To Lyger 0: Potentially…

"Super-criminals sighted! Eleventh Arrondissement, around Place de la Nation."

"Unit One en route," Ramus responded, turning down the next cross street and accelerating. His jaw clenched as he searched the street in front of him, alert for any signs of pedestrians out and about in the ruins. Barreling down the street, he barely slowed down as he shot through the next intersection, racing along parallel to the Seine. They were on the wrong side of the river, and the closest bridge had been knocked down by one of the tremors from the Tarasque's enormous steps, but the bridge next to it was still standing. The streets remained deserted as they careened down them, and Ramus easily swerved around each pile of debris they passed. This was the first lead they had gotten on the escapees since Rigaudeau's death, and they could not allow this opportunity to slip past them. He frowned. Other units were closer to Place de la Nation, but all of them consisted of regular uniformed police officers drawn from various precincts whom Prefect Raincomprix had cobbled together into a makeshift force to provide security to the city. None of them could hope to stand up against the escapees; the last time they had tried it, Fire-Fly had burned two officers severely when she set their patrol car on fire. Ramus ground his teeth in frustration. They didn't have the people to spare, or the patrol vehicles to replace losses. After everything they had lost, all the officers killed by the Tarasque, they had buried far too many brothers and sisters to bury any more. Morillon should have made the "do not engage" order clear to his men far sooner than he had. They didn't need more officers injured or killed while trying to fight these super-criminals. Not after Mind-Wipe had taken Gouger out. He keyed the radio again. "Sit rep?"

"Unidentified criminals, still in the same position as of the last report," answered Élodie. "Regular police have established a perimeter, four blocks away from the criminals."

"Unit Two en route," Wilson reported over the radio.

"ETA five minutes," Ramus announced, racing across the bridge. "Wait for my signal before we approach."

"Copy that."

"No siren?" asked Roux, raising an eyebrow dubiously.

Ramus shook his head firmly. "No; we can't risk them hearing us coming and getting away." He scanned the side streets as they blew past them and nodded to himself on seeing them entirely deserted, without a single vehicle on the road to slow them down. On reflection, there weren't too many benefits to the utter breakdown of order after the Tarasque's rampage, but at least they didn't have to worry about traffic. "We'll be fine without the siren."

Roux shrugged, staring out the car window sullenly.

Ramus let out a breath. This was the hardest part of leadership. "How is Angelique handling all this?"

Roux scoffed, giving him an irritated look. "She lost her husband. How do you think she's handling it?"

Damn it. Ramus had never wanted to have a leadership position; he had been perfectly content as a regular patrol officer who occasionally assisted with raids like the ones against the Lynchpin's drug smuggling operation last summer. But then, on one such raid, the accident had happened, after which Roger had pulled some strings to get him the new prosthetic arm. That was also when Roger had recruited him into the SLD, giving him a promotion to go along with the new position and arm. And just like that, he was now responsible for the men on his team – and when someone was hurt or killed…

There was a reason he kept beer at home.

Ramus' mouth set into a thin line, and he risked a sidelong glance at Roux. "He didn't die for nothing."

"He got squashed," Roux retorted, glaring out the window at the destruction around them. "He got crushed, and the thing didn't even slow down. Kind of feels like nothing."

Ramus turned onto Boulevard Diderot and slowed down marginally. "He died to keep people safe. That's why we join up." Roux glared straight ahead. Ramus gave him a sharp look. "Hey, you still with me?"

"Let's just do this," Roux grumbled, finally meeting Ramus' gaze. "These bastards want to cause trouble when we're still reeling…"

Frowning, Ramus pulled to a stop just down the street from the Place de la Nation at the same time that a second patrol car stopped on the cross street in front of them. Wilson and Mansart jumped out of the other car, and Wilson grabbed a long, thin bag off the back seat, looking up at Ramus expectantly. "Take a position on this roof," Ramus instructed Wilson, pointing to the apartment building on the corner. "How long will you need?"

Wilson sprinted to the fire escape ladder on the side of the building, tossed the rifle case up, and climbed up after it. "No more than five minutes," he called over his shoulder, pulling himself up to the next level.

Ramus let out a breath and turned to the other two. "We stick together and move forward on opposite sides of the street," he instructed them. "When we get within sight of them, I'll move in close while you back me up. Understood?" Mansart nodded curtly. Roux's eyes narrowed, but he nodded reluctantly.

Quickly, scanning the interiors of the buildings they passed through the windows, Ramus made his way down the sidewalk toward the jewel exchange where the criminals had been spotted. Most of the buildings appeared to be deserted. No lights could be seen in any of the rooms they passed. On the opposite side of the street, Roux and Mansart stepped around piles of fallen bricks and the burned-out shells of cars, working their way down the sidewalk at the same pace as Ramus. They were still a couple buildings away when Ramus froze mid-step on hearing a low curse.

"Shut up and just carry what you can!" a woman's voice hissed.

Another woman scoffed. "It's not like I can carry a lot! I have to be careful I don't overload or I won't be able to fly! I thought you were supposed to be the strong one now."

Ramus signaled for Roux and Mansart to stay where they were while he moved forward cautiously, his ears primed for any further sounds. The two women continued to bicker as he edged closer, pressing himself against the wall and moving as quietly as he could. Finally he poked his head around the corner to see them. The first one he immediately recognized – Michèle Moulin, also known as Mistral – even though the jet suit she wore appeared far worse than the one in which she had been arrested. Unlike the more professional quality of the original suit, this one looked like it had been cobbled together from a trio of repurposed house fans, one on her back and the others attached to her arms, with a dozen wires connecting them to each other and to her backpack. The other criminal, however, was not immediately recognizable, though her face seemed oddly familiar from the mug shots adorning the wall at city hall. He cocked his head in confusion, examining her as closely as he could despite the distance. She appeared to be wearing a suit of a yellowish brown with a pair of round ears atop her head and a bare midriff and thighs. "Miraculous?" he wondered to himself, his voice barely over a whisper.

The miraculous user's ears twitched, and she turned in his direction.

"Definitely a miraculous." Ramus' eyes widened in shock, and his prosthetic came up, aiming at her midsection. "Paris Police!" he bellowed, stepping out from behind his cover and bracing the prosthetic with his other hand. "Surrender or we will open fire!"

The miraculous user scoffed, her eyes lighting up with mania. "Good luck with that, officer!" she shouted, raising her knife in front of herself defensively.

Ramus fired, the energy flash of the blast almost searing his retinas. Pounding footsteps behind him heralded Roux and Mansart, rushing up on the opposite side of the street to join him. The miraculous holder slashed her knife through the air, turning it side-on to the energy beam and deflecting it straight back at Ramus before whipping her knife around and placing it between herself and the other two. Ramus jumped back behind the corner of the building, poking his arm out and firing from behind cover as she continued deflecting his beams, her blade dancing in a complicated ballet. As Roux and Mansart added their fire to his, her knife flashed in the sun, turning into a blur as she blocked the energy pulses and deflected them in all directions.

"Hey!" yelped Mistral, jumping out of the way and glaring at the other woman in annoyance. "Watch where you send those things, Sandy!"

Sandy sneered. "Then stay out of my way!"

Mistral hit a control on her glove, and three massive gusts of wind picked up beneath her fan-jets, pushing her up into the air to hover a couple meters off the ground. "Don't need to tell me twice," she retorted. "Eco-freak."

Sandy glared at her and jumped out of the way of another energy beam from Ramus. Roux stepped out from behind cover, his pistol raised, firing at Sandy from a shorter and shorter range, even as Mansart continued to fire past him, forcing her to keep her head out of the way.

"Roux!" Ramus yelled, his eyes turning toward Sandy nervously as the distance between them dropped. "What are you doing!?"

Roux fired again and again. Mistral shifted one of her fans to point at him, kicking up dust into the air that blew into Ramus' face. Still Roux strode forward. "You think you and your friends can disrupt our city?" he called, ducking a ricocheted energy beam that Sandy sent in his direction. "With all the good men out there trying to keep the city safe? With all the good men who have died for this city!? You would put all of that in jeopardy?" Roux stopped a couple meters from her, and Ramus had to hold his fire to avoid hitting him. Roux pointed his pistol at her face, though without firing. "You should be grateful, not trying to take advantage!"

Sandy scoffed, raising her knife. "You think I should be grateful to the sons of bitches who threw me in prison to rot!? Who are responsible for the sorry state of this city?" She spat. "When it comes right down to it, I'm more grateful to the Tarasque: at least it had the decency to chase off all the people who are a blight on nature!" She growled. "But now I have the power to end this fight and return nature to its proper order. Eu-Collect-It!"

Thin tendrils reached out for Roux and connected with his skin. He eyed her in confusion, looking down at the tendril that touched his hand. Suddenly he started swallowing hard, licking his lips. The tendrils shifted into a stream of clear mist that sucked back away from him and toward Sandy. But the tendrils never stopped. "What – what are you doing?" he shouted, panic in his voice, staring at her in terror. His skin started to wrinkle; he smacked his lips. Suddenly he collapsed to his knees, his shoulders sagging.

An energy pulse shot down from the rooftop where Ramus had told Wilson to set up and hit one of Mistral's control wires. Mistral spun around out of control and shot off to the south. Sandy glanced up in the direction of the shot, and leaned out of the way as Wilson took his second shot, not breaking her connection with Roux.

Ramus' eyes widened in horror, staring at the sight. He had already lost one of his teammates; was he about to lose another? And to someone with a miraculous – what were they supposed to do? "Stop!" he bellowed. Quickly he started firing pulse after pulse at Sandy, trying to disrupt her concentration, but she deflected every beam.

Suddenly, another energy beam lanced out from somewhere behind Sandy and struck her in the back of her shoulder. Her eyes widened in shock, and she spun around to find the source of the energy beam. Ramus seized the opportunity to shoot at her back, striking her in the waist. The tendrils vanished into mist, and Sandy stumbled forward, sprinting away.

"You owe me one, Lieutenant," a familiar voice announced through the SLD radio.

Ramus raced forward, Mansart hot on his heels, and dropped to his knees next to Roux. Roux's mouth opened and closed weakly, his face drawn, his fingers and skin wrinkled like prunes.

"Hang on!" Ramus called, grabbing Roux's shoulder and hauling him up into his arms. "Medic!"