Devil in the Church: Interlude Partner

Missy stared at the blank form in front of her. Questions needed answers. Summary's needed to be written to explain her actions. The Director herself gave her until nine to get it done. That was two hours away. In all the time since she was grounded to the Ward Room, she hadn't done a single one. Instead her mind wandered over the Directors ire over her disobedience, and of course how to write the report in a way that wouldn't make Gambit look bad.

She could understand, did understand, why Ms. Piggot was mad at her. Missy knew she was breaking all kinds of rules to help Gambit, but it was the right call. Even Velocity said so, even if he said she couldn't tell anyone he said it. She might have been the Ward with the most experience, but in the eyes of the public, she was 'cute little Vista'. The last thing the PRT, Protectorate, and especially the Ward's Program needed was something bad to happen to one of them and make it so that they couldn't help anymore. Everyone knew Director Piggot got away with a lot more when it came to them than other places did. Something that made Missy happy to be apart of the Brockton Bay team. Here, even if they treated her like a little kid most of the time, they could still do some good.

Unfortunately, that was half the problem now. Taking the initiative like she had wasn't doing Gambit any favors. As Missy thought about it, if anything, her actions were going to make the PR people point the finger at Gambit for the stuff that happened, and that wasn't right. Had Missy been older, she knew the scrutiny wouldn't be nearly as bad as it was. There wouldn't be any if she as one of the adult heroes.

But her being young didn't make her wrong. Sadly, it also didn't help with the damn report. Missy didn't have a problem taking her lumps when she earned them, and she earned her share this time, but Gambit didn't deserve the crap that was being said about her. If anyone knew that, it was Missy. She was there, talked with Gambit, saw the drive that sent her to rescue the victim.

If that wasn't heroic, then they needed to redefine the term. Seriously.

It was a welcome distraction when the green light above the door turned on signifying someone trusted was entering. Until opened and showed it was Dennis.

He looked rather rough around the edges. Once inside the door closed and he took off his mask showing his face was as emotionally haggard as his costume was. Walking over to her table, he sat down.

"Dennis," Missy started to say before the cape across from her shook his head.

"Assault finally came in."

"Gambit?" She asked worriedly.

"Wasn't in the building," Dennis answered looking just as relieved as Missy suddenly felt. "The only thing they found was her coat and those three guys you said were in the building."

"Were they…"

"Yeah, still alive but in a bad way. Rushed over to Mercy General but Assault said they'll likely pull through."

Blowing out a breath, Missy slumped in her seat. She personally knocked out one of those guys on the ground floor and it had been weighing on her terribly.

"What a mess, right?" Dennis half joked.

"You're not kidding. I still don't know what to put in the report and the Director want's it by nine."

"Tell me about it. She just reminded me I still have to do one for Bay Central."

Wincing at the reminder, Missy reached over to grab her friend's hand. "I'm so sorry for not being there, Dennis."

"Don't be," he assured her. "I would have done the same thing. At least you managed to do something other than making an ass out of yourself in front of half the city."

"It was that bad?"

"Yeah. Did you hear what Chris pulled?"

Missy shook her head. She hadn't heard anything since she was banished and only snippets of what had happened as she made her way here.

"You know that big ass gun he's been obsessing over? The one he tried justifying was for A class threats?"

"He didn't."

Snorting, Dennis nodded. "What do you think tore up half steps and the lobby? Regent knocked him out and started firing the damn thing everywhere. I'm just glad he didn't know how to change settings. Chris had it on low and the damage that thing was doing was nuts."

"That explains what I overheard about Chris being in lockdown."

"Director's orders pending oversight review," Dennis confirmed. "Even if they cut him slack, he's still going to end up with huge restrictions and even harsher oversight over his tinkering."

"That sucks. Poor Chris."

"Poor all of us. Man, this day, seriously."

"No kidding," Missy sighed looking at the whiteboard someone dragged in. The Undersiders were listed each with their own columns. Powers, assessments, and observations. "At least we know more about them. They never stuck around long enough for us to get a feel for their powers before."

"Yeah, Carlos tried spinning that as the upside earlier. Would have been more impressive if he hadn't been holding a couple of towels in the giant holes Hellhound's freaky dogs gave him."

"How badly was he hurt?"

"They used him like a human squeaky toy," Dennis answered. "Two of them even tried to play tug-a-war with Carlos as the rope. Would have been funny except for all the blood and the big holes in his body."

Shuddering, Missy's eyes looked to the other whiteboard in the room. This one, with Gambit's name listed on it. Someone had added the known factors from her file, which wasn't much. Basically boiling down to explody powered playing cards, current suspected villain connections, and the like.

Looking at Dennis showed he was looking at the board as well. Like her, he wasn't in any hurry to be the first to have to pick up that pen.

"She saved that girl," Missy whispered drawing Dennis to look at her. "Gambit. If it wasn't for her, I never would have been able to separate the victim from her kidnappers. She cut their numbers so when they got careless, I could use it. She stayed and bought time for me to get us out of there. Gambit is the only reason I was able to do anything."

"Write that."

"I can't," Missy sighed, throwing her pen on the table. "For everything good there's something bad and I'm worried that the only thing they care about is the bad. They're not going to believe Little Vista that the only hero in that fight, was the villain."

"Tell me about it."

Seeing frustration on his face, Missy asked, "Dean still giving you a hard time?"

"That is a completely different problem," Dennis growled. "Sorry, Missy. Just, leave that one alone, alright?"

"Yeah, sure."

After several moments of silence, Dennis got up to get his own report form. Once seated back at the table and noticing Missy still hadn't written anything, he asked, "So, how bad is bad?"

"Pretty bad," Missy hedged. "I went back to school because I heard the gunfire. By the time I got there the fight was on the other side of the campus. There was a couple of cars smashed up out front and a witness I could barely understand trying to tell me her friend was being kidnapped and Gambit was chasing them."

"Why couldn't you understand the witness?" Dennis asked.

"She was talking so fast I barely caught every other word," Missy answered with a smile. "I know her from Science class, she's always like that but she was pretty shook up earlier. Even tried to stop the kidnapping herself."

"Really?"

Missy nodded. "Yeah, one of them gave her a black eye that's going to take a long time to fade too."

"Damn. Remind me not to pick a fight at Lords," Dennis tried joking. "So where did the bad come in?"

"There was an unconscious guy lying in an indented roof of car with a car door laying next to him," she continued. "If he didn't have any broken bones, I'll give you my Ward allowance for a month. Wasn't hard to find the action from there. Gambit left a couple of others beaten unconscious. I caught up in time to see her hit a guy into another getaway car and when I approached her she was carjacking some civi's car to chase them. That was all before we left the school and doesn't account for the stuff that went down when we caught up to the kidnappers."

"Yeah, that's bad."

"Yeah," Missy muttered. "But, you know, she was fearless the whole time. They shot at her, and it just didn't matter. She just kept throwing herself at them. Even had me put her on the hood of the getaway car while it was moving just so she could safely wreck it without hurting the victim."

"She did what?" Dennis asked wide eyed.

"Yeah, it was one of the craziest things I've ever seen. Your girlfriend is nuts," Missy said. However, her mirth didn't last long. "I was so worried about her when she went through that boarded up window though. They sent two guys with tinker rifles in after her but she was alright because one of the screamed. Since she was alight enough to fight, I used the distraction to get Dinah away from the kidnappers. Once they let go of her, I was able to snatch her back."

"That's what led to you guys going in that old building?"

"Yeah. Gambit's idea actually."

"She suggested it?"

Shaking her head, Missy clarified. "No. I made a joke about how my power is kind of like a funhouse, but without the fun. Gambit joked back saying it depended on which side of the glass you were on. It's what gave me the idea. They saw us going in, and when they followed, I used my power to twist everything into a funhouse of warped space.

"I was able to knock out one guy that way and break their tinker weapons but they trapped us on the second floor. That's when Gambit saved us again. Dynamic Entry right through the window. Even used a couple of one liners on the guys chasing us."

Looking across the table, Missy stared directly into Dennis's eyes. "You should have seen her go. She blew a hole in the wall so I could use my power to get us out of there. Then she kicked the crap out of those guys. I mean, she was just all over them, Dennis. I saw her power at work, if she wanted to she could have killed them at any time. But she didn't. She limited herself to just trying to knock them out."

"When we were hanging out, she didn't say it, but I don't think her powers have a 'safe' setting, you know?" Dennis added.

"On your date?" Missy asked, smiling.

Rolling his eyes at the blatant trolling, Dennis nodded. "I suggested we didn't talk about powers and stuff cuz, you know. But some of the things she said make me think that. I mean, her powers are exploding things and nothing in her file suggests she's ever used them to their full extent. She's known for knocking her enemies around, not blowing them up, but based on stuff, she could."

"It would explain a whole lot," Missy agreed. "That was the only reason she couldn't break free to get to us. Those guys were tough and just wouldn't stay down. Then the building started coming down and she yelled at me to get Dinah out. I swear I was going to go back for her, Dennis. But…"

"You did what you had to and there was the victim to think about," Dennis sighed. "I don't blame you for that, Missy."

"She sacrificed herself for us," Missy muttered. "I don't know what went wrong after I left, but I saw the flash and that had to be Gambit. Something went bad in there. I know she brought down that building to make sure we got away but no one is going to believe me. I just hope she's alright."

"She wasn't in the building so she had to have been alright enough to get away. Assault told me PD looked around for a few blocks but didn't find any trace of her."

Looking around, Dennis leaned in toward the younger girl. "I didn't say this, but on our date, she noticed some people following us, like she noticed you and Chris. Called someone and told them to back off. I don't know who it was, but she was joking with them. I think whoever that was found her and got her out before the cops started looking."

"Oh, I hope so."

The alarm brought both of their attention to the door, and the green light above it. When the door opened, the mask face of their graduated friend greeted them.

"Thought I would find you two here," he said while removing his mask.

"Rory," Dennis greeted. "What brings you down here with the beaten and downtrodden?"

"You guys actually."

"That's not ominous," Dennis said. "Please don't tell me Ms. Piggy sent you down here to hassle us over the reports."

"No, and don't call her that. And if Director Piggot asks, I wasn't here at all," the lion themed hero stated. Grabbing a seat, he joined them at the table.

Seeing had both Wards attention, he directed his to the younger girl. "A couple of things. First, you are lucky you walked away from today alive, Missy. What were you thinking going solo against those kinds of people? Do you realize what could have happened to you? What it would have done to us if you died?"

Her open mouth closed at his look. When he was sure she wouldn't interrupt him, he continued. "Now that that is out of the way, secondly, thank you. I know you're taking a huge hit for it but thank you for what you did."

"What?" Dennis asked, blinking at the heartfelt words from the older teen. Looking to Missy showed she was just as confused as he was.

"You have no idea who you saved, do you?" Rory asked as his eyes moved between the teens. "The girl you saved today was Dinah Alcott. Dinah is my cousin."

Grinning at the stunned looks his announcement generated, he continued. "I don't know her very well, but I've babysat for her a few times a couple of years ago. I've been on the phone half the evening with Dad who was also on the phone with my Uncle over what you did for us."

"Man is that what this whole thing was about?" Dennis asked. "Someone was trying to kidnap the Mayor's niece?"

Rory nodded. "Dad thinks so. My Uncle isn't in politics, owns a dealership over on Preston in downtown, but the concern about it happening has come up in the past. There's another reason why it might have happened, but we're not talking about it yet."

"It wasn't just me, Rory," Missy finally said. "I mean, I didn't know and your welcome, but I was just in the right place at the right time. I was just trying to help. But it wasn't just me that got her free. The whole thing couldn't have happened without Gambit."

"Yeah, Gambit," Rory chuckled strangely. "Trust me, that has come up a lot too. Dinah's been begging for information on her and telling anyone who will listen how worried she is about Gambit. Partly why I'm here."

"We don't know anything you couldn't find out by talking to the adult heroes," Dennis groused. "Seriously, you're likely to hear something before either of us does."

"A fair point, and one I've already looked into. Talked to Ethan when I clocked in. Also talked to a few others and had a look at what is known so far. Which, isn't much."

"Has anyone found Gambit?" Missy asked. "She could be hurt."

"No. Theory is she's gone to ground and talk is that until she surfaces, we're not going to find her," Rory answered. "Rumor is she's good at this kind of thing."

"What did Dinah say about what happened?" Dennis asked. "How did Gambit even find out what was going on? Missy said Gambit was trying to stop it as it was happening."

Looking to the younger teen, Rory raised an eyebrow. "You know that officially, I can't comment about that kind of thing, Dennis."

Giving it a moment, he smiled. "Unofficially, I can tell you, Dinah said a lot. However, I know for a fact one connection between Dinah and Gambit is that Dinah is part of the same Girl Scout Troop that Gambit's been hanging around with. Saw it myself when I answered a call with Prism to check out one of the meetings and Assault said both were at another girl's birthday party."

"No way," Dennis said, smiling widely. "Dinah is part of the Girl Scout Mafia?"

"The Girl Scout what?"

"Hey, I didn't start that," Dennis said over Rory's chuckle and Missy's giggles. "That's what Assaults been calling it. I heard it from a PRT trooper who was laughing about it after Assault told him Gambit was teaching them how to play poker."

Leaning against the table, Missy put her chin over her hands. "You know, Ms. Halls is always after me that I need a hobby that isn't beating people up. Maybe I should join the Girl Scouts. That will give the Mafia two capes and we did work pretty good together. I bet we would sell all the cookies."

"I doubt very much that is what the Youth Guard rep had in mind for a hobby, Missy," Rory said, rolling his eyes.

"I know. That's half of why I think it would be fun," she replied impishly before sighing. "Especially if my report is as badly received as I'm worried about. I think I'm about to beat out Dennis for the longest run of Console duty ever. Not to mention how I'm afraid they're going to hang Gambit for the things that happened."

"Which reminds me," Rory muttered, reaching into his costume. After a moment, he looked at Missy in the eyes. "Privacy bubble?"

Blinking at the odd request, the air around the table began warping. Everything beyond them twisted into caricatures of normality.

Nodding thanks, Rory held his hand out to Dennis. "This, never happened. Just like what I'm going to say, wasn't said, and if anyone ever asks me if I said it, I will deny it. Okay?"

Reaching for the small item, Dennis held the earring between two fingers looking confused. "Dude?"

"Rumor has it that it's more likely you're going to see Gambit before anyone else does," Rory said. "She might want her earring back."

"Are you serious?"

"That I didn't give that to you? Yes. Yes I am. Just like I'm serious that Ethan didn't fail to put that into evidence and gave it to me."

"You guys could get into so much trouble for that," Missy squeaked.

"Rory, seriously, what the hell?" Dennis asked.

"Between the three of us," Rory explained seriously. "This didn't happen, so no one should get into trouble for anything. That said, it doesn't matter. People know she was there so this doesn't mean anything. Ethan said he owed her for calling in that Empire pit fight and this was his way of cleaning the slate between them. It might not mean anything, but he said it looked 'old' to him so it might mean something to Gambit to get it back. Which wouldn't happen for a long time if it's in evidence."

"Rory, if anyone finds out about this," Dennis said. "And if this was a deal to Assault, why get you involved?"

"Because he's been banned from talking to anyone in the investigations because it's known Gambit is something of his pet project. It's no secret around here he's been trying to turn her hero," Rory explained. "He wasn't even supposed to be at the site, and Piggot tore strips out of him as soon as he got back."

"But, why you man?"

"Because he knows who Dinah is to me and knew I was going to come up here," he answered. "Now you know why I asked Missy for privacy. You guys know what this means if it gets out."

Once heads nodded in understanding Rory continued. "Good. Now that we're all agreed that this didn't happen, I'll ask a question I didn't ask. How's the report coming, Missy?"

Still a little punch drunk over events from the normally straight laced hero, she answered honestly. "I haven't even started it yet."

"Because it would make Gambit look bad?" he asked.

"It kinda is bad," Missy nodded glumly. "I just know they're going to focus on that and make her the scapegoat. You weren't there, Rory. She so doesn't deserve this."

"Maybe," Rory conceded. "Want some advice?"

"Could you help me make this not make Gambit look bad?" Missy asked hopefully.

"You would be amazed at what I learned about report writing from Ethan," Rory smirked. Looking at the hopeful faces in front of him, it faded somewhat as he continued. "I will say this. I don't know if Gambit is a villain or not. Everything about her is circumstantial but none of it would even be in her file if there wasn't something to it."

Rory raised his hand to stop Dennis from talking. When he closed his mouth, Rory continued. "But, I've met Gambit and she seemed like a stand up cape. She was good to the Scouts, and I know for a fact she risked her life for Dinah. For that alone, she gets a pass for today and I'll keep an open mind until someone can conclusively prove one way or the other if she is, or isn't, a villain."

"You're the best," Dennis said, clapping his older friend on the shoulder. Missy nodded smiling as she grabbed her pen.

"To be clear, this won't be something I'll do again," Rory warned the Wards. "I'm not even doing it now, and the only reason I am here is to make sure neither of you try fudging the report and making more trouble for yourselves than you can handle. I have no idea what the official stance on today is going to be, but a lot of that will have to do with the PR spin. That spin starts with the report. Piggot will wait to see what the blowback is going to be and what grace we have is that Dennis here screwed up publicly at the bank."

"I'll take that hit," Dennis nodded easily.

Smiling, Missy asked, "Where do we start?"

"Keep up the bubble and give me the sequence of events. Leave nothing out," Rory answered.