Chapter Forty-Six: Recalibrate
April 22, 2011
Fi didn't so much as blink when Jason invited himself home with her on Friday night. They were already deep in discussion about her new Contract image, so when their monitor shift ended they simply continued the conversation on their way. Armsmaster was scheduled for a patrol and had already been verbally briefed by Clockblocker.
When they got to the apartment Fi was now sharing with Armsmaster, she cooked for both of them. Jason managed three servings of spaghetti, while Fi plowed through seven. Together, they finished everything she'd prepared, and she threw a pizza in the oven in anticipation of their future appetite. She'd refused to guess when the deal to cover Vista's disguise might be finished.
"You really think the skyline is okay?" Fi asked again as she did some sort of slow-motion kata in the middle of the living room floor. One of Glenn's exercises for her was to wear her new costume whenever possible to become more comfortable in it.
The skyline in question was a blue embroidered outline of New York City that now circled the bottom few inches of Fi's white top. The pattern was repeated across the back of her shoulders, helping to transform the otherwise unremarkable white shirt into an actual costume. The outline was also on the back of her jean pockets in white.
"Yes," Jason repeated for the umpteenth time. "It's not presumptuous, it tested fine in Glenn's surveys, and it's not haughty. For God's sake, you might be known as the Ender to most of the world, but half the people in New York are still calling you their savior. You restored the heart of their city and drastically minimized casualties."
"Sorry," she muttered.
Jason just shook his head, and counted that as a win. "How's the display?"
Her new visor had actually been designed and built by Dragon, based on Armsmaster's original prototype. It didn't offer full head coverage, but it fit the overall aesthetic of the costume. The screen and mask were three inches thick across her eyes, incorporating a blue under-mask similar to the one Beetle had designed for Contract's stint as an anti-hero. It narrowed on the sides of her head, connecting to a hidden web of plastic supports that hid under her hair to act as a semi-helmet. It let Fi keep her open appearance while still offering some protection.
"I'm finally getting used to it. Dragon's working on a pair of truly enormous sunglasses for Sophie to use."
"Pink?" he guessed. Watching her and Dragon practically fangirl over the Sophie identity was highly amusing.
"Better. Silver and purple!"
Jason tried and failed to picture that. "And I always thought you were so demure."
She shrugged. "Fifteen or twenty-four, remember? Sophie's the part of me that's still a cheerleader."
"A what?"
"Never mind."
"No, go back. You were a cheerleader? I can't imagine you ever being anything like Sophie."
Fi snicker as she stopped her stretches and came to sit on the couch next to him. "I have smiled before." She sobered as she continued, "Was I ever a carefree, bratty tween? No. But I laugh, I screw around, I flirt, I prank, and I bounce. When I'm Sophie I just do it a little more consciously. I turn off the morbid humor and ramp up the mischievousness."
"You bounce?"
"I bounce." To prove it, she leapt to her feet, and started doing a truly ridiculous dance, limbs going in every direction without rhythm or coordination. Jason found himself laughing helplessly, curled up on the sofa, unable to breathe.
"See?" she asked as she stopped, frozen in a pose that was close to contortionism.
Jason looked up, still laughing, and the angle was just right to let him see through the reflective coating on the visor. "Fi," he cut in anxiously, "when was the last time you slept?" Her eyes were ringed by deep shadows.
The energy dropped out of her body. "I'm fine," she said, but she didn't even try to make it convincing.
Jason hmmed at her, and she threw her hands in the air. "What do you want from me? I go to bed early every night, and nap most afternoons. It just doesn't add up to much!"
He glanced toward the timer on the stove. "You've got twenty minutes until the pizza's done. Sleep. I'll wake you if you start to dream."
She hesitated, but he pointed to the couch as he stood up. "I mean it, Fi. Rest. I've got schoolwork I can do."
She sighed and sat down heavily, but she lay down without further complaint. Jason briefly considered texting the abort code to Clockblocker, but discarded the idea. They had hours until go-time, and he knew she wouldn't sleep that long.
Instead he retrieved his current reading assignment and tried again to understand how Lord of the Flies related to Russian politics. The parallels were so easy to see, after the teacher had explained them. He'd like, just once, to see it coming. Instead, he tended to notice the symbolism surrounding human nature.
He'd nearly finished the chapter when there was a soft "pop." He glanced toward the stove, but there was still two minutes left on the timer and no sign anything was amiss. Then a hand landed on his shoulder and Jason found the world around him growing rapidly.
Shit. They'd come early, gotten the drop on him, and Fi was still asleep. Jason yelled her name, but she didn't stir. He tried to twist, to grab the hand on his shoulder and use it as leverage to get himself free, but his opponent was ready for him and caught his groping hand at the wrist.
The arm of the couch was up to his chin, or rather, he'd been shrunk down to less than half his original size. Magnidude's hand was still on his shoulder, growing from Intrepid's perspective as he was shrunk.
Damn it. Intrepid tried to twist away again, even without the leverage he still hadn't found, but the hand was heavy. He threw himself backwards and managed to finally duck his shoulder out from under Magnidude's hand. It didn't matter - Magnidude's power worked just as well through the vise grip he had on Intrepid's wrist.
Intrepid flew away as hard as he could, nearly dislocating his own shoulder before he popped free, but the victory was short lived. Magnidude's reach was huge from Intrepid's relative perspective, and Intrepid was caught again before he'd regrown even ten percent.
Barely a few seconds had passed. Intrepid tried to shout again, before he remembered that Fi was deaf. Intrepid then attempted to corkscrew away from Magnidude, but he was holding hard enough to bruise. In a real fight, Intrepid might have risked the damage, but it didn't seem worth it now. He'd bide his time.
Fi twitched in her sleep, but she couldn't have been reacting to the sounds of the fight. She must have been dreaming.
A thin giant dressed in a blue body suit made her way around the couch approaching Fi as she slept, as Intrepid was pulled back toward Magnidude. Willow's body suit was traced by organic grey lines, emphasizing her lean height and showing off her curves. She had an aerosol can held out in front of her - a sedative, maybe. It made sense. Anyone planning to kidnap Contract would be dumb not to try to sedate her.
The giant Willow took another step forward, now within two arm's lengths of Contract. Either Contract finally sensed the intruder or her dream was worse than Intrepid expected, because Contract came off the couch like a person possessed. She had a knife in her hand from God-knew-where and lunged forward, swinging toward the girl who proved she was Willow by bending herself in half to avoid the strike. She reformed upright more than actually moving into the position, and yet Contract was there, ready for her. She caught Willow's aerosol can in the hand not holding the knife and wrenched it out of her grip.
"Enough," rumbled the giant holding Intrepid, probably trying to get Contract's attention and use Intrepid as leverage. The world shrank just a bit, Intrepid becoming more visible as he grew, though he was still squashed in Magnidude's left hand. From the relative size of the fingers wrapped around his torso, Intrepid guessed he'd been reduced to about twice the size of a Barbie.
...He was never letting Clockblocker hear that comparison.
Contract didn't pause, and managed to use her dominant arm to get Willow into a chokehold in front of her body, using the intruder as a shield. Willow thinned out her head and neck, slithering out of Contract's hands like putty.
Either Contract finally remembered she had telekinesis, or it had been inaccessible until now. With a wave of her hand, Willow was thrown past Intrepid and into Magnidude. Intrepid saw the hit coming as soon as his partner's fingers twitched, so he was already using his power to try to fly skyward. Magnidude's grasp only slipped for a moment as his teammate hit him, but it was enough. Intrepid darted away, and then suddenly everything was dark.
The darkness didn't last long, barely enough for him to start to panic, before he found himself in a blank, featureless room. He whirled around just in time to see the tiny figure of Flicker leave again as the world finally stopped shifting sizes.
Damn. Intrepid had still been small enough for Flicker to teleport when she'd tagged him, and he hadn't even seen the other mover. Now there was nothing to do except wait in this itty-bitty room for everything to be over.
The door opened, proving Intrepid wrong. Weld was there, bracing himself to fill up the doorway. He expected Intrepid to try to dart past him, which was, admittedly, Intrepid's instinct. Fortunately, he had more experience than that, and retreated into the room instead. Weld advanced, backing him into the corner.
Intrepid walked backward carefully, not wanting to seem too eager. Then, the moment he felt the wall at his back, he executed one of his favorite maneuvers. He bent his knees and jumped, and Weld jumped up too, expecting Intrepid was going to try to go over him. Instead, Intrepid coiled his legs against the wall to his left and pushed off, darting to the right. He crossed the room in a split second, rolling himself in a mid-air somersault so that he hit the right wall with his feet, absorbing what was left of his momentum, and then with another push he redirected that energy so that he was past Weld and out the door before the other Ward really understood what was going on.
Without his gun and armor, Intrepid was no match for a brute of Weld's ratings in any sort of combat, but it did make him lighter and nimbler, so he had to play to that advantage. The hallway to his left was blocked by a closed door, so Intrepid banked hard to the right. He found an arrow of bugs on the wall, pointing him through another closed door. Had they already grabbed Beetle?
Intrepid tried to punch through the door with his feet, hitting just above the doorknob rather than slowing to open it, but it was too solid. The impact jarred him, and cost him his lead. Weld was there in almost immediately, and managed to get a hand around Intrepid's upper arm in a vise grip.
Rather than fight an opponent he knew he couldn't beat, Intrepid allowed himself to be manhandled back to his feet. Then Weld pulled both hands behind his back, and forced him to walk through the very door that Beetle had tried to direct him through.
It opened into what turned out to be the main space of the warehouse. Beetle was already bound to a chair in the center of the open space, with a cape in a purple and green costume standing over her.
Given that Hunch was the only other cape on Weld's team assigned to Beetle's kidnapping, Intrepid assumed that this was the precog. He knew Hunch and Weld had been assigned to Beetle based on their powers. Weld, because he could make himself safe from her bug attacks, and Hunch because his precognition would be screwy around Contract. Hunch's full-cover armor was also ideal to protect against Beetle. Conveniently, this arrangement kept Weld out of Contract's line of sight, since she might recognize him.
Beetle's swarm was nowhere to be seen, but she was clearly conscious so she must be biding her time. Given that her swarm would give her better data on their current situation, Intrepid chose to follow her lead and continue to cooperate, for now.
Weld sat Intrepid in the chair next to Beetle's a little harder than necessary and started tying him down. Intrepid judged that his flight power would be able to lift the chair, unless they had thought to bolt it down. He craned his head, but couldn't see the feet of either his chair or Beetle's to give him a hint.
Beetle turned towards him, even though she wouldn't be able to see anything through the sack on her head. Intrepid had agreed to unmask his face if not his name to the Boston Wards, but Beetle hadn't had that chance since she hadn't known they were coming. A canvas sack was one way to get around that problem. Based on the tenderness with which Hunch was holding himself, bringing Beetle in hadn't been easy.
"What do you want with us?" Intrepid demanded, playing his part.
Seconds later, when Weld stood up, Intrepid had to suppress the urge to jump. Beetle had set bugs to work on the ropes around his hands, and presumably on his ankles too, and the tickling feeling of organized legs walking across the exposed skin between his suit and his gloves was driving him crazy.
"Shut up," Hunch growled. "Either of you think of doing anything funny, the other one will pay for it. And I do mean even think of it. Any funny business and I'll see it before you can do it."
The grandstanding felt a little fake to Intrepid, but maybe that was because he already knew it was a practice exercise.
"I'm going to go check in," Weld said, and he left. Intrepid guessed he wanted to get out of the way so that Flicker could dump Contract right in the warehouse proper, with a good view of her two bound teammates, without Contract seeing him.
Weld was barely out of sight when Flicker reappeared with her cupped hands in front of her, probably holding her teammates, shrunk down by Magnidude to get around Flicker's restriction in carrying capacity. Flicker was a young girl with honey colored hair, at least as short as Fi and maybe smaller, who could only teleport herself plus half her weight.
Sure enough, she set her hands on the ground and almost immediately their figures became visible as they grew.
Magnidude was built like a football player, dressed in flashy yellow and blue with a geometric pattern. His helmet offered full head protection, but it wasn't integrated with his body suit and plating which meant he'd be vulnerable to Beetle in an encounter. Intrepid hadn't been impressed when he'd been told the other cape was a striker who could change the size of himself and/or the things he was touching, but since he'd seen firsthand how effective it was, he couldn't really comment any more.
O'Reilly was probably at least as tall as Intrepid, but looked smaller next to his towering teammate. His goggles and partial face mask exposed dark skin and wide lips. He was dressed in green and black with concentric circles worked into the armor, hinting at his sound-based wind and sonar abilities. He'd been an independent cape in Texas for a while, before he'd moved to Boston and joined the Wards, so Intrepid knew that "O'Reilly" was supposed to refer to "Radar O'Reilly." The younger cape didn't know the difference between radar and sonar, apparently.
Contract was still in full costume, sedated. Willow was nowhere to be seen, which was when Intrepid remembered that Magnidude's power also had a maximum weight limit.
Flicker was panting a little as she spoke to Hunch. "Mag and I gotta head back for Willow. Contract got her pinned before O'Reilly put her down. You good here?"
There was a pause, longer than the question warranted, and Intrepid guessed that Hunch was looking for any future problems. Intrepid wanted to tell them that they were back way too fast, there was no way Contract had gone down that easy, but he couldn't. If Contract was faking, they'd all find out soon enough. "Go," Hunch said.
"What's going on?" Intrepid spoke up again. "What did you do to her?"
"She's fine," O'Reilly assured him. Intrepid looked toward the Ward, waiting for details, and he elaborated. "The deafness should be gone by the time the sedative wears off."
Deafness. Holy crap. O'Reilly's main go-to application of his power was a sound wave that induced temporary deafness. Except Contract was already deaf, and Clockblocker had evidently forgotten to mention this to Weld. Hunch turned toward Intrepid with a funny look on his face, and that's when everything started happening at once.
The ropes fell off his hands; Beetle stood up next to him and ripped the bag off her head as a swarm of bugs descended from above. Fi didn't even bother to get off the floor. Instead she reached out and pulled O'Reilly's legs out from under him, then proceeded to grapple with him on the floor. He was caught by surprise, and it didn't take her long to gain the upper hand.
Hunch ignored the bugs and tried to help his teammate, but Intrepid was up now, too, and he moved to intercept. Beetle turned her head in the direction Weld had disappeared to and most of the bugs broke off to pursue him. A moment later, Intrepid could hear Weld cussing.
Intrepid engaged Hunch at close quarters, shoving him back and crouching into a better stance. Hunch went back much further than Intrepid expected, actually falling flat on the floor. By the time Intrepid realized why, it was too late.
The sound started as a whine but almost immediately it became too high pitched to actually hear. Intrepid clamped his hands over his head trying to stem the sound and the incredible pain, but it was useless. He blinked tears out of his eyes and shakily looked up just in time to see Hunch's fist coming toward his face. Flyer's instincts, to dodge up instead of down, saved Intrepid. Hunch let him go, moving to deal with Beetle instead.
For her part, Beetle seemed basically down for the count. The high frequency blast had killed a large number of bugs which now blanketed the warehouse floor. She was curled in a ball, hands over her ears, and her mouth was open but she wasn't screaming. Or rather, she was and Intrepid couldn't hear her.
Even without enough room to really accelerate, Intrepid was faster than Hunch. Unlike Grue and Bitch, Beetle was light enough to lift and she had practiced with him, even if it wasn't much. She clung to his neck as he took them up into the rafters of the warehouse and out through a roof access hatch. Weld and his team had probably sealed off the rest of the warehouse, but without a flyer on the team the thirty-foot ceiling wasn't close enough to ping their awareness, whereas Intrepid had automatically noticed the skylight, like he noticed windows and doors.
Beetle was more effective when she could see a battleground in person, but she could still help her team some from afar. He didn't want to leave Contract alone while he evacuated Beetle, but she'd been far too vulnerable to O'Reilly's scream, which could be repeated at any time. She had to be secured from that threat.
He skipped over only one rooftop, keeping the warehouse well within Beetle's radius. He pointed from himself to the warehouse, and from Beetle to the roof. She nodded vigorously, which was as close to planning as two suddenly-deaf people could get. Intrepid turned and raced back to the warehouse.
Inside was chaos. Flicker, Magnidude, and Willow had made it back, and had joined Hunch and O'Reilly in facing off against Contract. Weld was nowhere to be seen, either still concerned with being recognized or still occupied with Beetle's bugs.
Beetle was already compensating for the mass of bugs that had been killed by O'Reilly. He kept having to break off from generating his windstorm to kill off the swarm before it could grow too large. It kept him from building up the 30-to-50 mph winds that were possible with enough continuous use of his power, but it also kept Beetle's bugs almost too thin to matter to the rest of the fight.
Still, as long as she could keep O'Reilly occupied, it was something. He just hoped she didn't run out of swarm before the encounter was over.
Intrepid dove for Flicker, planning to match his mover rating against hers, but she vanished before he'd closed half the distance. He looked around, but she wasn't visible. Right. One quirk of her power was a few seconds' delay between picking her target and actually arriving. By the time Flicker appeared behind Contract, his partner was ready. She turned, seized the teleporter and threw her at Magnidude, who was now about nine feet tall. Flicker winked out before impact, at about the same instant that Intrepid plowed into the brute as a human missile.
The timing was perfect; Magnidude, braced for a frontal impact, was knocked sideways. But before Intrepid could follow through with the attack, Willow wrapped herself around Intrepid quite literally. Her legs clamped around his thighs, and her arms hugged him like a vise. For most, the steel grip would mean game over. Intrepid used his power to turn and hurl them both into the back of Magnidude's knees as the giant was just getting to his feet, using her extra weight to his advantage against her teammate. Magnidude stumbled again, which unfortunately put him at a perfect height to break Hunch's fall.
Willow vanished, flowing away from Intrepid, up and over Magnidude's shoulder. Without any need for communication, Magnidude threw the changer straight at Contract. Contract managed to telekinetically raise a chair to intercept her and sidestep the resulting tangle of parahuman and wood, but by then Intrepid was backpedaling away from Magnidude as fast as he could and he didn't see what happened next.
Magnidude managed to grow almost as fast as Intrepid could fly, so Intrepid turned and flew through the skylight again. His mobility was his best asset, and he needed to get as much use out of it as he could, which meant never being where he was expected to be. He shot out of the warehouse, then raced around the building until he found a broken window and darted back inside.
It was eerie, fighting in silence. He didn't realize how much he'd come to depend on his hearing until it was gone. He was even used to judging his speed by the sound of air rushing around him, and without that he actually overshot the window and had to double back, costing himself a few seconds. Stupid.
He made it inside just in time to see Contract get thrown off her feet by a blast from O'Reilly, which also kicked up the multitudes of dead bugs on the floor of the warehouse. At this rate, there wouldn't be a single insect in the area by the time the fight was over. The combined Contract-and-bug-corpse missile shot across the warehouse. Intrepid raced to catch her, feeling the wind across his cheeks but still not hearing it.
He didn't make it in time, but it didn't matter. Contract hit the ground and rolled twice, coming to her feet with alarming grace. A blow like that should have dislocated her shoulder or worse, but she was showing no signs of pain. Had she made a contract of some sort?
Her hand flashed out, but no telekinetic blast followed. Instead, Intrepid saw a flash of silver. O'Reilly dodged the knife, thank god, but it was a close call. Flicker appeared behind Contract, fast enough that she had to have left before the knife toss. Intrepid dropped down behind O'Reilly, lining himself up to take out the blaster at the knees, and continue on towards Magnidude, hopefully using O'Reilly as a shield against Magnidude's striker attacks.
Contract whirled, lashing out, and got Flicker in a submission hold for only a moment before the girl escaped by disappearing again. Intrepid was worried that Contract didn't seem to be reacting fast enough, and wasn't using her telekinesis. The adrenaline or stress of the situation, or both, had thrown her off enough that she couldn't access her "Jedi" talents. Without those, Contract was just a well-trained normal unless she escalated with deals. Intrepid targeted O'Reilly before the blaster could connect with Contract again.
O'Reilly was smaller and younger than Intrepid had guessed, maybe ninety pounds, so Intrepid re-directed his plan.
He was able to get O'Reilly out of the skylight with ease, and turned east away from where he'd stashed Beetle, but he'd been too obvious. Flicker was there, waiting. She reached out, barely touching Intrepid, but it was enough. Flicker couldn't transport anything greater than half of her own mass, but the attempt was enough to make Intrepid black out temporarily. By the time he shook the spots out of his vision, Flicker and O'Reilly were both back in the warehouse. The good news was that his hearing filtered in with his other senses.
As soon as he could hear again, he was a little surprised they hadn't woken the neighborhood yet. O'Reilly's climbing winds were rattling the whole warehouse, or at least every loose thing in it. Intrepid shook the thought out of his head and went back into the fray. Weld was still absent, and Intrepid had to credit Beetle with that at this point, though he couldn't imagine how she was managing it.
Suddenly, just as he passed into the warehouse, the winds died an abrupt death. The silence, so complete, nearly made him think he'd lost his hearing again. He hadn't.
Contract had managed to actually catch Willow. It looked like she'd wrapped the girl's rubbery arm twice around her hand, and she was now using Willow as a body shield. With the loss of O'Reilly's wind, Intrepid could hear Willow whimpering. Contract's right hand darted behind her and came out with a knife.
Intrepid had seen Contract when she was desperate. He'd seen her when she ought to be feared. He knew how her body hummed with suppressed action and her fingers flexed with anticipated violence. This was not that, wasn't even close, but to someone who hadn't seen worse, it must have looked like it.
"ASHLAND," Magnidude said forcefully, and loudly due to his size. He raised his hands and stepped back, already shrinking. Flicker appeared beside him, and also held still, hands raised.
Intrepid barely slowed his descent as he came down next to Contract. He could see the shock of that name playing across her face, so the visor must still be translating for her. He was glad, because he hadn't been certain that she'd let herself be distracted by translations during combat.
Intrepid touched down next to Contract, landing on her right-hand side just a little bit back. It was always his choice of combat position, when available. The moment of shock had passed, but rather than calming or confusing Contract as Clockblocker had hoped, Intrepid saw rage and desperation light in her face.
"How do you know that name?" Contract didn't cuss and didn't need to, twisting Willow's arm further as she stepped forward in emphasis.
"Contract," Intrepid barked out, but she wasn't listening.
"Who the hell are you?" she spat. When the Wards backed up, hands raised, the confusion they'd expected finally hit.
Intrepid used the moment of silence to step up and touch her shoulder. "Contract!" She turned, yanking Willow with her. The knife in her dominant hand stopped long before it would have made contact as she registered he was an ally. "Trust me," he added forcefully, then commanded, "Let her go."
Contract's demeanor got more guarded, not less. "Christo," she spat out.
"Contract," he repeated, but she cut him off.
"What's my field name?" she asked, and he recognized the tone of voice from the one master/stranger situation he'd seen in Texas and the drills they had run afterward. Contract didn't trust that he was himself.
Contract couldn't mean Fi, which was widely known by a number of individuals. "Jedi," he answered instead.
Contract finally, finally released the now-silent Willow, but she didn't sheath her knife. "What's going on?"
"Simulation," Weld announced from the far side of the warehouse.
Contract was so startled she actually threw her knife, and only a last minute jerk of her hand threw it far to Weld's left. She breathed out a curse too quiet to hear clearly, then froze again. "Weld?" Her tone was incredulous.
"Contract," he replied. She faced him only a moment longer before she whirled on Intrepid.
"You knew." It wasn't an accusation, per say. More like she was looking for confirmation.
"I knew," he admitted. At that, Contract actually collapsed, sitting on the concrete floor with a thump, breathing hard and shaking. She was coming off the combat high. "I'm going to go get Beetle. Don't kill anyone while I'm gone," he joked, and she nodded.
Intrepid found Beetle sitting casually on the roof he'd left her on, still wearing her pajamas. He was suddenly very glad that Beetle dressed modestly for bed, although the cold spring nights helped ensure that.
"It was a simulation," he told her.
"I guessed," she deadpanned back.
"Weld's got a domino mask for you if you want it. Otherwise you can show your face but not your name, or a full reveal. Whatever you want."
"I'll take the mask," Beetle said. Intrepid flew her down to the office section of the warehouse, which now had an open door. Inside they found Vista waiting for them with Beetle's full costume. Intrepid hadn't been sure if she and Clockblocker would be on-site already.
"Clockblocker's in there, and you should get in there too," Vista told him. Intrepid followed the sounds of shouting into the warehouse.
"You had no right to tell them that name. None. I almost killed Willow, do you know that?" Contract was saying as he came into earshot.
She was still sitting on the ground, and still shaking. Weld and Clockblocker had drawn close to her, while the rest of the Boston Wards backed up to give her space.
"I thought they had a sniper or… shit, Clock, I could have… why the hell would give them that?"
"It had to be something that would get your attention," Clockblocker hedged. "We couldn't exactly establish a safe word without giving away the whole gig."
"So use Jedi. Or Michael Buble. Or hell, have them yell pineapple or something. The sheer weirdness would have worked. Or they could have just backed off."
"In the middle of a battle rage?" Clockblocker pressed, "You would have listened?"
From her expression, Contract realized he had a point, but she wasn't ready to back down just yet. "Clock, I want you to listen to me very carefully. Ash didn't just die. He was shot. He was shot because he was talking to me. Now, Lucius himself might be dead. But his posse currently have two hundred thousand dollars in escrow, as a bounty for my death. That might not sound like much, but I know these people. I know their resources. That's every cent they have. When I heard Ash's name, this situation crossed from 'someone, somewhere wants something from me,' into 'Crap, at this moment Gordon is staring down a sniper scope watching me.' The only reason I didn't lash out is that I couldn't figure out which direction he would be in."
"Okay, next time we use Jedi," Intrepid said, walking past Clockblocker to put a hand on her shoulder. Contract looked up at him, but didn't stand. She was still trembling. Intrepid glanced at Weld. "Is Willow okay?"
"Yes. She can maintain an enhanced state for a little while, just not indefinitely. A couple bruises maybe, no real harm done."
"Thank God," Contract stated emphatically. "Thank God," she repeated at a whisper.
"Contract," Clockblocker started to say, but she just shook her head.
"Give me a minute, Clock. Just… a minute." So saying, she reached up and unclipped her visor, dropping it in her lap. Then she shut her eyes and tilted her head back until it touched Intrepid's leg. He squeezed her shoulder.
The rest of Weld's team drifted closer and Vista and Beetle came out from the office area to join them as well. Willow cleared her throat, and said, "Ah, it's really okay. We knew this was going to be a full contact exercise. Magnidude stepped in before anything could have happened just in case, but I was fine. I was playing up the pain to fake you out."
"She, ah -"
Clockblocker glanced at Intrepid, who sighed and finished the thought. "She can't hear you. Contract's completely deaf. With her eyes shut like this, she's got no way to know you're even talking."
The Boston Wards blinked at that, surprised. "So, my scream…" O'Reilly trailed off, realization dawning.
"She played us like a fiddle," Flicker finished. Intrepid felt Contract shift as she lifted her head up and put the visor back on. Flicker continued, "She went down so hard, I just gassed her and assumed she was out."
"The visor registered the sound, so I took a guess at the intended effect," Contract said. She made no move to stand, probably because she was still shaking.
"You okay?" Vista asked, obviously worried.
"I will be. I was reliving my trigger event, and when I woke up there was someone standing over me and Intrepid vanished and Beetle's there and then she's not… Shit. I just need a minute."
The Wards all grimaced at that, while Weld shuffled uncomfortably. Intrepid distantly remembered Contract's long-ago comment about the types of capes and their reactions to a mention of a trigger event.
"Calories wouldn't go amiss either," Beetle observed. "Unless there's a reason we're standing in the middle of our battleground?"
"What's even open at this time of night?" Flicker asked. In the relatively dim lighting, the black and white lines of her costume were a little eerie, especially now that she was standing still.
"Denny's," Contract offered. She put a hand in the air and Intrepid helped her to her feet. "But given that we're in costume, let's just go back to the apartment. I'll make a butt-load of pancakes."
It took several trips for Magnidude and Flicker to ferry them back to the apartment. Intrepid and Contract went in the first wave, and as the other two Wards disappeared back to the warehouse Intrepid surveyed the scene. There was surprisingly little damage.
The remnants of a bowl were lying at the base of one wall, the area above slightly marked. He assumed someone had dodged the impromptu projectile. Some furniture was moved around, but none seemed broken. He'd been taken too quickly, and then Contract had gone down purposefully in order to be taken, too. He set about straightening the few details and cleaning up the ceramic while Contract opened and shut cupboards, assembling supplies.
As he threw the bowl fragments in the trash, he realized she was still shaking. The nearly-silent pop of another wave of Wards echoed behind them and the measuring cup she was fishing out of the drawer dropped back in with a clatter.
Intrepid put a hand on her shoulder again, but shockingly she didn't jump. "I'm fine," she said.
"I don't believe you," he answered.
She planted both hands on the edge of the counter, gripping it with white knuckles to force herself to stop shaking. He felt tension replace tremors under his hand.
"Capes are scary," she whispered, "message friggin' received. Shit." She hunched over, her forehead coming to rest on the counter in front of her. "Shit."
"You did good," he said as another pop echoed. Contract didn't react, but he was pretty sure her eyes were closed so she wouldn't have seen the message. After a moment he repeated, "You did good."
This time Contract shook her head and straightened up. "I survived. Barely. I couldn't have defended Beetle if you hadn't gotten her out."
"That's why we're a team."
Abruptly she swung around, staring at him, and Intrepid was very aware of how close they were standing. It felt much less intimate when she was facing the other direction. "J… Intrepid. Please believe me, I trust you. I do. I did not hesitate because I didn't trust you."
She was so earnest, so worried that he wouldn't believe her that Intrepid actually laughed a little. "I know. You just had to make sure I was me." Her shoulders slumped in relief, and finally the shaking was gone. "Where's the Bisquick?" he asked, mostly to break the mood.
"Top friggin' shelf. Where else?" Contract asked rhetorically, moving out of the way so he could grab the box for her. "Five friggin' two, I swear," she muttered.
"Hear hear," Flicker said as she dropped into a seat at the table. Intrepid handed the box to Contract and turned to see that the rest of the Wards had arrived. Everyone had found seats, either around the table, on the couch, or at a bar stool. Intrepid must have missed a few tell-tale "pops." Weld was sitting, leaning back against the wall which had been the target of the bowl. Intrepid hoped he hadn't missed any ceramic pieces.
It said something about how not-fine Contract was that she was willing to be vulnerable in front of an audience. She must not have any strength left to hold it in.
"I'm limited to carrying half my weight," the teleporter continued. "It'd be nice if there was a little more of me to halve."
Contract laughed as she started cracking eggs into a truly massive mixing bowl. "My cousin used to tell me I'm five hundred pounds of crazy in a ninety pound package."
"Oh, ninety, ouch," Flicker commiserated. Willow mimed a talking mouth with her hand. The other girl wasn't fat by any means, but she was built tall and thick while Flicker had a Hollywood figure that would make anyone jealous.
"Well, one-oh-two according my physical, not that he'd listen."
"We all good?" Weld asked, interrupting the banter.
Contract looked up, confused. "Uh, yes?"
"Contract, you kinda freaked us all out in there," Vista confided. It was hard to tell under the mask, but Intrepid thought Contract might have blushed.
She turned back to her mixing very quickly. "I'm fine, really. I appreciate the experience, actually. I… needed that. In a weird way. I'm just really glad none of you were seriously hurt."
"This was just the first exercise. New Wave is joining us tomorrow," Clockblocker added. "I figured we make the most of your guys' help while you're here."
"Sure," Weld agreed easily. Willow and Magnidude shared an uneasy glance.
"What?" Beetle snapped out. She trusted the Brockton Bay Wards now, but Intrepid had noticed she was still a little sensitive around new people, assuming the worst automatically.
Willow coughed and said tentatively, almost apologetically, "It's just… what you said, Contract, to Clockblocker… that you might have killed me?"
Contract took the time to spoon batter onto the hot griddle before she answered. "For a moment, I thought you guys were a professional hit team, hired to kill me, specifically, knowing the exact and full nature of my powers. That assumption implies more skill than you actually possess. I already knew you were exaggerating your pain, and for a moment, only a moment, I considered the possibility that you were entirely liquid and only faking your limitations. I felt your trembling escalate before I acted on it, but I could have accidentally hurt or even killed you if I'd overestimated your flexibility."
A sigh of relief rushed out of all of the Boston Wards. "Clockblocker?" Intrepid asked, "What exactly did you tell them?"
It was Contract that answered, sounding much more passé about the situation than Intrepid felt. "He was afraid I'd escalate too far too quickly, particularly if you were in danger."
"Contract, this really isn't the time or place," Clockblocker interjected. She flipped the last pancake and glanced up.
"Why not? You told them I was a potentially lethal danger. I think they'd be relieved to hear our debriefing, and I don't care if they listen."
Clockblocker's face was impossible to read under his helmet, but his silence somehow spoke volumes to Contract. Her forehead wrinkled. "I didn't pass your test," she realized in confusion.
"You escalated to lethal force," he said grudgingly. Contract's expression didn't clear. "The knife you threw?"
"I was completely in control of both knives during the entire encounter. The shorter blade missed Weld by a significant margin, and I would not have released without knowing exactly where it was going, which precludes throwing at a friendly. I threw it to keep him back, not to do harm. The longer blade left my hand headed in the direction of O'Reilly. It was flying at less than half its maximum speed, plenty slow enough for him to dodge, as he did. If he hadn't done so, human reflex is to throw one's hands in front of the face," she demonstrated the position.
"At which point the knife would have glanced off his armor and fallen to the ground. Failing that, Magnidude was within arm's reach of O'Reilly. Failing even that, the knife would have struck pommel first, which at the part of the shoulder I was aiming for would numb his arm but not kill him. It was a distraction, not a direct attack."
Silence greeted her recitation. She turned back to her pancakes, removing them from the griddle and loading up a plate. "Intrepid? These are Beetle's," she said, handing the plate off to him. "Syrup's on the back burner, would you put in the gravy boat?" She pointed to a cupboard.
Without hesitation, Intrepid walked the plate over to Beetle. When he turned around, Vista was dealing with the syrup.
"I'm a little impressed you didn't knife me, actually," Weld said lightly, injecting humor back into the conversation. It was a little strained, but it was a start.
Contract just shrugged as she spooned the next puddles of batter into position. "I remember flirting with you before Behemoth," she commented off-handedly.
Silence reigned again, as the Boston Wards all turned to look at Weld, and the Brockton Bay Wards all tried to pick their jaws off the floor. Weld himself managed to choke on nothing. Contract turned from the stove while she waited for the pancakes to brown, and surveyed the room.
"What? What did I miss?"
"Flirted?" Weld asked, sounding strangled.
"Oh. You don't remember me. This is awkward."
"No, I remember talking to you, I just didn't know we were flirting."
At that, Willow and Flicker both started giggling, with Vista close behind them. Beetle managed to shove pancake into her mouth, and the guys all tried to keep a straight face for Weld's sake. Contract's blush was now clearly visible between her visor and her hair line, and below the blue edging.
"Oh. Sorry. I guess you must get a lot of that." Flicker and Willow both laughed harder.
"Uh, what?" Weld looked like he was ready to shrink into the floor.
"I just mean, you're a good looking guy, sooo…" she trailed off as Hunch and Magnidude both lost their fight against laughter. "Okay, I'm going to put down the shovel and walk away from this particular hole before it starts resembling a grave." She turned back to the stove and flipped the pancakes.
"No, no, it's okay," Weld hurried to assure her. "It's fine, it's just… um… it really doesn't happen that often. Flirting, I mean."
"That you know of," Clockblocker deadpanned unhelpfully. Beetle, who had been successfully resisting her mirth thus far, started to choke. Clockblocker thumped her back while Weld shot him a deadly glare.
"Wait, really?" Contract asked.
"I, ah…" Weld didn't seem to know what to say. Contract just kept looking at him, and he finally gestured to himself. "With the metal and all."
Contract's forehead scrunched once more in confusion before she shrugged and turned back to the stove. "I hate to break it to you, and don't take this the wrong way, but on the list of strange or interesting things I've seen, 'metal man' doesn't crack the top twenty. You're just another attractive teenager."
Contract turned to hand Intrepid the next plate, but he took the spatula from her instead. "Go sit and eat. I can cook pancakes."
"I'm fine," she insisted.
"Contract, you have a serious case of survivor's high. Go sit down and eat."
"I'm fine," Contract repeated.
"In a minute you're going to start telling your marijana story," Intrepid countered. "Go sit."
He shoved her between the shoulder blades. Contract looked at him for another moment, then shrugged and wandered over to the table to pour syrup on her pancakes. With all the available seats in the apartment taken, she sank down next to Weld, who didn't seem to know what to do with that.
Fortunately, Contract didn't require human interaction. She inhaled the first plate of pancakes, and was ready for her second by the time Intrepid was pulling his first set off the griddle. She paused only long enough to tell Vista there was a fry pan under the stove if they wanted to cook more pancakes at once before she descended on the food again.
An hour later, the teenagers had eaten their way through three batches of pancakes and the frozen pizza that Contract had started before the attack. By ten o'clock, everyone was finally fed and calm.
"Can we debrief now?" Contract asked Clockblocker. He shrugged, polishing off his second glass of milk.
"Sure. Did you want to start somewhere specific?"
Contract immediately turned on Willow with something like admiration. "You are one tricky fighter. How do you move so fast? Is it power based or practice or enhanced senses?"
Willow blinked, surprised by Contract's enthusiasm. "Ah, slightly enhanced perception of time during the other uses of my power."
"And the flexibility? It's time limited?"
"Not exactly. I can't hold any specific non-natural shape for too long. So I can stretch and then bend and then melt and then knot myself," she performed each action with her hand as she spoke, which was one-part freaky and two-parts awesome. "But I can't stay there."
"So when I wrapped your arm and trapped you in that shape… got it." Contract nodded to herself.
"You actually found both of my greatest weaknesses pretty fast. There's a maximum thinning I can achieve, so trapping me in the cupboard was perfect. And then the wrapping, like you said."
"I gotta ask," Hunch interject, "how do you fight deaf? Any time I don't get out of O'Reilly's way, I have the hardest time and I'm a precog."
Contract shrugged. "Some precognition. A lot of practice. Dragon's got a heads-up display in the visor, but it was more distracting than helpful. I'll have to practice with it, or just nix it."
"So, overall, was tonight a success?" Flicker asked. Weld gave her a dirty look, the rest of the Boston Wards seemed uncomfortable, and the Brockton Bay team all seemed as confused as Intrepid felt. "I mean, what exactly was the purpose?"
Contract turned to Clockblocker. "You want to tell us or should I guess?"
"Go ahead," Clockblocker invited her. Intrepid guessed that he was really just interested to hear Contract's take on everything.
"I triggered six years ago, but I haven't had a lot of what you would call cape interactions," she explained blithely. "Mostly I used my powers to help out in mundane situations, anonymously. For a variety of reasons, I have also seen my fair share of violence but none of it was related to powers. I'm having trouble adjusting my expectations of situations. I can recognize most guns on sight, know their exact strengths and weakness, and I calibrate my response accordingly. But you say Mover 4 and I just sort of shrug. Being one of the few capes I knew for the last six years has given me a dangerously large ego. Basically, I needed to have my ass kicked, so yeah, mission accomplished."
"Was it?" Magnidude muttered. Weld motioned him to speak up. "You held you own against the five of us with only occasional help from Beetle and Intrepid."
"Well, first of all, Beetle kept O'Reilly mostly occupied until the very end. And don't think I didn't see you looking over your shoulder for Intrepid twice as often as you needed to, so I wouldn't write off their contributions. Plus, I think six cracked bones counts as an ass kicking."
"What?" snapped out Clockblocker, Vista, and Weld in near-unison.
Contract waved her hand. "Relax, I've already gotten the hospital lecture from Armsmaster. I'll go before he gets home tomorrow morning."
Vista's mouth opened and shut. Clockblocker wasn't nearly as surprised. "Goddammit, Contract. You stood there and cooked with six broken bones?"
"No. I stood and cooked with six cracked bones. One rib, two in the forearm, and up to three related to dislocating and relocating my shoulder, which will have to be confirmed by x-ray. The doctors are going to tell me to bind the rib, which Beetle's undershirt is already doing quite nicely, and to keep the forearm in a sling for a couple weeks. I hate slings, but I also haven't used it or bumped it once since the fight ended. The shoulder they have to wait for swelling to go down anyway, based on past experience. I've taken three Motrin and I'll take three more in a couple hours. All I'm doing is waiting here instead of in a hospital bed. I'm a rookie to cape fights, not to violence."
Clockblocker sighed heavily. "Don't scare me like that."
"Sorry," Contract offered quietly, and she actually sounded sincere.
"I have to admit, I feel better now," Hunch said. "You didn't show any of that in the field. I was starting to wonder if we were even connecting."
"Adrenaline is a wonderful drug," Contract agreed. She hesitated, then turned to Weld. "Which reminds me that I do owe you an apology. I didn't mean to embarrass you earlier. After combat my brain-to-mouth filter tends to take a vacation, and I never seem to remember that fact at the time."
"I won't take it personally," Weld promised.
"But that doesn't mean we're ever letting either of you forget it, either," Clockblocker said with a grin. Contract blushed and dropped her head back against the wall with a thud. "Watch the head," Clockblocker added mockingly.
"Eidolon fixed the concussion. I'm fine."
"Subdural hematoma," Clockblocker and Intrepid corrected together.
"Head injury," she conceded. This effect was ruined when she mouthed, "Whatever."
"That doesn't increase our confidence in your self-diagnosis, you know," Vista warned her.
"Back to the original point," Clockblocker said, "tonight was not about you having your ass kicked. Well, not exactly."
"I'm listening."
"It was the first time we've really seen you or Beetle on the defensive. We needed a solid baseline to decide where we go from here. Now we can assess weaknesses and strengths and train accordingly. It was a test, like you said, to see how hard you'd escalate and when. It was to see if you could hold onto your telekinesis in a full fight. It was further exposure to cape tactics. It was a rare opportunity to do all of that in a controlled environment. Having now had one fake attack, any future ones become that much harder."
"Future fake kidnappings. Great!" Beetle put in sarcastically.
"I don't know why you're complaining," Hunch muttered.
"He's right, you were pretty awesome," Flicker said.
"This I gotta hear," was Contract's encouraging contribution.
"Suffice it to say it took the six of us nearly ten minutes to get her out of her house, and the whole time she managed not to wake up her father."
"Daaamn girl!" Contract congratulated, while Intrepid tipped his water glass at Beetle.
"Good job," he affirmed, quickly echoed by Clockblocker.
Vista offered a fist bump and, "Girl power!"
"Wait, you went after Beetle first?" Contract clarified. "Not both of us together?"
"If we hadn't gotten the drop on Intrepid, the secondary plan was for Flicker and I to drop back and pick up Beetle to use as leverage." Magnidude was pretty pleased with himself, and considering how easily he'd gotten Intrepid maybe that wasn't out of place.
"That's not what I was told," Intrepid protested. "I thought the plan was always for Hunch and Weld to take on Beetle."
"That's basically what it came down to," Weld assured him. "First of all, contrary to the intelligence report she did not in fact go to bed early, so we teleported into a live situation. Magnidude and Flicker had always planned to drop us and double back for the others. By the time they made it back to us and we were mostly the right size again, Beetle was downstairs and fighting. The others tried, but we got in each other's way more than we helped."
"Shrinking me was kinda an obvious mistake," Beetle put in her two cents. "I mean, you should have seen that one coming."
Vista laughed, and elaborated, confirming Intrepid's guess that she and Clockblocker had been watching live surveillance of some sort. "Magnidude tried to make her small enough to put in his pocket, which made her just about the right size to hitch a ride on a june bug."
"Those things are nasty," the jock defended himself. "Anyone would have dropped her when they were being divebombed by twelve of them."
"What was the plan there, anyway?" Beetle asked.
Magnidude shrugged. "You were lighter than I guessed, so you shrunk further than I meant you to."
"So anyway," Flicker continued the tale, smiling, "Beetle gets down to her basement before she's big enough to spot, and the rest of the june bugs fly into the kitchen. When we follow the mass to kitchen, thinking we're following her, she's got bugs swarmed together and more coming all the time so that it's not immediately obvious that she's missing."
"Yeah, laugh it up, Flick," Willow jabbed. "You weren't the one getting webbed."
The Boston Wards all looked over to Beetle at that, and she explained. "I keep black widows in the basement so they can be weaving material when I'm at home. I had to go down and open the aquariums before the rest of the swarm could use the silk. I really thought I was going to make it out of the windows down there, even if I had regrown by that point."
"You would have, except I've got echolocation. I was watching the outside of the house in case you got away. I'm a little surprised you tried to run, though. I mean, you left your dad behind."
"I already knew you weren't interested in the upstairs," Beetle explained. "I had sent alerts to Clockblocker and to the PRT board using the comm system Kid Win set up for me, so I knew help was on the way to the area. I was hoping to get out, get away a bit, and then draw you guys out of the house."
"The ecolocation reminds me," Vista cut in, "we're supposed to make you two guess the power details to see how close you are. We've bent that a little, but let's do it now anyway."
"Beetle," Contract offered, one hand sweeping out.
"Cheater," Clockblocker protested. "I'm pretty sure Beetle has them all pegged already. What do you know?"
"Teleporter, slight delay, weight limit." Contract pointed to Flicker, then to Willow. "Shapeshifter, enhanced strength, durability, possibly mass manipulation." She skipped O'Reilly to point to Hunch, "Martial arts training, thinker."
She stared at Magnidude for a while. "Resizes self and others, possibly a weight limit because I've never seen more than your own mass plus 200 percent but that could also be a fake limit held in reserve. Macro control only, because it's a striker trait but it worked through your gloves and our clothes."
She ignored Weld, and looked over at Beetle, but O'Reilly asked, "And me?"
"Manipulation of sound and through that, air. Winds, occasional directional blasts, and something that messed with Beetle's bugs." Contract sounded particularly unsure, which made sense if she hadn't been able to hear his power for herself. Who knew how her visor had translated the sounds of combat.
"My turn!" Beetle said, excited. She started with Weld, who Contract hadn't faced. "Changer, unusual biology means no requirement to breath. Can reshape self, but not easily, probably from practicing the current form so often. Was able to eliminate his mouth, eyes, and nose but still see. Wasn't hurt by bugs, but was inconvenienced by other metal, to which I sacrificed most of my silverware. Did seem to be inconvenienced by the few bugs I was able to trap within his biology."
Weld nodded, and Beetle moved on to Magnidude. "Definite striker. Mass limitation Contract mentioned, but I think there's a total number of people you can change at one time, too. Also, I noticed there's only one size manipulation happening at one time. So you can make people small, but then you can't do anything else until you release them. When you used your power on yourself to make yourself larger, you couldn't change others' sizes. It let you operate as a brute, but cost you the advantages you have as a striker. In general, the mass seemed to stay proportional to volume, so increasing your size gave you increased durability."
Beetle grinned evilly. "Also, growing increased the size of various passages for my bugs to navigate." Magnidude shuddered, and Intrepid winced in sympathy. Beetle evidently hadn't pulled any punches. "And you didn't drop me in the house - I wriggled out of the sweatshirt I was wearing. Once I wasn't in contact with the cloth in contact with you, I started growing. Barely made it to the basement before I was big enough to be seen."
Hunch whistled. "Damn. Now I see why Clockblocker made Contract start. You're good."
"And look alive," Contract stage whispered, "you're next."
Hunch gulped theatrically as Beetle's attention turned his way. "Close-range fighter, but not a brute. Precognition, but it's not very good."
"Clarify," Clockblocker encouraged her.
"He was able to avoid the worst of my traps but not all of them. I theorize it's some sort of warning system, but it can only identify the biggest threat, not all threats."
"Continue," Weld said.
"You've got some sort of connection with your teammates," Beetle mused, thinking aloud. "You could look at them and understand whatever they were about to do, but you didn't the same read on me."
Beetle hesitated, but moved on to O'Reilly. "Serious air wave manipulation. You could do concentrated blasts with very little build up, or strong area-wide gale-force winds with preparation. Plus that weird scream that deafened us and killed my bugs, which I also noticed you could direct with pretty good precision when you took the time to do so. But you can only do one thing at a time. I didn't have the echolocation trick exactly figured out, but I knew there was something hokey going on because there were too many times when you weren't doing something obvious."
"And me?" Willow asked.
"Not done with O'Reilly," Beetle corrected. "You also have an air shield around your body, except when it gets disrupted right at the start of other power uses."
O'Reilly slow clapped. "Very few people figure that out."
Beetle preened, and then moved on to Willow. "Ditto what Contract said. I'd add that you never got thinner than two inches, or thicker than two feet. Extremely enhanced durability when you're shifting around, and you either don't feel pain or you can turn it off."
"Very temporarily," Willow confirmed.
"And me?" Flicker echoed her teammate.
"When you go, you take everything touching you with you. With enough bugs, I could have locked you down, provided you didn't get out of my range first. There's also that thing you did to Intrepid on the roof. My guess is that when you tried to jump with too much weight, you and your passengers black out instead of leaving. O'Reilly didn't lose it and was able to get you two back down to Magnidude, so it's probably something your passengers can build immunity to, but it knocked out Intrepid."
Beetle paused, thinking over everything. "I think that's all."
Vista let out a whistle, and Intrepid joined the rest in applause. "Very good job," Clockblocker congratulated her.
"Functionally correct on all accounts," Weld confirmed.
Contract was beaming up from the floor. "I'm so glad you're my teammate."
"Yes, you are," Magnidude said as he shuddered theatrically. "She's a terror to fight."
"It can't be that bad," Clockblocker protested. Magnidude gave him a dirty look.
"I wonder if we could convince Jouster to try to take her?" Contract mused aloud.
Weld bumped her shoulder. "He's not that bad."
"He's a jock," Contract protested, as though this was a cardinal sin.
"Cheerleader," Intrepid coughed fakely. Clockblocker and Vista's eyes lit up.
"Really?" Vista demanded, turning on Contract.
"Very, very briefly," she insisted, before she turned her stink eye on Intrepid. "See if I ever confide in you again."
"Ready to go to the hospital?" he asked. Maturely, Contract answered by sticking out her tongue.
"Oh yeah, wasn't there a marijuana story you were going to share?" Vista asked. Weld made a point of sticking his fingers in his ears.
Contract bumped him back, and though it was much less effective going in the other direction, Weld removed his hands. "I had two bones sticking through my leg and a ten mile hike between me and the car. What would you have done?"
"Weirdly, that's something I actually kinda want to see," Magnidude admitted. "The Ender, crippled and high. Does that make me a bad person?"
Contract answered the question by pegging his visor with her wadded-up napkin.
"Careful," Beetle warned sagely, "crippled and high can be arranged."
Magnidude paled, much to the delight of his female teammates. "Tomorrow, we are totally going guys on girls," Willow crowed.
"That's what she said," Clockblocker said.
Vista smacked his arm, chiding, "You're team leader now."
"So?"
She rolled her eyes helplessly. "So we're going to crush you tomorrow."
"In your dreams," Hunch muttered just loud enough for the room to hear.
"Let's see, that's what, eight girls and nine guys? Seems fair. You guys will need the advantage," Beetle said with mock haughtiness.
"Nine? Where do you get nine guys?" Hunch demanded.
Contract rattled off the rosters. "Magnidude, Weld, O'Reilly, Hunch, Clockblocker, Kid Win, Gallant, Intrepid and Shielder for the guys. And for the girls we have myself, Vista, Beetle, Willow and Flicker, Glory Girl, Panacea, and Laserdream. That's nine dudes and eight dudettes. We're ready if you are."
"Game on," chorused the Boston guys. Intrepid and Clockblocker shared a glance. They'd need to take time tonight after the group broke up and strategize. Maybe call the other Wards and see if Shielder had any insights into New Wave's girls. It wasn't that they couldn't beat the girls… it was just… better to be prepared. Yeah. That sounded right.