"Twenty minutes," Glory Girl said as she sat in the waiting room of Brockton Bay General Hospital.
"You've said that three times already," Weaver said in acerbic tartness even if her mask made her look emotionless and slightly creepy.
"You removed all of the bugs from an entire hospital in less than half hour. And then explained where all the nasty messes that they had made were. And made $10,000, the minimum a pest control company would charge." She glared at the younger girl.
"Why are we waiting?" Weaver asked the other girl as she shifted in her seat. The off-white color of her outfit felt vulnerable and off, for some reason.
"Erik was hanging out with his friend, which I totally think is his boyfriend and Crystal's last class is just ending," she replied.
"I'm not made of glass, you know." Weaver glared at her, to no effect. The older girl seemed immune or oblivious. Immune seemed more likely.
"We are all normal under the forcefields," Glory Girl reminded her tartly.
"Which is why Amy and I are going to make spider-silk outfits for all of you." She narrowed her eyes behind her gold filmed goggles. "Are you trying to do an end run around your parents on the New Wave thing?"
"Hmm." Glory Girl tilted her head at her perceptiveness. "This is our way of showing Mom our displeasure with not even being allowed to have any word about a new member who is our age. Crystal's madder than I am."
"Because she is an adult going to college and they still didn't let her vote."
"And she would have tied it for you to join, which means that Dad would have had to decide and vote or they would have had to let the three of us 'kids' vote."
"So you are just acting like I've joined even if they won't allow me in?" Weaver asked as she thought it out somore.
"Exactly. And to the public, it will look like you joined. So Auntie Sarah or Mom will have to do a press release or ignore it. And if they talk about it, there will be pushback. Especially about why New Wave isn't allowing another unmasked that is a hero and friends with their kids join the team."
"Which would blow up in their faces. So they are going to be checkmated," Panacea said with a smug tone as she walked up behind them.
"I-" Weaver paused to gather her thoughts. "I'm not sure how I feel about being used like that."
"Oh shit! I'm not trying to use you. I'm doing this for you. I just didn't want you catching flack or being accused of manipulating us, Taylor," Glory Girl said as she looked a bit panicked.
"Me manipulate you?" Weaver just stared at her.
"We know you aren't doing anything like that." Glory Girl shared a quick look with her sister. "You probably wouldn't even think of it after what those witches did to you at Winslow."
"Oh." She looked away. "Um, I need to think about this."
"Did you want to put off your first patrol?" Panacea asked in a tone that showed her worry.
"No. No, I do want to patrol. And now that I think of it, I do want to be on your team," Weaver replied as she jerkily nodded her head.
"Even if that's- No, that's for after we have our confrontation about New Wave," Glory Girl replied. She pulled her phone out of the hidden pocket on the back of her outfit under the cape. "They are on their way."
"You guys will be scouting in the air, like normal?" Panacea asked.
"You got it!" She gave them both a thumbs up.
Weaver and Panacea walked down one of the smaller roads near the Boardwalk.
"Empire gang tags," the more experienced hero said as she pointed out the stylized red and black painted 88 on the corner of the road in an alleyway.
"And no one removes them?" she replied in question.
"It would be a lot of work and money." Panacea shrugged.
A sluggish swarm flew out of her small armored plate on her back. They buzzed and swarmed over the icey, painted brick.
She leaned over to inspect their work. "Hmm." Too cold right now, so she moved back onto the patrol path. She looked around as different people waved to Panacea or called out a soft greeting.
"Skinheads down the alley, but not doing anything illegal," Glory Girl's voice came across their phone's wireless earpieces.
"The Empire must just want to watch us for now," Panacea said, though her voice carried a hint of worry.
The next half an hour (and first half of their patrol) went by without any incidents other than Panacea helping a couple of homeless families with their health issues.
"You are probably saving their lives," Weaver said after the last group wandered back to their alleyway.
"What?" Panacea asked in a startled voice.
"This is making it so they can deal with the colder nights if they can't get into a shelter. You fixed things like parasites and diseases, right?"
The other girl nodded.
"I can't remember how many people get hospitalized or die, but it's higher than it was thirty years ago. And now it's considered to be 'normal'. Which is sad."
"Yeah." Panacea hunched her shoulders inward again.
Under her mask, Taylor frowned at her response. "Cold?"
"You'd think so, but no. I'm wearing my full winter coat under here. Someone hates wearing her full coat as it ruins her look." You could hear the smirk in her voice.
The flyer's winter outfits look much like thicker and padded regular costumes, except Glory Girl who had to put on some pants (and thermal underwear) so she did not freeze. Even so, they ended up being chilled due to wind and the dropping temperature.
"Miss? Can you help my buddy? I think he got jumped by some Merchants earlier for being in the wrong neighborhood," a thin young man in a big winter coat asked. He pointed out a guy leaning up against the wall.
"Sure." Panacea tapped her bluetooth earbud. "Got an injured guy here."
"I've got you in sight," Shielder called out from overhead and down the street. In the winter sky, you could not see him beyond fifty feet. And he was sixty feet up.
Weaver watched her walk up to the beefy guy with a knit beanie hat and a puffy winter coat.
Panacea pulled off her woolen glove and set it on his cheek in a clinical matter. Under her hood/scarf, she frowned at the bruising. Hamming it up a little?
Weaver kept an eye on the whole area as a training exercise. Even so, the bald man with a baseball bat still nearly surprised her when he dashed out from a small group of men and women walking down the sidewalk on her side of the street.
She barely moved her leg so that the baseball bat hit her thigh, not her knee. Pain still exploded, but her leg managed to hold her weight. He pulled back for another swing when bugs exploded out of her little armored pack at latched onto his face.
"I'm being attacked," Weaver shouted out in pain as she reached for her extendable baton.
"Get 'em off! Get 'em off!" he shouted as he swatted at the bugs on his face.
With a schlackt sound, Weaver slammed the baton on his wrist to force him to drop his baseball bat. He screamed in pain and took off towards an alley. Even in pain and fear, he knocked boxes and garbage bags to break his trail and trip up pursuers.
Weaver gathered all the insects in the area to hem him in with a wall of flying insects.
"Shit! Shit! Going to shit!" the thug bemoaned as he looked for an escape route.
Glory Girl slammed to the ground in front of him with a three point landing (perfectly!) and then stood up. "I'd give up if I were you," she ordered.
Laserdream zoomed in with a quiet woosh. "I really would," she said as energy appeared in her palms.
He looked around frantically for an exit when Weaver limped around the corner at a fast pace, Panacea right behind her. She held up a high tech looking pistol and pulled the trigger. With a phoot, it shot a two pronged blunt projectile trailed by a wire that hit the meaty portion of his thigh. A buzz sounded and he flopped to the ground in a twitching mess.
"Got you," Weaver said. Thanks for making me take the taser, Dad.
"I'm dialing for the police," Shielder called out as he hover and texted... right into a wall. With a squawk, he floundered and then landed heavily in a pile of trash.
Weaver stared at him in shock as the two oldest girls slapped their foreheads.
"Eric. We talked about this. No showboating with your flight until you get it working better," his sister said in an aggravated tone.
"Sorry," he said as he scrambled to his feet. Then he started to dig around for his phone in the trash.
Waver leaned against the wall as she started to shiver. "He just attacked me out of nowhere. If I hadn't been watching with my insects-"
"You're all right. You will be alright," Panacea said as she patted Weaver on her shoulder.
"Hurts like a bitch," she complained. "He tried to smash my knee."
"Kind of stupid of him. I mean you are friends with Panacea and she could fix that in minutes," Laserdream said with narrow eyes as she studied the E88 thug. "This was a message."
"They botched it. Sounds like they wanted to scare me away," Weaver said as she got her shakes under control.
"Ames! Tay! Go stand over there and be photogenic!" Glory Girl called out as she held up her phone to take a picture. Behind her, Shielder talked on the phone with the police.
"What is this?" Carol Dallon asked as she slapped the newspaper down on the kitchen table the next morning.
Mark looked over at his wife in bleary confusion. He wanted to go back to bed and not be part of this interrogation.
"Looks like Weaver's hero debut where she caught the Empire thug trying to scare her off." Vicky very carefully did not mention the article's title.
"New Wave's newest member attacked by the Empire. That's what this says. Now explain. Weaver is not a member of New Wave. We told you that," their mother stated in a very flat and unfriendly way.
"No, two of the five adult members of New Wave decided that without asking Crystal nor your nearly adult kids," Vicky shot back. She took a quick glance of her sister.
Amy flinched and hunched her shoulders harder. Then she sat up a little more straight. "It's the right thing to do."
Carol looked incredulously at both of the girl. "Do you realize what you have done?"
"Not left a publicly known hero out to dry?" Vicky said in her snarkiest tone of voice.
"She's... she showed that heroes need public accountability. Shadow Stalker used her secret identity to abuse Taylor and got away with it because of her secret identity. Not letting her join-" Amy paused here as she thought. "It betrays what New Wave is supposed to be."
The older hero opened her mouth. And then closed it to think over the matter. She gave them a very muleish look. "I am not happy and the adults of New Wave are going to have a meeting about it."
"Are you going to remember Crystal this time?" Vicky countered.
Carol glared at her daughter. "I don't need you telling me how to run New Wave. You are grounded-"
"WHAT!?"
"Grounded until that meeting." She looked over at Amy a second later. "Both of you. And no stringing Taylor along with any promises."
"That isn't how it happened. She actually got mad because she thought we were manipulating her."
Amy winced, as Vicky had turned on her 'stubborn mode'.
Her mother looked terribly angry. "Room! NOW! Both of you!"
Mark popped the tab of a beer as he sat down next to Neil in his 'super-heavy' chair in the Pelham dining room.
Carol looked over at her sister. "So we're ready to start?"
Her sister looked back and thought for a long second. "Actually, we're not. Neil, how long until Crystal gets here?"
"Crystal? I- I guess," she replied. The younger sister looked concerned and upset.
"Don't be like that, Carol. Crystal was pretty upset at being excluded from our last meeting," Neil said as he studied the high strung mother.
"It didn't occur to me, sorry. It was our first important meeting since she turned 18."
The Pelham's front door opened to admit their oldest kid. "I got here as fast as I could." She looked between the parents. "This is about Taylor, isn't it?"
"You know it is-"
"Carol, please. Yes, Crystal, it is." Sarah looked over the other five. "And this also goes over out last meeting, where we voted two against, one for and one abstaining to let Taylor join New Wave. And one that we forgot to ask for her vote." Sarah sent a sharp look at her sister.
"You forgot, too," she shot back.
"I did and I apologized."
Crystal waved to get their attention. "And for the record I would have voted against her, as I didn't know her at all. And that would have been a mistake. We should have at least tried to meet her halfway or something. Even just patrolled with her when she went out first."
"Why the change of heart, Chrissie?" Mark asked.
It's been eight years, uncle! "Because she's going to be a great hero. She prepared and made herself a bullet resistant uniform, can control every insect within blocks and is a real trooper. Some E88 ganger tried to break her knee as a warning and she actually chased him down to where we had cornered him and tased his ass."
"Hmm." Neil looked pensive from his throne of heavy wood that barely fit his massive form. "That's not bad for a first night."
"Reconsidering your vote?" Carol asked as she tested the waters.
"Probably should have a proper vote again," Mark noted as he sipped his beer.
"Does anyone else second that motion?" Sarah asked as leader of New Wave.
"I do," Crystal said a little loudly.
"By a raise of hands, who thinks she should be a member?" Sarah raised her own hand again. Crystal did not surprise her, but Mark and Neil did.
Carol looked betrayed.
"And those against?" Sarah asked.
Everyone watched to see what the other sister would do. Carol shook her head.
"I'll abstain."
"That is four for her joining, no votes against and one abstaining," Sarah said as she felt one crisis deflate, with yet another crisis coming from her sister.
"Um, I don't know how we do this, but I'd suggest in the future we actually do a vote to get to know someone that wants to join and then a vote to join. That way we just aren't flat out saying no because they are new," Crystal said as she tried to explain her idea.
"We really aren't planning on expanding New Wave, Crystal," Sarah said with a sad little smile. "This was a rather unique situation."
"Oh, and what if I have a boyfriend who's a hero that wants to join so that he can have an open relationship with me, Mom?"
"I'll need to think it over then, because that's a good point." She suddenly grinned at her daughter. "Though I think I have more to worry about that with Vicky and Eric."
Crystal bit back a counter-argument. She was the one that brought it up. "Ahem. Well, I did get something intriguing from Amy after the patrol. Weaver is willing to make bullet resistant outfits for all of us."
"I didn't realize she was a Tinker," the giant in the room said in surprise.
"She makes it with spider silk. I guess Amy is helping so that she can make it faster. Even before the vote, Taylor was going to try and get that done in a week or so."
"As one of the non-bulletproof crowd, I'm all for that," Mark said and chuckled.
"Oh, Crystal? Would you let her know that we have a New Wave photo shoot at the West Upcity Mall on Saturday?"
"Dang, I nearly forgot about that."
"I have a what on Saturday?" Taylor stared in abject horror at her friends (and new team mates).