of chicken curry, mac and cheese, a few burgers and fries, a few baked potatoes with cheese, a chowder with clams and fish, and some chicken noodle soup." They unpacked all the containers the cafeteria staff had filled for them without complaint.

Taylor handed the woman, who was staring at the large amount of food with surprise, a fork she'd made. Sherrel took it without comment although she looked a little puzzled about where it had come from.

"This is a hell of a lot of food," she said, reaching over and picking up a container of the curry. Opening the top, she tried some. "And it's damn good."

"The cafeteria here feeds well over three hundred people, they make simple but decent meals in huge quantities," Lisa said as she snagged some of the curry herself, while Amy took the stew and Taylor helped herself to some mac and cheese. "They don't mind, none of it will go to waste. We eat a lot." She grinned at the blonde who looked back, then shrugged. All of them started eating after Taylor made some more forks.

"Whatever else happens, you should eat several meals like this for about a week, then drop to a normal two or three a day," Amy advised. "You're severely malnourished, and obviously haven't been eating properly for some time. Even with Metis healing you, that will take time to correct, and it's best to let it happen normally."

"Thanks," Sherrel said after a few more mouthfuls. "You want to know the really horrible thing? I can't actually remember the last time I ate an actual meal. Been living off junk food for probably years. That and meth. And alcohol."

"You can get a lot of calories from alcohol, but it's not really part of a balanced diet," Amy grinned. "I can't recommend it."

"I'm not planning on starting that again if I can help it," the woman replied fervently, still eating, not wildly fast but steadily like she intended to finish what she'd started.

"Good. I'll give you a proper checkup after you've eaten for a while and had a rest. You look like you need about twelve hours sleep, after a very long shower."

"God… That would be amazing," Sherrel sighed. "I'll have to get some more clothes as well. These are the only things I had left that were usable and I hate them. Too many memories, and way too much grease and sweat."'

"To be honest I don't think the style is entirely ideal either," Taylor noted with a smile. "Although mammalian fashions aren't my field of expertise. But I think we can come up with something useful later."

She finished her meal, then stood up. "I'm going to get Danny," she said. "He needs to know about all this, then we need to figure out what the next step is. It's going to take some work but I'm hopeful we can sort something out that makes everyone more or less happy."

Sherrel looked worried again, pausing in her eating. "Danny?" she asked.

"Danny Hebert. The guy in charge around here, basically," Amy replied. Lisa started grinning again, but shook her head when both she and Taylor stared at her. Taylor glanced at Amy, who shrugged, not knowing what was so funny.

"He needs to know, the DWU is involved in this one way or another, but don't worry, he's a good and smart man," she continued after giving her other friend a hard look which only provoked a smirk in return. "He'll listen, and he always has good suggestions. We may need to bring in some other people but we'll keep it to the minimum for now."

Appearing uncertain but resigned, the blonde nodded and resumed eating. Taylor headed for the door, slipping out and re-locking it behind her.

Hannah tapped on the door to the director's office, opening it when the woman called out. "Have you got a moment, Director?" she asked, going inside and closing it behind her.

"Yes, unless it's something to do with Saurial and hypersonic surfboards, in which case go away," the woman behind the desk sighed.

She smiled a little. "Not as such. It's sort of relevant to the Family, but not directly."

Mutely waving to a chair, Director Piggot steepled her fingers and waited.

"I've been collating information I've heard back from various contacts around the place," Hannah said as she sat. "Some more information has come to light about Skidmark's whereabouts and activities, although so far we don't have conclusive proof of either of them. The Thinkers tell me he's most likely either on the way back, or will be very shortly, but he's going to a lot of trouble to make it difficult to trace him."

"Or is so drugged up that even he doesn't know where he is or what he's doing," the blonde woman grumpily noted.

Hannah nodded. "That is not impossible," she commented wryly. "Weirdly enough, doing totally random things to an overall vague plan would be quite effective in throwing off precogs."

"Have you asked our new Ward about it?" Emily asked.

"Prospect isn't yet on duty, not until she's fully trained on the relevant knowledge, but I did ask her, yes," Hannah said. "She gave a 26.29% chance that something major involving the Merchants will happen in the next week, rising to 37.83% within two weeks. But, more worryingly, she gave a 79.87% chance that a major event would happen in that same two week period. She couldn't give details, which she said probably means it's too tightly associated with the Family."

"What does that mean?" Emily asked.

Hannah shrugged a little. "Damned if I know, exactly. We're already aware that the Family is odd where Thinkers are concerned. Most of them get very confused when they try to predict anything about that group. Prospect is a much higher rated Thinker than anyone else we have easy access to, which you'd think would mean she would be more successful, but if anything she's less successful in predicting them. Apparently she figured that out some time ago, when she was talking to her Uncle about Kaiju, but none of the researchers paid any attention to her when she said something about it."

She sighed a little. "Why would they? She's only a twelve year old girl. I'm going to have to look into that, there's a bias there which is problematic. Anyway, the young lady stopped bothering to mention it when she worked out that they weren't taking her seriously, but apparently she's been experimenting on her own for some time. She finds the Family fascinating. She wouldn't tell me exactly what the problem is when she tries for a prediction about them, she only said it didn't work properly, but she's come up with some quite interesting workarounds for parts of the issue. Not enough to really give any insight into their activities but enough to work out in a general manner if they're going to get involved in various things."

"And she feels that this high percentage chance of some major problem is related to them?"

"Yes. Although she was at pains to point out that it wasn't, in her estimation, their fault, but more likely to be them reacting to something someone else did. She's fairly sure it is the Merchants in some way but like I said the details get confused the more she probes. Plus the headaches the girl gets are very debilitating so we can't ask too many questions. She did say that there was something else involved but she couldn't work out the right questions to ask herself to figure that out yet."

Sighing, Hannah shrugged a little once more. "It's annoying, but par for the course with those lizards. They don't do normal."

"So I've come to realize," the director muttered. "Pity she gets the headaches, or we could sit her down with a map and just go city by city, or even state by state, until we narrowed that idiot's location down. I'd be half tempted to send out a sniper and shoot the fucker between the eyes before he does something idiotic that gets Kaiju pissed enough to go after him."

Hannah looked hard at the other woman, who looked back. "You'd actually do it, wouldn't you?" she finally said, a little shocked.

"If it came down to a choice between a crazy drug lord who's killed to my knowledge at least four people directly, and god knows how many more or less accidentally with his crap, and a giant lizard who's actually a good citizen and also the scariest fucking thing this side of Leviathan, damn right I would." Emily sighed. "But it's not only illegal, it's also against policy. No kill order on the bastard."

She looked thoughtful for a moment, then shook her head sadly. "No, probably can't swing that one. Pity. It would solve a hell of a lot of problems."

"And open a can of worms the size of the Medhall building," Hannah pointed out. "We can't go around just arranging assassinations of people we don't like. We're supposed to be on the side of law and order."

Her superior gave her a look. "If you for one moment believe that the side of law and order doesn't arrange the odd assassination, you're nowhere near as cynical as you should be, Hannah," she sighed. "That said, I more or less agree. It wouldn't be a good precedent. But I am not looking forward to the crazy fool turning up with a plasma cannon or some such fucking thing and taking pot shots at Kaiju, or any other Family member, with it. Partly because I don't think it would do more than really annoy them, and partly because it will cause even more chaos than normal."

Emily leaned her chair back, turning it to look out the window. "This damn city is cursed, in my opinion," she went on after a moment. "The number of Parahumans and amount of general insanity is just ridiculous. But at the moment, thanks to some very weird neighbors, it seems to be running more smoothly than I can ever remember, and I'd prefer it stayed like that as long as possible. Even if we end up with alien lizards on every street corner. At least they're polite."

She swung her chair back. "So we need to find and stop Skidmark before he does something everyone is going to regret."

"Well, he's certainly getting around. Making enemies everywhere he goes, apparently. Very few people want to see him again, and the ones that do only want to so they can look him in the eye when they shoot him. He's been kicked out of four cities and two states now to my knowledge, three times by the local Mafia, twice by law enforcement of one sort or another, and once by several local gangs, who normally hate each other, joining forces to do it. Everyone involved is aware that he's doing something that will get the Family angry and wants no part of it. He's burning a lot of bridges."

"What's his last known location?"

"Tucson, Arizona, for some weird reason. A long way from his normal comfort zone. He popped up there, talked to a few locals, and vanished again before the nearest PRT agents could find out anything. The people he talked to have disappeared as well, we don't know anything much about them. Some sort of black market weapons dealers with a couple of minor Tinkers involved is all I've been able to find out."

She spread her hands to show she had no idea. "It's very frustrating. We know he's looking for some sort of weapon or some way to attack Kaiju and the others, but it's all second hand info at best. By the nature of the people he's been looking up, they don't particularly want to talk to the PRT, or the FBI who have also been looking for him. I don't know anyone in old-school organized crime, unfortunately, or at least anyone high enough up the food chain to give me more than rumors. Of which there are dozens. Apparently the Mafia in general is extremely irritated with the man and getting more so by the minute."

"Maybe they'll solve the problem for us," Emily said, hopefully.

"Perhaps. Not quite the correct procedure, but I wouldn't be surprised if it happened right now. Normally they stay out of cape politics for the most part, even though they have a few of their own, but..." She shook her head. "Can't tell this time. He's not a popular man."

"He never was," the director pointed out.

"True enough." Hannah nodded soberly. "There is one other piece of information that just came up before I headed over here, but I don't know how, or if, it fits into this whole thing."

"Oh? What would that be?"

"An informant I've been cultivating in the Merchants said that Squealer has disappeared."

"What?" The blonde woman looked surprised, then thoughtful. "Disappeared?"

"So I'm told. Apparently, and I have no way to verify this at the moment and can't vouch for the accuracy of the information, Skidmark seriously lost his temper with the woman shortly before he left on his mission to earn an early death. Beat the crap out of her, told her he'd kill her next time, then went walkabout. That was about ten days ago or so. She's been holed up in her workshop ever since, my informant said. Only the people at the top of the gang have seen her until recently."

Emily listened carefully. "I assume something changed?"

"I believe so, but I don't know what. I'm told she came out of the workshop last night, wandered around with a weird expression most of the night and today, then went back in. Had some massive bust up with Skidmark's third in command, broke his arm, kicked him out, then locked herself in. That was this morning sometime. They have a hazy idea of time so I can't be sure when. But it all went very quiet this afternoon and eventually some of them got it into their heads to break in and look for her. They may have thought she'd died from an overdose, which would be a fairly sensible thought under the circumstances."

"And they couldn't find her?"

"No. The workshop was entirely empty, aside from tools and her latest project, whatever that was. No signs of anyone else, and no way out except through the door which was barricaded on the inside. None of them have the faintest idea where she went."

"She could have walked out the front door and most of them are probably so high they still wouldn't know where she went," the other woman pointed out, making Hannah smile.

"That's not entirely inaccurate, I'm afraid. As I said I'm not sure how much weight to give the rumor. I would imagine that more data will turn up sooner or later. If she really has decided to escape the gang, I doubt she'd get far. All of them are hopelessly addicted to a whole slew of narcotics. We'll probably find her holed up in the docks somewhere in a week or so suffering withdrawal symptoms. Or dead."

"Interesting. But not as worrying as her boyfriend's activities."

"No. If she really has left it will at least deprive him of Tinker support. She's annoyingly effective, even if her aesthetics leave a lot to be desired. It irritates the hell out of Colin, of course."

They both smiled a little, the Protectorate Tinker's feelings about Squealer's creations was well known, as he tended to make them clear to everyone in the area when it came up. 'Inefficient' was the least of it.

"All right. Thank you for the report. Keep trying to find out what you can. I don't know how long the Family is likely to wait before they decide to launch a preemptive strike, which in their place I'd probably have done already. But I imagine they're getting ready for trouble."

"The entire DWU is if what I've heard is accurate. I'm told there's a new fence that appeared today around the entire site, and some other sort of defense I don't yet have information on. I'm thinking of driving over to have a discreet look. With Saurial and her family involved it could be almost anything."

Emily sighed, nodding her agreement. "I don't even want to consider what she could do if she got all militaristic. What she does when she's just having fun is terrifying enough." She tapped her fingers on the desk, thinking, then shook her head. "Probably best not to get involved right now. Keep digging, if we can go to them with real information and show we're trying to deal with the situation it will be more likely to get them to trust us a little more than spying on them. Which I'm certain they'd notice."

"If you say so." Hannah stood up. "I'll get back to the Rig, then. Good bye, director."

She headed out of the office, wondering what Skidmark had found and when he was really going to get back.

It was likely to get very noisy shortly afterwards, she suspected.