A Waken 14.4.T

Things escalated quickly.

Eventus' crew was gathered at a conventional-looking shipping yard. Apparently the Elite owned most of the riverside, so it took a few thinkers and one weird tinker to find exactly where they were. Rows of cargo containers right next to the water, trucks on one side, and an office building at the center.

It looked like a dozen places I'd seen before back in Brockton Bay.

Oddly, I'd yet to crash into the parking lot of one, grab a man by the collar, and drive him into the ground before.

Firsts are nice.

Cursing and shouts erupted around me as I lifted the Brute and slammed him back down. He dug a crater with his back. Unfortunately, that didn't stop him. Brutes are cheaters.

A hand grasped at Exia's forearm and squeezed. The creak of E-Carbon groaned in my ears, but he could only press so hard before his fingertips began to slip. The arm was too big for the small Brute to really get a good grip.

"That's cute." The Full Armor's sub-arms unfurled from behind Exia and grabbed the Brute's shoulders. "But I have more hands than you."

The man snarled at me. "Bit—"

I pressed the twin-linked cannon on the right arm into his chest. "There are minors present, sir."

I fired. His fingers left my suit's arm entirely, scoring only a small dent as the blast of GN particles slapped him into the ground and dug a deeper crater.

To my right, a woman in a tux and masquerade mask raised her hand and snarled. Whatever she planned to do didn't happen. The front gate shattered and laser fire filled the air.

"Housenka, with me."

Behind me, Chris' suit slid over the ground as he broke through the smoke and dust. Another suit followed behind him. Blue, with a single eye mounted in the head and large shield-guns on the shoulders. Chris planted the base of his shield in the ground. His beam rifle peppered the air with energy, knocking guards onto their backs. Housenka's suit took up a position behind him, the shoulder-shields swinging up as she fired both guns at a charging man.

The beams didn't stop him.

"Ramshackle," Halberd identified.

The cannon over my right shoulder swirled and fired, blasting the ground at Ramshackle's feet and sending him tumbling. If nothing else, he didn't have super-balance.

A dozen tinkers flew over the front gate, beams firing and grenades dropping. More in heavy armor charged in, shields or field projectors out and blocking incoming fire. A few of the flying tinkers went right to the roof of the office building that overlooked the shipping yard. They occupied the corners at the top and started shooting.

"We have their attention," Halberd announced.

The guy really was an Armsmaster fan. His armor and weapons were similar, though something about it seemed off. Ill-fit. He was good though. He landed right behind Ramshackle in a flash of movement. The thrusters on his boots and shoulders folded into his armor and he hooked the Brute's leg with his weapon. Ramshackle's balance broke, and Halberd jumped back before a hand cracked the ground where he stood.

A strong wind blew through the yard.

Dragon's ship roared, spinning about as it emerged from the river side of the shipping yard.

"Elysium is on the right," Xcaliber noted. "Keep her away from Sunstone. Tecton, Ramshackle's power redirects all energy into the ground beneath him. Can you cancel it out?"

The back door of the ship dropped open, and thirty more tinkers poured out. Tecton hit the ground first, a shock wave snapping out and flipped the trucks parked along the side gate.

"Let's see," he replied. "Aid, set up by the gate there. Anyone gets hurt you go to Aid. Matchlock and Waveraider, guard her."

The yard wasn't busy as we arrived, but it wasn't empty either. Armed guards scrambled, some throwing their weapon's down and surrendering the moment the sheer number of capes shooting back became obvious. The capes started pointing and shouting, and the handful of unarmed civilians working the yard scattered.

"Green, Red. Civilians."

"On it, on it!"

The two Haros popped out of the small cubbies on the Full Armor's pack and popped their rotors. Both Haros began flashing their eyes red, white, and blue.

"Butt kicking in progress, butt kicking in progress!"

"This way to surrender, this way to surrender!"

"Housenka and I will hold the front gate," Chris decided. He'd gotten really assertive at some point. It was nice.

"Direct civilians to the nearest exit," Xcaliber ordered. "Foam anyone who surrenders or acts suspiciously. We'll need special measures for Elysium and Sunstone. Be careful with both of them and I repeat, do not let them join forces!"

He dropped out of the ship last, a huge sword slung across his shoulders. His armor was red and blue, with a big gold X spanning his chest. The older boy emerged as the de facto final say as we'd organized, while Halberd and Tecton served as lieutenants.

Even then, it didn't feel like being bossed around so much as a good plan being a good plan. Kind of refreshing to let someone else do that for a change. I got to focus on dishing out hurt.

The sub-arms lifted Brick—I did not name him that—from the ground at my feet. The thrusters fired, throwing me into the air as Chris organized a guard for the front gate. I dragged Brick up with me, grabbing hold of his collar.

Grasping the spare shields from the Full Armor pack and, the extra set of hands reached over my shoulders and shielded my chest. A wave of ice-light—I didn't know how it worked, it was light and ice began growing anywhere it touched—slid over the shields. For a moment, my eyes darted left.

Eidolon stood on a rooftop two blocks away, watching. Rebound was with her, and two other capes I didn't know. They were drinking coffee.

They really intend to let the Wards handle this unless they can't.

I swung Brick like a sack and launched him.

Elysium jumped out the way as the Brute bounced off the ground and sailed into the shipping containers. The whole stack began to tumble, steel crying and snapping while the mountain of cargo and metal buried the Brute and rolled toward Eventus' small group.

"Holy shit!" someone exclaimed.

"First time seeing Newtype in action?" Chris asked.

"She just used that guy as a projectile. Are we allowed to do that?"

"If they're a Brute," I answered.

Eventus pointed and shouted while the woman at his side raised a hand. The asphalt rippled and then peeled away as vines ripped their way out of the ground. The dark green appendages coiled around the falling shipping containers and knocked them aside.

Or in one case, lurched them toward me.

A missile from my shoulder pod met the impromptu projectile and the container blew apart before her vines even released it.

"You'll get used to it," Chris suggested.

sys.v/ Dryad
sys.v/ powerful shaker
sys.v/ her power is similar to labyrinth's

Didn't seem simil—Oh, she meant it got stronger the longer she was in one place. Good to know.

It seemed Eventus had a thing for brutes and shakers, contrary to my assumption that there would be few fighters in his merry little band. This was probably why he was winning the civil war. The thinkers who made the group their money must be on the other side, and a bad match if this kind of firepower came right at them.

Good thing we went in with twice as many Tinkers as I initially expected.

I didn't wait for the debris to clear.

Exia charged through the smoke, over Eventus' head. I grabbed Dryad by the throat and drove Exia into the ground. Vines tried to wrap around me, but they were too slow. I spun about, firing the twin-linked cannons at Elysium while the shoulder cannon swiveled the other way. The beam fired, blasting through a wall and throwing someone in a costume back into the bathroom stall he'd been using when we arrived.

"That's so mean!" Optics proclaimed. "But pretty neat you can do that! X-Ray vision? No, you're using sonics!"

"Optics," Xcaliber chided, "focus."

"I'm focusing!"

I dodged right, well aware of Blastout's position. Optics managed to mark everyone in and around the shipping yard before we arrived. I had all the information I was accustomed to the Haros providing, all from one small cape with a somewhat uncomfortable amount of enthusiasm.

I wasn't going to complain.

It hadn't even been a minute, and the shipping yard was already a war zone… And that metaphor already felt in bad taste, given the circumstances. Still though. We knew where all of the capes were. We knew where the guards were. Wards and independents cut off every escape and executed a simple plan.

Divide and conquer.

I contributed by dividing Dryad away from Eventus.

Chris and Housenka fired their weapons, forcing Elysium to run one way while Eventus scrambled for cover with a few armed guards in the opposite direction. He was shouting some cliché like 'you can't do this.' Pretty absurd really. What exactly did he think we couldn't do, and who was going to stop us?

There were ten blue dots on my HUD—all found and identified by Optics—and not one member of the Protectorate was moving to stop us. Neither were the four blue question marks Halberd identified as members of the Elite opposed to Eventus. They were watching from across the river in New Jersey.

The message the Protectorate wanted to send was taking shape. Maybe. Was Uppercrust really in the hospital, or did he conspire with the Protectorate to spread false information?

It would make sense. He was cooperative, played ball. Eventus apparently wasn't expected to follow suit. If the old tinker's health was failing, it would make sense to secure a more favorable successor, especially if the Protectorate didn't want to do something even more extreme.

This was despite appearances, a subtler message. Play ball or get overrun. Surprisingly like my style, my qualms with the Elite aside.

I sped down a long alley between two rows of shipping containers and swung my feet forward. Dryad yelped as her body got thrown away by the sudden deceleration, and cried when her body snapped back into my chest. I dropped her on the ground and turned as five Wards crept through a hole they'd made in the fence.

"Can you handle her?" I asked.

"Um, yeah? Is she—"

The woman wheezed at my feet.

I rolled my eyes behind Exia's faceplate. "I know what I'm doing."

Paradoxically, despite being a cape for less than a year, I probably had more experience than a lot of the Wards. Maybe that was something to consider. For those like Halberd, who'd been heroes for years, seeing someone as new as me rise so fast might engender some bitterness. Should have thought of that before.

I jumped back into the air and spun around.

Armsmaster wasn't wrong. The Wards were good, but I saw all the signs of inexperience in many of them. Many of those present weren't even part of NextGen, they were led by those who were. That former group was overcautious or overbold. No one had gotten seriously hurt yet, but a big part of that was raw numbers.

Even the Empire at its peak would buckle if someone dropped forty capes on them with no warning.

"We're sweeping the office building," Halberd declared.

He led nine forward, past the line Chris, Housenka, and three others had set up at the front gate. They moved straight across the front of the yard toward the office building. Several guards had run inside, and three capes were still there.

Xcaliber swept the back of the yard in a clockwise motion, moving with ten other Wards. They'd surrounded three of Eventus' capes and about a half dozen armed guards. Figured they could handle that. Tecton had an equally sized group moving counter-clockwise and surrounding Ramshackle.

That left Elysium, north of the front gate, Sunstone around the back, Eventus hiding behind an overturned truck, and the three capes in the office building. Sunstone hadn't been engaged yet, and Eventus had all but surrendered in humiliating fashion.

Elysium was fighting though. Bough bounded over a broken container and threw a grenade at her. The woman waved her hand and a field of ice burst into being and caught the weapon before it exploded. The ice-light continued, and Bough threw himself to the side to avoid it.

Offense and defense in one package.

"Surround Elysium," I said as I turned toward her and fired.

Chris and Housenka pushed up, using their suits to shield other Wards as they poured fire at the woman. She managed to stop some of the beams. They fizzled out or dissipated from the cold—must be very cold—and projectiles didn't reach her at all.

Objectively, it actually looked pretty with all the light and snow dancing about her little ice garden.

"She is dropping temperatures at a rapid rate," Veda noted.

"She can't do that forever," Bough said. Admittedly, his soft voice was hard to hear with all the noise. "She gets colder the more she uses her power. She'll have to stop soon, unless Sunstone gets to her."

"I have eyes on Sunstone," Xcaliber announced as he turned his team directly toward the woman. "Keep the brutes contained."

Ramshackle took a volley of laser beams from the roof of the office building, and Tecton slammed his hand to the ground. I turned and fired all three of my cannons and launched two missiles. The resulting explosion sent a small mushroom cloud into the sky, and with the sonic cameras I saw Ramshackle stumble and collapse.

"Ramshackle down," Tecton declared. "Foam him!"

I wasted no further time and turned toward the office building.

I aimed at a woman moving through the top floor of the office building at the center of the shipping yard. The blast bored through the wall, sending debris and glass showering down toward Elysium. The woman looked away for a moment as debris fell toward her.

"There's an idea," Chris snapped. "Bomb her!"

I burst forward, chasing my original target. Chris could handle Elysium.

The woman tumbled out of a window and sloppily righted herself in the air. Almost. Exia flew over the roof and slammed into her while she searched for balance. I wrapped an arm around her and dove, launching the woman forward before I hit the ground.

Xcaliber snapped around for a moment, then turned back toward Sunstone as I crashed both my spare shields into Arclight before she could get up. Getting driven into the ground didn't stop her from snarling at me.

Eventus really had a thing for brutes.

A thought occurred to me as I ducked back to avoid a blast of the woman's power. "Has anyone ever told you your name makes no sense?"

Arclight didn't give me a verbal response. A sort of silver shimmer surrounded her as she pressed her feet to Exia's stomach and pushed. It wasn't light though, more of a mist. And it definitely didn't arc.

I jumped up, pointed Exia's thrusters down, and fired. Arclight grunted as the backblast slammed her back into the ground. I flipped in the air, fired my pistol at two men with guns and my cannon at Sunstone as she tried to get around the back of the building to Elysium. The woman reacted fast, raising a wall of molten asphalt and metal to block the blast.

Guess that was why we didn't want her linking up with Elysium. Fast freezing and fast heating. Instant thermal explosion.

I spun back around and fired as Arclight glided over the ground. She swung her leg at me and the silver shimmer of her power cut out in a wave. Did that count as an arc?

The four shields around Exia opened and the shimmer rolled over the wave of GN particles projected in front of me. I fired again. Arclight dodged to the right and kicked off the wall toward me.

She threw her other hand forward.

I decided, "That's not an arc, it's a wave." One of the sub-arms from the Full Armor pack swung around, knocking the woman's hand aside as the shimmer of mist blew over my shoulder. "They're not the same thing."

The second sub-arm slammed her in the chest with a shield, knocking her toward the river. I chased her as she flew back and grabbed her leg. Swinging my second Brute of the day, I whipped the woman overhead and down into the water below.

The Hudson is filthy by the way, so I did feel a bit bad about that. Her name was stupid, but she had the kind of hair I had and clearly maintained it well. I sympathized, just not enough to not do it.

The surface of the river burst into steam the moment Arclight hit it. I didn't even know her power didn't travel through water. The things we learn in the heat of the moment. She did apparently have the ability to fly out of the water, but that ran into a roadblock when Exia grabbed on and pulled her under the surface. Bubbles billowed around Arclight, but no shimmer came when she threw her hand out.

Pulling my short sword from Exia's waist, I fired the blade down—the Hudson was deep, wow—and tied the cord around her waist. I gave the woman enough slack that she wouldn't drown in the next few minutes, but not enough to get more than her shoulders above the waterline.

A little heat wouldn't break my line.

"Arclight is secure," I announced.

Releasing the villain to float back to the surface, I burst out of the water and turned back toward the yard. The place was a mess, but not as much as I'd expect from all the firepower present. Other than the shattered containers I threw Brick into, the busted walls of the central office building, and a matching set of frozen and molten pits on opposite sides of the yard, things were mostly in one piece.

Optics hummed. "I think there's a basement?"

I turned my head down and switched to the sonic cameras. "There is. I can't really make anything out though." The image was fuzzy.

"Vanbrace," Halberd ordered. "Sweep it with Vulcan and Damascus. Pull back if you encounter resistance."

"When I've had this problem before," I noted, "it's usually tinker-tech."

"Variance in the materials would disrupt sound waves," Optics surmised, with an odd amount of sense.

"Check it out," Xcaliber said. "Be careful. It might be some of Uppercrust's tech."

"Eventus may have tapped into the old tunnel or sewer systems," someone proposed.

"We need to secure that area and assess it."

I checked the time. We'd washed over Eventus' entire group with sheer numbers in five minutes. It was unfair, and I knew plenty about unfair odds. Eventus' crew didn't stand a chance. Though, that suited me.

Only a fool goes looking for a fair fight.

That said, this fight was over.

Ramshackle, Brick, Dryad, Eventus himself, and four other capes were foamed and under guard. Arclight was wading water.

Sunstone was surrounded in the back of the Yard, pinned between Xcaliber and Halberd's teams. The latter must have stormed straight through the office building. I couldn't see into the basement, but I did see a Ward guarding two foamed figures in a cafeteria. The Wards kept a distance from Sunstone, saturating her in laser fire. Her power didn't stop it so well, and her power seemed to have a range limit of fifteen feet around her.

She'd give up soon.

Elysium on the other hand—

Chris's GM and the armor Housenka used slid over the ground and came up behind the woman. From behind a shield, Chris aimed a rifle and fired. He ducked to the left, opening a firing line for Housenka to shoot the cannons mounted on her suit's shoulder.

Elysium responded with her power, sending a wave of cold that froze the ground and air. Chris and Housenka dodged and kept firing. While the woman was distracted, Xcaliber pointed his sword and fired a beam from the weapon. It went over Sunstone's shoulder, sliced through the office building, and hit Elysium square in the chest.

The icy villain was blown into the air between Chris and Housenka, stopping only when she hit a shipping container.

I'd give it to her though, she kept fighting.

The woman caught herself and she stomped her foot on the ground. Instantly ice burst into the air and water vapor turned to snow. The grenades thrown at her didn't explode. Housenka did hit her in the back though, and Chris lunged forward. His armor flashed, the shield vanishing in place of a long staff. The tip ignited into an energy trident and he thrust the weapon at the villain while she was distracted avoiding Xcaliber's second shot.

The villain got her hand around Chris' weapon, but it vanished in a flash and Chris leveled a long-barreled cannon in its place. The weapon fired a wide wave of energy, knocking Elysium off her feet and through the field of ice that had grown around her. Behind Chris, Housenka and two more tinkers launched foam grenades, and they exploded mid-air rather than after hitting the ground.

And like that it was over.

What few armed guards weren't already captured were surrendering. Sunstone had finally dropped to one knee and raised her hands. The writing was on the wall for her. Elysium did manage to freeze con-foam apparently, but that didn't make her any less trapped in the stuff. Chris directed the Wards to keep a distance from her and was talking to Tecton about how to transport both shakers.

"Secure the area," Xcaliber said. "Move everyone but Sunstone and Elysium to the ship."

Halberd pointed his weapon and Aid ran past him in the direction indicated. "Injuries?"

"None."

"None."

"Bough's hurt."

I turned my head.

"I'm okay. Just a scratch." He raised one of his robotic arms. Zooming in, I could make out a score in his armor and some blood. It didn't look too bad. "Honest."

Housenka's suit skated over to him and leaned forward. "He'll be okay," she said. "It really is just a scratch."

"I said honest…"

"No acting tough," Tecton begged. "If you're hurt, say so, or get to Aid. Let's not ruin the moment. Vanbrace, what did you find in the basement?"

"Bunch of tech. Not sure what it does, but I don't think it's weapons or anything."

"Secure it and clear out," Xcaliber ordered. "We'll let the Protectorate deal with that. They have more experience and we won't take chances with unknown tech."

They didn't lose their enthusiasm with victory. The Wards broke into teams. Some guarded the prisoners they couldn't move. Others guarded the prisoners they could.

Red and Green flew at shoulder height by the front gate, eyes still flashing. A small crowd had gathered, but they didn't make a move to cross the line of armored men and women. Troopers had arrived about halfway through the fight, but held back just outside the fence surrounding the shipping yard. They moved in only when Chris waved them in.

Eidolon and the other Protectorate members never moved.

The Protectorate really was letting the Wards do this from start to finish.

I was impressed.

Not just in the Wards, but in this. All of it. This was a bold plan. All these heroes in one of the largest cities in the US. The powers that be were actually making use of it to clean house.

The villains no doubt planned to lay low while so many out-of-towners were around. I doubted many anticipated an all out assault with the Wards at the tip of the spear. The PRT's silence and lack of an 'itinerary' was probably taken as a defensive measure, paranoia borne of recent attacks against the Wards.

Instead, they were using it as a weapon. No one could plan to defend against an attack they didn't know was coming. Improvising a defense against dozens of tinkers storming your doorstep?

Even I couldn't do that.

"Newtype."

Breaking out of my thoughts, I looked down at Tecton. "Yes?"

"Um." He rubbed the back of his helmet with an oversized hand. "Could you fish Arclight out of the river please?"

Oh, right. "One sec."

The woman must have realized what the sudden quiet meant. She put up no real fight as I retrieved my sword and pulled her out of the water. The Wards foamed her, and then moved the contained villain to Dragon's ship with the others. It hovered over the water with the lip of its door resting on the yard.

"Good work, everyone." Tecton helped Aid with those who were hurt, but none of the injuries looked like more than an inconvenience.

A few dings and bruises. Some chills and burns. Eventus' capes really never stood a chance.

There didn't seem to be much for me to do, so I started doing some checking as capes and troopers moved around me.

Chris' armor slid up "You okay, Taylor?"

"Of course, I'm okay." I glanced around. "That was a good idea. With Elysium."

"Oh. Thanks. Figured she couldn't freeze something into not falling." His suit released some steam from its back, and he looked at the scene arounds us. "Don't really need this many capes for cleaning up. Might talk with Xcal, see how we're going to disband this."

"Don't. Not yet anyway."

"Why?"

"Because there might be more before the day is over and we're out and ready."

I'd guessed, and a quick search of social media proved me right. Half the villains in the city were being swarmed. There was a dogfight over Rockaway Beach, a chase in Brooklyn, and fights throughout Queens, Brighton Beach, and the Bronx. Edgewater and Englewood in New Jersey too.

"The Protectorate is letting the Wards clean house," I explained. "It's not just us. There are fights all over the city. Those of us who can fly should group up in case anyone needs help."

"You're not in charge."

Chris and I turned our helmed heads toward Vanbrace. She glared at me, lips set in a scowl. Second time in as many hours this girl was picking a fight with me.

"She's right, though." Tecton stepped between us, looking at Vanbrace warily. "We should split into teams."

Xcaliber glanced around. "Halberd, take those who can fly long-distance and stick with Newtype." From the response, I realized Halberd didn't like me either, he just wasn't vocal about it. "Tecton, can you finish cleaning up here?"

"I can."

"Keep five with you, just in case. We should secure that tinker-tech in the basement. Everyone else, load up in the ship. We'll drop our prisoners at the HQ building and then do any quick repairs we need to do. Be ready to back up whoever needs us. Optics, can you link in with the thinkers?"

"Sure. Why though?"

"Because they're probably in on this and might have something to suggest. If they don't, you can feed them information."

"Oh. Okay!"

Part of me preferred to just go, but this was different than what I normally did. There were fights all over the city, most of them conducted by Wards with Protectorate watching from the sidelines.

I also had eyes on me, and while I wanted to act I wasn't sure what the PRT and Protectorate had in store. There could be more going on, and at the moment playing nice might be the better call. A slip up could work against me, even a minor one.

Still felt weird to be standing around while fights played out elsewhere. It wasn't my usual response. There were advantages to watching, for the moment.

sys.t/ contact sarah
sys.t/ let's see what Schwartz makes of this

I doubted anyone in the PRT or Protectorate knew Tattletale's real name. Even if they dug into her, they'd find Lisa, not Sarah. That name would only have meaning to Veda and I. Anyone else who might intercept the message—and I wasn't taking chances with so many tinkers around—would think I was talking about Schwartz Bruder. Everyone thought I was behind them anyway.

This might be what we needed.

"Thinks she's in charge just because she's big shit somewhere else."

I don't think Vanbrace knew I could hear her. Then again, she wasn't being that quiet. Chris' helmet turned my way. I could feel the apology. It wasn't his fault. Making friends with the Wards might end up being a tougher job than I originally expected. My own choices seemed to be playing at least some part in that.

The other parts though...

I eyed Vanbrace, glad for Exia's faceplate hiding my expression. That I did not need. How many of the Wards got their powers from vials? The Protectorate? By default, I needed to assume they were an agent of someone else. A chat with Count might narrow down those possibilities. Surely she knew which capes got powers from Cauldron while she was in it.

Tattletale thought corrupt troopers would be the path for the attack to come. They might be. Now though, I realized we'd overlooked the obvious.

The Protectorate and PRT were compromised. So too were the Wards. They had to be. If David was about ready to reveal himself, he might not care to reveal that now.

Chris broke me from my thoughts again.

"Right. Taylor, this is Housenka."

"Shiho is fine," the girl said. She'd parked her suit next to ours, and the similarities were striking.

"Do you know Leet?" I asked.

"You noticed too?" Chris asked.

"I don't know Leet," Housenka—Shiho—said. "Why?"

"Your suit is similar to one he used," I explained.

Strikingly similar, as I said. Mostly it was the helmet, marked with a visor and a visible mono-eye. The rest of the armor was sleeker than Leet's, long sloping lines rather than bulbous sections.

"I didn't know that," she replied. "Honest."

"I don't think there were any pictures," Chris mumbled. "Just a crazy coincidence, but my armor looks a bit like Taylor's."

"You've seen my armor," I noted. Only made sense he'd get ideas from it.

The coincidence could be explained without jumping to conspiracies. Powers were alive, and they talked to one another. Did that extend to tinkers and how we used our powers? Could a tinker building one thing in one place end up mirroring another tinker building something in some other place? An interesting thought, but maybe an outlandish one.

"I'd heard more tinkers were making bulkier suits like this," Chris said.

"I guess," Shiho replied. "There's that guy in California with the boxing surfboard thing."

Chris nodded. "Wonder who will make the next on—Is that Dragon?"

I turned around and raised my head. "Yes. That is Dragon."

It was a smaller suit, like the fast response one she brought to Brockton Bay to fight Cranial. It landed deftly on two legs, and rose up to match Exia's height.

"Did we mess up?" someone behind me asked.

"No." The suit marched forward at a steady pace, head turning momentarily to look at a Ward who got hit in the side and was holding her injury. "I'm here to inspect the tech in the basement. You all did very well." She turned her head toward the office building. "Maybe a little more property damage than desirable, but Eventus' cell consisted of several powerful brutes and shakers."

"No serious injuries on our side," Xcaliber said. "We were about to take the prisoners in and ready for redeployment."

"If that's your decision," Dragon replied.

sys.d/ so you can play nicely with others
sys.d/ :]

I smiled.

sys.t/ I'm surprised
sys.t/ this isn't the Protectorate's style
sys.t/ definitely not the PRT's

sys.v/ I do not believe the Wards have ever been so active
sys.v/ and I can search the internet to prove it

sys.d/ I was surprised too
sys.d/ several thought it was a bad idea
sys.d/ I'm not among them
sys.d/ though I think I might have been before
sys.d/ experience changes things

sys.t/ like the Protectorate and PRT's timidity

sys.v/ she is trying to play nice

sys.d/ I know
sys.d/ you could have hit a little more softly
sys.d/ Dryad has a complicated history

sys.t/ a lot of people do

sys.d/ people like Bakuda?

I grimaced. That's not what I meant, but Dragon also wasn't wrong. Was I going to have to defend that choice all week?

sys.d/ it's brave what you're doing, Taylor
sys.d/ I didn't say anything before
sys.d/ I didn't want to sidetrack anything or make the argument worse
sys.d/ I don't know if what you're doing with Bakuda is right
sys.d/ but it is brave to stand up for someone when no one else will

sys.v/ how her case was handled was foolish

sys.d/ it was
sys.d/ but what she did after her escape was foolish too
sys.d/ I do not think two wrongs make a right

sys.t/ neither do three wrongs

Might need to talk to Kati some more. It was hard to explain. I didn't want to call out Orga or Mikazuki or the rest of Tekkadan publicly. I didn't want to point at the Turbines and how they helped protect refugees. I didn't want to admit just yet that Bakuda and I conspired against Lung together.

It was hard to get the point across while keeping those things secret. People only knew Bakuda as some insane bomb maker. They didn't know she could beat her worst self, that she had chosen more than once to do the right thing even at her own expense. She could be a hero. Maybe not a conventional hero, but the line between hero and villain isn't always so clear

Noelle.

Suppose that included me too. Everyone is justified in their own minds. That thought left me unsure what to do or say. This was going to be hard.

sys.d/ there will be time to work things out
sys.d/ the PRT is not unaccustomed to extreme cases
sys.d/ for the moment, Bakuda is a low priority
sys.d/ she's been quiet now for months, like most of Brockton Bay
sys,d/ and there is someone who wants to speak with you about your efforts there

I raised my brow, and Dragon offered a connection over a secured line. Veda scanned it briefly, accepted it, and secured it on our end as well.

"Newtype."

My brow rose higher. "Chevalier."

"I suspect this might be an awkward conversation. I can be a bit stiff on the social front."

Huh. "I'm getting used to thinking on my feet today." He chuckled lightly. I frowned, though it didn't feel right as a response. "What are we talking about?"

"Nothing too petty. I'd rather not spoil the moment with an argument over who said or did what."

"This is about some comments I've made? Very public ones?"

"Yes, but no. I'm sure PR on both our ends can find ways for us to snipe at each other in furtherance of our brands."

"You say that like it's all a show."

"In some ways it is. Is arguing with us over the best way to do things something you really want to do?"

"Am I going to be given a choice?"

"We're capes, Newtype. We're very adept at wearing masks, and not just the ones covering our faces. We blend. Become the image we want to be and the image that people expect of us."

"Can I get a t-shirt with that on the front?"

"I'm serious. I think Piggot, Armstrong, and Ramius are right about you. You're much smarter than people think you are. You are a firebrand yes, but not in the way Lustrum was."

"What does Lustrum have to do with this?"

"The tangential relationship between her and you has been noted."

"My mother."

"The comparison has been made. That's all I mean. It's a bad one. You're not out to rattle sabers and enjoy it. You have an end in mind, a goal and you have ideas about how to get there."

I inhaled, watching as Dragon walked off and followed Vanbrace into the office building. "What's the point here?"

"The point," he answered, "is that we are closer than we sometimes appear to be. The Protectorate needs to work with independents. We can't do everything ourselves anymore than you can. I want to see if it's possible for us to keep whatever feuds we have to a reasonable level, and to avoid letting differences in opinion become differences in action."

"You might need to define that a bit better."

"Stiff, as I said." The man went quiet, thinking maybe. Or maybe he was consulting with someone. I wouldn't know. He was probably back at the PRT building directing things. "What I mean is, can you trust us enough to work with us, and would we regret trusting you?"

"I don't think I'm the one who ever gave anyone reason to distrust me."

"Faultline."

My hands tightened around Exia's controls. "What about her?"

"It was very clever. Had you not previously worked with her to defeat Lung, it might have gone unnoticed that her actions in Hartford and Providence were coordinated." Shit. "And we know they weren't coordinated with Facade and the Travelers. She's working with you."

I glanced around, looking at the capes around me.

Wonderful time for an ambush.

"You're going after Teacher," Chevalier said. "I think you've been going after him since Sam Stansfield's assassination."

What could I say?

Technically, I'd committed...Shit, I didn't even know how many felonies. I accepted that I didn't always follow the law. People's lives and rebuilding the world were more important to me. The law didn't matter if we were all dead, or if Teacher took over and the law became his inhumanity.

That was the choice I made.

"I don't—"

"We'd never prove it," he clarified in a very low voice. "You've covered your tracks very well, better than we have I'm afraid."

"Explain." Was he just matching my tone, or were there others nearby? Was this a trap? A probe?

He couldn't be serious.

"There are things that don't sit well with me," he whispered back. "Things that make me worried that we've already lost." My eyes widened. "I know dozens of thinkers, and I become very suspicious when many of them give me the same answers. Almost word for word."

He was serious. They knew about the Think Tank. "Sounds like an internal problem. A serious one."

"We're unsure how serious, but a cautious estimate would be...very."

They'd figured out the Think Tank was compromised and they had to know it was Teacher.

This sudden onslaught served a whole other purpose, I realized. Chevalier was testing his thinkers. Looking for who was giving bad info—No, looking for who said the same thing almost word for word. Could David really screw this up so obviously so late in the game?

I didn't really know how the master power—or powers—he used worked. Maybe this was an oversight, or something that was never a problem before. So many capes were rarely gathered together like this, and focus was usually elsewhere when Endbringers were involved.

"Why tell me?" I asked.

"Because you're very smart, Ms. Hebert. Not just you. Watching the Wards right now, it's...rewarding, watching them grow. Seeing how far they've come. How far they can go." There was a weird tone in his voice. Long. Not sad, but forlorn. "And a time may come, when all of you have to carry on without us."

I grit my teeth. He was suggesting that. Holy shit, he was admitting the Protectorate could be destroyed. Wait—"You've already written off the PRT, haven't you?"

"I would never suggest something so dangerous." That was a yes. "You know what comes next, don't you, Ms. Hebert."

Of course, I did. I knew everything that came next. Dinah had seen it all already, and I knew we were too deep now to stop it from happening. The guns. The fires. The death.

And with that thought, I raised my head and felt my chest drop into an abyss.

I didn't want to think about it, but I knew. What was coming would be nothing like this. This stupidly cynical game of cops and robbers we played, however bullshit the rules were there were rules to it. Those rules wouldn't apply in a real fight. A fight of life or death didn't really have rules. Just desperation and fear and hate.

Chris and Housenka were talking with Tecton and Bough. Xcaliber directed people around. Halberd was talking to Vanbrace a little further away. He looked angry and she looked downcast. I'd wonder what that was about any other time.

Right now, I couldn't stop myself from knowing that they were going to die. Not all of them. Us. But some. Bullets don't discriminate.

This should be a good moment. A big moment. In another time or place, a better world, this would be the turning of the tide. The day the people with the power to make a difference went out and made the difference. Months ago, I would have called this victory. I would look back at myself and my actions, and feel like I'd done what I set out to do.

The person I used to be was more naive than the one I was now.

Chevalier was right. They had lost already. You wouldn't know it, looking at the smiles and congratulations going around. Maybe if it had been like this from the start, we wouldn't be where we were now. Maybe hindsight is twenty-twenty.

What did it matter now? Now wasn't the time for blame.

Ah. That's what he meant with the thing about what we said in public and what we said in private. He wanted to know where my priorities were, and if I'd help him save what he could. Just like he was prepared to ignore what I'd done with Faultline—and in the process warned me that Teacher probably did know what I was doing—if I was prepared to ignore what they'd done.

In private, at least. For now.

"I know," I admitted. "There—"

"Is still time," he interrupted. "I'm not just having this conversation with you. I've spoken with Narwhal as well. Rosary. My counterparts in the Internationals and the King's Men. Uppercrust. Myrddin is even proposing we warn the Yangban."

Shit, if they were telling me this how bad did they think it was? Even with what I knew, I'd never have imagined this response. It felt surreal. "What are you asking me to do?"

He audibly inhaled. It was a resigned sound, one that said 'I'll fight, but I don't know if I can win.' He knew they might not win. That's how bad it was. Whatever he suspected or discovered, he knew the corruption was deep enough the Protectorate probably wouldn't survive.

Shit, that's bad.

"I'm asking if we can trust you to care more about what's right than what you think is wrong."

My answer was immediate.

"All I've ever done is what I thought was right."

"You do remind me of her, you know."

"Who?"

"Lustrum. Whatever else she was, however she failed, she was a believer. She didn't say what she said simply to indulge in the attention and praise of others. That was how many saw her. It can be hard to tell sometimes."

So he talked to me directly, privately, to see where my masks were.

"And so we're clear, Ms. Hebert, you do know what comes next, don't you?"

A Waken 14.4.C

He'd grown accustomed in Philadelphia to keeping an eye on everything. He couldn't know all that happened in the city, but he could at least keep himself appraised and aware. Aware of his team. His enemies. The enemies who were friends and the friends who were enemies.

Now…The job worked against his instincts.

He couldn't track every city or team member under his authority. He couldn't keep himself aware of every mover and player. He had to abstract things and rely on the input of others far more than he was accustomed to.

At least some of those were easy.

The Elite were closely monitored, a legacy of Alexandria. Lines to Toybox, the Yangban and numerous independents were all left to him by Hero. Legend's reputation left him seen as more of a symbolic leader, but he'd still established a system that kept all the important details flowing to the Protectorate Leader's desk.

The Hanged Men and the Fallen were at it again in Maine. The Elite were approaching the point of civil war between it's violent and less-criminal elements. The Nine were chasing something around Nipigin lake in Canada. No one knew what or why and Ben didn't think there was a point in guessing. The Adepts were trying to poach members of the Wards. The Case-53s were behaving oddly.

The Triumvirate left him everything he needed to succeed, but it hardly seemed to matter. He couldn't deal with all the problems in the world and watch for the knife pointed at his back. Who do you trust when you can't trust anyone?

Heh. A teenage girl, apparently.

"And so we're clear," Ben whispered, "You do know what comes next, don't you?"

Chevalier waited in silence as the room around him bustled.

It's not a place he wanted to be. Maybe once, in better times. Legend's desk felt too big now. The challenge ahead too insurmountable. Despite what Legend had admitted to doing in private, Ben wished the man were still behind it. There would be time for the sins of the past, but now wasn't it.

"Jouster's team is done," Reed announced. "Redirect Flash's group to the Bronx."

"The situation in Brooklyn might blow up past what's acceptable."

"Rime knows to step in," Ben said, trying not to let his frustration show. That was a familiar mask to him, and one he regretted very much in the moment. "Give Corsca a chance to get a handle on it."

"But—"

"Give her her chance. She hasn't lost the situation yet."

He kept his back to Reveal as he spoke. There was no real way to know. His suspicions might already be in enemy hands. Part of him wondered if Teacher would even care. He'd come too close to stop now, and Ben knew he couldn't stop it. Not before it happened.

He'd given his entire career to being Chevalier, and yes, he had looked at Legend and hoped to live up to him one day.

Not this day.

Not the day he realized how bad things really were, how bad they'd all allowed them to become. Maybe that wasn't fair. The world was not so simple. Even knowing everything that was wrong now, he wasn't sure what he could have done to avert the crisis that was coming.

Six thinkers in a room. The first said Blue Cosmos would continue to escalate violence. The second suggested that a calm response would allow the uproar to blow over. The third proposed that the Triumvirate should remain in the loop, consequences be damned. The fourth suggested that a steady course would keep the Protectorate whole and allow the uproar to blow over. The fifth was afraid the Case-53s would all quit and further damage the Protectorate's image by seemingly confirming the allegations made against the Triumvirate. The sixth said the Triumvirate could no longer be trusted, at any consequence.

It was the second and the fourth that alarmed him. Then the ninth. The eleventh. The fourteenth.

Ben had been a cape for a long time. No two powers were the same, and that included thinkers. Nine thinkers, all telling him variations on the exact same thing with nearly the exact same words. The uproar will blow over. The Protectorate should maintain its current stance.

Damn Teacher.

They'd known Blue Cosmos was arming, but not to this degree. They knew extremists were trying to pull people into their way of thinking, but not so many. They knew Blue Cosmos had made significant political inroads, but not this many.

The Thinkers were wrong, and the ones who were most wrong were all wrong in the same ways.

How long had this been going on? Alexandria had been distracted for a few years now, but didn't she notice? Hero too. They weren't fools. They were the brains behind everything the Protectorate was. The PRT too.

Now he was staring down the barrel of a gun he couldn't dodge, and dreading who the bullets would hit.

The girl hadn't answered yet.

He watched her from the cameras on Dragon's ship. It was strange to look at her. He saw things no one should see. Shadows. Glimmers of memories. Capes—friends and enemies—in their weakest moments. Their worst moment. The moments that defined them.

It was a boon at times. Gave him perspective. At other times he hated it, because far too many good people suffered far too much. Become twisted, something that wasn't truly them. His own trigger event felt petty compared to things some endured.

He saw it, the crying girl trapped in darkness, begging to be saved. Pleading. Asking why no one did anything to help her.

It explained a lot about how she viewed the world. How she refused to abide inaction and passivity. No one who saw her in that moment could look at Newtype and say she was a callous person. Rash, untempered, but not callous.

There was something else though, and it was harder to describe.

He saw the lines of the powers too, not just memories. More than once he'd been quietly asked to help figure out a power that eluded explanation. They were usually more esoteric than this. A solid and discernable shape was new, and he didn't know what it meant.

The golden girl stood behind Taylor Hebert.

She was hard to make out. Her face was similar in a way, but different too. The geometry didn't really line up. Nine eyes couldn't fit on a normal human face without distorting it.

Nine eyes Ben swore were looking back at him.

"Yes," the girl finally answered. Her voice was heavy, sorrowful. That was encouraging, in an unfortunate way. She was young, but she wasn't naive. "Next comes hell."