Chapter 3-3

The van pulled over a block from our target. "Have fun, kids!" The driver said, sardonically. I briefly wondered if I'd get to zap him at some point. I pushed the silly thought aside. It's time to go to work. Gallant nodded to Vista and the girl curved space in front of me. Hesitantly, I stepped through and found myself on the top of the room. Just as planned.

Of course it went just as planned, I reminded myself. Vista knew what she was doing. She'd probably done this a hundred times already.

I canceled sound around myself and checked for guards. One of them was standing near the edge of the roof, completely looking in the wrong direction. Perfect. I ran towards him, grabbed the soldier from behind, and hit him with my taser. The guy struggled for a few moments before slumping to the floor. Huh, I thought he'd drop like a rock. Apparently I shouldn't be getting my information from cop shows when it comes to weapons.

After checking the area for any unexpected noises, I touched my earpiece and said: "Guys, this is Banshee. The roof's clear. There're four more guys in the building: three on the ground floor and one at the target office."

"Roger that." Gallant replied. "Tie up the roof guy and take out the one in the office. We'll come in from the lobby."

"Got it."

Tie up the roof guy…just zip ties would probably be enough. I dragged the guy out of view and bound his hands. It won't hold for long, but it didn't need to. We should be gone in less than an hour. Before leaving, I briefly checked his pockets for something useful. Let's see: weapons, already got them; cigarettes, nah; wallet, no; oh look, a master key. How convenient. Even better, a radio. I took the key and the radio before moving on.

Next target: Office guy. If I didn't handle him carefully, he could turn out to be a problem. One: he had access to the building's cameras. Two: he was sitting next to a phone. If the guy saw any of us, he could get the PRT on our case in minutes. Miss Militia mentioned that we'd probably be detected the moment we tried to 'hack' into the target computer, but if we could delay that a little longer, we'd have a better chance of getting out of here. At least, that was the theory. The PRT could have been lying to us when they said that the cameras weren't monitored from the outside. We were lying to them about our numbers too, after all.

I was lucky that the room he was in had a skylight, or else office guy would have been a lot harder to deal with. Dean advised me to use it to stake out the opposition, but I had a better idea. Summoning my glaive, I carefully removed the glass plate, hoping that office guy didn't have the presence of mind to look up or call roof guy on the radio. As I carefully put the glass away, I started thinking on how I wanted to do this. The guy was almost directly above me, so if I swung carefully, I could get behind him and…

He looked up.

Fuck.

He was reaching for his radio. With no time to react, I jumped down and landed feet-first on top of him. My landing knocked the wind out of him, but I didn't hear any bones snap. Good.

"Ow. Okay, I surrender." He said. "You can get off me now."

I picked the man up off the floor and pushed him face down onto the table preparing to tie him up too. He was a tough guy, he could take the abuse. Suddenly, the radio turned on.

"Simmons, they're here!" A voice said. "Call the PRT already!" On the cameras, I could see the Wards casually swagger through the lobby, probably doing their best supervillain impersonations. The guards opened fire, but the three didn't seem to care. Vista must have been redirecting the bullets. "Simmons, respond dammit! Where…" The man was cut off by a blast from Gallant. He flew a couple of feet and started crying like a baby. Right, Gallant's blasts did something with your emotions. I should probably feel sorry for the guy, but it's not like he's really hurt, or anything. The emotion effect only lasted a short while, after all. I was half-tempted to pick up the radio and gloat to the other two guys, but decided against it. Pretend supervillain or no, it's not my style. Besides, I'm not good at cackling maniacally.

Without warning, Simmons got up from his seat, hit the 'talk' button on the radio with his forehead, and screamed: "Not the spleen, not the spleen!"

I pulled the radio away and turned it off before asking: "What was that all about?"

With a grin, he said: "Look at Rogers' face. Camera B. Totally worth getting my ass kicked for."

Camera B showed a view of the lobby and I got a good look at one of the officers. Okay, I had to admit, the confused expression on his face was pretty funny. Very immature, but funny. "Hilarious." I deadpanned. "I'm so sticking you in the Janitor's closet." Truth be told, that was part of the plan anyway, but he didn't need to know that.

"Oh no, have mercy!" Simmons said as I strapped his own handcuffs on him before relieving him of anything that he could use to break out again. "That would be such an evil to do. Trapping me, all by myself, and leaving me to go completely mad, how could you? If I start talking to the brooms, I'm blaming you."

"Well, we're supposed to be supervillains, aren't we? Being a bastard kinda comes with the territory." I answered as I pushed him out the door and towards the closet.

"I know. Just leave a note on the desk, or something. I don't want to be left here all night."

Part of me felt a little guilty. Sticking someone in a small room all by themselves… Just like Sophia left me in that locker… I mean, I kind of had to do it. Simmons had to be restrained somehow, and this was probably the least painful way of doing it. It wasn't even full of rotten tampons and I knew that someone would come for him sooner or later, but still…

"Hey, you okay?" Simmons asked. I looked up. "You zoned out on me, just then."

"I did? Oh, sorry." I said, before pushing him in. "Just…feel kind of bad about this."

"Good girl." He replied with a smile. "No hard feelings, you know. Last few times this happened, I ended up, naked, hogtied or dangling from the ceiling. Trust me, I've had worse."

"Nice to know I have your permission."

He grinned. "But just for the record: when I get out of here, I'm totally going to kick your ass."

"Then I'll be sure to never let you out." I replied, without missing a beat. Wait, where did that come from? "Tell the brooms I said 'hi'." Without another word, I locked the door.

I could hear Simmons mutter: "A fourth Ward. The cheating bastards. Ugh. I wonder what the acoustics of this closet are like…" Then, he began to sing. Very badly, if I might add. Meh, he'd be fine. I searched the table for a piece of paper and a pen and made a note to let the guy out later. It wouldn't do to leave him to rot.

Gallant, Kid Win, and Vista walked through the door. "The guards?" Gallant asked.

"Dealt with. One guy's unconscious on the roof, the other's testing the acoustics of the janitor's closet."

"Right." The hero replied, looking curiously. I got the distinct impression that he completely misinterpreted what I just said. "What about the alarms?"

"Guards didn't trigger any. Not as far as I can tell, anyway."

"She's right." Kid Win chimed in, looking at some sort of computer in his suit. "If there was a silent alarm, it would have sent out a signal already. Told you this was a great idea."

"Credit goes where it's due." Gallant said before removing a flash drive from his suit. "Alright, people, you all know the plan. The moment I stick this thing in the central computer, the PRT will know we're here. Thanks to our newest acquisition, we'll have a few minutes to prepare for them. So, let's review. Vista?"

"I'll stay here, lengthening hallways and making the troopers run in circles." The girl replied. It sounded strange, hearing someone so young talk so confidently. Makes you wonder if she's really as young as they say she is. "It won't hold them back forever, but it should slow them down enough for the download to finish, especially with the extra time we've got from not triggering the alarms. Banshee?"

"I'll sneak around and pick off isolated squads while staying silent for as long as I can. Hopefully, it'll be a while before they figure out that they're dealing with four Wards instead of three. Kid Win?"

"I'll fly around the building on my hoverboard, taking pot-shots at the troopers. They'll be forced to either split their forces to deal with me or risk getting shot through the windows."

"And I'll support anyone that needs help." Gallant said. "Once our program's run its course, we take the flash drive and escape together. Now, the most important thing is to be careful. Villains might be fine with leaving one of their own behind, but we're better than that. No sacrifices, no taking one for the team, and stay away from the containment foam. I'd rather fail the mission than losing one of you. Do I make myself clear?" The rest of us nodded in response. Just Gallant living up to his name, I guess. "Good. Does anyone have any last minute suggestions before I plug this thing in?"

I showed the team my radio and said: "The guards had radios. Maybe we can use them, eavesdrop on the PRT, or something."

Kid Win looked at the device thoughtfully. "Gimme a second and I could modify them to pick up the PRT's frequency. Not sure if it will work, but it might give us a head's up. Vista, could you go downstairs and grab a couple from the goons we took down?"

"You should check their pockets for master keys too." I quickly added. "Never know when those come in handy." Vista nodded and disappeared.

"Good thinking, Banshee." Gallant said with a smile. Going easy on the rookie, I guess. Vista reappeared a few minutes later, goods in hand. Kid Win gave the go-ahead soon after. "Alright, people. It's showtime." Our leader said, before plugging in the device.

Showtime indeed.