Snarl 3.2

On Thursday night I headed to the Docks. The route was a familiar one, one I'd taken plenty of times as a civilian and every night since Tattletale had raised her proposal. I still wasn't very comfortable about it. When I went out as a cape, I usually stuck to the southern areas around my neighborhood or the fringes of the Docks proper, Merchant territory, while my current destination was firmly under ABB control.

I tugged on my power and found my reserve of energy responsive, a comforting weight compared to the potential hostility of the surroundings. It was nearly full, reduced only by the trio of eye-spies I'd summoned at the beginning of the trip and had circling over me, providing an excellent view of my surroundings. The month of operating as a cape had given me practice with my power, which included practice with control. As a result, I'd been able to lessen my daily routine of exhausting my energy pool before school. I still didn't quite have it down to a point where I could avoid reducing it at all, but I had a good enough grasp on it that I could reduce it to a level that would recharge to full over the course of the day before I went out at night.

It wasn't a perfect system. When Sophia got in a painful hit or Emma delivered a particularly cutting remark, I still felt my power rising up in response to my impulsive desires. But now I was able to stamp it back down and keep it under control. I'd been tempted to let it out on several of those occasions despite my newfound control, half out of spite and half out of curiosity whether it would create some new creature. It had produced minions to spy and conceal as I'd needed them, so why not something to verbally tear Emma down?

I'd talked myself out of it every time. My cape life and my civilian life would stay separate as much as I could keep them, and I had no intention of changing that. While I was at school I would be Taylor Hebert, powerless teenager, no matter how tempting it was to lash out at the Trio via minion, or even just send an eye-spy into the city so I could distract myself with the view during the worst of the bullying.

No, my cape life would only influence my civilian life when I became a Ward and got to transfer out of Winslow to Arcadia. The thought had sustained me enough that I hadn't skipped school again. I just had to put up with things for a few weeks longer and then it would all be behind me.

Or perhaps only a few days longer, depending on how things went. The idea of turning a group of superpowered thieves over to the Protectorate and fast-tracking the lengthy process I'd envisioned was a tempting one, but also one I couldn't be certain of. I was operating with what I knew from a few sparse wiki pages, forum posts, and word-of-mouth from Tattletale herself. Going to some planning meeting for the job she had in mind would inform me about the job itself, but I needed to know the context around it. Intel on the Undersiders would be helpful, but I needed to know if I would have options if I went along and everything went belly up. The skeleton I had of a plan for getting caught by heroes on a criminal enterprise would be to claim mercenary status and ask to join the Wards. It wouldn't be a lie, Tattletale was essentially asking to buy my services for one job, but I needed to know how far that would carry me.

My options as far as finding those answers were limited. Asking the PRT or Protectorate was out of the question considering I was only entertaining the idea of doing the job as a way of accelerating my goal of having enough footing to talk to them in the first place. A professional lawyer would be equally as ludicrous given the prices they charged. So that left the only people with firsthand, professional experience with that sort of thing in the city. Faultline's crew.

Which led me to Lord's Street. Early in our arrangement, I'd asked Tattletale to list areas in the city I should avoid going to for one reason or another. The list had been short, more because the city was so full of gangs that few areas were worth noting as particularly dangerous than because the city was safe, but Lord's Street had been one of those. She'd noted it because of the high density of ABB gangsters who frequented the area hoping to prey on shoppers, but she'd also made an offhand comment about Faultline's crew operating somewhere nearby.

Which led me to my visit. "Somewhere nearby" was a wide area, but my power had a good range. Every night after Tattletale had made her proposal I'd come here and spent a few hours sweeping the area with my eye-spies, hoping to pick up some sign of Faultline or her crew. I hadn't called Tattletale during that time either. It would have been so easy to let that streak continue and toss the phone away. I would have been perfectly justified too. She'd broken our deal after all, no reason to keep up our agreement. Depending on what I learned from Faultline, assuming I ever actually found her, it might still be in the cards.

But I didn't. I'd weighed pragmatism against idealism and come very close to just throwing it out several times over the course of the week. But Tattletale was still a resource. Whatever else, she was reliable with her information and I could still make use of that if I turned down the proposal.

I tried not to think about the fact that she was also the only person my age who'd been even remotely friendly to me in the past few months. I'd been trying not to think about that a lot over the past few days as I debated the merits of finding assorted ways to sell out the Undersiders to the Protectorate. I hated that the first thing approaching friendship I had was a mutually beneficial business relationship, and I hated that I was in a position where I had to decided whether to betray that, even if she had invited it.

I shifted focus from that line of thought with the same thought I'd been using, that I still didn't have enough information to decide one way or another. Hopefully I'd find Faultline soon. If I wanted to stay effective in my efforts against the Merchants, sisyphean as they seemed, I'd have to make another strike soon. Like it or not, the best way to do that would be with Tattletale's help, and I refused to call her before I had an answer.

I arrived at Lord's Street and continued the next step of my little ritual. Using an eye-spy to tell me when and where I could move without risking an encounter with any wandering gangsters, I headed to the short building at an intersection. One shifter-provided peg ladder later and I was atop the building with three eye-spies spiraling out to canvas the area. The shifter stayed with me to help me move between buildings down the street, with one eye-spy in overwatch to tell me when I could move between roofs without being spotted.

As with every night before, it was tedious. Considering Faultline worked with two Case 53s and a Shaker known for large distortions to the landscape, one would have thought it wouldn't be so hard to track them down. It was to be expected though, one wouldn't last long in a city with this many capes on either side if you were easy to find. I'd considered trying to find them through whatever means people used to hire them, but I didn't exactly have an encrypted computer to make those searches on.

It was hours before I spotted him, within minutes of the time I usually called it a night. A morbidly obese man wearing a hoodie with the hood pulled up, a stuffed convenience store bag held in one hand. With the hood up he might have successfully hidden himself from me, but my eye-spy saw his face clearly, the shadows of the hood and the night reduced to a tone of grey. His face was crusted with growths, ranging from the size of pinheads to thumbnails. I let my eye-spy sink lower in the air to get a better look, relying on its small size to hide it against the dark sky. He wasn't wearing a mask, but he had the right build and seemingly the right aberrant features that I was sure it was Gregor the Snail, one of Faultline's employees.

I kept tracking him with the eye-spy as I descended to ground level and began running to intersect his predicted path. It wasn't that far, only two streets over. A month ago that would have tired me more, but my morning runs had helped get me into shape. For once, being stick thin with long, gangly limbs was in my favor, each step carrying me farther with less weight to push forward. I wasn't anything near a track star, but I was optimistic about how much better I would get with time. Still, I stopped running a bit before I actually intersected the street he was on. I didn't think it would make a good first impression if I was asking him a favor while still breathing heavily.

I waited in the mouth of an alley for him to approach, watching through an eye-spy until he was close enough for me. I steadied myself for a moment, then stepped out into the path of the mercenary.

"Gregor the Snail?" I asked.

He stopped and regarded me for a moment. It was odd being able to make out less of his face at a closer distance without the eye-spy's night vision. It wasn't just the darkness either, there was something off about his face. Whether or not seeing it in full would have put me at ease was something I couldn't be certain of. Some of the descriptions I'd found for various Case 53s had been grotesque or nightmarish, and the pictures I'd seen of his mask fully covered his face. I settled on being glad for the darkness.

"That is me." He replied, his voice carrying an accent I couldn't pin down. "If this is an attempt to start a fight, I would ask you to reconsider. I do not wish to take part in a street brawl at this time of night."

He raised his empty hand with the palm out in a nonthreatening gesture. I tensed anyways. I'd read enough about capes to know that the gesture wasn't necessarily harmless. With parahumans, a pointed finger or an upraised palm could be akin to pointing a loaded gun. I didn't miss that the gesture bought his palm up to face me, presumably so that if a fight broke out he wouldn't have to waste time aiming before unleashing his power on me.

Not that I intended to fight. I suspected by his unperturbed tone that his request was more out of a desire to avoid a hassle than any real fear, which would have been reason enough to back down even if I hadn't been planning for this to be peaceful from the start.

"No, I don't want to fight." I said.

Gregor made a noise that was half affirmation, half skepticism. "Some people, they think attacking a know cape will bring them reputation, renown." I pointedly avoided responding as I thought about my ideas for the Undersiders and my experiences with Trainwreck and Squealer. "Others seek to assault those like me, thinking that beating a freak will win them favor with the groups that are more monstrous in action than I am in appearance."

He still didn't drop his hand.

"I just want to talk to your boss." I hurried to reassure him. "No fighting, no… whatever, just a talk."

Gregor hummed quietly. "A talk. Do you wish to hire us?"

"No." I said hesitantly. "I just want advice."

"Then I believe I will decline on Faultline's behalf. We are not in the business of giving free consultations." His tone was impeccably polite, a clear dismissal as he moved to step around me.

"Wait!" I said hurriedly. I didn't move to block him though, I had no desire to incite him to lash out and leave me incapacitated while he left. "I'm new to the cape scene here. I just want to know my options."

Gregor stopped a few steps away, turning his head back a bit to look at me. "You wish to join our group?"

"Maybe." I hedged. It wasn't wholly a lie, but if that's how he wanted to interpret it, I wasn't going to correct him. "I mainly want to know how it works being a mercenary, doing the kind of work you do. Your crew is the only group like that in the city I can ask."

He was silent for a few moments before turning around to face me. "Very well. I will try to arrange a meeting. But there are conditions. If Faultline does not agree to a meeting tonight, you will leave and only return at a time and date of her choosing, and only if she is willing to meet with you. Whether the meeting takes place tonight or in the future, you will be blindfolded and l will lead you to the location, where Faultline will meet us. Do you accept these terms?" His tone wasn't that of a question. It was an ultimatum: accept the terms, or no meeting.

I didn't really have a choice if I wanted to do this. I nodded.

"Stay here." Gregor said. "I will be back in a minute."

I watched as he walked halfway down the alley before digging a cell phone out of his pocket and making a call. I presumed he was calling Faultline to set up a meeting place. The alternative, that he was calling someone to deal with me, wasn't one I enjoyed considering. I'd cross that bridge when I came to it.

I resisted the urge to put my hands in my pockets while I waited. No need making him suspicious about what I had on me. Not that I had anything on me that would be a threat to him, with the exception of the pepper spray, or maybe the screwdriver if I used it as a knife. Though from what I knew of his power, both of those were debatable.

I occupied myself while he was on the phone by considering how I would deal with it if things turned violent with Gregor. Nothing I could do would really hurt him, which meant none of my minions could do anything to him besides just dogpiling him unless I wanted to resort to letting them use claws and fangs. No, if worst came to worst and he attacked me, my priority would have to be on occupying him long enough to get away.

I waited for a few minutes until he finished his call and approached again. "You are lucky. She has agreed to meet with you tonight."

He reached into his bag and pulled out a large t-shirt, clearly sized for him. "May I blindfold you now?"

Not quite the bag-over-the-head I'd been expecting, but then, I doubted he had cause to do this enough that he carried blindfolds as a matter or habit. I nodded and inclined my head to him as he stepped towards me.

Gregor stepped closer and pulled the shirt over my head like an improvised hood. Then he grabbed the fabric and began wrapping it back around, layering the cloth over my eyes to block off even the faint traces of light I could see and typing off the loose fabric to make sure it stayed tight on my head. In a matter of seconds, I was blind.

I watched all this happen from the perspective of my eye-spy hovering in the air some hundred feet above us. Agreeing might have been necessary, but I wasn't going to be stupid about it. He'd even spared me the trouble of lying by not asking if I had any powers that would render the blindfold useless. I suspected the gesture was largely symbolic rather than practical, a way to show who was in charge of the meeting.

In any case, I was largely unaffected by the loss of my sight, and so I wasn't surprised when I felt his hand grab my elbow, guiding me to follow him as he walked. I didn't like him holding my arm, but I accepted it as a guide. It wasn't a guide I really needed with an eye-spy showing me where I was walking, but he clearly thought it was necessary given the blindfold.

We walked in silence for a few minutes before he spoke. "How did you find me?"

I considered the question for a moment before deciding there wasn't any harm in telling him. "I knew the general area where your group works, so I just searched there. It took me a while to find you though."

"Yes. And you found me out of costume, carrying a shopping bag. Did it occur to you that I am off the clock?"

I nearly missed a step as he led me along. I hadn't. I'd been so caught up in finally finding a member of Faultline's crew I'd just acted immediately before he could slip away again.

He kept talking without waiting for a response. "Were I another cape you would have ignored me, perhaps not even realized who I was. But I am a Case 53. So you did not hesitate. Case 53s, we do not get secret identities. We cannot hide or blend in with ordinary people. And so you approach me as if I were going around in costume, when all I was doing was picking up groceries in the body I have."

"I'm sorry." I said, completely meaning it. I hadn't fully considered the context of approaching him, and having it revealed and thrown at me in so stark a manner left me feeling guilty and embarrassed.

"Perhaps you are." Gregor said. "But you still did it. It was rather insulting as well, throwing in my face that which I lack while wearing a mask of your own."

"Is there something I can do to-" I cut myself off in the middle of the question. I wanted to make it up to him, but I also couldn't think of a way to do that that I would be willing to do.

"By the unwritten rules, the typical penalty for finding another cape's civilian identity is to unmask in turn." Gregor said, cutting right to the core of my fears. "But Case 53s, we do not benefit as much from these rules. As I have stated, we do not get secret identities, so we are not protected by the rules surrounding them."

He shrugged a gesture I would have missed without the eye-spy to provide me sight. "In any case, I am not a vengeful man. I have endured worse than the thoughtlessly insulting actions of a teenager. I can endure this as well. But perhaps you will remember this, yes? Avoid repeating this mistake in the future?"

I nodded shamefully. "I will. And I am sorry."

He didn't respond this time, merely continuing to lead me on in silence. Out of all the ways I'd imagined this meeting going, I hadn't expected it to begin with a massive guilt trip. I deserved it though after managing to breach the unwritten rules by accident just by approaching him. And come to think of it, I'd done much the same thing to Trainwreck too, even if I hadn't known he was a Case 53 at the time. Considering how much I worked to keep my two lives separate, I was doing a shitty job at allowing others to do the same.

I almost felt bad about shifting gears to consider the possibilities if this meeting turned against me. But the desire to not get beaten into a pulp was stronger than remorse, so the feeling passed fairly quickly, or at least was relegated to the back of my head along with all the other embarrassing moments I remembered at the worst times.

The good news for me was that Faultline's crew didn't kill. Every source I'd found on them, from their wiki page to the forums, agreed on that. So if worst came to worst, I'd get beaten up but left alive. My best option might actually be just letting them whale on me until they were satisfied, both conserving the energy for my minions and supporting my interests of making sure no one got a chance to see how my power really worked.

But that was something I would do as Taylor when faced with the Trio. As a cape I wouldn't let myself get victimized, so I'd have to fight back, or flee if that was a poor option. And how poor of an option it was depended on who she had with her. If it was the entire group, I'd be screwed no matter what. If it was only one or two of her people, I'd still be in big trouble. From what I'd read, Newter, Gregor, and Labyrinth could all take me out of the fight almost immediately if they got a chance to use their powers on me. I had next to no information about their newest member, Spitfire, but with a name like that it wasn't hard to guess her power would probably put me in the hospital if given half the chance. Faultline herself was actually the weakest power-wise, with a Manton limited matter destruction power that wouldn't even harm my hoodie, much less me. But she was still a trained mercenary and the leader of the group, which meant I couldn't afford to underestimate her, especially since I was coming here to ask questions of her expertise. Besides, I had plenty of personal experience to prove that supposedly weak powers could still be effective if used right.

The building we stopped at was a diner. From the lack of lights it was clearly closed, which Gregor didn't seem to care about. He hauled open the side door and led me inside. For a brief moment I debated swooping in my eye-spy to get through the door with us, but decided against it. A second later the door closed, and for the first time since he'd put the blindfold on me, I was truly blind.

I followed him into the building, unable to see where I was going or what was around me. My power surged in response to my unease and I had to push it back down to stop myself from summoning a new eye-spy. I'd grown used to the freedom having extra eyes gave me, and now I was robbed of it. I sent my existing eye-spies flying around the building, looking for an opening they could wriggle through to join me. But this wasn't a run-down warehouse or a conveniently open garage. I couldn't find a way to get them inside.

Before I could, the blindfold was pulled off my head. I readjusted my hood as I looked around. We were in what looked to be the back room of the diner, where they kept the boxes of ingredients that didn't need to be refrigerated. Gregor loomed to one side of me, stepping to the side and back, placing himself out of my line of sight and where I would have to get past him to get to the exit. Clinging to one wall was a cape I immediately recognized as Newter, a boy my age with bright orange skin, a tail, and green hair. He wore clothes similar to Gregor's, the kind that could hide his unusual features if he wore them right.

Standing in front of me was Faultline. Compared to Gregor and Newter, both of whom were wearing ordinary clothes, her costume was of high quality. The main part of it was a dress, not long enough to be obstructive and not short enough to be skimpy, blended with the aesthetics of martial arts gear and liberal use of body armor. Her face was hidden by a welding mask, with a stylized crack running across it at an angle rather than a visor to allow her to see. It was well put together, both good looking and useful, and I felt a pang of jealously as I compared her costume to my ramshackle assembly of ordinary clothes and dye.

Gregor and Newter remained silent as she looked me up and down. "So," she said at length, "The Bogeyman wants to talk to me."

The statement put me on edge. I hadn't introduced myself to Gregor, he hadn't asked. Either he'd figured it out and passed it on, she'd figured it out only a few seconds after meeting me, or they somehow knew me already. I could reasonably rule out the third option, as my eye-spies had never picked up anyone watching me, which meant that either one of them had excellent intuition or I was worse at being covert than I hoped I was. Still, I'd spent days working to make this meeting happen. I couldn't back out after only one sentence.

"Yes." I said.

I waited a moment for her to respond, but she waved her hand in an indication for me to elaborate.

"Like I told Gregor," I said, "I'm new to the cape thing. I wanted to get a lay of the land, check out my options. The pros and cons of the heroes and villains thing are pretty publicly known. Stuff like rogues and mercenaries gets glossed over, and you're the only mercenaries in the city I could ask about it."

I paused for a moment, then added one last point before she could reply. "Specifically, I'm looking into my options that don't involve signing up with Tattletale."

Faultline had seemed like she was about to say something, but she stopped when she heard that. Behind her, Newter glanced at Gregor, who I could only presume shared a look with him. Tattletale had never explicitly said it, but it was clear she and Faultline didn't get along well. Whether that was for personal or professional reasons, I had no idea, but I hoped Faultline would be willing to talk with me if it meant taking a potential ally away from Tattletale.

"Why Tattletale?" Faultline asked. Her voice was still as stern as before, but I thought she seemed a bit more interested than when she'd first talked. Or maybe I just hoped she was, but there was no point in backing out now.

"She approached me, offered me a job." I replied. "Promised pay, assistance, connections. I'm wondering if it's worth it to sign up with her, work with her as a mercenary, or whether I should just avoid her altogether."

Faultline scoffed. "I'll tell you right now, nothing in the world is worth signing up with that smug bitch."

I wanted to ask more about that, but instead I stayed quiet. It hadn't been an actual response to my request so I didn't want to respond. Looking back on my talks with Tattletale I'd noticed a pattern when she'd made her offers, periods where she stayed quiet and let me think or talk at her without giving me anything to seize on other than considering the options I had. As I was now in a business partnership with Tattletale and considering going on an actual job, I hoped it would be as effective here.

I occupied myself trying to guide an eye-spy into the building.

A few seconds passed before Faultline spoke. "Alright, two questions. One, what do you want to know? And two, how much are you paying for the answers?"

I suppressed a wince. I'd been hoping she'd be willing to give me answers without charging for them. "I don't really have much money. I can give you fifty bucks now, another hundred and fifty if I get my savings."

Faultline sighed. "Look, kid, it's clear to me that you're not very experienced with negotiating. I get it, I was there once upon a time. So were these guys before they joined up with me."

She gestured to Newter and Gregor. Newter nodded, though he didn't speak up as Faultline kept talking. "Why don't you join up with us? We make enough that a hundred and fifty dollars will seem like chump change, you'll get opportunities for training extra skills, and we can go over the mercenary stuff in a nicer place than the back room of a restaurant."

The offer of money and training could have been a tempting offer if it was in the short term, but the way she phrased it didn't sound like that's what she had in mind. Joining likely meant unmasking, which would make leaving the group a much harder process, and I'd likely want to leave sooner rather than later if I joined given their status as a semi-nomadic mercenary group. I thought of Dad and all the times I'd heard him complain about how the Docks were going to shit or sat through a school presentation talking about the very real dangers of getting mugged, killed, or kidnapped by the gangs. No, leaving the city wasn't an option. Their nature as a villainous group only solidified my decision. I felt a bit uncomfortable that their villain status hadn't been the first thing I thought of to immediately dismiss the idea, but I stifled the discomfort with the self-assurance that I had decided against it anyways.

"Thank you for the offer, but no." I said, trying to politely phrase my denial. I didn't offer an explanation, and she didn't ask for one.

Faultline didn't visibly react, though Newter seemed disappointed. I'd roughly figured things out by now. Faultline was stoic or just professional enough that not much of her emotions showed through, while Newter was not only expressive, but he didn't wear a mask. He'd be the one to watch for reactions as the conversation went on.

"Really?" Faultline said. "Word on the street says you've been doing vigilante work, but if you're considering working with Tattletale you can't be so squeaky clean that you're refusing on principle."

It stung to hear her so casually assume I had an openness to villainy. It was enough that I almost reconsidered my entire plan for the Undersiders. If she made that assumption so quickly after hearing that I even considered working with them, what would it be like if I actually did the job and was found out? I shook my head, but didn't answer aloud.

She waited for a moment before accepting I wasn't going to say anything else on the matter. "Fine." Faultline said briskly. "Give me the fifty dollars and tell me your power."

I was already reaching into my pocket for the money when I heard the second half of her sentence. Newter seemed surprised too, though he quickly tried to school his face back into a neutral expression. Probably not a good sign. "Excuse me?"

"Your power." She said impatiently. "Tell me what it is. Powers are all different, which means they all need different advice. I can't give you anything besides the generic stuff unless I know what you can do."

I weighed the options in my head. Better advice versus compromising my best advantage of keeping the specifics of my power under wraps. I didn't need to think long.

"No. I'm fine with the generic advice." I said.

"Really?" Faultline said exasperatedly. "You came to me asking for advice. If you're not going to be open to a simple request, you're just wasting my time and yours."

I cast a glance to Newter. He seemed tense at the situation unfolding, looking between me and Faultline. He knew Faultline better than I did and I assumed that meant she was unhappy enough that things might unfold poorly. Still, I wasn't willing to back down.

"Generic advice is fine." I said. "I just need to know the basics for now."

Faultline stared me down for a moment. I met her gaze, the mirrored lenses of my goggles hiding my eyes. After a few seconds she scoffed and held out a hand for the money, which I passed to her. She flipped through the bills for a second to count them before nodding in satisfaction.

"Fine." Faultline said. "You want to be a dumbass, less competition for us. First, find a niche. Bodyguard work, hacking, information retrieval, they all require different skill sets. Find what you're good at, stick to that. Second, always demand partial pay up front. You'll never get a full half unless you're dealing with an amateur, but asking for it gives you a good start for haggling."

She pocketed the bills and stepped away. Newter hopped down off the wall, flipping up his hoodie and pulling down his long sleeves to hide his orange skin. I took that to be a sign that Faultline was done talking.

"Wait!" I said hurriedly. This was not going how I'd hoped. "How does the hero-villain thing work with being a mercenary?"

Faultline looked back over her shoulder at me. "Kid, I could teach a class about the difference in work coming from heroic and villainous types and how the public takes it. But you paid me fifty dollars, not a teacher's salary. Short version, no one ever calls you a villain until they see you breaking the law, and that's all you're getting out of me. Gregor?"

I heard a wet noise and something struck my foot. I tried to stagger and found that only one leg moved. Looking down, I saw a glistening mass of slime encasing my other foot, gluing it to the ground. I yanked on my leg to no avail. I was stuck tight.

I seized on my power in preparation to summon savages and defend myself, but Faultline and Newter were already circling past me to the exit, making me twist around to watch them. "Nothing personal, but I'd rather you didn't get any ideas about following us." Faultline said. "Don't worry, it's harmless. Give it an hour and you can pull yourself loose."

She glanced at Gregor as she spoke, who nodded an affirmation. He was holding the door for Faultline and Newter to walk out before he moved to follow them. He gave me one last look before the door swung shut behind him, leaving me alone in the back room of a diner.

I calmed myself and pushed my power back down. It might have been my imagination, but I suspected Gregor had looked a bit pleased about leaving me glued to the floor. Not that I could blame him for it given how I'd approached him. I could appreciate the reasoning too, I would have done much the same in their position.

That didn't mean I was happy about it. I pulled harder on my leg but remained resolutely stuck. The feeling of being trapped in place really didn't sit right with me, and the method brought to mind memories of glues and adhesives smeared across seats and floors. So while I could appreciate the caution, their attempt to stop me from following them really just pissed me off.

Not that it actually impaired me any more than the hood had. I still had my eye-spies, and after how this meeting had gone, I had no qualms about sending one to follow them as they left the diner. I wasn't sure if they'd actually go anywhere worth noting while they were still in my range, but it was worth a shot. At the same time I summoned a savage to try and claw my foot free, though I had to dismiss it a moment later as its claws got stuck in the glue. I'd be waiting the hour after all.

That gave me time to think. This meeting had been, generally speaking, a waste of time. I hadn't lost more money than I could replace by looting a few gangster's wallets after taking them down, but I'd apparently gotten what I paid for. That actually annoyed me more than if they'd been outright hostile. I could have dealt with getting attacked, or at least I would have survived. Instead I'd gotten mocking condescension when all I wanted was some advice.

It wasn't bad enough that I was going to attack them over it, though the thought crossed my mind. They were too competent, and their powers were too good for that to end well for me. Tracking them with the eye-spy was more of an impulse decision, though one I was coming around to as I thought about it. Worst case scenario, I learned nothing. From what I could see, they were taking a deliberately circuitous route to wherever they were going, doubling back and taking shortcuts in what I assumed to be an attempt to shake any tails. If their destination wasn't somewhere they'd reach soon or fell outside my range, learning nothing seemed the likely scenario.

Best case, I'd learn where their hideout was and I'd have that info in reserve if I ever needed it. The location of a villain mercenary team's base would probably go nicely with any info I gathered on the Undersiders when I handed it over to the PRT. It wouldn't be much in the grand scheme of things, but it would certainly be more useful to the heroes than Faultline's sparse advice would be to me.

'They don't call you a villain until they see you breaking the law." I snorted and tried to pull my foot free again. I didn't need her to tell me that, my biggest concern about taking Tattletale's offer had been over making sure I wouldn't be linked to a crime. Well, maybe second biggest concern after my constant one-person debates about how and whether to betray them.

If nothing else, I'd met some of the other capes in the city at least, marking the second time I'd ever come face-to-face with another cape without violence arising. And both of those meetings had been with villains, which did not do wonders for my personal image even if no one else knew.

I sighed and pushed the goggles up on my face to rub the bridge of my nose. This all left me roughly back where I'd started: in need of more information. If anything, it only convinced me even more that I needed to know more about the situation before making a decision. And there was only one way I could think of to do that.

Tattletale had said I could come to the planning session for whatever job they decided to pull. Going to that promised information on whatever job was in the works, as well as an opportunity to learn about the other Undersiders. From whatever I learned there, I could decide whether to proceed farther with the job and find an opportunity to try and turn them over to the Protectorate despite the counter-scheming Tattletale was sure to be employing, or to just play it safe and just inform the Protectorate of everything I learned about the group in the one meeting.

I ignored the stray thought that arose at the idea of betraying them by using what I'd learned abut them against them, one that made me compare myself to someone who regularly did much the same to me. This was different. We weren't friends, our connection was purely business. Besides, she'd been the one to raise the idea of betraying her. I couldn't be blamed if I did it. It wasn't the first time I'd had the thought and made the rebuttal, but it still wasn't easy.

In any case, I needed to go the that meeting to learn more. I pulled out my phone and dialed Tattletale. As it rang I watched Faultline, Newter and Gregor through my eye-spy. They'd started talking, though only after several minutes of travel. Another show of caution I could respect, remaining silent until they were farther from a potential adversary. Even if I tapped into my eye-spy's senses I wouldn't be able to hear them without moving it in closer and putting it at risk of detection. I wasn't willing to take that risk, so I just watched.

They cut around another building, but rather than continue down the street they went in the front door. Quick observation showed the building to be a nightclub, with gaudy glowing letters spelling out "Palanquin" on the front. I doubted they'd just go clubbing right after a meeting, especially since Gregor was carrying bags from shopping. They'd gone right in the front door too, cutting right past the line outside. Clearly they had some sway there. Was it their hideout, or were they just well-known there? In any case, it was worth remembering. I had an hour to kill so I set my eye-spy to watch the entrances and exits in case they left for another destination.

Tattletale picked up after over a minute of ringing. "Hey, Bogeyman! It's been a while."

I interrupted her before she could get going. "The job. You mentioned a planning meeting?"

"Yup." She said, popping the P. "We lay out all the blueprints, talk over everything we know about the place, put together a plan, order takeout, all the good stuff."

"Okay." I said. "When is it?"

"For our next job? Tomorrow." Tattletale replied immediately. "Are you in for the job?"

"I'll come to the planning meeting," I said, "On two conditions. One, I get paid up front. Whatever I would get at the end of the job, I want you to give me half of it at the meeting."

"Half is too much." Tattletale shot back. "Ten percent."

"Forty-five percent." I countered.

"Twenty."

"Forty."

"Thirty."

"Thirty-five."

"Done." She said. "You know we don't actually know what the final haul will be until we've done it, right?"

"You've done other jobs before. Make a high estimate, take it out of my pay at the end if it's too much." The possibility that there wouldn't be a payout at the end, or that I might not even be there for it, went unspoken but understood.

"Sure." I could tell she was grinning. "And the other condition?"

"You have that one meeting to convince me to go along with the job." I said. "If I'm not satisfied by the end of it, I'm not coming on the job and I'm keeping the thirty-five percent."

"Fair enough." Tattletale replied. "Meeting at eight o'clock at night then?"

"If you want me to attend over phone. It would have to be later for me to make it in person, after ten at least."

"Okay, we can work with that. I'll call you tomorrow at ten with the location then."

"Got it." I said before hanging up.

I let out a breath and tucked the phone away. All in all, it was about as good an arrangement as I could get. One meeting and I'd probably have enough information to try and reach out to the PRT, while I'd certainly have enough money to make up for everything I spent in my early stages of preparing to go out as a cape. I'd just have to make up some reason to be dissatisfied with the plan, assuming it wasn't unsatisfactory to begin with, and I wouldn't even have to truly betray anyone.

I tried not to acknowledge the bit of relief I felt at the idea.