Behind his helm, Bran's brow knit in thought. But rather than voice his concerns he reached out for the piece of paper. "I have not sought new fellowship such as this for quite some time. I will certainly make my way north. What do you call yourselves?"
The man smiles again Glad o hear it. we call outselves the church of the Nephilim. he looks a bit sheepish it isn't as bad a it sounds, it was just a name to grab attention when we were young....
Hope to see you. We do a community meal on Tuesdays. if you need food, it begins at 6. and if you don't... prep starts at 3, and more hands are always welcome. he offers.
Nephilim?! Oookay. I'm guessing they're talking about Nephilim in the 'Giants, Children of Fallen Angels' sense, and not so much with the 'probably this refers to the intermixing of different tribes of early humanity' sense. Thanks for the 'Secrets of the Bible' rants MB.
Still, collar or no collar, clearly I should check this out for entirely different reasons. This sounds really cultish, and if anyone with powers is falling for it, that could be really dangerous for everyone.
Behind his great helm, Bran's face suddenly spread from being rigid with thought to a broad, resigned smile. Sheesh. And as a 'divine' giant with abilities, I'd be quite a get. Can't just go in alone if they've got power dampers though...
"I thank you for your offer. I expect that I will see you again soon, Father...?"
As two heroes patrolled in a quiet part of the city, the Silver Shadow headed back to her lair. At least, that was plan.
That plan halted when as she vaulted across a rooftop, she came face to face with two people, boy and girl, with opposite sides of their head shaved and wearing clothes that would mark them as punks.
"What's up? Nice to meet a legacy here in town. You know, Ava, I used to have a little toy Silver Shadow utility belt when I was a tot. You remember that?" The young man asked the woman.
"Course I do. Shame that it burned up with everything else back then, Char. Would have been nice to get it autographed," She replied, focusing on the Silver Shadow in front of them. Their accents seem to be South African based by how they speak, though it seems they had let go of the harder inflections. That spoke of a life outside of the country, traveling around the world.
"Anyways, to business. See, we may have happened to overhear-"
"-Well, supposing we were eavesdropping at any rate-"
"-That you're looking to take down our old pal, in case they get out of control."
"We happen to have a tailor made solution to that, actually. Can't kill them - nothing can kill them, believe us-"
Ava procures a small metal tube with a depressor on one end, a clear liquid suspended inside of a thick glass tube. "This is our fail safe. We're giving it to you." She tossed it up in front of her, and suddenly it was racing forward, halted in place a foot in front of her. It was easily taken by her from the air.
"It's got a cocktail full of the world's nastiest viruses and bacteria inside of it, supercharged for the regenerative type. Anyone like dear Mercy who gets a shot of that will be too sick to even crawl for at least twelve hours," Char informed her.
"Now, as much as we're giving this to you out of the goodness of our heart, there's a bit of a stipulation to it. Namely, we're offering this in the potential for future negotiations of good faith." Ava added.
"She means that we'd like the opportunity to speak with our sibling. Barring that, we'd like the opportunity to discuss speaking with our sibling by speaking with your new leader. Machina, right?" Char confirmed.
"Course, you don't have to do anything. You can even refuse the fail safe, give it back to us. But," Ava emphasized, "We know you're the practical type. Never one to give up an advantage. You're not going to refuse the pragmatic solution to your problems, especially since you have nothing to lose."
Another Sunday meant another drive with Mrs. Browne, another time wearing one of Mr. Browne's old suits, and feeling guilty every time she saw Mrs. Browne's eyes flash with surprised recognition when she caught Bronwyn in the corner of her vision.
I wish Mary-Beth was coming along too. It's lonelier when I'm actually leaving her behind instead of just getting there and seeing that she didn't come...
As soon as she arrived, she beelined for the donation area. She couldn't afford to put anything in the collection plate, but that didn't mean she had to be selfish. So she took the bag of the clothes that Shayera had bought for her with money from her 'father,' and carefully put them into the bin alongside the other, more worn clothes being given away.
She'll understand eventually... Right?
Maybe she won't even notice. And it's not like I didn't take them, I'm just using them differently than she probably guessed.
I wish I couldn't see how much thought she put into picking out really great clothes for me... Maybe it was just her 'wardrobe consultant' though.
I hope she didn't spend too much time on these. But I hope she would...
She sat back down, instinctively slouching in the pew to avoid another embarrassing encounter with her mom. I can't believe they still haven't called me at Mrs. Browne's...
I was sure they'd at least be willing to talk about it. I know they still love me, just... I thought they'd have called.
Her hearing had always been good, and since taking up Gae-Dearg it was only better, but that didn't mean she walked around in a state of constant awareness, or eavesdropping on every conversation at the edge of hearing. But sitting here with nothing to do except worry about her parents coming, she couldn't help but overhear snatches of conversations.
"-wyn. That's right, the Pascal girl. No she's still here, even if her parents can't bear to show..."
"-ght not make our goal this month. I've told the priests that they have to make a special appeal if we're going to keep up the program, but they..."
"Right over there. I'm telling you. I just saw her drop off
a bag full of these lovely dresses and everything - it looks to me like she might be wearing a lot more suits in the future if you know..."
"- has somewhere to stay though, right?"
"I'll ask Anna and make sure. She shouldn't be homeless!"
"You can't be that surprised. It's just what happens if you let your child get exposed to homosexuals. Mark my words, she'd still be with Marco if her parents had stepped in to keep her away from..."
She focused on her breathing instead, trying to bring it back under control as she counted ins and outs.
Okay, okay. You knew not everyone would be okay with it. And there were way more people who saw you than said anything bad. The rest are probably fine with it. Father Rotoli was fine with it! Why wouldn't they be too?
***
The service passed in a blur, but at least during it she couldn't see anyone staring, or giving her sad smiles, or just looking right past her...
She rose to take communion, carefully not listening to whispers as she took her place in line, and gradually filed forward.
"The body of Christ." "Amen."
Suddenly something horrible struck her.
"The body of Christ." "Amen."
That night when Shayera was... I mean, I didn't touch anything. Or not anything wrong.
"The body of Christ." "Amen."
But... I mean, I wanted to.
"The body of Christ." "Amen."
And it's not wrong to want to
"The body of Christ." "Amen."
But... I chose to put myself in that position where I'd be... tempted. And when she thought she should stop, **I** was the one who told her to keep going...
"The body of Christ."
Is that lust in my heart? I wasn't **planning** to do anything, but... "The body of Christ." God I wanted to see her overwhelmed with- Someone prodded her from behind. Ohmygod. She looked up from her reverie at Father Rotoli, who stood there, wafer in hand.
Ohmygod. Oh my- Umm. Umm! "Just a blessing today, Father." [smaller]Better safe than sorry. Better safe than sorry. Father Rotoli nodded, placing the sacred wafer in the hands of his deacon to give a lesser blessing with hands unencumbered. "Receive the Lord Jesus in your heart" He traced the sign of the cross on her forehead. "Amen"
How long was I standing there! Was everyone watching me stand there thinking about her?!
She hustled back to her seat, all of her concentration focused on keeping from bursting into actual flames of embarrassment when she saw him. "Papá?"
The man smiles as Bran accedes. Marshall. but you can just call me chris. He supplies. Se you then, Bran.
Alexandra stopped short as the two appear. A grenade finds her palm, though she does not reveal this. Make it quick, and please don't come any further.
She listens to the two propose their coutermeasure. and how do I know this isn't laced with a tracker, or listening device? This has a lot of unknowns. She says.
I'm not approving a face to face... or anything you give me. Frankly, you're wanted internationally, on 4 different parahuman terrorist watchlists, and responsible for nearly killing one of my allies. and Alexis is mentally basically a physically, emotionally, and sexually abused 10 year old. because of your organization. By all rights, I should tell you to go f~*+ yourselves. she sighs, shaking her head. Which means, you chose the right teammate. I'm not giving this up.
She takes a burner phone out of her coat Put the syringe and a number I can contact you at on the ledge. I'll get her to call you later tonight. or at least try to. She really doesn't like you.
Kaoru winced behind her mask. Their team truly was terrible with codenames. But at least Alexandra had called her 'Kay' instead of using her full name. On the bright side, she had seen her check for bugs or eavesdroppers, so it was probably ok. Alexandra had also basically just answered her question about why leave Bronwyn out of the meeting, so she probably didn't need to hang around after to ask. Which was...ok. As the meeting came to a close, she slowly lowered herself from her treetop perch and helped to clean up, silently grabbing all of the empty containers to throw away but leaving the food for Alexandra.
She carefully found a safe place to de-mask and de-formalize slightly. It was a little unfortunate she had to in the first place; she rather liked the mask and its voice modulation. She could be bawling her eyes out and save for maybe her body language, no one would be any the wiser. It was a lot like being safely behind a computer in that regard. She didn't have to think about who she was presenting as to the world; she could just be. It was nice. Too bad it'd be weird to just go around wearing it 24/7.
It was also unfortunate she had left her computer at home. Now would be a great chance to check the motion sensor data to see if there was a nice, quiet place she could claim as her own in the park since she was already here. Not that she lived particularly far away to begin with. She also needed to email Alexis her venmo info so he could pay her back for the escape room tickets. She'd leave Wingblade off since she was still probably technically in debt over that limo/movie theatre fiasco.
She paused as a sudden thought struck her. Alexis had been a girl. Then he died, and now he was a boy. Wingblade was a girl. She had also died. So clearly at some point, she had been a boy. But...was it normal to go from being a boy to kinda of a girly girl? At least as far as clothing had been concerned? I guess if that's your 'normal' you adjust to those sorts of changes pretty quickly? Alexis had switched from fairly girly clothes to masculine ones over a couple of days. Suddenly Wingblade's relationship with Bronwyn made a lot more sense though. They probably liked each other before the change and just kept being together afterwards. And when Wingblade died again, she'd go back to being a he and their relationship would all work out.
...ahh s+@!, she still had that text from Bronwyn she hadn't responded too. She pulled out her phone and re-read the message. She still didn't actually know what to say in response. It just...wasn't clear what Bronwyn was looking for it. She was about to put her phone away again when she stopped. No, stop being lazy. You're team leader now, and Bronwyn is on your team. You can't just half-ass this and ignore it. You need to get back into old habits. She stopped and read over the messages, more carefully this time.
At their core, Bronwyn wanted to know that she was ok. Maybe not in the 嬉しい sense but in the しあわぜ one; that she would be ok even if she wasn't right now. What was the best way to achieve that? Just saying she was ok wouldn't be very convincing. She wasn't sure she should bring Alexandra into it either. There seemed to be some issues between the two of them, even if Kaoru didn't know the details. Potentially stroking a rivalry was no good; the two of them needed to be able to work together. So partially attribute her meltdown yesterday to something else and throw in some ego-stroking, so she'd feel good about herself and like her words had made some kind of meaningful impact.
> Thanks, feeling much better today. Mostly needed some sleep. Stayed up too late working on that encryption algorithm for the comms, so brain was kinda already fried. :-/
> I got plenty of love from mah kitteh, which helped a lot. :-3
*insert 3 images of Shadow being adorable*
> Thanks for checking in though, it means a lot!
> Sorry for the late reply; today was busy. You missed a pretty cool escape room.
Hmmm, was there anything else? Lighthearted tone, downplaying her reaction, affirming relationship. Plus who didn't love cat pics? She read over Bronwyn's message once more. Was she afraid she might get killed like Alexis had? She had to be, right? Sure, she was used to helping out other heroes and clearly enjoyed that, but that didn't mean she expected to be put in the field. A field where someone had died. Was there a good way to assuage those fears? She could chalk it down to incompetence on Wingblade's part if, y'know, they weren't dating. That was just likely to anger her. And while anger was better than fear, neither would be useful to have directed at herself in this case. In this case, her best option was probably to play up the fact that now they'd have two heavy-hitters in the field, not having to multitask. Or more specifically, just play up the fact that Wingblade would be there. Play up the girlfriend angle and play down the fact that one of their heavy-hitters had apparently gone psycho and turned on the rest of the team.
> And don't worry, neither I nor the rest of the team will let anything happen to you either.
> This way kid's WB won't have to multitask and will be able to concentrate full time on dealing with combat threats.
> No split attention means greater safety for the entire team.
Sighing, she put her phone away. She had known what was wanted, but had she been able to adequately give Bronwyn that? She wasn't sure. She was definitely rusty at this or she would know. But on the bright side, it looked like she was going to have plenty of opportunities to practice...
Ava shrugs her shoulders at the Shadow. "We found you in the middle of the city already. Doesn't take a genius to realize we don't need to put trackers on you," She points out. "Look it over if you like, but try to crack it open and I guarantee you'll only succeed in killing yourself. We don't need to use such obvious ways to know what you and your team are doing."
As she comments about Mercy's condition however, that caused Char to break his self-assured mask, showing confusion and worry instead. "What do you mean, ten year old?" He asked. "Mercy's not an idiot. Before they ran off, Mercy was-"
Ava hushed her partner, Char clamming up as he glowered. "It's important that Mercy comes back. It's also important that you get them to someone who understands their medical needs, if they won't come back to us. There's a cost to rebirth for them. Better you confirm it for them than us telling," Ava said, depositing the syringe into the Silver Shadow's pocket.
"One other thing," Char added, writing out a number on the roof. "If any of you have hurt Mercy...they've been hurt enough." His eyes narrow in anger. "They've died for us long enough. So you'd better make sure they don't get themselves killed again."
Having properly warned Shadow, and with the number written on the roof near them, the pair absconded to the roof access door. "We'll be seeing you," Ava cheerfully calls out as they disappear behind the door, locking behind them.
Bronwyn: and I know what happened to Alexis was scary, but I swear I won't let that happen to you.
Kaoru (New Boy): Thanks, feeling much better today. Mostly needed some sleep. Stayed up too late working on that encryption algorithm for the comms, so brain was kinda already fried. :-/
Kaoru (New Boy): I got plenty of love from mah kitteh, which helped a lot. :-3
Kaoru (New Boy): *3 images of Shadow being adorable*
Kaoru (New Boy): Thanks for checking in though, it means a lot!
Kaoru (New Boy): Sorry for the late reply; today was busy. You missed a pretty cool escape room.
Okay. Well, good that he's not like, literally catatonic anymore. I was kinda hoping he'd tell me that it wasn't that he was afraid of getting hurt. Then again he's into Alexandra; he can't be that bothered about people making presumptuous guesses...
Still, talking about his dad dying when he's never brought it up, and you're technically guessing... that's more than just presumptuous.
Kaoru (New Boy): And don't worry, neither I nor the rest of the team will let anything happen to you either.
Kaoru (New Boy): This way kid's WB won't have to multitask and will be able to concentrate full time on dealing with combat threats.
Kaoru (New Boy): No split attention means greater safety for the entire team.
Well, guess Alexandra doesn't count as being part of the team, if I'm supposed to believe that she wouldn't let anything happen to me, and- Hail Mary, full of grace. Hail Mary, full of grace.
Okay. Y'know, she kind of almost apologized to me. As Bran. Then she said not to tell me about anything, apology included...
**sigh** I can pretend my way back to the almost apology part.
Bronwyn: I'm not worried. We'll all watch each other's backs!
Bronwyn: I'm glad you're feeling better.
Bronwyn: Sorry i missed the Escape room too, I just
Bronwyn: ...
Bronwyn: ...
Bronwyn: Y'know what? You know my cellphone service got cut off.
Bronwyn: Honestly, I technically could've afforded to go, but it would have been really irresponsible of me
Bronwyn: so... Yeah.
Bronwyn: Hurray for me being broke and not me blowing you off? I guess?
Bronwyn: sorry
Bronwyn: don't mean to be a bummer :-/
Kaoru was putting away her groceries for the upcoming week when she got Bronwyn's response. Should she say she could have paid for Bronwyn's ticket? She didn't really know enough about Bronwyn's cultural background (or about Bronwyn) to tell if that kind of offer would put her on the defensive. Except, well, Wingblade seemed to look for basically any excuse to throw money at something, so she couldn't imagine her not being willing to spend money on her girlfriend. At least some of the ingrained "the guy pays for stuff" must have carried over from her death, right? Unless Wingblade somehow didn't know? That seemed a little unlikely. But it indicated offers of financial support would likely not be met well. Though that didn't mean she couldn't help in other ways. A good starter being to make sure any group activities she invited her to would be free of charge. Which...probably meant no more escape rooms for a while.
That didn't really tell her the best way for her to respond though. Sympathy and support were the given. Was offering to help look for a part-time job too much? If she was responsible enough to skip out on fun times to save money, it hopefully meant she wouldn't balk at the idea of getting a job.
> I didn't think you were blowing me off. It was a kind of last minute thing Alexis wanted, and you declined in a prompt and timely fashion.
> But I'm sorry, that sounds rough. :-/
> Let me know if there's anyway I can help? Like with a web scraping of help wanted listings in the area or something.
> Though if you ask me to rob a bank, I'm insisting we do it Old West style with six shooters, bandanas, and horses
> The horses are vital to the image. Vital!
> ...wait, do you know how to lasso someone? That seems like an important skill that I don't have.
Did she make too many jokes when she texted? It was possible it detracted from what she was saying, but she wasn't really saying anything all that important anyway. It also served the dual purpose of giving the impression that everything was back to normal and possibly lightening Bronwyn's mood. She finished putting away the last couple of items she had bought, including the mint chocolate-chip ice cream and headed upstairs. She still needed to send out that email calling a team meeting on Monday.
She sat on her desk and booted up her laptop, fiddling with the multi-factor authentication drive around her neck as she waited for the login screen to come up. Except that it never came up. Instead there was just a picture of the laughing dog from that old skool Duck Hunt game. Her eyes narrowed. When the fk had she gotten a virus? Ugg, this is what I get for not running my virus scanners last night. Not that I used my computer thus far today, so I suppose it didn't make much of a difference. She grit her teeth, grabbing a spare hard drive before also grabbing her various computer backups. It was time to start the long, tedious process of first copying her corrupted computer to a hard drive to be analyzed later, and the slowly working her way back through her other backups to find an uncompromised version of her computer to restore. It was probably going to be her most recent backup, but she'd have to double-check that it really was clean since clever hackers were always coming up with new ways to bypass virus detection.
The good news was that nothing truly important had likely been compromised. All her important accounts were guarded by MFA, so short of gaining physical access to her hardware token, they were unhackable. The private keys for the comms units would have to be swapped out just in case. But really, it was just more of an annoyance than a true threat. She'd have to figure out where exactly the virus had come from and take precautions to shore up whatever her weakness was.
As she waited for the data to copy over, she pulled up her email on her phone. Using her hardware token was more awkward to do on it and required a specialized adapter (not to mention typing was more of a pain), but the whole process with her laptop was going to take a minimum of hours, much of which was time where the only thing she could really do was wait.
Kaoru (New Boy): Let me know if there's anyway I can help? Like with a web scraping of help wanted listings in the area or something.
Kaoru (New Boy): Though if you ask me to rob a bank, I'm insisting we do it Old West style with six shooters, bandanas, and horses
Kaoru (New Boy): The horses are vital to the image. Vital!
Kaoru (New Boy): ...wait, do you know how to lasso someone? That seems like an important skill that I don't have.
Bronwyn: Can't get a job without a work permit
Bronwyn: Can't get one of those without a parental signature :-/
Bronwyn: Thanks though.
Bronwyn: This should all be temporary; I just have to be careful for now
Bronwyn: Hey, I don't think it'd come up, but don't tell Shayera I bailed 'cause of the $30? I don't want her to just throw money at this.
Bronwyn: Especially cause, you know, temporary.
Bronwyn: And hey until then
Bronwyn: sleep is for the weak & rope is cheap
Bronwyn: I'll work on the whole lasso thing ;-p
> Yes, and I've never forged a parental signature. That would be wrong.
> But don't worry; I won't tell ur gf
It wasn't even like most of the time Kaoru was doing something bad with the forged signatures. Typically it was just household chore stuff. She could still remember the first time she had needed to. She had been...what? 9? Maybe 10? Less than a year after... It had been some plumber or someone who had wanted payment upon completion of services, and mother was away on a business trip and had forgotten to write a check for it. She had panicked, looking everywhere for it until as a last resort, she started faking a check. She was pretty sure her hand had been shaking the entire time. If he had bothered to look closely at it, it probably would have been obvious the signature was a forgery. But she managed to hold herself together and bluff her way through it until he left.
In retrospect it was a dumb thing to have cried over. Though not as dumb as mother now trying to do all the household upkeep tasks herself and demonstrating very clearly that she really had no idea what she was doing anymore. Yet another disadvantage to her current desire to "be present" and "help her settle in to her new school." Along with all the awkward family time meals. When she was lucky, she was too tired to try to make small talk. When she was less lucky, it was always fending off questions about when was Alexandra coming over again, when was she was going to meet Bronwyn or her other friends, and were there any cute boys at school. At least the questions about classes were easy enough to make up answers for.
Her computer was finally done backing up the corrupted hard drive, so she set it to do a hard reset; wiping everything on it, so she could begin her search through backups to find a clean copy. As she sat back to continue waiting, she pulled out the deck of cards she had bought. May as well start working on her manual dexterity.
Still don't especially buy that you care about her all that much... Alexandra says, locking eyes with Ava as she encroached upon her space. Don't look scared. look Scary. Do the "Look into your soul" thing. Meanwhile, her hand cured up toard her wrist momentarily, then returned. Eyes locking Ava's, daring her to look away first
and as the girl leaned, one of the spare buttons on her coat, the ones near the bottom there to replace missing ones, came into easy reach. Alexandra's hands were quick. it wouldn't broadcast, that was too risky. but it could be scanned for, if you knew the frequency....
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Alexandra rushed into the tower, muttering a string of profane and obscene comparisons for the two who had just cornered her.
Wing, Lex? You two here, we gotta talk....
Ava procures a small metal tube with a depressor on one end, a clear liquid suspended inside of a thick glass tube. "This is our fail safe. We're giving it to you." She tossed it up in front of her, and suddenly it was racing forward, halted in place a foot in front of her. It was easily taken by [Alexandra] from the air.
Alexandra finds the apartment empty for a brief moment, until a heavily armored individual lands on the balcony railing. He scrabbles a bit, holding on and pulling himself over the edge, before Alexis pulled off his helmet, huffing and grinning.
"I told you I could make the jump!" he shouted up at Wingblade, glad to have burned off some of his anxiety and aggression. Though as he sat up, he blinked, seeing the Silver Shadow inside. "Oh, hi. Is everything okay?" He asks.
"Barely. You're lucky you caught that updraft!" Wingblade says as she lands hard on the balcony.
Shayera's wearing her usual action outfit of a black tank top and cargo pants, but this time she's wearing a black domino mask of a similar shape to the one Whippoorwill always wears.
She steps inside, folding her arms casually when she sees Silver Shadow. "Hey. What's up?"
Alexandra rolled her eyes at the dramatics... Shovel talk from a bunch of mercenaries... they might have even been scary if they weren't trying so hard... and that was her opening, she waited, tracker in hand, for the dramatic turn and exit. she wasn't disappointed. she felt the vial in her pocket, and checked that everything that had been there still was. she then picked up the number, it weighing heavy on her conscience. But then, I'm the shadow. it's my job to do what the others can't.... even when it looks sketchy...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I was approached by two members of the Triakosia, less than 15 minutes ago. she says, pulling the number from her pocket. Decided to threaten me. Kinda. Felt like shovel talk. she says
A TK and.... I don't know what Char could do Very interested in Alexis' well-being. almost protective of her.
Alexandra writes a string of numbers on a piece of paper, and hands it to Wing. Tell abacus to scan on this frequency every 12 seconds or so. if Ava is within 3 block, it should warn us.
She turns to Alexis. They exacted a promise to have you call them... I have the number and a burner in my pocket. I doubt they're as innocuous as they claim, but might get them to back off for a while.... worth a shot?
Alexis' cheerful smile immediately fell. His eyes seemed to bug out of his head as he scrambled up to his feet. "We have to go now," He urges Wingblade. "They wouldn't compromise the mission. This has to be part of it. They won't disobey orders," He states.
He walks into the penthouse, grabbing the largest duffel that he can find to stuff as many new outfits as he can into it. "Why did you come here? They would have followed you! We're not safe! I can't be here anymore," Alexis tells them, the panic deep in his voice.
He picks up his phone, finding Cassie's number and giving the girl a text. Need a place to stay. Please, it's an emergency. He hoped she would respond quick enough to that.
"You have to abandon this place. When they come, they will come hard," Alexis warned as he looked over the edge of the balcony. "If they contacted you, they could be in contact with the others. Everyone has to leave their homes, find a place they can't find us," He mutters, a slightly unhinged look in his eyes now. "I have to make sure everyone is safe. I have to...to disappear."
He turns to look at the others. Then he takes a step backwards, moving to leap backwards and towards the nearest rooftop, ten stories below them.
As Alexis is scurrying around, Alexandra tries to stop him.
I checked for trackers. and tails. unless one of them can turn invisible, fly, and walk through walls, no one followed me! she says indignantly. And, you're overreacting. I think they're less dangerous than you think they are.... and that this place's security could withstand a lot more than you think it can. especially with Wing and I and you in it...
As Alexis moves toward the ledge, Alexandra grabs his hand. Either they are trying to make a move on you, in which case they've been watching you enough to know our base of op's, and you'd be leaving the second safest place in the city to flee to.... where, precisely? they want to try to sway you without making a huge scene in halcyon, where there are enough heroes that they can't do the whole "Cartel, wipe the building out one floor at a time" approach. either way, running is stupid. Alexandra puts emphasis on the last words.
Wingblade steps in front of Alexis, wings flared out in a fierce configuration. In a clear voice, she says, "算盤，鎖定。"
Suddenly, massive sheets of metal slam shut over the balcony, encasing it in a protective blast shield. The lights go out, replaced by red emergency lighting. The banks of computers recedes into the floor, and weapons emplacements pop out at the corners.
"This is no ordinary apartment, Alexis. Besides, they contacted me, too. I didn't tell you, since I was concerned you'd panic like this.
"算盤，外面看法。" A holographic image of the apartment building appears in the middle of the room. "掃描敵人。" A wash of blue light courses over the building.
"See? They're not around. Not right now. 算盤，取消防禦模式。" At her last command in Chinese, everything within the apartment returns to normal.
She puts a hand on Alexis, trying to calm him. "Hokori and Pokora showed up, let me know they've been drilling on how to extract you from my apartment. They wanted to convince me that you're better off with them. I threatened them back. I'm not going to let them take you."
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Alexis finds that his efforts to flee are for naught when the shutters go down. Shayera might have believed that would make him feel safer. But looking at him, she can still see the fear in his eyes.
"Hokori and Pokora?" He asked, dread in his voice. "Ava and Char too? They all talked to you..."
The gears are whirling in his head as he contemplates what's happening. There's some confusion in his expressions though. "I don't understand. If they were drilling, they shouldn't have made contact. With either of you," He tells them. "It's against the rules. It compromises the mission to make you aware. Why would they do that?" Alexis asks them.
He sets his duffel bag down for the moment. He sits quietly for a moment, hands on the floor as he listens. "...This doesn't make any sense. There should already be boots on the ground. We should be surrounded by Hoplites," Alexis tells Shayera. "They know where I am. They know how to get into this place. Why haven't they been ordered to extract?"
The puzzle confuses Alexis as he slumps down, fear gone now - replaced entirely by bafflement.
"...I'm afraid to talk to them. Afraid of what they'll say to me." Alexis admits. "I don't want them to think I'm a traitor."
Alexandra's eyes burn into Alexis... Okay... so, you don't know what their tactics are. You don't remeber a lot, I don't think. You atacked your handler, and went off. you "Died" Alexandra supplies air quotes. And you come too.... in your current state, a few extremities notwithstanding. Given my conversation with them, your current mental state is atypical for you. they urged me to either hand you over, or find a doctor familiar with the neural degeneration. they give me threats about hurting you... like a big brother. You just admit that you still have emotional stuff with them. you expect them to come storming in to rescue or capture you, as your perspective sees it.
Alexandra stalks forward, never breaking eye contact But, a lot of that just doesn't add up. and you and they seem to be on a different page. your words and their behavior don't align.... and behavior is usually more reliable. So, tell me, and so help me gods, I have had it up to here! He hand slashes above the muscular boy's head, an inch or so. With members and half members of this team lying to me.
her voice lowers a little, eyes scouring Alexis for tells How big are the gaps in your memory. and how much of what you do remember have you told me... or others in this room. She watches her reactions carefully
"I haven't told you or Shayera, but I talked with Bronwyn and Shaun about the Triakosia members that I do remember." He goes over to the kitchen table, taking out the notes and papers on the six members he'd been able to recall and spreading them out. "...I remember things from the past five years. Nothing earlier than that except the times that I've died. There are people I can't remember from then that I know I should."
He presses his hands against the counter. "If they haven't come for me, I can only think it's because they haven't yet been ordered to come after me yet. Which means they were telling you all this trying to get me to come back so they aren't forced to fight me."
Alexis nods, and surprisingly, he looks relieved to have come to that conclusion. "It means that they don't think I betrayed them. But...I still won't go back. I can't go back to being a soldier."
Shayera pulls her attention away from the notes, a little surprised that Alexis had told Bronwyn and Shaun about the Triakosia and not her. But she puts that out of her mind and focuses on Alexis.
"Good for you," she says. "Don't let them manipulate you. Guilt, feelings of betrayal, leaving your old team, all that does is give Omega power over you. Your old teammates may actually care for you, and I don't doubt that you used to care for them. But remember, it's all so you can be controlled by the higher-ups. So you'll do their dirty work."
She gives Alexis a comforting smile. "You don't need to go to them for any reason. My Dad's got access to some facilities that can do brain mapping. As long as we promise not to wreck the place since that's what happened to the last three, I'm sure he'll let us use them to make sure your mind is good, and not suffering from your last rebirth."
Admits the demonstrative lockdown and heart-to-heart-to-heart between Shayera, Alexis, and Alexandra. there’s a hard clunk of military boots as Shaun clambers up from the gym, an ice pack taped over his most recent bruise. ”...uuuuuuuh, guys? What ta’ f+@~’s goin’ on? Are...s%$*, are we under attack?”
"Papá?"
Cesar didn't look great. He was wearing his jetlag sunglasses, probably to hide the dark rings under his eyes, and he had a couple days of stubble, even though he had put on his Sunday best.
Bronwyn couldn't help but step towards him, but when she did, he shook his head minutely, then pointed it towards the door to the atrium.
She followed quickly, a lump in her throat kept her from being the first one to speak. As soon as the door closed behind her he embraced her tightly. "Come home, mija. Nuestra casa está vacía sin ti; ¿por qué todavía te has ido? Realmente no puedes querer abandonarnos, ¿verdad?"
"Papá... No estoy tratando de abandonaros, pero-"
He shook his head and put his hand up to the side of her face. "We don't have to talk here. Come on, we'll grab a bite to eat - I'm sure Nora's been making you do all the cooking, right?."
"I came here with her, Papá. I can't just-" Cesar's eyes flashed, "I'll bring you back! Or drop you off Bronwyn. Dios! ¿No quieres arreglar esto?"
"Fine. I'll let her know I've got a ride."
"Papa... I'm not trying to abandon you, but-"
...
"God! Don't you want to fix this?"
***
"Papá! ¡Lo juro, si devuelves esos huevos una vez más..!"
"¿Es mi culpa que no puedan cocinar bien un huevo? No." He chopped his hand in finality, but she was smiling, and his lips were quivering on the edge of sternness and mirth.
"This is nice, Bronwyn. We can go back to this, back to how things were before."
"That's all I want, Papá."
"¡Wepa! We'll go and get your things from the Brownes' and-" "But... I mean how they really were before. I was helping heroes before you knew about it. I was gay then too. I don't want to pretend anymore, but that's all I want to change."
"Mija... te quiero. Es por eso que no puedo dejar que tú y Mary-Beth se arruinen la vida, incluso si su madre está esperando. No sé lo que realmente significa amarla de todos modos..."
Bronwyn's eyes flashed with anger, and her face all but spasmed in surprise, but all she said was, "I'm not with Mary-Beth that way. She's just being a friend. She's being there for me. I thought you'd understand that."
Cesar's face sagged with relief, "Well how was I to know this Bronwyn? You come to us in the middle of the night and say you are leaving us for her? You tell us that you're- Nos dices que eres una tortillera. What was I supposed to think? You won't talk to us-"
"You turned off my phone!"
"Did that mean you could not use Nora's phone to call us? Did that mean you had to leave your home?"
"Papá, why would I stay with my Mary-Beth if- Do you think we got married while you weren't watching or something?!"
"No trates de decirme que has sido puro. Te he visto. No has comulgado desde que te fuiste."
Beneath the table Bronwyn quietly folded her fork in half. "That's between me and God, Papá. But just so you know, I didn't take communion last week because I was afraid I wasn't honoring you and Mom." "¿Crees?" His voice dripped with sarcasm. "Bronwyn, you know it is not within us to stand by when one of our children is on a dangerous path. We'll help you. You say you're gay? Fine. Father Rotoli says that this is for a reason, but you don't have to let it ruin your life - look how unhappy all this has made you. Just stop fighting us, Bronwyn! Come home."
Bronwyn slipped the ruined fork into her pocket as she stood, face pale with anger.
"I have to go, Papá. Tell Mom I love her too, okay?"
...
"Sweetie, I love you. That's why I can't let you and Mary-Beth ruin your life, even if her mother is willing to stand by. And that's if how you feel about her really means anything anyways."
...
"You tell us that you're a d$@&"
...
"Don't try to tell me you've been pure. I've seen you. You haven't taken communion since you left."
Okay, probably could have chosen better people to talk this over with, but we know now Alexandra says, trying to think of countermeasures to these members... not especially successfully. we don't know how long they had you... or how old you are, for that matter... she muses.
So, they might not have gotten the order to seize you... I kinda think they won't do a raid on this place... it's too stupid. we're 4 minutes run from the defenders HQ. significantly less by wing. this place could withstand some s%$@. and Wing, Cassie, and you are all pretty top tier capes. and Shaun can do some damage to regenerators, me too. she reassures the boy.
if we still had Jusker, or Thor girl...
Alexis looked at Alexandra. "I'm fifteen years old," He tells her. "Or that's the last birthday the team celebrated. Most of the Triakosia don't remember their birthday, so we just had a birthday day. That was..."
He paused, thinking for a moment, then cringing. "I can't remember," He admits. Alexis notices Shaun coming up from the gym. "I think we're not going to die today," He helpfully informs him. "Shayera, I'm going to try and sleep."
That said, he walks out, finding a decent spot to rest his eyes and lie down in his armor. It was comfortable enough to sleep in - he'd done so plenty of times. He didn't want to be caught unaware if the Triakosia did come after them tonight. But he would trust that Shayera and Alexandra were right.
He drifted off to sleep, forgetting that he'd unnecessarily worried Cassie with his text...
Shayera nods, understanding. "You can crash in my bed if you want."
She turns to Shaun. "Alexandra and I got a visit from some of Alexis's old teammates. They're trying to get him back. They made it known that they know about my apartment. I doubt they know all its defenses, though, so we're safer than Alexis thinks. Besides, I think their tactic right now is to let us stew in the knowledge that they're watching us."
As Alexis leaves, exhausted, she folds her arms and thinks a bit. "Going to my dad is the best call, at this point. They seem to respect him. He'll be able to help Alexis with her memory, and can probably suggest our next move."
Shayera's eyes drift over to the pages with the various Triakosia members and their powers. She reads over them a few times, then looks up at Alexandra, a worried expression on her face. "So, they always operate in pairs. Who's Mercy's partner?"
Alexandra waits for Mercy to be out of earshot. I'm staying too. I wan tot do a bit of stuff in the chem lab... does Abacus know English yet? Or french? She makes a "Whatever gesture and, I'm trained to deal with sleep deprivation, so I can stand sentinel, if you wanna get a couple hours sleep.
They offered me a neutralizing agent for Alexis, Knowing that I've been looking into a couple countermeasures for... the more volatile members of our team. they demanded a chance to speak with her in exchange... I said they got a phone call, if Lex agreed to it... She holds up the syringe They accepted. I should probably call that number, tell them that Mercy doesn't ant to tal with them... maybe get her to say it, on speaker, just so they have proof. she says
God, I feel like chamberlain. But, well... She turns to Wing The team doesn't have the firepower it used to. I miss having Skuld to smite my foes... even if it was just two team ups. or Jusker, on the rare occasion his pink energy beams weren't endangering my life too. she says, a little whistful. I know that list is a bit longer for you.
Not saying we aren't pretty good, hell, you, Alexis, and Bran are legitimately intimidating... just... miss the big guns, y'know
Alexandra shakes her head a little. Sorry, got a little emotional there. You alright on that front? You got f$@#ed by the council of a&%#+@+s.
Despite her late night checking and double checking to make sure she had found an uncorrupted backup, Kaoru's body insisted upon waking her up at its normal early hour. Which was probably good since she had a lot to do that Sunday. She went downstairs, fed Shadow, and made her usual 'breakfast' of matcha. It was still too early for stores to be open, so she killed some time making some presentation slides for the next day's meeting. Then it was time to get dressed and head to a computer store. She arrived just as it was opening.
First was the easy stuff: a new phone for Bran. As much as it galled her to be spending her own money on the lummox, it really would be the more efficient option for team communication. Which of course meant he was getting a dumb phone. All he really needed was the phone and texting part, so there was no point wasting money on fancy features he didn't know how to use. The next part took more thought: buying a new computer for herself. Her current was actually kind of old by computing standards, but more importantly, she needed a computer that could be corrupted while looking into the virus she had gotten. Otherwise she'd have to wait the hour or so it took to completely wipe her hard drive and restore her backup before she'd have something working again. Plus it meant she could completely separate out her hacking computer from her personal stuff once her investigation was over. But the age part was enough that she could justify it to her mother in the unlikely event that she actually noticed and asked about it.
That accomplished, she headed back home. As she waited for her new computer to transfer the appropriate data from her backup, she took her older computer and first deleted anything irrelevant from it. There wasn't too much anyway; mostly class notes and some personal coding projects. Honestly, most of the drive was taken up with a variety of video games. A few of the games were kind of embarrassingly girly, but overall nothing too terrible to have been compromised. Certainly nothing most viruses could have done anything with. Removing her networking chip to make sure she wasn't connected to the internet or anything, she plugged the corrupted backup in to her old computer. Alrighty. Let's find out how you got in out of the dog house, Duckie.
Shayera arches an eyebrow at the syringe. She points toward the labs. "Abacus understands English. Some of the command prompts are only in Mandarin, but you should be able to use the labs with the access you have. Let me know if you have any trouble."
She gives Alexandra a bit of a shrug when she laments about their lack of heavy hitters. "I get it. I remember being a bit miffed when Atoms started increasing in power exponentially. But he could handle just about anything there before he left. Waved a hand and a barrage of missiles just went 'poof.' If Atoms, Eldritch, or North Star were still around, we'd be going to them right now and kicking their asses. Even Hashtag -- he liked to b##&& about his powers, but he had some powerful tricks."
Her little trip down memory lane has her sighing wistfully. She waves off Alexandra's concern about the council. "I lost my first gig as leader because I nearly broke the team up. It feels a lot better losing it because I was actually pretty good at it."
She puts her domino mask back on and steps out to the balcony. She calls back in, "I'm gonna to talk with dad about Alexis and the goons. Have fun in the lab. The system's still on alert, so you're not unprotected."
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Yeah. maybe we'll get lucky and some scientist will kidnap shaun, and give him superpowers. Alexandra jokes
I like that way of looking at it. Besides, I think Kaoru is gonna do a good job. He's very talented. Alexandra offers, blushing as she says it.
Actually, Wing, can we talk about that... I know he's your dad, but... well, He's involved with some pretty shady people. I don't want to put Lex in danger. I'm not gonna say don't talk to him, but... I'd like to have Kay check anything he gives us... Hell, I'd like to run it by Foresight, if she has the time to spare.
Shayera's expression is mostly hidden behind the mask, but her mouth is a tight line. "You don't know him like I do. He's my dad. Just because you've got issues doesn't mean I--" She cuts herself off and shakes her head in frustration as she bites back her retort.
She takes a deep breath. "Sorry. Just... dammit. You'd think my dad would put him in danger? Isn't he already?" She doesn't bother to listen to anything else, turning with wings spread wide. She dives off the balcony and flies off into the night.
Whippoorwill steps into Shayera's apartment from the balcony. Whoever she sees still hanging around or working in the lab, she greets them.
"Hi. I'm trying to locate Wingblade. She's not answering her comms, and I'm not picking up her tracking signal. Have you seen her recently?"
I'm not gonna pretend I don't have more daddy issues than your average centrefold but- G*~@&$nit! Alexandra curses as Wing leaves
She sighs, but shirks her coat, electing to carry her crossbow and a few explosives with her without it. the hat goes too, and her hair is let down. I should keep a spare set of clothes here... I'll do that tomorrow. She thinks as she strides into the Chem lab.
Abacus, tell me if the door to Shayera's room opens. please she says
Affirmative
Alexandra chuckles. And tell me when the balcony door opens. please Alexandra chuckles again You're punch drunk. you can tell because the automated voice, and the act of minding your manners, is making you giggle the sane part of her thinks.
Affirmative
Okay. she takes the syringe, and places it in a sealed chamber. Abacus, without opening that syringe, can you analyze the contents?
Within the specified parameters, results will be limi-
That's fine. please run the tests you can. she says. also, would you kindly close the door to the lab, and warn me if Shaun approaches.
As you wish
Did I just get sassed by an AI? She thinks as she Dials Bron's number. She waits for the ringing to stop, and a groggy Bron to greet her... tepidly.
Hey, I know it's late, but... Well, We have a wing situation. The Triakosia approached me, and made me aware of a condition Lex has, which needs treatment. One consistent with my observations, and details Lex shared with me. I mention this to Wing, after we manage to talk lex down from jumping ship and going to hide out... The All-f!$*ing-mighty only knows where. Anyway, she gets the bright idea to bring her dad in on this. I try to talk her out of it without mentioning the memories... just alluded to him being in with shady people. She... didn't take it well. Accused me of having daddy issues, and then made the point that Lex is already in danger, and flew off, and f@+$ it, this seems like a you problem, because my solution won't be pretty.
Balcony door open
the mechanical words woke Alexandra from a stupor, looking up the various medical and chemical ingredients in the Triakosia's all purpose warcrime in a needle!(TM). She goes out of the lab, Crossbow in hand, just in case, and sees Whip instead of Wing.
She went off to see her "father" Alexandra says. We've been having fun with the Triakosia. she says. she gives Whip a brief rundown of the past few days incidents, as she knew them.
so, yeah. she thought this was a good course of action. I disagreed, but for reasons I couldn't share, she dismissed me, and that's the last I saw of her. Alexandra finishes
Oh yeah, and some stuff I've been meaning to say for some time. F&+@ you for dragging my Boyfriend into this before he was ready. F$+$ the SCA for setting us up to fail, and as long as you work for those a@!*$+~s, as far as I'm concerned, you're wearing jackboots too. She rattles off
"...I'm sorry." The filtered voice comes from the set of armor tucked in the corner, somehow unnoticed until Alexis deemed it necessary to speak. "I don't know where Shayera is either. I haven't been able to reach her over comms. The Triakosia, I don't know why they're calling out to people or why they're waiting around to bring me back in. But I think it has to do with you," Mercy admits to Whippoorwill.
"Xenophon must not want to make people like you feel a need to come after him. I think that he doesn't want to make war with heroes. He must want to try to get me back some other way." Alexis stands up to his full height, which is even larger in the armor. "I think that I'm safe for now. That everyone else is safe for now. As long as we don't force their hands, and the team stays together."
Alexis seems better after a few hours of sleep. He turns to look at Alexandra, head tilting slightly at an angle. "I didn't know you had a boyfriend," He commented to her.
"F!+& it, this seems like a you problem, because my solution won't be pretty."
"Umm. Okay. She didn't say where she was headed? Of course not. Don't do anything umm, un-pretty. I'll see if I can find her."
Whippoorwill listens calmly to the information provided by Alexandra and Alexis, processing. She nods briefly at Alexis' assessment, though she doesn't look pleased at her protégé's actions.
When Alexandra lays into her, Whippoorwill doesn't react. At the end of the tirade, she looks a bit disappointed. "You know I don't work for the SCA. I have to work with them, since I don't have the means to detain every super powered crazy I've put down. And believe me, it's not easy."
She lets out a tired sigh. "I'm going to chalk that outburst up to frustration, since you should know better. The SIDEKICK overseer forced my hand. He wanted to make an example of all of you, since someone had made him look bad just the night before. 'Every action has a reaction.' Your dad should have taught you that."
It hadn't been too difficult to figure out where the virus had come from. She hadn't done a whole lot in between her last clean back up and when she had discovered the issue. Apparently the search she had done for Alexandra and the resulting image she had found had been a trap. There was a decent chance the person pictured also wasn't a speedster since a decent chunk of the footage was just missing around that time frame. What was baffling was why this one still image had been left intact. Or at least, intact enough for her to find it. And it wasn't so much a question of why it had been left intact, that was obvious. More a question of 'why would you leave a trap'? Specifically, why leave what was admittedly a rather innocuous trap? All it had really done was completely lock her out of her computer and waste some of her time. Which, ok, sure, if she didn't do regular backups would have actually been a lot more annoying. But who didn't back up their stuff regularly? It hadn't really tried to make her computer part of a botnet, hadn't tried to get into any of her accounts or crack any of her passwords, nothing really serious. So what exactly was the point of it?
Now the image she had found was completely gone, transformed into this Duck Hunt Dog image. Not that it really mattered since the image didn't really show anything useful in the first place, and she already had the location of the place the poster had been put up. So why go to that much trouble just to be annoying? And whomever it was seemed at least good enough that they could have attempted to cause some real harm. After all, she had spent the past several hours trying to backtrace them with no luck. They seemed to use the same sort of code obfuscation that Pinky did, though no where near as advanced. At first, she had actually hoped it had been Pinky trying to contact her (though why they would go about it this way was a mystery to her), but the coding styles were too different. It wasn't Delphi either; neither the code style nor the hack-style seemed like them. She had, of course, interacted with a number of other hackers, but those seemed to mostly be either braggarts who didn't know the difference between SQL injection and buffer overflow or political radicals. And still, none of the styles she had seen thus far matched up.
About the only thing that was familiar was the signature. Familiar not as in she knew it, but as in she had recognized it as a signature. It was something she had never really understood. Why announce yourself like that? If you paid very close attention, code style was generally enough to give away who the author of a hack was, so why bother announcing it so even idiot non-coders could recognize? It had been the downfall of a number of rather incompetent hackers too full of themselves and too proud of their meagre skills. Not that it was a sign of incompetence in and of itself; even Pinky had a signature. It had been a point of endless debate between the two. Pinky had wanted her to develop her own signature, but she had thought it was needlessly stupid. Maybe if she ever got to Pinky's level of hacking she could possibly get away with it, but she was pretty far from that.
She felt a small, niggling worm of doubt crawl into her brain. If Pinky were really as good as she thought, and she had no doubt that they were, why hadn't they found a way to contact her yet? Could Delphi really be that good? Or was it simply that Pinky had gotten bored of her? Didn't think it was worth the effort to circumvent Delphi's blockades to find her? But...they were friends, weren't they? They had been the only one to stick by her through the whole mess that was the fallout with Jack. You didn't just do that for some random person you didn't care about, right? No, Pinky was probably just busy. They had mentioned having their finger in a lot of different pies, international ones even. There was probably some despot in South America who needed to be overthrown and things had gotten critical, so that was taking a higher priority. Pinky would find a way to get back in contact with her. Her brain was just fried by repeatedly banging itself into a wall. She needed a break.
She used the next couple of hours to let her brain rest by creating some fake IDs, using her new computer and a completely reconfigured internet connection to ensure her activities would once again be anonymous. This at least she could do. It was a little unsatisfying breaking into the school's computer system when she had already compromised it, but she did her best to ignore that. She killed a little more time by setting up Bran's new phone. Feeling marginally rejuvenated, she sighed, stretching her neck. Time to dive back into this Duck Hunt virus. Maybe if she approached it from a different angle, she'd get better results.
After a while of looking, Bronwyn sent Shayera one more set of messages.
Bronwyn: Abacus: Disable auto-respond
Bronwyn: Hey :-)
Bronwyn: If you want to vent or talk about it just let me know
Bronwyn: And whenever
Bronwyn: Don't worry about waking me
Bronwyn: I promise to be up all night with projects just so you don't have to feel guilty either way :-p
Bronwyn: Just want to make sure ur ok
Bronwyn: <3 <3 <3
As Bronwyn leaves the breakfast restaurant, a shadow swiftly passes over her, drawing her attention skyward. She catches the sight of a brown-feathered shape dipping behind a pair of buildings.
Whippoorwill is waiting in the alley with a concerned look on her face. An entirely different expression of concern appears when she sees Bronwyn up close.
"Hello, Bronwyn. I'd hoped Shayera would be with you, but it looks like you haven't seen her either. And, you've got other issues." She looks profoundly sympathetic. "I'm sorry to have to come to you when you clearly are going through a difficult time. But if it helps, I've seen you show remarkable strength in the short time I've known you. If there's anything I can do to help your... situation, let me know." Her level stare shows this isn't just empty platitudes.
Well, she said she was going to talk to her dad... so I assume that's where she is bound Alexandra tells Bron. I'll avoid shouting "Your dad is a supervillain" until it's the only way for me to keep his paws off Lex's greymatter.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Yes, Lex. Kaoru is my boyfriend. haven't we been... never-mind... Alexandra says...
Yeah, and that's fine, working with them as wardens. But now, they are a liability. They are a bunch of mere mortals, terrified of people with abilities like you and Wing and... all of us have. Myself, Kay, and Shaun notwithstanding. and they resent the fact that, with all of their influence and importance, we still contribute more to the safety of the city in a year, than most of them will their whole lives.and they are hunting OUR side, scaring young heroes off, or even pushing them to be illegal. So yeah. I made everyone see how incompetent he was. if you hadn't intervened that night, we would have done so again. it wasn't a boast. it was a fact.
So, don't sell me that. You're smart. you can see where this will go. Tectonic is a full member of your team. in a few years, Wing will be too.If those Goons hadn't scared him away, Jusker would have been on that track too. And maybe Alexis and Cassie. Long term, where does the next generation of members come from? the people they arrest for trying to be heroes? or people who are green at 18, the few who don't just settle into quietly using their powers for gain, because they never had the chance to do more? Whip, it's wrong. and as long as you enforce for them, you're in the wrong too. Alexandra's words aren't angry anymore, a little sad maybe, but mostly, they're just calm.
Bronwyn met Whippoorwill's eyes, but it was clearly an effort. "I don't know. I keep thinking it's about to get easier..."
She looked down for a moment, her eyes closed as tight as she could manage. By the time Bronwyn looked up again they were dry. "She's probably with Him. She's not hurt or anything, but that doesn't mean she's okay." The fresh determination in her eyes, softened again into sorrow, "We have to get her out of there, Whippoorwill. She's going to be torn apart if He stays in her head. She got in a fight with Alexandra about Him already, and if it's easier for her to connect with Him and her new-
"Wait, has she told you about her new friends that came back with her from that trip she took to China? Three other girls, umm," her eyes closed again, this time in concentration, as she carefully recited, "阴影, 数字, and 余曉- 余-
... Yu Hiu. Sorry, still can't get the tone on that last one, so I might not have it right. If He goes in for Significant Names like he did when he tried to rename Shayera, they might have abilities too, or they could just be a way for her to have friends that are meant to separate her from us. I try not to get too paranoid about what he's up to, but... Well it's not paranoia if the Evil Nameless Scientist is really out to get you."
That sorrow had melted to tightly held anger, "That's the situation that needs help. As for the rest... I have a place to stay; I have food; I have clothes; I have Shayera. I have faith the rest will come in time. They just can't hear any of this from me..."
Whippoorwill takes a moment, her jaw set as she controls her anger. She turns from Alexandra and stares outside towards the balcony for a brief pause, then spins back around to face her.
"You're not paying attention," she says with a simmering heat to her voice. "I agree with everything you say. I've made those same arguments, publicly. After every discussion I have with Innis and his cronies, I'm ready to quit the Defenders and go off and do this work like I used to.
"I have to be talked from that ledge every single freaking time, because I am needed *inside* the system instead of out. To work *within* the rules instead of breaking them." Her voice is thick with emotion, her eyes glistening. She steps closer to Alexandra, looming over her.
"Wear that hat and cape long enough, you'll see what I mean. You'll have that choice too. Your dad chose to walk away. So did your grandfather. So I wonder if you can understand my concern when you'd rather act like a stupid child and provoke the SCA into treating you like a villain. They may have some trigger-happy idiots working for them, and they may be run by some passive aggressive a-holes, but they're not your enemy unless you make them one."
Finished, she turns to Alexis. "Have Wingblade contact me as soon as you see her, please."
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Whippoorwill goes pale when she hears about Shayera's friends from China. She gets a far away look in her eyes. "She didn't tell me. I should have forbade that trip to China."
She blinks and refocuses on Bronwyn. "I had thought -- hoped, really -- that his hold would loosen as she grows. That the real relationships would outweigh the fake one he put in her." Her eyes close and her hands clench. "I don't want to lose her again."
The moment of vulnerability disappears and Whippoorwill straightens. "I didn't want to force the confrontation, but I don't see where time is on our side anymore. I'm open to your ideas, since I don't doubt you've been thinking about it. However, I've got to investigate something now. Something without her."
They didn't walk away. and I'm not stupid Alexandra mutters, to no one in particular as Whippoorwill flies away
Lex, go back to bed. I'll keep watch until dawn. maybe even make breakfast. Alexandra offers, patting the boy affectionately on the head.
I thought **she** had a plan!
"I guess- I mean, on some level she knows what he is... I don't know. I told her that I didn't trust him and why, but... well it's been a while since we've talked about him directly. I wouldn't be surprised if some kind of cognitive dissonance kept her from really thinking about the fact that either he is horrible, or I'm either wrong, lying, or crazy." She shrugged to smooth over the sting her own words had left her with.
Then she gradually realized that... Whippoorwill hadn't flown away after her cryptic statement. "Wait, do you want my help with the investigation?"
A quiet debate shows on Whippoorwill's face as she studies Bronwyn. Slowly, she shakes her head. "No, I think I should do this on my own. But if you could, see what you can learn about Shayera's new friends. Find out what she's been up to last night. And tell her to contact me."
An expression of grave worry appears on the Defender's face. "I suspect you're right about that cognitive dissonance. She's not making the connection. Trying to get her to see through him, though..." She lets out a frustrated sound and rubs her face.
Suddenly a bitter, black laugh emanates from her throat. "I think I finally get it. I wondered what his angle was, giving her back to me. I never quite believed that she was just to be a shield between me and him." Whippoorwill's mouth twists. "He's taking her back, slowly, bit by bit, and making me watch it happen."