Disclaimer: I want to break free from your lies.

Another Duckling

Part three of the Omake: What Would You Think. Meh Chapter 14 (Information) and chapter 15.

Dennis' breath caught in his throat, his eyes darted around looking for an exit, and his brain worked frantically to think of an excuse to leave when their sort of boss strode into the room. He'd laughed when they'd said they were getting a normal kid as their boss, had cracked jokes about the beanpole after she'd shown up, and blown off Shadow Stalker's warnings. Then he'd seen the video and had finally agreed to look at Shadow Stalker's pictures and realized just how fucked he was. He never should have made those stupid jokes, it was only a matter of time before she heard them and found out that he was the one who thought them up and then he'd be turbo fucked.

"Gotta go to a doctor's appointment about . . ." Think brain, THINK! "My chronic incontinence." Good one, brain, go with the classic. No one ever questions that one. "Gotta go." He pushed past Missy and Shadow Stalker who'd both taken to following Taylor around like ducklings.

"I've been meaning to speak with you about that," Taylor's voice stopped the boy cold. "You've skipped the past three meetings and the medical wing doesn't have any record of you showing up."

Dennis did the only thing he could think of to get out of the situation. He released his bladder. "I wasn't making it up, see, I wasn't just making an excuse." He gestured at his groin.

"I wasn't saying you were," Taylor agreed calmly, doing her best not to look at the rapidly growing stain on the boy's costume. "I was saying that there isn't a record of you getting treatment. Go to medical and get that treated or I'll drag you to medical myself. Clear?"

"Clear," Dennis agreed quickly. "Going now!"

Vista waited until her teammate was gone. "You know he's lying about that, right?"

"Yeah," Taylor agreed. "But if he's so dedicated to a joke that he's willing to piss his pants the least I can do is play along."

"That wasn't a joke, boss. Kid's so scared of you he actually pissed his pants," Sophia boasted. "No shame in it, not everyone can come face to face with an apex predator without feeling at least a little fear."

IIIIIIIIII

Lisa grinned as her minions began draining the stolen tanker trucks into the air vents of her soon to be former boss' underground hide out. She never would have expected to get inspiration from movie night.

"I still don't understand why you had us steal two truck loads of gasoline only to pour it down a drain," Alec whined. "Bad enough to have to leave the hideout, but for nothing?"

"You know where we could offload hot gasoline?" Brian demanded.

"No."

"Then shut up."

There was a muffled thump in the background followed shortly by three more. "What was that?" Alec demanded.

"Money well spent," Lisa replied as she put the detonator back in her pocket. Having charges placed in Coil's house and back ups hadn't cost even two percent of the money she'd stolen from his accounts, paying for roving death squads had bumped expenses to just under three percent. "Toss in the road flares and let's get out of here." Sometimes it was good to be her. "I want to be back at the hideout before letting Kaiser know about Coil's plans for the Empire." She pulled out her phone. "Hey, boss, I know you told me to never call you on this phone, especially not from a number the PRT has already linked with criminal activity but-"

IIIIIIIIII

Taylor froze when her ears detected the sound of gunfire. Negligent discharge or enemy action? Her brain wondered. Either way there was a good chance that there were people ahead that might need help.

"Hang back," Taylor ordered, making eye contact so her two shadows understood exactly how serious she was. "Worst case scenario, I want the two of you ready to run and get help."

The three rounded the corner to find one officer on the ground and another standing over her with a smoking gun.

"Missy, Sophia. Get out of here and sound the alarm," Taylor ordered. "I'll try to slow him down." She shot them a look causing both girls to hasten to comply with her orders. "This town," she laughed. "This stupid town." The girl sprang from cover, made a combat roll, and came back up firing the fallen duty officer's gun.

IIIIIIIIII

Emily sighed heavily at the looks on her people's faces when she came in that morning. "What'd she do this time?" Piggot asked, resigning herself.

"Junior shot Commander Calvert, ma'am."

It took a supreme act of will to keep from smiling. "Did she have a good reason?"

"Yes, ma'am. Commander Calvert had just shot the duty officer and was attempting to escape. Junior took exception."

"Who and how are they?"

"Smythe and the vest took all of it, ma'am. Just a couple bruises."

"You didn't call me because?"

"Procedure, ma'am. When you're off, you're off unless it's an A-class threat or better."

Piggot's lips pursed in annoyance. "What happened then?"

"Junior told Commander Calvert that if he resisted being arrested again that she would shoot him again."

"Did he?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Did she?" Piggot asked eagerly.

"Several times, ma'am. She put a bullet in both elbows and both knees to go along with the ones she'd already put in his left kidney. Then she kicked in his teeth for trying to talk and told him that she'd gouge his eyes out if he tried to look at her."

"What brought this on?"

"Intercepted a call from a known villainous number to Commander Calvert. Duty officer went to ask him to explain and Calvert pulled a gun."

"Where is she now?"

"Already waiting in your office, ma'am."

Emily nodded cheerfully in acknowledgement.

"They wouldn't let me call you," Taylor said the second Emily entered her office.

"Alright," Emily agreed. "Do you know if they were able to pull security camera footage?"

"Yes, ma'am, and then got Armsmaster to do something to improve the resolution and sound quality. There should be a link in your inbox."

Emily opened her email program and was gratified to find that, yes there was a link to the video. She watched the first few seconds before pausing.

"Why did you shoot him in the kidney?" Emily asked mildly. "I'm the one who taught you to shoot so I know damn well how good you are at it. I would have expected to see heart shots or spine shots or lung shots. But kidney? That's low and to the right from your perspective. Painful, sure, might put him into shock, but it isn't instantly disabling."

Taylor turned red, her eyes dropped to examine the woman's desk. "I shot before I had a good sight picture," she mumbled.

"What was that?"

"I shot before I had a good sight picture, ma'am," Taylor admitted. "I was so excited that I started pulling the trigger a bit too early."

"Fine." Piggot leaned back in her chair. "In that case, don't worry about it."

"Ma'am?"

"I wasn't scolding you for bad shooting, I was making sure you didn't try to do something fancy. You shot minute of bad guy in your first armed engagement." She held up a hand. "What you did to Hookwolf doesn't count. Your blood was up and you had and overwhelming advantage. You did good, kid. Keep it up."

"Yes, ma'am," Taylor squeaked.

"Why'd you kick in his teeth?"

"You told me that as I got older, it wouldn't so much be the things I did that I'd regret but the things I didn't do, ma'am."

Piggot raised an eyebrow.

"There are masters that can master people through people they've already mastered," Taylor said defensively. "I read a case about that last week."

Piggot nodded. "And?"

"And I knew that I'd rather be punished for excessive force than punished by you for not taking advantage of a golden opportunity to wipe some of the smug off of Calvert's face, ma'am."

"Very good. What have you learned?"

"That Vista is capable of getting to New York and press-ganging their Protectorate in seconds and that it's unlikely any of us can stop her from making day trips to Disney World now that she realizes that, ma'am."

Piggot considered the matter for a couple seconds before thumbing the key to her intercom. "Vista still in the building?"

"I believe so, ma'am."

"Tell the wards that I've got a secret mission for Vista. Tell Vista that I need her to go get a couple pizzas from a place I know in New York. Have her come to my office first so that I can give her my order and the money to pay for it.

IIIIIIIIII

Carlos considered the story he'd been told. If nothing else, it confirmed his decision to never do anything to get on Taylor Hebert's bad side. The girl had a better arrest record than the vast majority of the Protectorate. Anyone who could take three capes without powers was someone to watch.

"Why didn't you stay and fight?" he asked. "Sure Taylor won, but you and Missy could have been needed."

"Boss says jump, I jump. I don't waste time asking her how high," Shadow Stalker replied.

"The middle of a fight is the wrong time to start questioning orders," Vista concurred. "I thought about it later and I realized that Taylor was right. We had a possible Master/Stranger situation. Most important thing was to make sure the base was alerted. She realized it in an instant."

"That's why she's the boss," Sophia agreed. "She's not just the most dangerous predator in the room, she's also the smartest."

IIIIIIIIII

Emily stared at her intercom for a few seconds, her mind unwilling to process the words she'd just heard.

"Repeat that," Piggot ordered.

"Tattletale of the Undersiders is on line 1345 for you, ma'am. She says that she and the rest of her gang were working for Coil, Commander Calvert, and that she would like to switch sides now that he's in custody."

"Did she say why I should listen to her request?"

"She did, ma'am. She said that she was recruited at gunpoint, ma'am. She, uh, says that she's willing to split the cash she looted from Commander Calvert's accounts if you say yes, ma'am."

"Damn it." Emily sighed. "Fine. Put her on."

"Good afternoon, Director Piggot," Tattletale's voice crackled. "Please forgive the poor sound quality, it's a result of the voice changer and all the things I did to make it difficult to trace this call."

"You want to join. Why?"

"Quite simple, Director. I'm a thinker, meaning I'm squishy, and I'm not sure the Undersiders are powerful enough to remain independent, meaning I'm not sure they're powerful enough to keep me safe. In short, we need to join a bigger gang if we want to survive in this town. None of us are asian, not all of us are lily white, and none of us are interested in becoming brain fried druggies which leaves the Protectorate as the last gang in town."

"The Protectorate is not a gang," Piggot snapped.

"It's close enough," Tattletale replied, smug dripping from every syllable. "That was part of the sell to the others. Bitch, Hellhound to you, likes the idea of joining a bigger pack. Grue likes the idea of your resources solving his problem. Before you say anything, his problem is something you'd likely be willing to solve and doing so will ensure his loyalty to your organization. Both Regent and I want protection."

"From whom?"

"A specific group of villainous capes for Regent. For me? From everyone."

"Why now? Why not just take the money and run?"

"We would have if not for Junior." Lisa smiled widely. "Coil wasn't even interested in seeing the report I did on her, you saw where that got him. Are you interested in my report? It details exactly why I want to work for her in great detail."

"Summarize it," Piggot ordered.

"She's the sort of person that would tolerate almost anything you do to her without retaliating but she'll happily crawl through a hundred miles of thorns to piss on the grave of anyone who did anything to one of the people she considers hers. That sort of loyalty and the protection it grants can't be bought for all the money I stole from Coil's accounts."

AN: Didn't think I'd write more of this, seems I was wrong.

Typos by Conspiracy, Ronnie McMains II, James C