A peek behind some other scenes.


Beta'd by FirstSelector, SpyTheEngineer, and Kinsfire.

Just to clarify one thing that came up after last chapter- Amy does not believe that Fleur's killer is actually a "picture perfect American", she's just using that line to emphasize the way that the justice system fails those of us who aren't cishet white men. Something relevant to both that and this chapter: just because I have a character say something does not mean that it's true, or that I believe it.


"So," said Director Armstrong, voice tinny through the laptop's small speakers. "Tell me what Brockton Bay has come to these days."

"Nothing good, I'm afraid," Clay replied, toying with a cube made of her forcefields. "In the wake of Coil's captures, we've managed to weed out a number of moles and informants, both willing and unwilling, but the level of sympathy for the Empire and their cause is… worrying.

Armstrong frowned. "Remind me what the Empire is?"

"Empire 88, a neo-Nazi organization started by Allfather, then taken over by Kaiser after his death. They've become… less overt in their plans, as far as the public is concerned, but based on what it kinda looks like they're working on more subtle methods," said Flechette.

Armstrong's frown deepened. "Elaborate."

"At best we have major infiltration of the PRT East-North-East by the Empire 88 as well as Coil, even if he's probably under wraps, thanks to the damn Nazis of course," said Clay, a skin of forcefield forming momentarily on her hand before shattering like a particularly thin peanut brittle once she flexed it.

"Elaborate on that."

"There's been an unusual number of, ah… PRT agents and officials who have social ties including the proprietor of Fenrisúlfr, a bar not too far from Captain's Hill that's a suspected Empire front, working the guard duty over two of the prisoners we have, Coil himself and the former Ward, Shadow Stalker. Both of them are black and experiencing some more stringent requirements than a normal prisoner- nothing too onerous, in isolation, but in context…" Clay trailed off.

Armstrong sighed. "I need more proof before we can afford to kick up a stink about Piggot- Rebecca is remarkably stalwart in her support of the current state of the situation in Brockton Bay even in the wake of Shadow Stalker and Coil being exposed."

"We, uh, might have something else," said Flechette.

"What is it?" asked Armstrong, drawing himself up from where he was slumped over his notepad to look more piercingly at the two capes.

"Looking at Piggot's historical behavior with regards to the Empire, it shows… compromised judgment, starting a couple of months before the initial capture of Shadow Stalker." Flechette winced, seeing Armstrong's face redden with anger. "If it helps, it roughly coincides with the arrival of Othala, Victor, and Clausewitz from the Herren Clans."

Armstrong sighed. "It does, and it doesn't. I'll see what I can't do on my end, but depending on what exactly has been done to Piggot, I can't afford to make any overt moves in the immediate future." He paused, then looked up, visibly weighing options. "You might want to liaise with some local independent heroes to see what pressure they can't put on either ENE or the Empire- I think I remember New Wave and their new friend mentioned by Piggot, and there's a civilian who kicked up a stink recently about some malfeasance with regards to a Wards stipend- they might be able to help out too. Use your best judgment, the both of you, keep me updated, and most importantly- stay safe."

"Always am," drawled Clay, while Flechette just nodded.

"Again, I'll see what I can do on my end, but no promises. Good luck," said Armstrong just before the screen winked out.

Flechette relaxed, then turned to Clay. "Alright, what next?"

"Now?" asked Clay. "Now, we wait for the other shoe to drop.

"I was afraid of that," grumbled Flechette.


Crystal Pelham wasn't exactly someone you'd expect to be a particularly insightful person.

Much like her cousin, she deliberately took on the "dumb blonde" persona, and between that and how she mostly faded out of the public eye in the context of New Wave once Glory Girl arrived on the scene, and certain comparisons were drawn between the two of them, never mind that she was already withdrawing from the team before Vicky triggered to buckle down for standardized testing and college prep.

In short, Crystal was used to seeing more than she spoke about.

Nowhere was this more abundant than Carol Dallon's house (for, in the end, that is the person whose house it was- not Mark's, not Victoria's, and especially not Amy's).

She had noticed the way that Carol ruled over her household with an iron fist, not caring that it was harming both of her daughters in their different ways- Amy, wilting, all but forgotten in a figurative corner, and Vicky buckling under the full brunt of a lawyer's attention and expectations. Hell, even Uncle Mark was being hurt by it, even if it was only exacerbating his issues.

The worst part was that there was, essentially, nothing she could do about it- her mother was far too busy with trying to keep New Wave above water to try and interfere in how Carol was treating her household, and even if she tried to take matters into her own hands the level of effect she would have was negligible at best and actively harmful at best, depending on how exactly Carol took things.

That didn't stop her from trying in the little ways she could- she was a hero, after all, and she was going to live up to the title as best she could.

Making a habit of dragging both cousins over to her family's house… helped, at least a little, and when she'd moved out for college she made it very clear that her new apartment was a safe space for them, in case they ever needed to get away.

Vicky didn't feel the need to take her up on that offer, but Amy certainly did (perhaps due to the proximity her apartment had to the hospital, given how often Amy spent nights there, but that wasn't something she was particularly willing to deal with at the moment).

Of late, though, things had… changed.

Amy started spending more and more time with her- until she'd abruptly (almost) stopped a couple weeks ago, looking almost guilty and happy in almost equal measure. Some subtle inquiries at all the local hospitals she had friends interning at turned up a slight decrease of her time there, so that wasn't it (or at least it didn't explain the happiness), and from Carol's mounting frustration it wasn't some kind of major development at home.

Vicky, at least, was easier to read (for a given value of "easier", that is- Glory Girl managed the "extroverted blonde" front far better than Laserdream ever had, even setting aside the emotional power that she was probably using to cover up some of her weak points) on this front- she'd broken up with Dean in early February and started dating Taylor Hebert. Taylor was quite possibly an independent cape- not Parian, obviously, given the obvious disparity in height between the diminutive blonde and the brunette who was approaching "amazonian", but Volur was a likely candidate- but she seemed to be making Vicky happy, and given some of the rumors she'd heard about a cathartic crying session at the mall, they were obviously more willing to trust each other than Vicky and Dean.

Carol was… not particularly enthusiastic about her daughter dating Taylor, although whether that was related to her family's economic status, the queer nature of their relationship, or the connections that Dean granted that they had reduced access to.

While Crystal was happy for her cousins, she was a little worried about how Carol would react when something inevitably pushed her past her breaking point- she'd been known to overreact to little things, more so of late, and that didn't exactly bode well for whenever something big set off her temper- either for their family or for New Wave as a whole.

That wasn't something she could meaningfully effect, though, so she mostly set it aside for worrying about smaller things, things she could change- things like Amy not feeling comfortable talking to her, or goddamn vector calculus.

She'd do what she could, and take what she could, as was the lot in life of all save for the truly powerful- just as she always had.


If you had asked Danny Hebert where he would have expected he'd be in four months at the start of 2011, he would have been hard-pressed to answer with anything even remotely approaching the actual state he found himself in.

Oh, sure. There were things that were going to stay the same no matter what he tried. Taylor was being A Teenager, the Empire was being a scourge on the city that the Protectorate wasn't doing anything to handle, the eponymous Bay was blocked off, things like that. You know, facts of life.

But Taylor getting almost killed by Emma? Him getting kidnapped by a supervillain? Taylor getting powers that were strong enough to send the Simurgh running?

Those he wasn't able to see coming.

Still, he tried to be as supportive of his daughter (his only family left, now, after his estranged brother had passed late in 2010) as he could, in what ways he could- Aides Truth had been a godsend in that aspect, taking both the school (who was trying to protect Emma and her two cronies past the point of sunk costs) and the PRT (who was in the corner of one of Emma's cronies because she was an "upstanding member of the Wards", never mind that despite all the action she took against the Empire, Shadow Stalker A.K.A. Sophia Hess was on probation) to task in a way that he only wished he could with all the salvage operations that had refused to so much as touch the Bay with a ten foot pole, even the local ones that got bought out by Fortress Construction and or sold of for parts by the Medhall group.

On a quality of life level, between getting permission for Taylor to do self-directed homeschool and the winnings from the lawsuits brought in by Aides Truth, their life had improved. He'd even managed to get in a couple of the guys to repair the water damage near the roof that he'd never actually managed to handle himself and a bunch of the other issues with the house that he had neither the skills, time, or money to do before, and he'd been able to pay them what they were worth to boot.

On a personal level, though, they were just as estranged as they had been since her mother died- more so, in some ways.

Danny wasn't an idiot- he understood that a great deal of the estrangement between them was his fault, between how he'd fallen apart since Annette's passing and how he'd failed to notice the signs (textbook, in hindsight) of Taylor being in distress.

That didn't stop him from being frustrated with the situation.

He'd failed Taylor in an almost unforgivable way- in letting the way that Emma had ruined her life slip his notice, he'd all but let her be assaulted and nearly killed, and in the aftermath he very nearly caved to the school in their demands to not sue with the token compensation of covering her hospital bills (which… the involvement of Panacea to handle her case of toxic shock complicated things in a way that he was thankful the lawsuits had prevented him from having to handle). In short, he hadn't been there when she needed it, and his daughter was hurt and almost killed for it.

After that had come the real issue, though- her powers (and everything that came along with them).

Danny had never been interested in being aware of capes, aside from the pragmatic "if you see a costume outside of a prescheduled PRT PR event, get away as soon and safely as possible" advice that Annette had given him (and she would have known, what with having spend so much time with Lustrum before Taylor had been born). Otherwise, he was lucky enough to have a job worthless enough to avoid the gangs' notice, and he lived close enough that it wasn't considered territory worth taking and holding.

Taylor's powers had forced a change in paradigm.

Taylor took to it like a plant to soil- she took after her mother far more than him in both adaptability and natural intelligence, and between both of those, being at just the right place at just the right time to make the right friends, and a really strong power, she was making her way in the cape world in a way that left him scrambling to even just stay in her wake.

Exacerbating that was the being claiming to be a mostly dead god (he didn't specifically doubt that claim, per se, but it was out there enough that he couldn't quite bring himself to fully believe it) providing his daughter guidance.

Admittedly, Odin wasn't likely to be up to date on the state of the world, but his experience as a warrior and a king would help Taylor immensely as she entered the world of parahumans.

While Danny wasn't sure he'd go so far as to call Odin a father figure to Taylor, the parallels were there, and something twisted in his gut every time he saw the rapt attention that Taylor paid to the specter, while the gap between Taylor and himself remained roughly stationary.

He knew that was from his own side as much as anything else- Taylor had been conditioned to not trust anyone, and while her girlfriend (at least, he thought they were girlfriends at this point) and Odin were working their way past that, he hadn't put in the effort to do so.

Well, that changed today.

After breakfast, Danny cleared his throat right before Taylor was about to get up. "Taylor, I'd like to talk to you about-"

He was interrupted by first a rumbling in the ground, and then, moments later when he tried to restart the conversation, a low whine that quickly built into a clamorous siren, multiple discordant tones overlapping to pierce the ears and chill the soul.

"No."

"Dad. They're here, and I can't afford to just stand by with my hands on my eyes."

"I can't lose you too," he said, tears filling his eyes.

"You won't," replied Taylor with hubris. "I promise."

"Don't go," he whispered.

"I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I did anything less." Taylor snapped her fingers, and in a flash of golden light, her armor appeared over her pajamas, steel glimmering in the morning light. "Get to the shelters. I'll keep you safe from the front."

And with that, Taylor all but tore the front door off its hinges with her father staring, frozen, behind her, charging away into the city to fight an Endbringer.


So, yeah, that's it.

Suffice it to say that if Richard Anders wasn't dead and buried (and if Taylor wasn't a straight-passing white girl, at least at the start of the fic), the fall of the Empire would be much higher on Taylor and Odin's priority list. Kaiser is much more subtle, especially with Victor and Clausewitz in his toolkit.

I got me a Ko-fi (Lucifra) and a site to be my patron (Lucifra), so if that tickles your fancy (or if you want to see some of my stuff a week in advance) then check it out!

I'm also working on reviving my writeblr (lucifra-writes)- I've got some other, original stuff there, if you're interested in that kind of thing, and it's probably a little bit easier to get my attention there than most places other than SB.

Next chapter is done and should be up in two weeks, if I've got my timing right.

That's about it, so read, review, enjoy, and have a nice day!