One More Trigger (Worm AU)

[Genesis09]

That was a cruel cliffhanger to drop the story at but despite the fact that this message might get marked spam I still want to say thank you for writing this. Even if it never gets finished I greatly enjoyed the read. One of my favorite worm stories.

 

[edale]

That was a cruel cliffhanger to drop the story at but despite the fact that this message might get marked spam I still want to say thank you for writing this. Even if it never gets finished I greatly enjoyed the read. One of my favorite worm stories.

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[Ack]

One More Trigger

Part Thirty- Nine: Moving Right Along

[A/N: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]



Mere Seconds Before

Purity

Kayden normally landed on the roof of the apartment building, but this time she didn't care. Also, they already knew about her secret identity, so there was no point. So she came in fast and low, arriving feet-first through the window into her bedroom.

And there Aster was, lying in the middle of the bed, crying loudly. The terror which had gripped Kayden's chest all the way from the PRT building loosened its grasp and she scooped her daughter up, holding her close. Just like that, her touch soothed Aster and her wails faded away.

She was just about to open the door and see where Theo was when she heard the voices emanating from just on the other side.

"Oh, bullshit!" That was a masculine voice, impatient and irritated. Kayden recognised the slight echo that came from PRT closed-face helmets. "We know she is! We got the report on the way here!"

Another voice intervened, sounding more curious. "What makes you say she isn't, junior?"

Junior. Whoever's out there has Theo.

He managed to keep them busy until I got here.

Taking a deep breath, she placed Aster in her crib, off to the side of the door, then powered up again. Hovering a little off the floor, she opened the door.

Theo was lying face-down on the floor of the living room, his wrists secured behind him with handcuffs. Standing over him were three PRT troopers. But just to make life interesting, there were also two police officers, pointing their pistols at the troopers.

She didn't make the mistake of thinking the police were on her side. In her experience, very few people in the world were on her side, and most of those wanted something from her in return. Of those who did not, Theo and Aster were the only two she could think of right then. Aster was safe; Theo was not.

She only had one thing to say about that. "Get. Away. From. My. Son."

<><>​

Sergeant Gary Eastman, BBPD

Being a cop in Brockton Bay was no picnic at the best of times. If they weren't having to contend with the ABB, it was the Empire, Uber and Leet, or the irritating smash-and-grab artists like Circus or the goddamn Undersiders. Fortunately, SOP was to call in the PRT to situations like that, and let them handle the problem. And the fallout.

Sometimes, though, disengaging wasn't really an option, and the PRT wasn't always there to be called in. For those types of circumstances, they'd all had de-escalation training. It wasn't a million miles away from hostage negotiation, and indeed used a lot of the same techniques.

Step one was to gauge the level of danger they (and the general public) were in if the villain decided to cut loose. Step two was to try to put the villain at ease by reducing visible aggression. Step three was to attempt to calm the confrontation down. This was usually done by finding out what the supervillain wanted, and making the judgement call on whether it was worth it just to let them have it and leave.

This last point had been emphasised over and over: if the bad guys were just stealing shit, ninety-nine times out of a hundred it would be covered by insurance. Cash could be replaced, artwork could be recovered. Dead people stayed dead.

When lives were at risk, that was when things got hairy. Some villains were in it specifically to hurt people. Mainly, this was the Empire; the ABB had been bad for it too, but they were no longer so much of an issue now that Oni Lee was also in holding.

And then … there was the situation in front of him right now.

Step one was easy: this was Purity. Her blasts were on record as being able to destroy buildings, so the overall danger level could be described as 'fuck that'. Unfortunately, step two looked to be a shitload harder, given that the PRT troopers on scene seemed intent on increasing the aggression level instead of decreasing it.

Step three looked paradoxically easier to figure out; she wanted her kids. Gary wasn't inclined to separate a mom from her offspring, especially—and this was important—if she was able to vaporise him for saying no. But again, the PRT idiots were complicating matters by (if junior was to be believed) wanting to take the baby into custody. Kidnapping her, as the boy put it.

He figured there must be stupider things to do while standing at ground zero, but he really couldn't think of any right at that second.

"Lopez," he ordered. "Eyes front. Ma'am, we're not here to take your baby. Or your son. You three, weapons down." He added emphasis with a twitch of his pistol.

"Sarge." Lopez was still side-eyeing the blazing figure in the doorway, but at least his pistol wasn't drifting her way anymore.

The PRT troopers were being less cooperative. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" demanded the one wearing sergeant's chevrons on the shoulder-piece of his armour. "She's a villain! We need to take the children into protective custody!"

"Stand the fuck down, mister!" Gary wasn't inclined to afford him sergeant-to-sergeant courtesy, not when they were both seconds away from becoming fuzzy outlines on the nearest load-bearing wall. "You busted in here with no warrant and assaulted this kid! That's about as far from any definition of 'protective' as I ever saw!"

"Are you on her side? Why are you on her side?" That was another trooper.

"Because you're breaking the goddamn law! Now, stand down! I'm not going to tell you a third time!" Gary wasn't sure if he was really going to open fire on these lunatics, but he wanted to go home at the end of the day.

"I told you, it's exigent … wait." The PRT sergeant held up his hand. "Wait. That can't be right."

That was when Glory Girl drifted in through the open window behind him. "If by 'that' you mean you've just been told to leave Purity alone, trust me that it's right. I'm here to verify."

"Jeez!" The PRT sergeant spun around, his shotgun coming up. The other two reacted as well, just not as violently. "What do you know about this?"

She shrugged, pushing the barrel aside. "Not a lot. Just that Brandish talked to Director Piggot, and they decided to cut Purity a break. You guys aren't needed here anymore." She gave them a finger-wave. "So … buh-bye."

His shotgun lowered to point at the floor. "Shit. Okay, we're going."

Gary didn't relax; he was pleased to see that Lopez didn't either. Some people just didn't know when to quit, and these troopers might be among that number.

But the PRT troopers stepped past him and Lopez and started toward the busted door. Gary raised his voice. "Hey!"

"What?" The sergeant stopped and turned. "We're going. Isn't that what you wanted?"

Gary took one hand off his gun and pointed at the kid. "Cuffs, dumbass. Also, gonna need your name and badge number for the report."

After just long enough of a pause that Gary thought he was going to leave anyway, the sergeant came back and unlocked the cuffs. He didn't help the kid up, though. "Farrell," he said. Another long hesitation. "Three one four seven six two."

Gary watched him leave, then holstered his pistol. Beside him, Lopez did the same. Something about the quality of the glare changed; Gary hoped that meant Purity was no longer ready to obliterate them on the instant. The kid went to climb to his feet, and Glory Girl helped him up. "You okay?" she asked. "Want me to get Panacea in on this?"

The boy shook his head. "I'll be fine," he mumbled. "Thanks."

"Yes," Purity said belatedly, as though she'd just remembered that common courtesy was a thing. "Thank you for … for helping us. Now please leave my home."

"Sure thing. See you around." Glory Girl climbed out the window and flew away, because of course she could.

Gary didn't want to hang around either. "Let's go, Lopez."

"Yes, sarge." Lopez followed him out of the apartment, pushing around the end of the sofa and past the ruined door. They were halfway down the corridor to the elevator before he cleared his throat. "Uh … aren't we supposed to get a statement …?"

Gary turned to look at him directly. "Yes, we were. But sometimes it's better to exercise discretion and skip certain steps. That was one such time. And once we get back to the precinct and fill out our reports, I'm certain that nobody will disagree with us."

"Yes, sarge."

They rode the elevator down in silence. Gary spent the time scribbling in his notebook to make sure he didn't forget the highlights of the encounter. At the ground floor, they headed out toward the police cruiser; as they were getting in, Lopez cleared his throat again.

Gary gave him a raised-eyebrows look. "What's on your mind this time?"

"Would you have really shot him? If he'd done something stupid, I mean?"

That question had been gnawing at Gary's mind too. He gave Lopez the best answer he had. "I'm glad I never had to find out."

"Me too, sarge. Me, too."

<><>​

Director Emily Piggot, PRT ENE

Emily was leaning on one of her old walking sticks when she stepped out of the elevator into the ruins of the lobby. She would've preferred none at all, but her legs were still shaky enough to make falling over a real danger, and she didn't want to present that kind of image to the troops in the aftermath. Two would've been better, but she'd decided to compromise with one.

The Samaritans had shown up; or rather, they'd shown themselves. She was certain that the mass collapse of the Empire goons outside the building was their work. The result of another unholy collaboration between Panacea and Ladybug, no doubt. Just another thing to keep her awake deep into the night.

On the upside, it had worked impressively well; had the attackers managed to breach the building and swarm inside, the defenders may well have been overwhelmed in the first rush. As it was, the capes had still forced their way in, but had gotten no farther than the lobby. The Protectorate and PRT forces on site were to be thanked for that.

"Hi, Director!" That was Sparx, striding over cheerfully. With her were Ladybug and Aerodyne. Flechette and Vista were also present, hanging back toward the entrance, apparently guarding against any unwanted intrusions. Meanwhile, Panacea was already healing those troopers and heroes wounded in the assault. She was accompanied by Athena (who of course looked irritatingly smug) and a black-haired girl with a strong resemblance to Bonesaw (who didn't). "How did it go? Nobody seriously hurt, I hope?"

"Not that I'm aware of, no." Emily had made it a point to check on everyone's welfare as a first priority; nobody had died, and there were no critical injuries among her people. "Thank you for the warning, and for attending."

"You're welcome." Ladybug nodded toward the walking stick. "But are you okay there? I didn't think any of them got into the building proper."

"They didn't." Emily chose not to mention the fact that Rune would have been shot in the face, had she attempted to gain entry through Emily's window. "An old injury was exacerbated during the attack. Not an issue."

Aerodyne nodded. "Are you alright with letting Panacea have a look at it, or would you rather not?"

Emily glanced again at where the former New Wave healer had just finished with one trooper and was starting on another. As Panacea performed her work, she was laughing and joking with the men. Emily could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times she'd seen the girl smiling, and still have a couple left over; laughing, never.

But even if she'd been inclined to put aside her natural antipathy toward cape healing, Athena was also there, with maybe-Bonesaw standing next to her. At that moment, the blonde Thinker glanced around and treated Emily to her trademark smirk. It was easy to read her expression: I know what you're thinking.

Emily looked away again; the cape formerly known as Tattletale almost certainly did know what she was thinking, and Emily hated that idea. "No," she said curtly. Then, because it was a stupid idea to snub a cape team with such capability under its belt, she gestured toward Bonesaw and Athena. "Have either of them been giving you any trouble?"

"Not so you'd notice." Butter wouldn't have melted in Aerodyne's mouth. "Athena's been a positive asset to the team ever since she jumped ship from the Undersiders, and Riley's starting to come out of her shell now that his influence is starting to wear off."

'He', of course, was Jack Slash. The man was dead, courtesy of a twelve-gauge shotgun to the eye-socket. His corpse would be kept under guard until it could be ferried out to Alamogordo and immolated by way of a small tactical nuclear device. The background radiation count wouldn't even go up by much.

Not that any of this was Emily's direct concern. She had other things to worry about. "It's been less than a week." She wasn't going to directly call the girl a liar, but she was allowed to be sceptical. "This isn't some Disney redemption movie."

"No, true," Ladybug agreed. "She isn't some misunderstood loner who needs to learn how to accept friendship into their heart just in time for the credits to roll. It's a lot sadder than that. She's a six-year-old girl trapped in the head of a serial killer that was manufactured by a monster and turned loose on the United States for fun."

"The serial killer's still in there," Emily warned. "Just because you killed the monster who made it doesn't mean it went away too. It's still looking out through her eyes. Waiting for its chance."

Sparx nodded. "We're aware of that. On the upside, we've got Athena poking and prodding at it. Give her thirty seconds to talk to someone, and she can make them doubt everything they hold dear." She used her hair tendrils to pull over a chair, brushed debris off it and offered it to Emily. "She's had days. There are buttons, and she's pressing every single one she can find, as only she can."

Emily shuddered. Good cause or no good cause, the thought of having someone like Athena—with the power of a top-flight Thinker coupled to all the restraint and good judgement of a teenager—digging through her head on a daily basis was frankly terrifying. "I'm still not sure that doesn't count as cruel and unusual punishment."

Accepting the chair, she sat down; her legs were starting to ache again. Around them, troopers were clearing out the worst of the debris.

Ladybug chuckled. "According to her, Bonesaw is hating every second. Riley, on the other hand, is doing okay. She's not embracing life away from the Nine with open arms yet, but that's because she's still internalising the idea that she's allowed to. Stockholm Syndrome—"

"There have been studies that discredit the concept," Emily interrupted, just as Bonesaw smiled at something that Panacea had apparently just said. "In case you were basing everything on that."

"Not when Masters like Jack Slash make it a reality," Aerodyne countered. "We know it's not the traditional, accepted version. But it passes the duck test, so why bother making up new names when everyone knows what it means?"

Emily mused, not for the first time, that there were several things she needed to keep in mind when talking with the founding members of the Samaritans. First, they had their act together. Second, they were absolutely willing to back each other up to the hilt. Third, they got shit done. She still hadn't forgotten the revelation about the booster bugs across Brockton Bay, though a solution to that particular conundrum had yet to present itself.

And of course, fourth: it was vitally important to stay on good terms with them, because she needed the intel they could provide her about the Brockton Bay criminal cape scene far more than they needed her cooperation.

Not to mention, if she tried to play fast and loose with the rules, they were also liable to poach her Wards right out from under her, which was not a good look for the PRT under any circumstances. She was still smarting from the dressing-down she'd gotten from Chief Director Costa-Brown about that little fiasco.

"Granted," she allowed. "So, with the city officially free of major criminal gangs, what are your plans going forward?" That they had plans for going forward, she had absolutely no doubt. These girls knew what they were doing, and weren't about to let anything stand in their way. Thus, the question: if she knew which way they wanted to go, she could plan accordingly.

Instinctively, she glanced around the lobby; everything seemed to be going well, and nobody was listening in on them.

"Well, the majority of the capes are gone, but there are still criminals." Sparx' tone was thoughtful. "Uber and Leet might hire on a few of them, but the rest have better sense than that. A city full of unoccupied criminals is basically a magnet for villains to wander on in and set up camp."

Emily had been thinking about this herself. "Boston Games all over again."

Ladybug touched her nose then pointed at Emily, in a gesture she had to have learned from her parents. "Got it in one. We've been talking to Panacea and Glory Girl about what it was like then. Boston's bigger than Brockton Bay, but our cape population's always been higher. If they decide that we're a wide-open frontier, who knows what kind of costumed idiots will decide to crash the party."

Emily raised her eyebrows. "If I've learned anything about how your team operates, you never just stand around wringing your hands and hoping that someone will do something about the problem. You get in there and create a solution yourself. So, what's your solution?"

Aerodyne gave Sparx what Emily interpreted as an amused glance. "I believe she's onto us."

Sparx nodded, a grin on her lips. "I believe she is." She turned to Emily. "Well, one thing we're not doing is drawing down the booster bug population. Ladybug gets to keep her city-wide bug control for the foreseeable future. Second, we're collecting the dossiers for every villain who could possibly decide to show up here. Third, based on the information in those dossiers, as interpreted by our Thinker contingent, we're going to be developing tactics and strategies to deal with them, en masse and individually."

"If they're small-time," Ladybug continued, "we'll explain carefully to them that it's healthier basically anywhere else, and send them on their way. If they're big-time, we'll hand them over to you. And if they have kill orders, and they don't want to surrender … well, it won't be pleasant, but we'll do what we have to do."

"Which reminds me," noted Aerodyne. "What actually happened to Manton? Because he seems to have fallen into a hole that nobody knows about."

Emily gritted her teeth, just a little. The only thing that irritated her more than having prisoners whisked away on orders from above was being queried about it with no good answers to give. "Athena needs to refrain from sticking her nose into PRT business."

"We all know that's never going to happen." Ladybug tilted her head. "So you really don't know where he's gone? Huh."

Aerodyne spread her hands. "Well, in a way it's a good thing. If the Dragonslayers had brought his transport down, taking out Jack Slash this time would've been a whole lot more problematic."

"Actually, that raises another point." Sparx' voice held a note that put Emily on guard. "We can't just let the Dragonslayers pull crap like that anytime they want. By bringing down Dragon's craft and giving Jack Slash the chance to come back at us, they caused the deaths of at least a dozen people, and they clearly don't care. That attitude needs to be remedied."

Emily held up a finger as she pushed herself to her feet again. "I suggest you rein in that Messiah complex a little. You're good, but you can't fix every problem in the region. I'd strongly advise you not to stretch yourself too thin by trying. We're already going to have our hands full with a potential Brockton Games, don't forget."

Sparx smiled, showing a few too many teeth for Emily's liking. "Oh, don't worry, Director. We don't even need to leave town. They'll be coming to us. We'll have all the time in the world to prep for them."

"I don't understand. How are you going to do that?" Emily knew better than to gainsay the claim that they could beat the Dragonslayers on home ground. Between Ladybug's coverage of the city and at least one Thinker (possibly two) on their strength, the intruding villains would be on the back foot from the moment they entered city limits.

They wouldn't even see the Samaritans coming.

"Armsmaster?" asked Ladybug.

Sparx nodded. "Armsmaster."

"Thought so." Ladybug turned to Emily. "Please ask Armsmaster to come and speak to us, under conditions of absolute discretion, as soon as he's free."

Emily frowned. "Are you intending to use one of my capes as bait in some kind of trap?"

"Bait will be used, but it won't be him," Aerodyne assured her. "I can guarantee, he'll appreciate it once we fill him in."

"You'll tell him, but you won't fill me in first?" She tried not to sound offended.

Aerodyne shrugged. "He can choose to tell you, or not, as he sees fit."

Which was the best deal she was going to get, she knew.

Fortunately, Armsmaster answers to me.

<><>​

The Evening of Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Hebert Household

Ladybug

Dad leaned back in his armchair. "Alright, everyone. The Empire event today. Let's have a breakdown. Emma, what did we do wrong?"

Emma considered the question seriously. "About the only thing I can think of is that we were being too clever with crashing the car into the bollards. Several things could've gone wrong with that; it could've veered off-course, or hit too hard and hurt one of them badly. And we should've let the PRT know it was us, and where they'd come from, so they'd know about Medhall straight away."

"And thus the Empire wouldn't have had the leeway to gather resources for the attack today," Mr Barnes finished off. "Does anyone else have anything to say about that?"

Riley raised her hand from where she sat on the sofa beside Lisa, with Missy at the far end. It should've been seriously overcrowded, but it wasn't. Even though eight people were sitting on it, there still seemed to be room to spare. Bullshit cape powers are bullshit; news at eleven.

"Uh, yeah, I do. I mean, if that's okay?"

"Absolutely," Dad assured her. "I was actually going to call on you at some point, so go right ahead."

"Oh." She blinked, apparently assimilating that, then went on, the words tumbling over each other. "Well, um, I think you're bein' too hard on yourselves. That whole thing with the villains was perfect misdirection an' showmanship. I learned some really bad stuff from Jack Slash, that's true, but he also taught me a ton about presentation. Sure, you framed 'em for drink driving an' ram-raiding, but once the PRT saw the costumes, that didn't mean jack anymore. They figured it out, collected the evidence, an' took the ball across the goal line all by themselves. Those charges could be dropped tomorrow an' not change a thing."

Mr Clements frowned. "But the attack—"

Riley shook her head. "Not your fault. Yeah, you coulda tried to intercept the capes on the way there, but that woulda split your forces and the unpowered mooks woulda still attacked the PRT building. If Vista and Flechette had gotten there sooner, things mighta gone better, but that's a really big if. Vista's good against opponents who are pretty far apart and Flechette's better with one-on-one situations. That wouldn't work well for what happened out there today." She gestured upward. "Rune and Stormtiger were the problem they coulda dealt with, but Aerodyne an' Ladybug already had that in hand." She stopped and took a breath. "Anyway, that's what I wanted to say."

Lisa nodded. "Perfect is the enemy of good. We could've been perfect today, but it would've taken a lot more effort and coordination. As it was, we beat them anyway."

"I'd still like to keep pushing toward perfect," I noted. "Slacking off just because we're 'good enough' is not a great way to stay in first place when it counts."

Madison nodded. "Totally. Nobody here's going to be slacking off any time soon." She broke off when Emma's phone rang. "You want to get that?"

"One sec." Emma checked the screen and her brow creased. "Shit, it's D – uh, the one we rescued from Coil." Because Riley didn't need to know everything right at that moment.

"Better see what she wants," Dad advised; not that anyone was in disagreement. Every time she'd called us out of the blue, it had been with information that we really needed to know.

"On it." Emma got up from her chair and wandered into the kitchen. "Heyyy, munchkin. What's up?"

Dad looked at the rest of us. "Okay, what did we do right, that we can maybe incorporate into other situations?"

I held up my hand. "Got something in between. A shortfall we can improve on. I remember thinking that we needed more ketamine bug hives. The reason you had to literally drive a bunch of them across town is because I've only got a few hives, and nothing near Downtown. If I'd had more near the Medhall building, I could've dropped nearly every cape before they got close."

Riley rolled her eyes. "I still think it's unfair that you can get Panacea to just make you up more bugs like that. Jack totally didn't see that coming, the first time around. Neither did I." But her tone indicated rueful amusement rather than actual upset.

Vicky snorted derisively. "In case you missed the memo, short stuff, capes are all about being unfair. In my experience, the ones who scream the loudest about 'unfairness' are the ones who're used having it in their favour. When it bites the other way, it's a real shock. Tell me I'm wrong, Ames."

"Haha, nope." Amy shook her head and chuckled. "I've seen it too often. Because I'm usually not the one in the middle of the cape fight, I can observe both sides, and the sudden look of 'I didn't know they were that strong' is impossible to miss. And the whining afterwards, while I'm healing them." She rolled her eyes. "So much whining."

"Well, we can definitely see about establishing new nests for them," Dad said. "Start looking for potential sites, and we can go from there."

Emma emerged from the kitchen, phone still in hand. "Uh, guys? You know how we were talking about Brockton Games? Looks like we've got our first contender."

Dad's head came up. "That was fast. The Empire only went down today."

"No, she actually got into town a few days ago." Emma nodded to Lily. "It's your old friend March."

Lily sagged. "Oh, shit. Guys, I am sooo sorry."

"March?" asked Riley. "Who's she?"

"We got powers around the same time." Lily sighed. "You know the old 'evil twin' schtick for cape shows? She's mine. Nearly the same powers, no sense of proportionate response, and will hurt anyone and everyone to get what she wants."

Riley spread her hands. "And what's that? Money? Power?"

"My attention," Lily said heavily. "If I ignore her, she comes after me. If I go after her, she organises people to hamper me, then she kicks the shit out of me. To her, it's all a big game, and she changes the rules anytime she feels like it."

"So, basically like Jack Slash would be if he had an obsession for one particular person," Lisa filled in helpfully. "Right down to his ability to keep people all lined up and pointing in a particular direction."

"Huh." Riley frowned. "And what'd you ever do to her?"

"Nothing, I swear." Lily shook her head. "Like I said, we got our powers at the same time, and hers are a lot like mine. I'd be fine with never seeing her again, but she just keeps coming back, injuring my teammates and playing with me like a cat with a mouse."

I caught Emma's eye. "Sophia," I murmured.

She nodded silently.

Lily was still talking. "I mean, I'm good on my own, but her power lets her organise people for group efforts. Every time I've gone against her, I've lost."

"Kiss-kill," Riley said, nodding. "I've seen that occasionally. People who get powers at the same time either end up bonding really close or wanting to murder each other."

"Yeah, well, with her it's both at once," Lily grumbled. "She wants to be close to me, but only so she can hurt me."

Sabah put an arm around her and hugged her tightly.

Mr Barnes dusted his hands off. "Alright then, we'll read up on her powers. Flechette, you let us know about anything that's not in the files. Sparx, what's she up to right now?"

"Building a gang," Emma said promptly.

Lily nodded gloomily. "Yeah, that's her way."

I grinned. "And that way worked in New York, but it's not gonna work here. Do we have an area of the city that she's in?"

"Boardwalk," Emma reported. "Closer to the southern end, near Downtown."

"Working on old information," Lisa noted. "She thinks Flechette's still in the Wards."

I mimed cracking my knuckles. "Well, my bugs are on the search right now. What am I looking for?"

"Oh, right." Lily nodded. "She wears a rabbit-head mask and a fake military uniform, like from a hundred years ago. All bright red and blue, with shiny buttons."

"Well, that's definitely a good marker to look for." I submerged myself in the bug sensorium as they began sweeping the area that Emma had noted. A mask like that would stand out even to the crap senses I had to work with, and bright primary colours with shiny brass was even better.

Madison leaned close to Emma, and I heard a murmur of 'five bucks …'. Emma shook her head, clearly unwilling to take the bet.

"So how long do you think it'll take?" Lily asked.

I grinned. "About now, actually. I've got someone with a bright red and blue shirt with fringes and shiny buttons. Also, a rabbit head mask with a little cap on top."

"That's her." Lily shook her head in disbelief. "Jeez, that was fast."

Leaning back in my chair, I crossed my legs at the ankles and put my hands behind my head. "To paraphrase the movie from that show, 'bugs go everywhere, and I go where the bugs are'."

"Seriously, wow. You're worse than Lisa." Emma reached across and poked me in the ribs.

I squawked and brought my arms down to protect myself. "Hey, hands off the merchandise!"

Mr Barnes ignored the byplay. "So, as I was saying, now that we've located her, we'll read up on her abilities then devise a plan for cutting her off from her power base and taking her down. Then we'll execute." He looked over at Riley. "You're invited to this planning session. Any insights you can offer will be greatly appreciated."

"What, really?" She looked severely taken aback. "I thought I was just observing. Learning how superheroes did things."

"You are," Mr Clements agreed. "But that analysis you gave us shows you've got something to offer in the planning stage. So if there's anything you think needs to be said, we're ready to listen."

She seemed to be having trouble with the concept. "And you'll actually pay attention? Not just pat me on the head and tell me to go play or something?"

"Hardly," Dad assured her. "You think we'd do that with Vista?"

Missy giggled and got up from the sofa. Heading down to the far end of it, she gave Riley a hug. "You've got more experience at being a cape than anyone else here. Of course we're going to listen to you."

"We'd be stupid not to," Madison added. She tilted her head. "I'm guessing Jack Slash didn't invite input like this?"

"What do you think?" Riley rolled her eyes. "He was good at finding out what we wanted and getting it to us, but he had to make the plans, every time. The trouble was, he was also too darn good at shooting down any suggestions we made. So usually, it was easier not to try."

Lily nodded. "March definitely comes across as that sort of control freak, yeah."

I gave her a grin. "Well, let's see what we can do about that."

<><>​

Later That Night
A Parking Structure

Armsmaster

Colin slowly rode his motorbike up the ramp to the top deck of the multi-level parking garage. The cycle was set to silent running, and he had every available sensor feeding into his helmet. The largest life form on any but the top deck were a few birds he'd disturbed three levels down. On the top level, four people awaited. They showed no particular surprise when he motored into view; in fact, the tallest one waved and gestured him over.

Low-light vision identified the costumes as belonging to Sparx, Ladybug, Aerodyne, and Vista. He also spotted Sparx' hair waving where there was no breeze, and bugs flying in large looping swarms around them. Every data point he could collect indicated that these were indeed the Samaritans; not that he'd doubted it, but a meeting with this much stress on secrecy naturally brought out the paranoid in him.

Stopping the bike a dozen yards from them, he dismounted and closed the distance. "I'm here," he said quietly. "What's the situation?"

Sparx held up her hand briefly. "We need to make sure nobody can listen in. Our phones are turned off and wrapped in aluminum foil. Please shut down all outgoing signals."

He wanted to ask why, but decided it would be a useless question. Better to do what she said, and find out afterward. As he started shutting down his transmissions, he noticed Sparx' hair flowing out into a cage around them. Tiny dots and crackles of discharge jumped from one hair to another. Beyond that, the swarming bugs surrounded the cage of hair with their bodies in a constant swirl of motion; he almost thought he saw flickers of silver among them.

"What are you doing?" he asked. "I'm not transmitting anything."

It was Ladybug who spoke. "We can't risk anyone being able to tap into your suit remotely. Sparx is making a Faraday cage, and my bugs are carrying tiny pieces of tinfoil for chaff. Aerodyne's also holding us a fraction of an inch off the ground, so not even a microphone stuck to the concrete will pick anything up."

Vista raised her chin. "And I've just expanded the space on this rooftop to a mile in all directions. Nobody gets to listen in on this conversation but us."

"Alright then. You've got my attention." Colin folded his arms. "Now what's all this about?" Though he'd never admit it out loud, he was moderately impressed by how thoroughly they'd embraced the concept of opsec. They were quite effective, for non-Tinkers.

Sparx took a deep breath. "Athena is sure there's a mole somewhere in Dragon's organisation, feeding information back to Saint and the Dragonslayers. They've hacked her communications, and they have backdoors into her tech. When they grabbed the transports carrying the Nine, they directly caused the deaths of at least a dozen people. We want to take them down."

Colin's jaw hardened. "I'm aware of most of that, except for the situation with the mole. Why aren't you bringing her in on this?" Half a second after he asked the question, he realised how stupid it sounded. "Sorry, scratch that. They're reading her mail."

"Bingo." Ladybug nodded firmly. "We want to remove the Dragonslayers as a problem for her. The trouble is, we can't leave town because there's at least one villain here to cause problems, and more will likely be arriving soon. So we want to draw them here, where we can take them down and hand them over to you guys."

"And how do you intend to do that?" Colin knew the girls couldn't see his raised eyebrows, but he did it anyway. "They're notoriously slippery to deal with."

"This is where you come in." Vista stepped forward. "Our plan revolves around you pitching a collaborative project for a new and improved Dragon suit. One that you're going to construct—with her assistance, either remote or in-person—right here in Brockton Bay. Let it be known that you're doing this, and word will get back to them. They won't be able to resist."

It was actually a good idea. Simple, effective and workable. There was just one flaw. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but for your plan to work, I'm going to need to deceive Dragon about what we're doing. Lie to her face."

Aerodyne nodded. "That's true, yes. She can't know about the plan. We don't know how deep this mole has their hooks into her personal computer setup, but any slip at all means we'll have to start from scratch, with them fully aware that we're going after them. Worse, Athena suspects they might have the capacity to take it out on her if someone tried to get them, and missed."

He shook his head. "She's a good friend. I don't like lying to her. Get someone else to do it."

"Armsmaster." Vista spoke with the authority of someone closer to thirty than thirteen. "There's nobody else in the city who works with her as closely as you do. Nobody with the same level of Tinkering reputation. There is no-one else who can do this. Tell me I'm wrong."

"I can't." He looked down and shook his head. "You're not wrong, but I can't bear to lie to her like that. Even if the plan comes off perfectly, she'll never be able to trust me again."

"That's a 'then' problem." Sparx folded her arms. "The Dragonslayers are a 'now' problem. Anyway, do you really believe that she won't understand, after the fact? Is she so unreasonable?"

"No, she's not unreasonable—" Colin cut himself off, fully aware that he'd been outmanoeuvred. "I just hate the idea of lying to her."

Ladybug tilted her head. "Would you be okay with a mole siphoning all your sensitive information back to a bunch of villains? So they could use your tech to commit crimes with?"

"Well, no!" If he found out that was going on, he'd move heaven and earth to get to the bottom of it.

"And would you be okay with Dragon pulling a sting to trap the mole? Lying to you, to make sure he got sucked in?" Aerodyne's sweet tone belied the trap they were setting for him.

He grimaced. "Yes. I would be. I'd be stupid to be angry over it."

"And Dragon's not stupid, is she." Vista made it a statement rather than a question.

There was no arguing with that. "No, she's not."

Sparx made a hand motion and all four girls shut up then; the only sound he could hear was the faint crackling of Sparx' hair and the buzzing drone of the surrounding bug swarm. They'd presented their arguments and broken down his objections. Now, they were waiting to see which way he jumped.

Colin Wallis considered himself a logical, pragmatic man. Emotions had little to no say in his decisions, or so he'd thought.

He'd been wrong.

Even when it was Dragon's welfare at stake, he found it hard to separate the emotional from the important. Intellectually, he knew what he needed to do, but it was difficult to square that with his personal view of himself. And of course, there was the other problem.

"I …" He hesitated. "I'm not used to lying. Even harmless lies don't sit right with me. I honestly don't know if I could pull it off. She'll see right through me."

"So, don't focus on the trap." Sparx' tone was entirely reasonable. "Actually figure out some tech that would work well with her suits, and really help her build the suit. We'll do the rest. She gets a new suit out of it, and gets the Dragonslayers off her back at the same time. Win-win."

"Yeah," agreed Ladybug. "And I guarantee you, she'll forgive you for the deception before you've even finished apologising."

Colin looked at Vista and Aerodyne. They both nodded in agreement, then Vista took half a step forward. "If I can just say something here?"

"I'm listening." This was the first chance Colin had had to speak with the girl since she quit the Wards, and he had more than a few questions for her. But it was only polite to let her speak first.

She took a deep breath. "When I left, I didn't do it because I hate the Wards, or the Protectorate. It had nothing to do with Aegis' leadership, or yours. You're a good hero. One of the best. Someone I still see as a role model to follow."

He rubbed his chin, then smoothed his beard. "I notice you didn't say you had no issues with the PRT."

She looked him directly in the eye; or rather, in the visor. "You'll have to take that one up with Director Piggot. Or Aegis. He was there too." Her tone had become uncompromising and hard-edged, giving him the hint as to where the fault lay.

"Understood." He would touch base with Aegis as soon as he could manage a quiet meeting, but this other matter had precedence.

He looked away, seeking some kind of epiphany within the river of fast-moving insect bodies surrounding them. No signpost showed itself within the swirl of black and silver. Which meant he had to reach inward, not outward.

What do I care more about, the way Dragon sees me, or her well-being?

When he found the answer to that question, he knew what he had to do. "Well, I suppose I should go and figure out what sort of tech I can offer Dragon to be incorporated into her suits."

Sparx smiled, Vista nodded, and the other two girls high-fived each other. "Excellent," said Sparx. "Lowering security now." As she spoke, the makeshift Faraday cage vanished as her hair settled back into drifting strands. At the same time, the bug swarm dissipated altogether, revealing a perfectly normal expanse of concrete.

"Thank you for this." Colin held out his hand; Sparx shook it, followed by each of the others. "I appreciate you bringing it to me."

"No problem," Ladybug said cheerfully. "See you around."

That part, he had no problem believing, given that she had 'eyes' in every corner of the city. Director Piggot had been savagely eloquent regarding the matter.

He gave the girls a nod, then went back to his bike. They stood, watching, as he stepped astride it then rode away down the ramp.

They'd given him a lot to think about, but the most important aspect was simple enough.

What can I offer Dragon to build into her suits?

It was an intriguing proposition, and one he was going to enjoy delving into.



End of Part Thirty-Nine