Even though I wasn't supposed to be involved after I backed out I was still persuaded to join the debriefing back at PRT headquarters. Almost everyone from the regular roster, to visiting capes, to independents like New Wave were there. The only one who wasn't there was Gallant, who had been stuck at a New Years party or something. The injured capes like Mouse Protector and Triumph would be sent to the infirmary to get some proper medical attention after they recounted what had happened to them.

I had once wanted to properly introduce myself to Mouse Protector, since I still admired her after all. But after hearing about Mesmerize's death I felt too ashamed. I didn't want her to think of me as the ward that bailed and had helped get Mesmerize killed. What I heard in the meeting only made me feel worse.

When the debriefing meeting happened there was a lot to cover. Our losses were technically light with only Mesmerize dying but that was only on paper. A lot of our capes were barely functioning either from injuries or exhaustion from a long fight. Even Miss Militia, who is a Noctis Cape, looked exhausted and ready for a long night's sleep. We were even treated to the rare sight of Armsmaster being out of his power armor, which I heard was pretty badly damaged in the fighting. He apparently favored sweats and a white T-shirt to go with his domino mask.

This was supposed to be an overwhelming victory, and the gap between that and what actually happened was depressingly large. What we got was a long, confused series of melees between troopers and gang members with a big all out fight between the gangs and Protectorate capes. What had happened to the infiltration team was just salt on the wound.

Since Mesmerize's hypnotism needed eye contact they were forced to get much closer to the party than the initial plan had called for. It didn't help that he had only a few hours of prep time. He had mentioned to Triumph that he hadn't actually expected to be picked since he generally got passed over for these types of missions ("He looked so happy when he arrived. He even mentioned finally having a chance to prove himself." Triumph had said.).

It made my guilt harden, since I could have just gone in and walked Squealer out by myself if the details about their lack of organization was true. There was nobody keeping her there, so the only reason the other capes went into action was that they sighted the infiltration team. They were only present for Lungs' assault because it took so long to get in and out. They were doomed by circumstance the second I backed out. The results for the gangs on the other hand were mixed.

The Merchants were basically wiped out since Squealer was arrested while Skidmark and the cape that was code named Mush were dead from Lungs initial assault on the warehouse. They had been buried in the rubble along with a few dozen other Merchants. Their remaining members were basically leaderless now, which was basically the prelude to all of them becoming ex-Merchants.

The Empire had lost three capes along with a decent number of members being arrested. Stormtiger and Cricket were arrested while Krieg was killed fighting Lung. Apparently they had realized too late that the Protectorate and ABB were also present when they attacked. Their losses probably would have been worse if they hadn't switched to fighting defensively almost immediately. I just wished they had lost more.

The ABB only suffered a small handful of foot soldier casualties since Lung tanked most of the Empire's and Protectorates capes. Oni Lee had thrown out some bombs as well but he was mostly a distraction for several of our capes. I think the only reason that Lung kept fighting for so long was that he thought he could go 2 for 2 with rival gangs destroyed when the Empire showed up with almost all their capes ("Wait, did anyone see Purity? Isn't it weird she was the only Empire cape who wasn't there?"). So overall they were the only ones who could call tonight a positive.

We were there for so long that I had to crash in the ward's quarters to catch a little sleep before my dad came to pick me up. I had called him before the briefing but I had only told him I was alive and the bare minimum of what had happened. I slept for a mere 3 hours before I had to get ready for him to pick me up. So it was in the early morning that I went out to the parking garage to meet up with him, since he insisted on picking me up himself. When I found his beaten down old truck he was standing by it.

"So how much can you tell me about last night?"

"There's not much to tell. I missed most of what happened." I got into the passenger seat. I was still tired but I could survive until I could finish my rest at the hospital. We had agreed to a pit-stop at the house for showers and fresh clothes. Dad got into the driver's seat and started the truck.

"Well I was hoping you could at least tell me what you did."

"Fine, I joined the rescue group and we saved a few of the other heroes who had gotten into trouble. I kicked some ass but it didn't matter because the operation had turned into a shit show once the-"

"Sam! Watch your language!"

Whoops, forgot dad is a bit sensitive about me using profanity. The hypocrite, I doubt he uses less than a dozen swears before lunch.

"Alright, Alright. Why do you even care? I learned 90% of my swear words from you talking on the phone with the other dockworkers."

"Sam, that's a different situation. Your mother wouldn't want you to pick up my habits. Now please continue. "

"Well we did catch two empire capes. Stormtiger and Cricket."

His face brightened up a bit. "Congratulations. That's actually impressive. It's been a while since two capes have been brought in at once in this town."

"Three technically. There was also this tinker the other heroes were transporting. But the empire ambushed them by accident and that's why they needed our help."

"By accident?"

"They had run into some other problems so they took one of the Merchant's vehicles to get away, and the empire only saw the vehicle when they were attacking."

"Wasn't there also a ward who took your place? Where was he during this whole mess?"

I shifted in my seat. "...He died, dad."

"What? How did it happen?"

"He got hurt in the ambush. We were actually trying to get him some medical help but he died before we even showed up."

"...Well at least you weren't on that mission. I'm glad you're safe."

"If I had gone on that mission nobody would have died. My powers were way better for it."

"You don't know that."

"Yes I do, they had to change the plan because I wasn't there. Mesmerize needed to get way closer than I would have to do the job. Mrs. Houlihan herself told me things almost always go wrong when the plan gets changed at the last minute. I backed out, the plan changed for the worse, and Mesmerize died because of it."

"Sam please, you are not the only one making decisions. The PRT decided to go forward anyway even though you couldn't participate. And the other ward had just as much a right to refuse as you did, but he decided to go anyway."

"So what, I had no responsibility for it all? You've always been on me about being more responsible. Now you're telling me that it's not my fault that I bailed and the whole thing failed?"

"Sam, what I'm trying to say is that you can't be responsible for everything. I could be helping even more people at my job at the union if I worked an extra day or two per month. But that would mean spending even less time with you and Taylor. I'm your father, and that means I should be worrying more about you than my job at the union. So it follows that the ones who should be the most responsible for missions and the Wards are the PRT, not you."

"I'll be sure to tell that to Mesmerize's family if I ever meet them. I'm sure they'll be able to tell the difference."

Once I said that dad's expression changed a bit. He looked a little offended by my statement but it was the truth. Other people had loved ones that would miss them if they died. I wasn't that special.

"You could also tell them you had family to worry about too. Taylor might recover from this but she wouldn't be alright if her sister had died. Especially while she was in a coma."

"Well what do I tell her huh? Even if I don't tell her anything she's going to put it together that I bailed from the mission from the news. And it'll obviously be because she got put in the hospital. Then she'll start blaming herself for it."

"Sam, it is not Taylor's fault she was hospitalized."

"I know that. But she's never completely gotten over her guilt from when mom died. I was there and…. Well… I just know that there wasn't anything I could have done. I needed to talk to Taylor a lot to figure that out."

"Well I'm asking you to trust that Taylor can figure that out as well. You're both smart girls after all. That's why I'm proud of both of you."

"Thanks. I'll keep that in mind." I decided to let the conversation end there. As nice as dad was trying to be, it was hard to let go of the guilt. The only thing I could hope for now was that Taylor could wake up soon and we could put this whole nightmare behind us.

We made our pit-stop at the house and accomplished our goals. It occurred to me that we should probably set some time aside before Taylor woke up and returned to the house to catch up on some of the laundry and cleaning. Maybe some groceries as well, since I would probably be making the lasagna for her "welcome back from the hospital" dinner.

We came back to the hospital and I did need to explain away why I hadn't signed out from the late night visitors sheet ("Oh silly me, it slipped my mind on my way out."). After that we settled into the room for another dull day of watching hospital cable and waiting for Taylor to wake up.

On the news the PRT was out in full force trying to spin last night's events. Unfortunately for them Mesmerize's family was willing to go public about him dying. That usually didn't happen since most ward families try to stay anonymous, but this family was angry enough to not care. They definitely gave the impression of feeling betrayed in their interviews. Families put a lot of trust in the wards program to keep their kids safe.

The circumstances of his death also looked bad. It was one thing for a ward to die during a routine day, but the fact that he was on the other side of the country on a special mission raised a lot of questions the PRT had a hard time answering ("Why exactly was a ward flown across the country to deal with a low-level drug gang?" "No Comment").

There was some coverage of the arrested and killed capes in the battle, but so far me and the other wards involvement was downplayed. There is an unofficial policy of downplaying the wards when they arrest other capes. It was just another way to discourage anyone from targeting us, since we don't want to look like too much of a threat. It seems like last night's disaster had caused them to shelve the idea of ignoring that policy. I decided to mute the TV and hope my picture or any video of me didn't turn up. It was a bit before lunch while dad was napping that we got an unexpected visitor in the form of Panacea.

"Hey Amy, I thought you weren't going to check in on Taylor until tomorrow?"

"Well yeah, but that was before most of the capes in the bay decided to punch each other's lights out to celebrate the new year. I was just told to be on standby for an hour last night for some first aid and then I'm healing almost every member of my family."

"Yeah I didn't expect things to blow up like that either. But what does that have to do with me?"

"Well Vicky just broke up with her boyfriend again and she's currently sleeping like the dead. Only reason she gave me was that he was being a coward or something. So I figured you might have some more details since I heard she tagged along with your group."

"I never took you for a gossip hound Amy."

"I'm not, I'm just wondering what he did to upset her this time. They were supposed to be going on a date together at the mayor's new year's party."

Sure Amy, you're just curious. Keep telling yourself that.

"Well I didn't see him last night. Not even at the briefing afterwords"

"Ah, that might have something to do with it."

I thought about it for a minute and the fact that Dean was pretty much the only cape in the wards or protectorate that wasn't out last night did reflect kinda badly on him. His parents had stopped him from going out on the operation but it's not like he couldn't talk to them.

"So she's angry that he didn't come out to help?"

"Mostly that probably. She's also been telling him lately that he needs to stand up to his parents more. Apparently they've been really pushy about his ward's career."

The fact that I had stood up to my dad last night and went out with Vicky present probably didn't help Dean's case either. I wanted to feel sorry for the guy. But I guess Vicky is a girl of high standards and he should probably know that by now. I decided that this was just a problem Dean would have to solve for himself.

"Well I guess that sucks for him. If Vicky ever feels bored with that extra free-time she probably has now, let her know I have plenty of movies to recommend."

"I'll do that. Since I'm swinging by, I might as well check your sister's brain activity."

She then walked over to Taylor's bed and grabbed her wrist. I went to wake dad up from his nap.

"Hey dad, Panacea decided to stop by early."

He rubbed the sleep from his eyes while looking for his glasses. "Whuh….oh! Did I miss something important?"

"Nah, just some gossip. She's checking Taylor now."

About then she finished her checkup.

"She has improved a lot. In fact I think she'll be ready to wake up by tomorrow morning."

Dad welcomed this news gratefully. "That's fantastic. Thank you so much."

I decided to throw in a request while Amy was around. "Hey, do you think you could fix her eyes like you did mine? It would be a nice wake up gift."

That was one of the perks I got from being a cape that happened to work in the same city as Panacea. Since bad eyesight was a disadvantage in cape work we were allowed to ask her to fix it if we got her treatment. I still wore some glasses to keep up my civilian identity (I'm still a bit young to believably be getting laser eye surgery or contacts for now), but it was a big quality of life improvement.

"I can ask her when she wakes up. I can provide treatment with your consent, but I'd need her permission before I change her eyes."

"Cool, I'm sure I can talk her into it."

"Sam, please don't pester your sister if she says no."

"Alright but it's cheaper to buy glasses with plastic lenses. Just something to keep in mind."

After that Panacea was on her way and it was a quiet day at the hospital. I had done some napping of my own while dad was awake in the afternoon. We decided to return home early so that we could get an early start tomorrow. But that left me wide awake laying in my bed, ruminating on the coming day.

I wasn't sure what I was going to say to Taylor when she woke up. A lot has happened in the last few days. Last time she had seen me I was being bitchy about her not wanting to hang out. I definitely had to apologize for that. It's clear my help isn't what she wants. Maybe I needed to listen more, maybe also give her some more space as well. At least I should be trying something to be a better sister.

Then there was the whole investigation into her attackers we would have to get into. Finally getting a lead on the bastards who tried to kill my sister would be a good distraction from last night's disaster. Might even be cathartic if I could deal with them myself. But that was something for tomorrow.

My last thoughts before I fell asleep were about how I had been approaching being a hero. It's becoming clear I need to change something there as well. Being benched had probably affected my mindset a bit. My meddling in Taylor's life was rooted in my need to be helpful. Missy was probably right that I needed to stop acting like I'm saving Taylor and start being a sister to her. But I honestly wasn't sure where to start there.

At the very least if what Armsmaster had said was true I'd be getting out on more patrols soon. I needed to be better prepared to deal with the real world. Last night was definitely a wake up call for that. I couldn't be the cute innocent child I was when I debuted anymore, I was getting too old to go back to that. But that left a central question.

What kind of hero am I supposed to be?

A/N
-Lots of angst and disagreement in this chapter, but I figured giving some focus on her processing all the crazy stuff in her life right now would be helpful. I'm writing Sam as an extroverted character so I figured part of how she processes it is that she's more willing to bring up personal problems with other characters. Of course that leads to more arguments and disagreements, but it also means she has a harder time rationalizing away her own flaws and mistakes.

-I keep forgetting I wrote her to have glasses like Taylor so the glasses conversation is my way of covering my butt.

-Wrapping up this arc with the interlude that is coming up next. I sort of planned for this arc to establish the story's foundations and give Sam some focus on her own problems before she has to start tackling other, bigger ones. Hopefully I can write a convincing POV Taylor. You can look forward to seeing some of what she was up to before her bad night, as well as her waking up. It'll probably be one of the longer chapters. After that we start the next arc.

-Please leave replies and feedback, always looking to improve.