Sparks, both literal and the profanity, flew from the small fire near Dan's workbench, one that he used to heat up his soldering iron. Ash leaned over for a closer look, jumping back and adding some profanity of her own to the mix as one of the sparks hit her in the face. Dan glared at her. "You deserved that," he said, motioning for her to move back.

Ash winced, inching back, though still intent on Dan's work. "It's been about five years since I needed a sense of self-preservation," she said.

"I know. Scootch. I need to focus on this."

"Don't you just need the box for this? We aren't even going to be using the metal detector."

"It doesn't mean we never will. Also, I have some professional pride." Dan frowned again, soldering another part into place. Despite Ash's interference and his earlier swearing, the goggles were coming together surprisingly well. He'd never call himself an expert on motivator technology, that had always been Dr. Reynolds, but he could cobble together a device or two when he wanted to. "Don't you have something else to be doing?"

"Dr. C kicked me out too." Ash frowned. "I say kicked out. I think it was more that I finished early, and she wanted me to shut up too."

"Good to know we agree on that," Dan muttered, twisting another pair of wires together and gluing it into place with a bead of solder. "And, I think, we are done."

"Already?" Ash said.

"Surprisingly, yes." Dan snapped the makeshift cover he had made in place. "I'd like to test this some more, ideally, but there are obvious reasons that would be a bad idea."

"Don't motivators, like, blow up if you don't do them right?"

"They do. But this one's been tested when we first built it. All the blow up-age should be accounted for." Dan looked up at Ash, taking off the safety goggles he had been wearing. "Good question, though. The worst this should do is not work, or maybe work oddly." He looked at the device on the table, frowning in worry. "Theoretically."

"Sparks, I love the word 'theoretically'," Ash said, frowning at the goggles as if they would leap up and bite her.

"It's a very strong 'theoretically'," Dan said. "Mind fetching Anna? I'd like to get going on this as soon as we can." As Ash left the room, Dan glared down at the notebook lying on the table, which contained a combination of battle plans and motivator notes. Everything will be fine, he thought. You will get the drop on him this time, and there is no way this will end badly. But even in his heart, he knew those thoughts were nothing but a lie meant to talk him into actually going through with this. Ash was right. Even trained Reckoners died a lot, and as much as he trusted Anna, and sort of trusted Ash, none of them even came close to being that. Even they had to start somewhere, Dan thought. And unlike them, he had a couple of semi-good Epics on his side. Which might be a plus, might be a minus. But even if it was a dangerous one, it was still an ace in the hole they could pull out even if things went really sideways. Which they would. Things never went according to plan. What was truly key was the ability to adapt a plan to make it work, even when things were in the middle of falling apart.

Minutes later, Anna came in from the cold, out of breath from the walk over. "Did you finish the motivator?" Anna stopped, pressing her face into her hand. "Wait, of course you did, otherwise I wouldn't be here."

"Excellent deduction, Sherlock," Ash said, wiping her snow-covered shoes on the entry mat.

Anna glared at Ash. "Everyone knew what I meant, Ash."

Dan cleared his throat. "Anyway. The motivator is only half of why you're here." He tapped his fingers on his notebook. "We're going to need to go over the plan before this mission," he said. "And we're going to have to go over it quickly." He looked at Anna. "I know you were trying to help, and you did, but even the chance Polar realized what was going on means we have to do this as soon as possible."

"Okay, step one, find a nice ambush point, step two, activate your thingummy, step three, kill ourselves an Epic," Ash said, counting off on her fingers. "Am I missing anything?"

"Literally all of the details," Dan said, opening his notebook to the first page, where he had drawn a crude map. "I was thinking of this park here for our spot. There's not a lot of metal around Polar can use, at least nothing that won't be buried under several feet of snow, and—"Dan paused, pointing to several scribbles that he had intended to represent trees and a gazebo. "There's a lot of cover we can use." He pointed to one of the trees, which had been circled. "Ash, I want you to be here. It'll be close to where I am, so you're going to be our backup in case things can and do get hairy."

Ash frowned. "I'm a dangerous choice for backup, you do realize that, right?"

"I know. But you're the only one who has any experience at all in hand to hand." He sighed. "And yes, if I'm being honest, the powers are a nice 'break glass in case of fire'. But, I promise it will be a last resort."

Dan cleared his throat, and pointed to the gazebo on the far side of the park. "Anna, you're going to be here. From the work I've done, it should be out of Polar's range, but still within firing distance. Which is going to be important, since most of what we can do is going to be reliant on metal weapons. I don't think I need to tell you how those can be used against us. Your objective is, if you see a good opening, to shoot Polar."

Anna nodded. "I suppose shooting the evil supervillain is a good plan," Ash said. "You'll be taking point, I assume?"

"Point's the one who directly interacts with the Epic, correct? I will," Dan said, pointing to another pair of spots on the map. "I hooked the device up so I can activate the motivator remotely, from behind that bush there." He opened up his jacket to show the inside and grinned, pointing to a silvery panel on the inside. "This is my favorite part of the plan, if we're being honest."

"I like it," Ash said. "Very '80s."

"If it were '80s, wouldn't it be on the outside?" Anna said.

"Touche," Ash said.

Dan cleared his throat, and they stopped, staring at him. "Anyway," he said. "My transmitter is going to be inside it, as well as my weapon. Polar's metal sight is blocked by other metal, and the aluminum is lightweight enough that it should be hard to use against me." Dan frowned. "Though I suppose it also works as a fashion statement. A very invisible fashion statement, that is."

"Anyway," he said. "The motivator itself will be buried under the snow in a non-conductive box. That way, he'll need to use his powers to get a visual of it, and the snow itself should offer us at least a little time while he digs it up." He looked over to Ash. "You're right, we don't need to use it for its intended purpose this time, so there's no need for it to be visible. And we should be able to keep Polar disabled with it once he gets there." Dan cleared his throat. This, of course, hinged on the pain Polar felt from the device being strong enough, but from how Polar had spoken in their first encounter, Dan couldn't help feel that it would be enough. Though given how the affront could've been that they dared imitate his powers at all, it was not a guarantee.

"And how do we know that Permafrost won't come and rain on our whole parade?" Ash asked.

"That is something I've thought of, though it doesn't seem likely. A device like this one—"Dan tapped the casing of the motivator proudly. "Is even better than a weakness in terms of disabling Polar. Permafrost would love to have his hands on this, which is exactly why I think Polar would never tell him."

"That sounds about right. I know I wouldn't," Ash said.

"Everyone clear about where they are and what they're going to be doing?" Dan looked over at Ash, and couldn't help but notice a faint smile on her face. "You seem happy."

Ash shook her head. "It's nothing, really. I'm just starting to think this might actually work."

Not an hour later, Dan was out in a field freezing his ass off. He signaled to Ash and Anna in order to make sure they were in their positions too, and got a thumbs up from both of them. Guess the only thing stopping me is my own nerves, Dan thought, his hand hovering over the transmitter's button. The plan was solid, and the only potential problems that might come were in the execution. He hesitated. Come on, just push the dang thing. With Anna's activation of the motivator the previous day, it was only a matter of time before Polar caught up to them anyway. Before he could let his anxieties stop himself, Dan slammed his hand down on the button. A small indicator light turned on. That was remarkably anticlimactic.

Dan shook his head. Of course this wasn't something that was going to work instantly. He released his hand from the button. And he probably wouldn't have been able to come unless the device was turned off. Dan shuddered, not just from the cold. Polar was going to come now, whether they liked it or not, and he had to be ready.

He didn't have long to wait. Not ten minutes later, a flurry of snow and shining metal shone at the park's border. That had to be Polar. He always did love making a dramatic entrance. Though it would appear that this entrance was a less fatal one than last time, at least so far.

The whirl stopped and settled into a human form, too bundled up to make out many features, about ten feet away from Dan. "You," Polar snarled. "Of course it was you. How did you even survive?"

Dan shrugged, trying not to let his fear show. "Guilty as charged," he said, unable to keep a stammer out of his voice. "And I ran. I ran, and I hid. But, as you probably felt, I think I'm done with that."

Even under the scarf and hood, Dan could feel the cold glare Polar was giving off. He laughed, a wheeze that felt as bitterly cold as the air around them. "You are like the rest of them. An impudent ant messing with forces beyond his comprehension."

Dan stared up into Polar's eyes and pressed the button again. "I think I comprehend enough." Polar crumpled in pain, only able to whimper. Come on, Anna, take the shot, he thought. Everything's lined up. Except—

Snow and wind kicked up again, despite the air that day being mostly still and Polar being incapacitated in front of him, and Dan tightened his scarf, hand not wavering from the button. Oh no, he thought. A tornado of snow, dwarfing the size of the one Polar had arrived in, approached the field they were standing in, and the sky itself seemed to darken around them. Somehow, despite all of Dan's calculations and planning, Permafrost was here.