Assault glanced up at the girl, her bone-white mask gleaming in the starlight.
"Hey Guinevere, how're you holding up?"
"I am well." She cocked her head at an angle thoughtfully. "I sought you out to inform you that I have apprehended several criminals."
Apprehended.
Assault sighed. He should probably radio Control and let them know…
Nah. Velocity can be there in a heartbeat if he needed it and MM's stressing enough for the whole of their little branch these days –retraining the Wards, playing Computer Monitor, and dealing with Beardface's socially stunted self is enough for anyone to go mad.
Besides, how bad can it really be?
xXx
Very bad, it turns out.
A large pile of pale bodies lay in the middle of the sidewalk, the blood pooling underneath it congealing quickly in the brisk air of the winter's night.
"Guinevere... didn't Piggot give you that pamphlet on excessive force and powers," Assault drawled, eyeing the mound with a cautious eye. There're a few Merchant dealers he recognized… an old, retired ABB enforcer that's been playing the part of an angry drunk recently. Dead, now. Welp, that's one thing to cross off the List of Many Petty Annoyances.
Wait… is that a swastika tattoo?
Kinda hard to tell, with all the blood.
"I did not need excessive force," the tall girl replied lightly. Assault could practically hear the genuine smile of pride and humor behind that stoic mask… actually, how'd she avoid getting blood spattered on it? Her armor's drenched in the stuff –to the point of looking ominously dark in the blueblack of the night. "They sought to strike me first, thus allowing me to respond in kind out of 'self-defense.'"
Assault idly wondered just how he would be able to word this in his report to keep Guinevere out of trouble. The girl doesn't really seem to understand second chances… or restraint, for that matter.
Piggot probably would've seen this as Guinevere disassociating from humanity as a whole… she'd no doubt then push for a kill order while ranting about how "that thing needs to go before it has a chance to learn how we operate, blah blah blah, subverting our methods, insert radical discriminatory phrasing about killing us all."
Honestly, the poor girl can't control her origins. And if her dear daddy was even half as cuddly as he seemed… well, is it any wonder that a child of his might need a little bit of a… learning curve?
Assault restrained a sigh.
At least Armsy isn't on patrol tonight. Dear Colin wouldn't have responded well to such a flagrant disregard for the law, or the unexpected threat to the current status quo –regardless of the innocent intent behind it. Hiding behind some dusted off regulation, the Tinker probably would've tried bringing Guinevere in out of a mix of righteous indignation and pricked pride. Really, the man needed to loosen up on rules and regulation.
Actually, so did Dragon for that matter. Hmm… maybe they could loosen up together? But how to go about arranging it? Armsy's too oblivious to notice that Dragon spends most of her well-earned favors on needless "tinker-tech consultations" with him. Idiot might even genuinely think that Dragon of all people needs his help.
Really Colin, She's Dragon of all people. The reverse-engeinner the captured magic tech of our enemies and turn it into our superpowered magic tech. Why would she need your help?
Not that the Canadian tinker is any better, of course. Poor girl would probably blush like a virgin on her wedding night if Ethan tried to do anything too blatant. Maybe he could get Puppy in on this. She seemed to be having fun playing matchmaker with Icarus and Shadow Stalker –not that the two Breakers really have all that much in common.
Well… thoughts for another day.
For now, Ethan was just thankful that there was a silent sort of… unspoken agreement around the office to keep Guinevere away from Director Coldheart and Captain Beardface as much as possible –until Guinevere crosses a line. Aegis had actually been the one to convince most of the Wards to be friendly to her. Vista's still a little wary, but even she agreed to give Guinevere a chance to make her own decisions.
To give the girl a chance to be her own person, to make something of herself…
A chance.
Now it's up to him to try and keep Guinevere from losing that chance before she's even started acclimating to… humans. Would the girl be offended by being thought of as humans? Does she even consider herself human? How does humanity compare to her? Hm…
"I thought that you were staying at Hebert's house?"
"Daniel Hebert fell asleep soon after arriving to his abode. His daughter seemed... disconcerted with my presence." Guinevere murmured quietly, the tip of her tail gently brushing against the concrete. "I thought it better to wander for a spell, if only to allow her time enough to fall asleep."
Hebert had a daughter? That's right, he did, didn't he? What was her name? George from Sigma Squad mentioned it offhand when Hebert came burst through like hell on wheels the other day…
…Thalia? Taylor? Something like that, he was sure. Probably around Shadow Stalker's age by now, right? Puppy said something about being a little hellion around that time, so maybe it was a puberty thing. Ethan was an only child and had never really had any close friends growing up.
"Maybe she needs time to get to know you?"
"…Perhaps. She held herself well, ready to fight or to flee at a moment's notice," Guinevere mused aloud, vague approval in the echoes of her voice. "Never let me out of her sight, and arranged herself to be easily overlooked."
Easily overlooked? That can't be right.
Didn't George say that his squad did security for the Dockworker's Union once? That Hebert had wrangled some pro bono "official protection" from Director Coldheart for a construction project. Something about the kid being a "delightful little chatterbox" and "almost enough to make me want one of my own."
But kids changed right? Teenage drama, puberty-fueled angst and all that? Just in case, Ethan made a mental note to talk to Shadow Stalker and Dean. See if one of them knew the girl... something felt off.
"Not that it would have helped," Guinevere's idle musing cut through Assault's intense contemplations. "Honestly, you humans are rather… fragile. I fail to understand why more of you do not wear armor."
"Well," Assault began with a smirk. "Most of us aren't nearly as rough with each other as you are with us. And for the most part, we capes try and keep the squishy civies out of our brawls."
"Except for your insurgents," Guinevere returned.
"Which is why they're criminals," Assault nodded, feeling his budding good humor fade. "And not all of them serve their gangs willingly. Some've been pressganged into it or feel like they don't have another option. Part of the law's job is to show that there are other options."
"But there are not. Not always."
"No… not always," Assault winced. "But that's why we try to improve. Try to better ourselves and to learn from our missteps. Because sometimes we can turn an enemy into a friend. An opponent into an ally."
"A turncoat will turn again," Guinevere declared with an odd sort of finality. "You should not leave beasts at your back."
Assault sighed. Puppy was so much better at explaining this than he was… albeit, he had needed it beaten into him, but that wasn't exactly her fault –he was the thick one.
xXx
Polished up for grammar. Trying to avoid slipping into "passive voice" where it's unwarranted. Doing so makes it seem like things are happening at a distance, like you're reading a screenplay of a movie rather than (an attempt at) a story.
Probably going to revise it more later on. Life happens and free time is scarce.
Eric Jtunn: thanks for the feedback! This's my first attempt at writing something non-academic related, so I know that I have a lot of room to grow. I really, genuinely, appreciate the time you took to provide feedback! I've edited the wording to make it seem a little bit more stream-of-consciousness and to (hopefully) fix the confusion of him knowing/not knowing about Taylor's existence. As for the info-dumps… yeaaaah, I'm trying to work on that. I'm not great at writing fiction but I'm hoping that with experience and EDITS GALORE I can fix that.
^.^
Akallas: Hey, fancy seeing you here! What's a person like you doing on a forum like this? I'm glad that you like what you're reading! Even if what you're reading is the rough, unholy bastard child of a first time writer with far too many thoughts and little enough time to write
x3