This is a Mic. Short for Microphone.
Drift (post-Leviathan canon divergence)
- Thread starter Octobre
- Start date
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- worm canon divergence
GREAT JOB RUINING ENDBRINGER DEFENSES FOR EVERYONE, COIL. Ruling Brockton Bay works out *great* for you if society collapses fast, I'm *sure*.
God.
EDIT: This is also going to make the announcement of Skitter as a Ward *hilariously awkward*.
Last edited:
- Location
- Michigan
I am fairly sure Browbeat didn't die during the endbringer fight, his parents withheld him from participation and had him transferred out after. At least that is if I am remembering correctly and haven't missed a retcon.
It was retconned in 2019 after too many jokes and memes about him disappearing from the story after Leviathan. The new version has him get stomped by Leviathan in front of Taylor, then called out as deceased by the armband.
Feels like extremely sour grapes on Wildbow's part to go back and revise a story for that...
That sounds exactly like Wildbow's M.O. to me. IIRC, he created the Youth Guard specifically to mess with the voters/community for PRT Quest.
- Location
- The Internet?
A nice perspective! Interludes are always a fun treat. Thank you for sharing.
Who knows, maybe with all the dirty laundry out in the open they'll actually be able to communicate and bond as a team...
Who am I kidding? Taylor's going to continue to be, and make things, awkward as he'll. It'll be great to read!
Oh dear, she doesn't know. Well, it'll be neat to see someone learn about what's been happening in real time.
I think she had to Dennis, but you'd made it pretty clear you didn't want to talk to her, so... when and how would she have?
Porque no los dos? Why not both?
She's been a little busy, and given circumstances, y'all haven't been the most welcoming... plus, you saw some of what her experiences with her peers was like. All that was just a taste of what she's been going through.
Yeah, the girl whose identity got leaked, whose trigger event is plastered all over the web, no pun intended, whose father might be in danger for the rest of his life given his lack of powers to defend himself from any fallout that comes with this disclosure. That's who they're throwing to the media wolves. Makes you think about the kind of person that would have all that heaped on them, and still try to do right by people as an actual hero.
Who knows, maybe with all the dirty laundry out in the open they'll actually be able to communicate and bond as a team...
Who am I kidding? Taylor's going to continue to be, and make things, awkward as he'll. It'll be great to read!
Chapter 13
Chapter 13
"Good morning, and thank you for joining us today," Legend addressed the crowd of journalists. "On Sunday, May fifteenth, Leviathan attacked Brockton Bay, and a gathering of brave heroes, villains and rogues defended the city. They did so under the protection of a truce, an agreement that everyone would put aside their grievances to cooperate for the greater good, and be free to go afterward. Unfortunately, one individual chose to break that truce. Shadow Stalker attacked another parahuman, grievously injuring them, before fleeing the scene."
Multiple simultaneous questions were thrown his way, and Legend raised a hand to quiet the assembled journalists before continuing.
"Let it be known that the PRT and Protectorate are doing everything they can to bring Shadow Stalker in as fast as possible, so that she can be tried for her crimes. Fortunately, quick intervention kept the situation from turning into a tragedy, and the victim promptly received medical care. You can be assured that we are holding ourselves accountable and are reviewing the safeguards we employ to prevent situations like this."
He quieted more chatter from the journalists.
"I want to reassure volunteering parahumans that we will do everything in our power to better protect them during future fights. We cannot let the choices of one individual undermine our entire defense against Endbringers. The world needs us, and now more than ever, it is important that we stand together for the greater good. Thank you."
He didn't take any questions, as Glenn had advised us that doing so was a recipe for disaster, and ceded the podium to Armsmaster.
"In July 2010, Shadow Stalker was arrested for using excessive force as a vigilante, and was offered to join the Wards as a probationary member rather than go to jail," he recited, his tone clipped. "As a young parahuman with only one known offense, we had good hopes of reforming her. Had we known then what we know now, we would have made a different call. Unfortunately, either because of insufficient supervision or because she was especially skilled at covering her tracks, we had no knowledge of her acting outside the law until her defection, nor did we know of any life she may have taken or injury she might have caused aside from the case leading to her initial arrest. As leader of the Protectorate ENE, I accept full responsibility for the oversight that allowed her to get away with so much for so long, which is why, as of today, I am stepping down from my position. I want to thank the people of Brockton Bay for their trust in me over the years, as well as extend to them my deepest apology for this whole situation. Thank you."
The assembled journalists erupted in a cacophony of questions as soon as Armsmaster finished his speech.
"No questions," he said before leaving the podium.
I couldn't help but feel bad for him despite myself.
I'd asked Clockblocker as we left the lobby, and he'd confirmed that Armsmaster had relinquished most Wards-related duties to Piggot, making her the one whose oversight had allowed Sophia to become such a menace in and out of costume.
Of course, proper accountability was out of the question while Coil loomed over the city, and Armsmaster's head was already on the chopping block. Lucky for them.
Still, it bothered me. It was as if the school's Principal had decided to fire Mr. Gladly in response to the bullying, and then called it a day. He might have let it happen under his nose, but he wasn't the one with the authority to put an end to it for good. It was only for show, rather than actually solving the problem.
The bitter, cynical part of me had toyed with the idea of going off-script and telling the truth, but anything I could say would only help Coil's goal to destabilize the PRT and force a restructuration, and I refused to become his pawn again. Instead, I figured that the more goodwill I earned by playing along, the less scrutiny I would face, especially concerning the use of my power. The happier Glenn and Maureen were with me, the less likely they were to look close enough to see anything but bees.
Miss Militia stepped to the podium.
The speech she — or rather, Glenn — had prepared was short and to the point, so much that I barely had time to stress about being next before she introduced me.
I left my place next to the other Wards and walked to the podium, feeling oddly exposed.
In the meeting room, I'd raised the concern of Coil positioning a sniper to take a shot at me, or sending the Undersiders and Travelers to crash the press conference, or using the occasion to make some kind of move. Miss Militia had called Déjà Vu, who had assured us that none of that would happen, but it didn't soothe my anxiety.
Alone against an army of journalists and flashing lights, I spoke Glenn's carefully prepared words, struggling to keep my voice even.
"You may know me as Skitter, and for that I am sorry. The fight against Leviathan showed me what we are really up against, why heroes are needed, and I cannot in good conscience go on as a villain after that. From now on, you may call me Apiary, and I hope that in time, I can prove myself to be the hero this city needs."
Flashes blinded me, and a flurry of questions were sent my way, only to be dismissed by Director Piggot who brought the press conference to an end.
I gladly stepped off the stage and retreated back to the lobby.
Armsmaster went straight to the elevator, hurrying to close the doors before anyone else could get in.
"That went well, I think," said Glenn, Maureen nodding beside him. They'd been waiting in the lobby, watching the livestream on the front desk's computer. "Apiary, you're already buzzing on the web, pun intended."
It's been one minute, I wanted to protest. And also: "I thought power was out for most of the city."
"Oh, it is, but the livestream is being viewed all around the world, and we had preemptively posted last night's emergency photoshoot on social media to generate some excitement. It's not everyday that a villain openly becomes a hero."
As opposed to secretly becoming a hero, which was apparently much more frequent.
"Speaking of buzzing," Glenn continued, "hives are being installed on the roof as we speak, and the city has agreed to let us install some on public properties, as well as several private building owners volunteering their rooftops. We've also reached out to various nearby farms, which would allow you to make different kinds of honey. Wildflower, clover, buckwheat, blueberry, alfalfa, lavender… Our rush order of bees should arrive tomorrow, once all the hives are installed. I'm hoping to get a nice video of you setting them up, for your social medias."
"You want me to do an unboxing video for bees?"
"That's exactly what I want! I knew you would understand."
There was no arguing with Glenn about the absurdity of it.
The other Wards filed out to the tinker-designed elevator, down to headquarters, while Miss Militia and Piggot waited for the other elevator.
Legend took me aside.
"I'm going back to New York this afternoon," he said. "Before leaving, I wanted to wish you the best, and express that I hope it's only a matter of time before we can fulfill the terms of our agreement and rescue Dinah Alcott.
He handed me his card.
"I can't guarantee that I always pick up the phone, but leave me a message if there's anything, and I'll get back to you shortly."
"Thank you," I said, meaning it, and he squeezed my shoulder before joining the others in the elevator.
Glenn and Maureen stayed with me in the lobby, and an agent joined us. She was a tall, serious-looking woman with high cheekbones, blue eyes and dark hair in a bun, dressed in a navy blue pantsuit.
"This is Agent Lanaro," said Maureen. "She will be your handler, your PRT liaison if you will, and will be escorting you on a spider-hunting trip for the rest of the day. As it turns out, we can't buy black widow spiders by the pound like bees, much less Darwin's bark spiders. We've managed to find an entomologist who should capture some specimens of the latter in Madagascar and bring them here in a few weeks, but you will have to breed them yourself, which will take time. For now, wild black widows will have to do. Bring back as many as you need for a large scale production of silk."
"And try not to terrorize anyone," Glenn added.
We waited until the journalists had dispersed, then I followed Lanaro outside to a van.
Since flooded Brockton Bay was rather hard to navigate by car, Lanaro took the simple option of bringing me to the next town over.
It felt eerily like stepping in a parallel world, untouched by Leviathan's destruction. Buildings were still standing, people walked without a care in the world, and there were even young children running around on a playground under the watchful eye of parents and daycare workers. It was sunny too, sunnier than it had been since the Endbringer came.
Just an ordinary Wednesday.
To think that all of that and more would still be normal, had the Endbringer decided to hit another city. Where would I be? Would I have rejoined the Undersiders despite knowing about Dinah, or would I have tried to strike out on my own? How would it have worked out for me?
I could only speculate.
Never in the world would I have joined the Wards if my back hadn't been against the wall, but it wasn't as bad as I had expected, even if I was still waiting for the PRT to come through about Dinah.
Meanwhile, various flying insects carried black widows to the box I had set out for them. I used a combination of image-friendly bugs, with wild bees, butterflies, dragonflies, and others, in case Lanaro reported anything to Glenn and Maureen. The reasoning was the same as with my speech. I could either drag my feet about the restrictions and PR and be looked at as the next Shadow Stalker, or I could keep them happy and off my back.
Once all the black widows were in the box, I climbed back in the van, and Lanaro drove the equivalent of my range before stopping again, so I had a new batch of spiders to call to me.
A few people waved at me, simply because I was dressed in costume. Technically, this was my first outing in my hero costume — the prototype, at least. The real one was still being made, in several copies.
One of the stops brought me near an elementary school yard during recess, and the children stared and waved as I stood in front of the box to hide what I was doing while I waved back. The last thing I needed was for Glenn to learn of me terrorizing a bunch of ten years olds by confronting them with the reality of the sheer number of venomous spiders in their surroundings. I sent a bunch of butterflies their way to distract them, and they seemed delighted.
Lanaro barely spoke, which was fine with me, but when she did, it was short and to the point. She struck me as a no-nonsense kind of person, and acted nonplussed around my power and the thousands of black widows in the back of the van, which was really all I could ask for.
We covered the whole city before noon, and stopped for the best bao buns of my life at a food truck downtown. One of the people in line in front of us asked for an autograph and a photo, despite not knowing who I was. Lanaro provided a pen, and I signed his napkin, then she took a photo of the two of us and handed the phone back to him.
We ate in the van, with me awkwardly hiding in the back with the spiders since I had to remove my mask, and the radio filling the silence.
In the afternoon, we went to three other cities.
The M.O. was much the same, and by the time we came back to base, I had several tens of thousands of black widow spiders stored in boxes.
Lanaro went in the lobby while I was opening the back doors of the van, and promptly came back with a cart to transport the boxes.
I thanked her, and she led me to my workshop. It was one floor above the Wards headquarters, across from Kid Win's workshop, and both doors were identified with printed signs.
It was a medium-sized, rectangular room that used to be a storage closet for spare furniture, but now, the side walls were framed with shelves holding a variety of plexiglas terrariums to keep my bugs in. In the middle of the space was a large workbench with drawers underneath hiding the handful of tools I'd requested, and Armsmaster's machine was installed in the bottom one, to keep the bugs following my last instruction whenever I fell out of range.
At the back, against the wall, was a massive aquarium nearly the same width as the room, with six horseshoe crabs, delivered and installed while I was spider hunting. Beneath the aquarium were two small vertical freezers, full of shrimps and mackerel, which is what the Maritime Aquarium fed the horseshoe crabs, as well as a large reserve of sugar bags for the bees' syrup.
On the left, below the shelves of terrariums, there was a small countertop with a sink, a portable induction cooktop and a large pot, to make sugar syrup for my bees.
A desk next to the door held a braille computer and printer, as I intended to learn it, and a shelf above it housed a variety of reference books about bugs, as well as a small radio.
There was no window, but a vent on the ceiling had been repurposed into a trap that led outside, so I could bring bugs in to feed the spiders.
"Everything to your liking?" Asked Lanaro.
"It's great," I answered.
She handed me her card. "My number is on it, as well as my office number on the third floor. Don't hesitate if you need anything. That's what I'm here for."
"Thanks," I told her, and she left.
I'd gathered a swarm on the way back, and it filed through the vent and into the workshop, settling on the ceiling while I unpacked the spiders. I opened the boxes and set them on the workbench, letting the black widows crawl out, then directed the swarm to feed itself to the spiders.
My phone buzzed, and I checked it. It was a text from my dad, asking me to call him when I could.
My first thought was to procrastinate, to avoid what was sure to be an awkward conversation for as long as possible. Then, the shame caught up with me. My dad had to leave his life behind because of me, on top of buying a cellphone specifically to keep in touch with me despite his specific hangups against them, and I couldn't even do him the courtesy of calling him back in a timely manner?
I called him right away, and he picked up halfway through the first ring.
"Hey, Taylor. How are you doing?" He asked.
"Okay, I guess. How are you?"
"Fine. I watched the broadcast."
"Oh."
"You were good. Nice costume. Bee themed?"
"It was my idea."
"I see. That's good, that they let you have some input into it."
"Yeah."
Silence fell for a moment, and I wondered what I could say. Dad spoke up again before I could find something.
"The other Wards are treating you alright?"
I could imagine more than hear the worry in his voice; he did a good job sounding casual, but I knew this was the real reason he'd called. Had he spent the last few days imagining the worst, that this was like Winslow all over again?
"Yeah." They resent me because of my past as a villain, but at least they're mostly polite about it. "It takes some getting used to," I answered truthfully.
"I suppose it does. And it's nice? The place you're staying at?"
"Yeah. I have a room and a workshop, for spidersilk production."
"Spidersilk? Wow, I didn't think that was something you could do."
"Yeah. It's how I made my costume. I mean, my old costume."
He went silent with the mention of my former double life, then, just as I wondered if I should come up with an excuse to hang up, he spoke again, quieter.
"How did you manage that? I mean, I never noticed anything."
The desperation in his voice gave me pause. I cringed, trying to think of an answer that wouldn't make him feel bad.
"In the basement. I mean, I can control them from a distance, so I didn't need to be there at all. I was just doing my homework and stuff in my room while they worked."
"I see. Still no news of Shadow Stalker?"
"No, aside from the leak about her actions."
"Right. They said they're doing what they can to ensure that your identity is safe, but that some people might know anyways."
He let the statement hang in the air, not quite a question, but I answered it as one, more for his sake than because I believed it.
"They have NDAs and stuff for situations like that, and they can stamp down online speculation. You're already in protective custody, and I'm sleeping in the most protected building in the city. It's gonna be fine, dad."
"I guess. It's hard not to worry, though."
"I know."
"What are they making you do? Do you patrol like the Protectorate?"
Another hidden question about my safety.
"Not yet. So far it's been search and rescue, and mostly stuff to do with me being a new Ward. Power testing, costume designing, reading the handbook and learning the rules. I went to the aquarium yesterday, to test my power. I can control crabs and other crustaceans too. Today, after the press conference, I went to gather black widows to make spidersilk."
I didn't mention that I would start patrolling tomorrow. I didn't want to worry him.
"How is it going in New York?" I asked to change the subject.
I was treated to a description of his safehouse, of how he was spending a lot of time reading, since he couldn't work, and that the PRT agents were very professional and accommodating.
"It's been nice talking to you, Taylor. I should let you get back to work."
"You too, dad. Have a nice day."
I hung up and put away the phone.
The spiders were full, so I instructed them to start weaving, while flipping the biological switch that urged them to reproduce. They would be ready to lay eggs within a week or so. From there, it would be about three to four weeks before my number of weavers increased to seven digits.
I set them to start working on four suits, one for each of the other Wards, and the last one for me.
"Good morning, and thank you for joining us today," Legend addressed the crowd of journalists. "On Sunday, May fifteenth, Leviathan attacked Brockton Bay, and a gathering of brave heroes, villains and rogues defended the city. They did so under the protection of a truce, an agreement that everyone would put aside their grievances to cooperate for the greater good, and be free to go afterward. Unfortunately, one individual chose to break that truce. Shadow Stalker attacked another parahuman, grievously injuring them, before fleeing the scene."
Multiple simultaneous questions were thrown his way, and Legend raised a hand to quiet the assembled journalists before continuing.
"Let it be known that the PRT and Protectorate are doing everything they can to bring Shadow Stalker in as fast as possible, so that she can be tried for her crimes. Fortunately, quick intervention kept the situation from turning into a tragedy, and the victim promptly received medical care. You can be assured that we are holding ourselves accountable and are reviewing the safeguards we employ to prevent situations like this."
He quieted more chatter from the journalists.
"I want to reassure volunteering parahumans that we will do everything in our power to better protect them during future fights. We cannot let the choices of one individual undermine our entire defense against Endbringers. The world needs us, and now more than ever, it is important that we stand together for the greater good. Thank you."
He didn't take any questions, as Glenn had advised us that doing so was a recipe for disaster, and ceded the podium to Armsmaster.
"In July 2010, Shadow Stalker was arrested for using excessive force as a vigilante, and was offered to join the Wards as a probationary member rather than go to jail," he recited, his tone clipped. "As a young parahuman with only one known offense, we had good hopes of reforming her. Had we known then what we know now, we would have made a different call. Unfortunately, either because of insufficient supervision or because she was especially skilled at covering her tracks, we had no knowledge of her acting outside the law until her defection, nor did we know of any life she may have taken or injury she might have caused aside from the case leading to her initial arrest. As leader of the Protectorate ENE, I accept full responsibility for the oversight that allowed her to get away with so much for so long, which is why, as of today, I am stepping down from my position. I want to thank the people of Brockton Bay for their trust in me over the years, as well as extend to them my deepest apology for this whole situation. Thank you."
The assembled journalists erupted in a cacophony of questions as soon as Armsmaster finished his speech.
"No questions," he said before leaving the podium.
I couldn't help but feel bad for him despite myself.
I'd asked Clockblocker as we left the lobby, and he'd confirmed that Armsmaster had relinquished most Wards-related duties to Piggot, making her the one whose oversight had allowed Sophia to become such a menace in and out of costume.
Of course, proper accountability was out of the question while Coil loomed over the city, and Armsmaster's head was already on the chopping block. Lucky for them.
Still, it bothered me. It was as if the school's Principal had decided to fire Mr. Gladly in response to the bullying, and then called it a day. He might have let it happen under his nose, but he wasn't the one with the authority to put an end to it for good. It was only for show, rather than actually solving the problem.
The bitter, cynical part of me had toyed with the idea of going off-script and telling the truth, but anything I could say would only help Coil's goal to destabilize the PRT and force a restructuration, and I refused to become his pawn again. Instead, I figured that the more goodwill I earned by playing along, the less scrutiny I would face, especially concerning the use of my power. The happier Glenn and Maureen were with me, the less likely they were to look close enough to see anything but bees.
Miss Militia stepped to the podium.
The speech she — or rather, Glenn — had prepared was short and to the point, so much that I barely had time to stress about being next before she introduced me.
I left my place next to the other Wards and walked to the podium, feeling oddly exposed.
In the meeting room, I'd raised the concern of Coil positioning a sniper to take a shot at me, or sending the Undersiders and Travelers to crash the press conference, or using the occasion to make some kind of move. Miss Militia had called Déjà Vu, who had assured us that none of that would happen, but it didn't soothe my anxiety.
Alone against an army of journalists and flashing lights, I spoke Glenn's carefully prepared words, struggling to keep my voice even.
"You may know me as Skitter, and for that I am sorry. The fight against Leviathan showed me what we are really up against, why heroes are needed, and I cannot in good conscience go on as a villain after that. From now on, you may call me Apiary, and I hope that in time, I can prove myself to be the hero this city needs."
Flashes blinded me, and a flurry of questions were sent my way, only to be dismissed by Director Piggot who brought the press conference to an end.
I gladly stepped off the stage and retreated back to the lobby.
Armsmaster went straight to the elevator, hurrying to close the doors before anyone else could get in.
"That went well, I think," said Glenn, Maureen nodding beside him. They'd been waiting in the lobby, watching the livestream on the front desk's computer. "Apiary, you're already buzzing on the web, pun intended."
It's been one minute, I wanted to protest. And also: "I thought power was out for most of the city."
"Oh, it is, but the livestream is being viewed all around the world, and we had preemptively posted last night's emergency photoshoot on social media to generate some excitement. It's not everyday that a villain openly becomes a hero."
As opposed to secretly becoming a hero, which was apparently much more frequent.
"Speaking of buzzing," Glenn continued, "hives are being installed on the roof as we speak, and the city has agreed to let us install some on public properties, as well as several private building owners volunteering their rooftops. We've also reached out to various nearby farms, which would allow you to make different kinds of honey. Wildflower, clover, buckwheat, blueberry, alfalfa, lavender… Our rush order of bees should arrive tomorrow, once all the hives are installed. I'm hoping to get a nice video of you setting them up, for your social medias."
"You want me to do an unboxing video for bees?"
"That's exactly what I want! I knew you would understand."
There was no arguing with Glenn about the absurdity of it.
The other Wards filed out to the tinker-designed elevator, down to headquarters, while Miss Militia and Piggot waited for the other elevator.
Legend took me aside.
"I'm going back to New York this afternoon," he said. "Before leaving, I wanted to wish you the best, and express that I hope it's only a matter of time before we can fulfill the terms of our agreement and rescue Dinah Alcott.
He handed me his card.
"I can't guarantee that I always pick up the phone, but leave me a message if there's anything, and I'll get back to you shortly."
"Thank you," I said, meaning it, and he squeezed my shoulder before joining the others in the elevator.
Glenn and Maureen stayed with me in the lobby, and an agent joined us. She was a tall, serious-looking woman with high cheekbones, blue eyes and dark hair in a bun, dressed in a navy blue pantsuit.
"This is Agent Lanaro," said Maureen. "She will be your handler, your PRT liaison if you will, and will be escorting you on a spider-hunting trip for the rest of the day. As it turns out, we can't buy black widow spiders by the pound like bees, much less Darwin's bark spiders. We've managed to find an entomologist who should capture some specimens of the latter in Madagascar and bring them here in a few weeks, but you will have to breed them yourself, which will take time. For now, wild black widows will have to do. Bring back as many as you need for a large scale production of silk."
"And try not to terrorize anyone," Glenn added.
We waited until the journalists had dispersed, then I followed Lanaro outside to a van.
Since flooded Brockton Bay was rather hard to navigate by car, Lanaro took the simple option of bringing me to the next town over.
It felt eerily like stepping in a parallel world, untouched by Leviathan's destruction. Buildings were still standing, people walked without a care in the world, and there were even young children running around on a playground under the watchful eye of parents and daycare workers. It was sunny too, sunnier than it had been since the Endbringer came.
Just an ordinary Wednesday.
To think that all of that and more would still be normal, had the Endbringer decided to hit another city. Where would I be? Would I have rejoined the Undersiders despite knowing about Dinah, or would I have tried to strike out on my own? How would it have worked out for me?
I could only speculate.
Never in the world would I have joined the Wards if my back hadn't been against the wall, but it wasn't as bad as I had expected, even if I was still waiting for the PRT to come through about Dinah.
Meanwhile, various flying insects carried black widows to the box I had set out for them. I used a combination of image-friendly bugs, with wild bees, butterflies, dragonflies, and others, in case Lanaro reported anything to Glenn and Maureen. The reasoning was the same as with my speech. I could either drag my feet about the restrictions and PR and be looked at as the next Shadow Stalker, or I could keep them happy and off my back.
Once all the black widows were in the box, I climbed back in the van, and Lanaro drove the equivalent of my range before stopping again, so I had a new batch of spiders to call to me.
A few people waved at me, simply because I was dressed in costume. Technically, this was my first outing in my hero costume — the prototype, at least. The real one was still being made, in several copies.
One of the stops brought me near an elementary school yard during recess, and the children stared and waved as I stood in front of the box to hide what I was doing while I waved back. The last thing I needed was for Glenn to learn of me terrorizing a bunch of ten years olds by confronting them with the reality of the sheer number of venomous spiders in their surroundings. I sent a bunch of butterflies their way to distract them, and they seemed delighted.
Lanaro barely spoke, which was fine with me, but when she did, it was short and to the point. She struck me as a no-nonsense kind of person, and acted nonplussed around my power and the thousands of black widows in the back of the van, which was really all I could ask for.
We covered the whole city before noon, and stopped for the best bao buns of my life at a food truck downtown. One of the people in line in front of us asked for an autograph and a photo, despite not knowing who I was. Lanaro provided a pen, and I signed his napkin, then she took a photo of the two of us and handed the phone back to him.
We ate in the van, with me awkwardly hiding in the back with the spiders since I had to remove my mask, and the radio filling the silence.
In the afternoon, we went to three other cities.
The M.O. was much the same, and by the time we came back to base, I had several tens of thousands of black widow spiders stored in boxes.
Lanaro went in the lobby while I was opening the back doors of the van, and promptly came back with a cart to transport the boxes.
I thanked her, and she led me to my workshop. It was one floor above the Wards headquarters, across from Kid Win's workshop, and both doors were identified with printed signs.
It was a medium-sized, rectangular room that used to be a storage closet for spare furniture, but now, the side walls were framed with shelves holding a variety of plexiglas terrariums to keep my bugs in. In the middle of the space was a large workbench with drawers underneath hiding the handful of tools I'd requested, and Armsmaster's machine was installed in the bottom one, to keep the bugs following my last instruction whenever I fell out of range.
At the back, against the wall, was a massive aquarium nearly the same width as the room, with six horseshoe crabs, delivered and installed while I was spider hunting. Beneath the aquarium were two small vertical freezers, full of shrimps and mackerel, which is what the Maritime Aquarium fed the horseshoe crabs, as well as a large reserve of sugar bags for the bees' syrup.
On the left, below the shelves of terrariums, there was a small countertop with a sink, a portable induction cooktop and a large pot, to make sugar syrup for my bees.
A desk next to the door held a braille computer and printer, as I intended to learn it, and a shelf above it housed a variety of reference books about bugs, as well as a small radio.
There was no window, but a vent on the ceiling had been repurposed into a trap that led outside, so I could bring bugs in to feed the spiders.
"Everything to your liking?" Asked Lanaro.
"It's great," I answered.
She handed me her card. "My number is on it, as well as my office number on the third floor. Don't hesitate if you need anything. That's what I'm here for."
"Thanks," I told her, and she left.
I'd gathered a swarm on the way back, and it filed through the vent and into the workshop, settling on the ceiling while I unpacked the spiders. I opened the boxes and set them on the workbench, letting the black widows crawl out, then directed the swarm to feed itself to the spiders.
My phone buzzed, and I checked it. It was a text from my dad, asking me to call him when I could.
My first thought was to procrastinate, to avoid what was sure to be an awkward conversation for as long as possible. Then, the shame caught up with me. My dad had to leave his life behind because of me, on top of buying a cellphone specifically to keep in touch with me despite his specific hangups against them, and I couldn't even do him the courtesy of calling him back in a timely manner?
I called him right away, and he picked up halfway through the first ring.
"Hey, Taylor. How are you doing?" He asked.
"Okay, I guess. How are you?"
"Fine. I watched the broadcast."
"Oh."
"You were good. Nice costume. Bee themed?"
"It was my idea."
"I see. That's good, that they let you have some input into it."
"Yeah."
Silence fell for a moment, and I wondered what I could say. Dad spoke up again before I could find something.
"The other Wards are treating you alright?"
I could imagine more than hear the worry in his voice; he did a good job sounding casual, but I knew this was the real reason he'd called. Had he spent the last few days imagining the worst, that this was like Winslow all over again?
"Yeah." They resent me because of my past as a villain, but at least they're mostly polite about it. "It takes some getting used to," I answered truthfully.
"I suppose it does. And it's nice? The place you're staying at?"
"Yeah. I have a room and a workshop, for spidersilk production."
"Spidersilk? Wow, I didn't think that was something you could do."
"Yeah. It's how I made my costume. I mean, my old costume."
He went silent with the mention of my former double life, then, just as I wondered if I should come up with an excuse to hang up, he spoke again, quieter.
"How did you manage that? I mean, I never noticed anything."
The desperation in his voice gave me pause. I cringed, trying to think of an answer that wouldn't make him feel bad.
"In the basement. I mean, I can control them from a distance, so I didn't need to be there at all. I was just doing my homework and stuff in my room while they worked."
"I see. Still no news of Shadow Stalker?"
"No, aside from the leak about her actions."
"Right. They said they're doing what they can to ensure that your identity is safe, but that some people might know anyways."
He let the statement hang in the air, not quite a question, but I answered it as one, more for his sake than because I believed it.
"They have NDAs and stuff for situations like that, and they can stamp down online speculation. You're already in protective custody, and I'm sleeping in the most protected building in the city. It's gonna be fine, dad."
"I guess. It's hard not to worry, though."
"I know."
"What are they making you do? Do you patrol like the Protectorate?"
Another hidden question about my safety.
"Not yet. So far it's been search and rescue, and mostly stuff to do with me being a new Ward. Power testing, costume designing, reading the handbook and learning the rules. I went to the aquarium yesterday, to test my power. I can control crabs and other crustaceans too. Today, after the press conference, I went to gather black widows to make spidersilk."
I didn't mention that I would start patrolling tomorrow. I didn't want to worry him.
"How is it going in New York?" I asked to change the subject.
I was treated to a description of his safehouse, of how he was spending a lot of time reading, since he couldn't work, and that the PRT agents were very professional and accommodating.
"It's been nice talking to you, Taylor. I should let you get back to work."
"You too, dad. Have a nice day."
I hung up and put away the phone.
The spiders were full, so I instructed them to start weaving, while flipping the biological switch that urged them to reproduce. They would be ready to lay eggs within a week or so. From there, it would be about three to four weeks before my number of weavers increased to seven digits.
I set them to start working on four suits, one for each of the other Wards, and the last one for me.
- Location
- The Internet?
Great update! We got to see the unveiling, and Taylor's first official day on the job. She checked in with Danny... and now that Missy et al have the added context... maybe they can start to make inroads to a decent working relationship. Thanks for sharing it with us.
dog spiders?'
They have safeguards? I'll believe it when I see it.
Why? He's gonna get to rebrand like you. I think they're calling him Scapegoat.
And all he ever tried to do was help? For shame, Blackwell, I mean Piggot.
Now who's the awkward one?
Honestly, it wouldn't be the fights against serial killers and walking disasters that would be the dealbreaker for me, were I in Taylor's shoes. It'd be having to be... an influencer! Sponsored content, mandatory social media posts... it'd be horrible!
Tell that to Coil.
Not quite as cool as Alec's stencils on the doors, but it'll have to do. What's Taylor's say? 'Beware of
Was the crab food blessed by the church? That would really be something to shout about. Why, you could even say... holy mackerel!
He's got some mandatory time off and is forced to confront his failings, hangups, and neglect? Poor guy. He cares about you. He's just pants at communicating it.
Take up a hobby, Danny! You've got the time for it.
I don't think Weld would necessarily need one, but Flechette could do with a more protective costume. They're still being transferred in, right? And their measurements would be on file. Could be a decent way to make a good first impression.
- Location
- Michigan
To be fair, he would probably appreciate a set of clothing that is cut/stab(provided she includes overlapping plates/scales between two layers) resistant given that he automatically fuses to metals that touch his "skin" and this would make it less likely to become an issue than his current costume unless he wears a kevlar gambeson on patrol and even then it would be a massive improvement when off duty to have a layer to wear under his more fragile civilian clothing.
Chapter 14
Chapter 14
"Welcome to the joys and wonders of console duty," said Clockblocker in a dramatic voice as I joined him after dinner. "For today's lesson, you will learn to be bored out of your mind while very little happens."
"Sounds promising."
"This is the police channel, and that one is the PRT's. Then there's the CCTV feeds to keep an eye on for suspicious activity," he explained, pointing at various screens and buttons.
Suddenly, all the screens flashed yellow, and an alarm rang to warn us of incoming guests. After a delay, the door opened to reveal Miss Militia and a PRT officer, who was pushing a cart with three seemingly empty boxes on it. Clockblocker and I greeted them with a nod before turning back to the console.
They went past us, toward the corridor of alcoves, stopping at one of the first rooms. From what I could perceived through my bugs, they appeared to be filling one of the boxes with the clothes and personal effects left in the room, presumably belonging to one of the three deceased.
"So really, we're looking for anything that spells trouble," Clockblocker continued. "And then we inform the patrolling team, and they inform us of what they encounter. We also relay it to the emergency services or the PRT officer on duty for backup or assistance, depending on the case."
"How do you know when they need backup or assistance?"
"Experience, mostly. And judgment. If they apprehend someone, we call the cops to pick them up. If it's a parahuman, we call the PRT officer on duty, who will send a squad or someone from the Protectorate."
He showed me how to send messages to the other channels, as well as to the patrol.
Miss Militia and the agent moved to another room, the one I thought belonged to Vista. Was I wrong in my assessment of what they were doing?
"No!" Vista shouted, loud enough that Clockblocker's head whipped around. "No!"
"Excuse me a moment," he told me before getting up and heading down the corridor.
From what I could tell, Vista was curled up on the bed and refused to move or allow the agent to enter the room, twisting space to block his access.
Miss Militia was talking to her, too quietly for me to hear or decode the information through my bugs. Clockblocker arrived, and managed to coax the girl out of bed with a few words, then led her to his room. He retrieved something under his bed, a flat box with ribbon around it, and held it out to Vista, who was still clutching her pillow.
"I snagged it after the fight," I overheard him say, "in case they took his stuff without warning. It's for you. His birthday gift to you."
Vista was shaking, squeezing the box against herself without opening it. Feeling like I was intruding on a private moment, I focused on the console.
Nearly half of the CCTV feeds showed an error message, a consequence of the fact that half the city was still without power. About twenty feeds showed on the screens at a time, and they stayed there for a few seconds before cycling to another twenty, and so on. As far as I could tell, nothing of interest was happening in view of the working cameras.
Clockblocker came back after a few minutes.
"Missed anything?" He asked.
"No."
He resumed his lesson.
"The point of it all is to teach us about information management, procedures, relationships between the different agencies, and what goes on behind the scenes, as well as familiarizing us with the city's more troubled areas. Or at least, that's what Triumph told me when I started."
"Makes sense."
"The rest, you'll learn with experience," he said.
He showed me the map with the various CCTV feeds and how to access one in particular in case we received reports of a disturbance in the sector. Then, as he was showing me how to navigate the internal database, Miss Militia and the agent came back, Vista in tow.
"I wanted to tell you," said Miss Militia, stopping next to the console, "this Friday will be the unveiling of the Endbringer event's memorial by the mayor. It's going to be brief and to the point, without media presence, but the Protectorate will be there to discourage gangs from causing a disruption, especially the Empire, given Kaiser's death. We're leaving your attendance at your discretion, but you're welcome to join."
She was looking at Vista as she spoke, but the girl nodded decisively. "I'll be there," she said in a thin voice.
"Me too," said Clockblocker.
Should I go? I hadn't lost anyone to the Endbringer, unlike them, and my presence might be unwelcome, especially given Clockblocker's advice to give Vista space. On the other hand, not going might be seen as callous, like I didn't care about the deceased and didn't want to pay my respects.
"I'd like to go," I said honestly, and no one openly protested, though Vista and Clockblocker exchanged a look.
"Please relay the invitation to Kid Win once he comes back from patrol," said Miss Militia.
Clockblocker nodded, and Miss Militia and the agent left with the cart.
Vista lingered behind us, long enough that I excused myself to the bathroom to let her talk to Clockblocker like she clearly wanted.
I stayed in the bathroom until she retreated to an alcove — her own this time — then I went back to the console.
"Were you spying?" Clockblocker asked as I sat down beside him. "I saw a mosquito."
"I can't really see or hear through them," I answered. "I mostly use them to keep tabs of where people and things are. Situational awareness. At this point, it's kind of automatic."
Not really, but I didn't want to admit that I kind of was spying, if only so I would know when to come back.
He nodded, turning back to the monitors.
"Is it okay if I go to the memorial's unveiling?" I asked. "It's fine if you guys don't want me there. I just don't want to overstep."
"It's fine," he answered. "It's expected, really. Miss Militia just said that it was our choice in case Vista wanted to opt out."
I nodded.
He hesitated.
"But thanks for asking, though. Vista and Kid Win will come around eventually. I know it can't be pleasant for you, to be isolated."
I shrugged, aiming for casualness. "It's nothing I'm not used to."
He looked at me for a long moment, helmet hiding his expression.
"Because of Shadow Stalker?" He finally asked.
"Amongst others."
"I… I wanted to apologize, for making assumptions before. I saw—"
The alarm mercifully interrupted him, the screens flashing yellow.
I'd known that the leak meant the other Wards could find out about the bullying eventually, but somehow, the thought hadn't connected to mean that they might talk to me about it.
"Nevermind," he said as Kid Win entered. "Vista and I are going on patrol. Think you can handle the console?"
"It should be fine."
He headed to the alcoves with Kid Win, relaying Miss Militia's invitation as they walked, then came back with Vista a few minutes later.
Clockblocker might have decried console manning as the most boring task imaginable, but it allowed me to focus on my bugs. The black widows were still weaving, and I had left the radio on in my workshop to practice listening through the handful of grasshoppers I had stashed in one terrarium.
It was hard work, but rewarding. The comms interrupted me four times, to relay messages to the police to pick up apprehended criminals. By the time Clockblocker and Vista came back from patrol, I had a headache, but could make out most of the words from the radio.
The next morning, after having breakfast in my room, I joined Lanaro and Maureen outside as a van full of hundreds of pounds of bees arrived in the parking lot. Maureen had insisted to be present to film the unboxing as Glenn had demanded. In full beekeeper garb.
"That's really not necessary," I told her. "I have full control over them. They won't sting you."
"And I have full control over my wardrobe, sweetie. It's a fashion statement. Now, smile for the camera."
"You can't see my mouth with my mask on," I protested.
"Smiling is a mood, dear. It's something we express with our whole body and voice. I can tell that you're not smiling right now, and that is not what we're about."
I stretched my mouth in an approximation of a smile.
"A real smile. Think of something happy."
Something happy?
The first thing that came to mind was an evening spent with the Undersiders, but that memory was soured with the knowledge of Dinah's situation and their apparent betrayal surrounding the Shadow Stalker leak. I thought of my mother instead, of reading with her in my bed when I was younger. I let the memory wash over me, relaxing my shoulders and posture. Then I smiled.
"See? That's much better."
She started filming.
"Don't worry, we'll edit it later," she said as I was about to protest that I wasn't ready. "We have to hurry up while the morning light is this lovely. Now, introduce yourself and tell me what we'll do today."
"Huh, I'm—"
"Start again. No hesitation. And greet the viewers. Go."
"Hi, I'm Apiary and—"
"Breathe in first, and say "hello everyone" instead of hi."
I exhaled, trying not to let my irritation show, then began the steps again. Smile, breathe in, speak. I tried to channel the videos I used to watch with Emma on Youtube.
"Hello everyone, Apiary here, and today we're unboxing my new bees."
"Perfect! See, it wasn't that hard!"
I almost rolled my eyes, but I remembered her near superhuman ability to know what face I was making beneath the mask. I supposed that when one worked with masked people and was in charge of their image, one ended up developing this type of uncanny talent.
She took a shot of me opening the van's back door, revealing piles of boxes made of wood and mesh.
"Tell me about the boxes," she said.
Smile, breathe in, speak.
"Each of these boxes contain three pounds of honey bees, so about twelve thousand, plus one mated queen ready to lay eggs."
"And what are we doing next? Voice it like I hadn't asked the question."
Smile, breathe in, speak.
"Next, we're going to the roof to install these colonies in their new homes."
"Let's go to the roof, then!"
Lanaro helped me fill a cart with boxes, then swiped her card in the elevator to access the roof. There was a helipad in the middle, and the hives had been installed next to the railing at the edges of the roof, all around it. There were thirty hives in total. Conveniently, the guards usually posted around the roof were absent, hidden away from Maureen's camera to offer a sanitized version of reality where the roof only served to host the hives.
Maureen panned the camera to show the row of hives, then turned back to me.
"Tell me about the hives."
I removed the cover from a hive to show her what was inside.
"Each of these will house one colony with it's own queen. These frames," I said holding one up, "are where they will make their honey. Then, at the bottom, there's a brood box with larger frames, where the queen will lay eggs."
"Let's transfer them, then."
Lanaro handed me a drill, and I removed two screws to open the grapefruit sized opening at the top of the first box. Maureen stepped back as a swarm of bees emerged from the hole, and I kept them in formation away from her.
"Can you shape the swarm as you want?"
"Yes."
"A honeycomb, like your emblem!"
I gave the instruction, and the swarm shaped itself like a hexagon, to Maureen's absolute delight. She took footage of it from all angles, then asked me to spell out APIARY with bees in midair.
"I think that's going to bee your banner for social media," she said after taking multiple pictures and videos.
Once she had thoroughly documented it, I directed the swarm into the hive.
"Tell me about the different roles of bees in the hive," she said.
"How much information do you want?" I asked, not wanting to bore anyone.
"Don't mind the camera or the viewers," she said, as if she'd read my thoughts. "Pretend that you're explaining this to a friend who knows nothing about bees."
To a friend? That was easier said than done, and it stung to be reminded.
Something must have transpired from my posture, because she looked at me like a wounded animal.
"Sorry, that was insensitive of me to say. What about the people from power testing? You had to explain everything you can do to them. Pretend that this is just another part of it."
Picturing Mark's unending enthusiasm for science did make it easier to find what to say.
I retrieved and opened the capsule with the queen. She landed in my palm, which I held out to the camera.
"This is the queen. We can recognize her because she's bigger than the worker bees, and has a pointed abdomen. She's also the only one to have a stinger without barbs, so she can sting more than once. She can live up to five years, compared to six to eight weeks for the worker bees, and can lay up to twenty five hundred eggs a day, on top of regulating the hive's activities through her pheromones. The colony can't survive without a queen, so when she dies, the worker bees will create a new queen by selecting a young larva and feeding it only royal jelly."
A worker bee landed in my hand next to the queen, to show their differences to the camera.
"Worker bees play a variety of different roles depending on their age. When they're only a few days old, they're in charge of cleaning the brood cells, warming the brood nest and caring for the queen. Then, they progress to feeding the larva, producing wax and carrying food around the hive. A few days later, they guard the entrance of the hive and regulate the hive's temperature by fanning their wings to create ventilation. Then, after about three weeks, they reach the top of the worker's hierarchy and become foragers, bringing back nectar, pollen and water."
I sent the two bees into the hive.
"Then there's the drones, the male bees. I don't have any here since this is a new colony and they emerge later, once the hive has a surplus of food and workers. Their only role is to mate with young queens, allowing them to establish new colonies elsewhere."
With all the bees inside the hive, I placed the feeder on top, over the frames.
"What is that?" Maureen asked.
"That's a feeder with sugar syrup. They need a constant food supply, so the feeder is a lifeline when natural sources are scarce, and ensures proper nutrition to allow the colony to grow."
I placed the cover back on the hive.
"That's it."
"From what you said when we were brainstorming during the night, there are many different kinds of bees? What's the difference?" Asked Maureen, still filming.
"These are western honey bees, Apis mellifera, the most common of honey bees. But there are over twenty thousand known species of bees, with a fifth of those native to North America."
"What can you tell me about the wild bees?"
I called a bunch of wild bees to my open hands and showed them to the camera before telling them to hover above my hands as I mentioned them.
"There are bumblebees, probably the most well-known wild bees and amongst the first pollinators to emerge in the spring, then several kinds of solitary bees who build nests with separate cells for each of their eggs, with a provision of pollen and nectar to feed the larva. Mason bees nest in small cavities and use mud to create partitions between the cells and to plug the hole once their nest is finished. One distinctive feature is that they carry the pollen on their bellies rather than on their back legs, so if you see a bee that looks like a honey bee but with a yellow belly, you can be sure that it's a mason bee."
I had one of them flop on its back to show its belly to the camera.
"Then there's mining bees, who burrow in the ground, and carpenter bees, who dig holes in wood, hence the name. They look a lot like bumblebees, but their abdomen is almost hairless, compared to the more fuzzy bumblebees. This one, the large carpenter bee, is the largest North American bee species. There is also the small carpenter bee, who nests in sticks and stems. Then we have leafcutter bees, who use hollow twigs or underground burrows for their nests. Their name comes from the fact that they use cut leaves to line the cells of their nests. There's the plasterer bees, who build cells underground, and line them with a cellophane-like material that the female secretes."
I dismissed the ones I had already introduced, leaving a variety of bees in all shapes and forms, some of which were metallic green or all black instead of the usual black and yellow.
"Then we have sweat bees, with a lot of different species. Their colonies are much smaller than honey bees, and they typically nest in the ground. They really like salt, so they are attracted to human sweat, hence the name. If they land on you, it just means that they want to lick your sweat, not that they're going to sting."
Maureen tittered at that.
"That's just a small fraction of the bees present in North America. No matter the shape, size or species, bees feed on nectar and pollen, and are important pollinators for over one third of our food."
"Speaking of," said Maureen, handing me a sheet of paper, "here's the text for a little capsule we'll film in front of a green screen next week. I want you to learn it by heart."
I let go of the bees to grab it, and read the first line.
"You too can bee a superhero, by following these simple steps to help the bee population?"
"Don't sound so disbeelieving. It's a perfectly fine line, and we're looking to position you as an ambassador for the Save The Bees movement. Trust me, that's gold for your image."
I had to forcibly remind myself of my decision to keep the Image department happy to avoid scrutiny and to slip through the cracks if needed.
The rest of the text detailed how to make a bee-friendly garden, the importance of avoiding pesticides and herbicides, that dandelions and other weeds provide an important food source early in the spring, how to create a bee bath, and how to create habitats for wild bees by leaving wood and hollow stems available.
I folded the sheet into my pocket.
"Are we finished?" I asked her.
"We just need the sign-off. Repeat after me. Go to wards.ene.com/apiary/bees for more information. Til next time, buzz off."
She made me repeat it a couple of times, then ended the video.
"You did great," she said with a wide smile. "I can't wait to edit this and show it to Glenn."
I was relieved as she left. After that, Lanaro and I worked in silence, with her opening the boxes and me moving the bees.
Installing the bees on the rooftop — and especially filming to Maureen's satisfaction — took the whole morning.
Lanaro and I stopped by the cafeteria for a quick lunch, eating in silence a few tables away from Kid Win and Vista, then Lanaro drove me to the other hives installed around the city to set them up too, then to a couple of farms just outside of the city to do the same.
We arrived back to base at quarter past six, and I only had the time to go to the bathroom, then eat a sandwich in my room before I received a text from Assault who was waiting for me at the doors for my first patrol.
"Welcome to the joys and wonders of console duty," said Clockblocker in a dramatic voice as I joined him after dinner. "For today's lesson, you will learn to be bored out of your mind while very little happens."
"Sounds promising."
"This is the police channel, and that one is the PRT's. Then there's the CCTV feeds to keep an eye on for suspicious activity," he explained, pointing at various screens and buttons.
Suddenly, all the screens flashed yellow, and an alarm rang to warn us of incoming guests. After a delay, the door opened to reveal Miss Militia and a PRT officer, who was pushing a cart with three seemingly empty boxes on it. Clockblocker and I greeted them with a nod before turning back to the console.
They went past us, toward the corridor of alcoves, stopping at one of the first rooms. From what I could perceived through my bugs, they appeared to be filling one of the boxes with the clothes and personal effects left in the room, presumably belonging to one of the three deceased.
"So really, we're looking for anything that spells trouble," Clockblocker continued. "And then we inform the patrolling team, and they inform us of what they encounter. We also relay it to the emergency services or the PRT officer on duty for backup or assistance, depending on the case."
"How do you know when they need backup or assistance?"
"Experience, mostly. And judgment. If they apprehend someone, we call the cops to pick them up. If it's a parahuman, we call the PRT officer on duty, who will send a squad or someone from the Protectorate."
He showed me how to send messages to the other channels, as well as to the patrol.
Miss Militia and the agent moved to another room, the one I thought belonged to Vista. Was I wrong in my assessment of what they were doing?
"No!" Vista shouted, loud enough that Clockblocker's head whipped around. "No!"
"Excuse me a moment," he told me before getting up and heading down the corridor.
From what I could tell, Vista was curled up on the bed and refused to move or allow the agent to enter the room, twisting space to block his access.
Miss Militia was talking to her, too quietly for me to hear or decode the information through my bugs. Clockblocker arrived, and managed to coax the girl out of bed with a few words, then led her to his room. He retrieved something under his bed, a flat box with ribbon around it, and held it out to Vista, who was still clutching her pillow.
"I snagged it after the fight," I overheard him say, "in case they took his stuff without warning. It's for you. His birthday gift to you."
Vista was shaking, squeezing the box against herself without opening it. Feeling like I was intruding on a private moment, I focused on the console.
Nearly half of the CCTV feeds showed an error message, a consequence of the fact that half the city was still without power. About twenty feeds showed on the screens at a time, and they stayed there for a few seconds before cycling to another twenty, and so on. As far as I could tell, nothing of interest was happening in view of the working cameras.
Clockblocker came back after a few minutes.
"Missed anything?" He asked.
"No."
He resumed his lesson.
"The point of it all is to teach us about information management, procedures, relationships between the different agencies, and what goes on behind the scenes, as well as familiarizing us with the city's more troubled areas. Or at least, that's what Triumph told me when I started."
"Makes sense."
"The rest, you'll learn with experience," he said.
He showed me the map with the various CCTV feeds and how to access one in particular in case we received reports of a disturbance in the sector. Then, as he was showing me how to navigate the internal database, Miss Militia and the agent came back, Vista in tow.
"I wanted to tell you," said Miss Militia, stopping next to the console, "this Friday will be the unveiling of the Endbringer event's memorial by the mayor. It's going to be brief and to the point, without media presence, but the Protectorate will be there to discourage gangs from causing a disruption, especially the Empire, given Kaiser's death. We're leaving your attendance at your discretion, but you're welcome to join."
She was looking at Vista as she spoke, but the girl nodded decisively. "I'll be there," she said in a thin voice.
"Me too," said Clockblocker.
Should I go? I hadn't lost anyone to the Endbringer, unlike them, and my presence might be unwelcome, especially given Clockblocker's advice to give Vista space. On the other hand, not going might be seen as callous, like I didn't care about the deceased and didn't want to pay my respects.
"I'd like to go," I said honestly, and no one openly protested, though Vista and Clockblocker exchanged a look.
"Please relay the invitation to Kid Win once he comes back from patrol," said Miss Militia.
Clockblocker nodded, and Miss Militia and the agent left with the cart.
Vista lingered behind us, long enough that I excused myself to the bathroom to let her talk to Clockblocker like she clearly wanted.
I stayed in the bathroom until she retreated to an alcove — her own this time — then I went back to the console.
"Were you spying?" Clockblocker asked as I sat down beside him. "I saw a mosquito."
"I can't really see or hear through them," I answered. "I mostly use them to keep tabs of where people and things are. Situational awareness. At this point, it's kind of automatic."
Not really, but I didn't want to admit that I kind of was spying, if only so I would know when to come back.
He nodded, turning back to the monitors.
"Is it okay if I go to the memorial's unveiling?" I asked. "It's fine if you guys don't want me there. I just don't want to overstep."
"It's fine," he answered. "It's expected, really. Miss Militia just said that it was our choice in case Vista wanted to opt out."
I nodded.
He hesitated.
"But thanks for asking, though. Vista and Kid Win will come around eventually. I know it can't be pleasant for you, to be isolated."
I shrugged, aiming for casualness. "It's nothing I'm not used to."
He looked at me for a long moment, helmet hiding his expression.
"Because of Shadow Stalker?" He finally asked.
"Amongst others."
"I… I wanted to apologize, for making assumptions before. I saw—"
The alarm mercifully interrupted him, the screens flashing yellow.
I'd known that the leak meant the other Wards could find out about the bullying eventually, but somehow, the thought hadn't connected to mean that they might talk to me about it.
"Nevermind," he said as Kid Win entered. "Vista and I are going on patrol. Think you can handle the console?"
"It should be fine."
He headed to the alcoves with Kid Win, relaying Miss Militia's invitation as they walked, then came back with Vista a few minutes later.
Clockblocker might have decried console manning as the most boring task imaginable, but it allowed me to focus on my bugs. The black widows were still weaving, and I had left the radio on in my workshop to practice listening through the handful of grasshoppers I had stashed in one terrarium.
It was hard work, but rewarding. The comms interrupted me four times, to relay messages to the police to pick up apprehended criminals. By the time Clockblocker and Vista came back from patrol, I had a headache, but could make out most of the words from the radio.
The next morning, after having breakfast in my room, I joined Lanaro and Maureen outside as a van full of hundreds of pounds of bees arrived in the parking lot. Maureen had insisted to be present to film the unboxing as Glenn had demanded. In full beekeeper garb.
"That's really not necessary," I told her. "I have full control over them. They won't sting you."
"And I have full control over my wardrobe, sweetie. It's a fashion statement. Now, smile for the camera."
"You can't see my mouth with my mask on," I protested.
"Smiling is a mood, dear. It's something we express with our whole body and voice. I can tell that you're not smiling right now, and that is not what we're about."
I stretched my mouth in an approximation of a smile.
"A real smile. Think of something happy."
Something happy?
The first thing that came to mind was an evening spent with the Undersiders, but that memory was soured with the knowledge of Dinah's situation and their apparent betrayal surrounding the Shadow Stalker leak. I thought of my mother instead, of reading with her in my bed when I was younger. I let the memory wash over me, relaxing my shoulders and posture. Then I smiled.
"See? That's much better."
She started filming.
"Don't worry, we'll edit it later," she said as I was about to protest that I wasn't ready. "We have to hurry up while the morning light is this lovely. Now, introduce yourself and tell me what we'll do today."
"Huh, I'm—"
"Start again. No hesitation. And greet the viewers. Go."
"Hi, I'm Apiary and—"
"Breathe in first, and say "hello everyone" instead of hi."
I exhaled, trying not to let my irritation show, then began the steps again. Smile, breathe in, speak. I tried to channel the videos I used to watch with Emma on Youtube.
"Hello everyone, Apiary here, and today we're unboxing my new bees."
"Perfect! See, it wasn't that hard!"
I almost rolled my eyes, but I remembered her near superhuman ability to know what face I was making beneath the mask. I supposed that when one worked with masked people and was in charge of their image, one ended up developing this type of uncanny talent.
She took a shot of me opening the van's back door, revealing piles of boxes made of wood and mesh.
"Tell me about the boxes," she said.
Smile, breathe in, speak.
"Each of these boxes contain three pounds of honey bees, so about twelve thousand, plus one mated queen ready to lay eggs."
"And what are we doing next? Voice it like I hadn't asked the question."
Smile, breathe in, speak.
"Next, we're going to the roof to install these colonies in their new homes."
"Let's go to the roof, then!"
Lanaro helped me fill a cart with boxes, then swiped her card in the elevator to access the roof. There was a helipad in the middle, and the hives had been installed next to the railing at the edges of the roof, all around it. There were thirty hives in total. Conveniently, the guards usually posted around the roof were absent, hidden away from Maureen's camera to offer a sanitized version of reality where the roof only served to host the hives.
Maureen panned the camera to show the row of hives, then turned back to me.
"Tell me about the hives."
I removed the cover from a hive to show her what was inside.
"Each of these will house one colony with it's own queen. These frames," I said holding one up, "are where they will make their honey. Then, at the bottom, there's a brood box with larger frames, where the queen will lay eggs."
"Let's transfer them, then."
Lanaro handed me a drill, and I removed two screws to open the grapefruit sized opening at the top of the first box. Maureen stepped back as a swarm of bees emerged from the hole, and I kept them in formation away from her.
"Can you shape the swarm as you want?"
"Yes."
"A honeycomb, like your emblem!"
I gave the instruction, and the swarm shaped itself like a hexagon, to Maureen's absolute delight. She took footage of it from all angles, then asked me to spell out APIARY with bees in midair.
"I think that's going to bee your banner for social media," she said after taking multiple pictures and videos.
Once she had thoroughly documented it, I directed the swarm into the hive.
"Tell me about the different roles of bees in the hive," she said.
"How much information do you want?" I asked, not wanting to bore anyone.
"Don't mind the camera or the viewers," she said, as if she'd read my thoughts. "Pretend that you're explaining this to a friend who knows nothing about bees."
To a friend? That was easier said than done, and it stung to be reminded.
Something must have transpired from my posture, because she looked at me like a wounded animal.
"Sorry, that was insensitive of me to say. What about the people from power testing? You had to explain everything you can do to them. Pretend that this is just another part of it."
Picturing Mark's unending enthusiasm for science did make it easier to find what to say.
I retrieved and opened the capsule with the queen. She landed in my palm, which I held out to the camera.
"This is the queen. We can recognize her because she's bigger than the worker bees, and has a pointed abdomen. She's also the only one to have a stinger without barbs, so she can sting more than once. She can live up to five years, compared to six to eight weeks for the worker bees, and can lay up to twenty five hundred eggs a day, on top of regulating the hive's activities through her pheromones. The colony can't survive without a queen, so when she dies, the worker bees will create a new queen by selecting a young larva and feeding it only royal jelly."
A worker bee landed in my hand next to the queen, to show their differences to the camera.
"Worker bees play a variety of different roles depending on their age. When they're only a few days old, they're in charge of cleaning the brood cells, warming the brood nest and caring for the queen. Then, they progress to feeding the larva, producing wax and carrying food around the hive. A few days later, they guard the entrance of the hive and regulate the hive's temperature by fanning their wings to create ventilation. Then, after about three weeks, they reach the top of the worker's hierarchy and become foragers, bringing back nectar, pollen and water."
I sent the two bees into the hive.
"Then there's the drones, the male bees. I don't have any here since this is a new colony and they emerge later, once the hive has a surplus of food and workers. Their only role is to mate with young queens, allowing them to establish new colonies elsewhere."
With all the bees inside the hive, I placed the feeder on top, over the frames.
"What is that?" Maureen asked.
"That's a feeder with sugar syrup. They need a constant food supply, so the feeder is a lifeline when natural sources are scarce, and ensures proper nutrition to allow the colony to grow."
I placed the cover back on the hive.
"That's it."
"From what you said when we were brainstorming during the night, there are many different kinds of bees? What's the difference?" Asked Maureen, still filming.
"These are western honey bees, Apis mellifera, the most common of honey bees. But there are over twenty thousand known species of bees, with a fifth of those native to North America."
"What can you tell me about the wild bees?"
I called a bunch of wild bees to my open hands and showed them to the camera before telling them to hover above my hands as I mentioned them.
"There are bumblebees, probably the most well-known wild bees and amongst the first pollinators to emerge in the spring, then several kinds of solitary bees who build nests with separate cells for each of their eggs, with a provision of pollen and nectar to feed the larva. Mason bees nest in small cavities and use mud to create partitions between the cells and to plug the hole once their nest is finished. One distinctive feature is that they carry the pollen on their bellies rather than on their back legs, so if you see a bee that looks like a honey bee but with a yellow belly, you can be sure that it's a mason bee."
I had one of them flop on its back to show its belly to the camera.
"Then there's mining bees, who burrow in the ground, and carpenter bees, who dig holes in wood, hence the name. They look a lot like bumblebees, but their abdomen is almost hairless, compared to the more fuzzy bumblebees. This one, the large carpenter bee, is the largest North American bee species. There is also the small carpenter bee, who nests in sticks and stems. Then we have leafcutter bees, who use hollow twigs or underground burrows for their nests. Their name comes from the fact that they use cut leaves to line the cells of their nests. There's the plasterer bees, who build cells underground, and line them with a cellophane-like material that the female secretes."
I dismissed the ones I had already introduced, leaving a variety of bees in all shapes and forms, some of which were metallic green or all black instead of the usual black and yellow.
"Then we have sweat bees, with a lot of different species. Their colonies are much smaller than honey bees, and they typically nest in the ground. They really like salt, so they are attracted to human sweat, hence the name. If they land on you, it just means that they want to lick your sweat, not that they're going to sting."
Maureen tittered at that.
"That's just a small fraction of the bees present in North America. No matter the shape, size or species, bees feed on nectar and pollen, and are important pollinators for over one third of our food."
"Speaking of," said Maureen, handing me a sheet of paper, "here's the text for a little capsule we'll film in front of a green screen next week. I want you to learn it by heart."
I let go of the bees to grab it, and read the first line.
"You too can bee a superhero, by following these simple steps to help the bee population?"
"Don't sound so disbeelieving. It's a perfectly fine line, and we're looking to position you as an ambassador for the Save The Bees movement. Trust me, that's gold for your image."
I had to forcibly remind myself of my decision to keep the Image department happy to avoid scrutiny and to slip through the cracks if needed.
The rest of the text detailed how to make a bee-friendly garden, the importance of avoiding pesticides and herbicides, that dandelions and other weeds provide an important food source early in the spring, how to create a bee bath, and how to create habitats for wild bees by leaving wood and hollow stems available.
I folded the sheet into my pocket.
"Are we finished?" I asked her.
"We just need the sign-off. Repeat after me. Go to wards.ene.com/apiary/bees for more information. Til next time, buzz off."
She made me repeat it a couple of times, then ended the video.
"You did great," she said with a wide smile. "I can't wait to edit this and show it to Glenn."
I was relieved as she left. After that, Lanaro and I worked in silence, with her opening the boxes and me moving the bees.
Installing the bees on the rooftop — and especially filming to Maureen's satisfaction — took the whole morning.
Lanaro and I stopped by the cafeteria for a quick lunch, eating in silence a few tables away from Kid Win and Vista, then Lanaro drove me to the other hives installed around the city to set them up too, then to a couple of farms just outside of the city to do the same.
We arrived back to base at quarter past six, and I only had the time to go to the bathroom, then eat a sandwich in my room before I received a text from Assault who was waiting for me at the doors for my first patrol.
Bee-lieve in the you the that bee-lieves in the me that bee-lieves in you!
Czarcasm
AMY DID NOTHING WRONG
- Location
- Alaska
Great story. Only criticism being Panacea using pain, instead of perhaps paralysis, or even just a threat. Reads more Red Queen than anything seen in Worm. Like when folk write an early Anakin force choking someone before anything broke him, it's more Vader than Skywalker, when given the timeframe Skywalker may fit better. Maybe it's a misstep maybe it's authors interpretation of the character, either way it's the sole gripe on an otherwise good story. 9/10 so far.
Glad you're enjoying it!
Maybe it was ambiguous from the text, but it's meant to be that Panacea simply stopped using her power on Taylor. Before that, her power was removing the pain, but then she stops when Taylor gets agitated, and Taylor feels the pain from her injuries. Then, Panacea touches her again, and the pain vanishes.
- Location
- The Internet?
A nice update! She's improving her insect senses... in-sences? That could be a thing, Image department! Working on getting console/procedure down pat even as costume creation continues apace. Top it off she's making her first foray into social media with a first patrol as a hero to look forward to, as well as potential drama at the memorial. Great chapter, thanks for sharing it!
Browbeat: "What if we're not dead?"
Wildbow: "You will be in a moment!"
Shadow Stalker: "What if you just decided to leave? For awhile, to a place without extradition? Can we pack our things?"
PRT: "Sure, we've got it all gathered up for you in this nice, electrified evidence locker. Come on in..."
Also, is this going to be like those bee videos that are on the tik toks?
Bring out your dead (guy's stuff)!
Browbeat: "What if we're not dead?"
Wildbow: "You will be in a moment!"
Shadow Stalker: "What if you just decided to leave? For awhile, to a place without extradition? Can we pack our things?"
PRT: "Sure, we've got it all gathered up for you in this nice, electrified evidence locker. Come on in..."
Event sounds so... I don't know... I think I usually hear Endbringer attack, but I guess event sort of smooths out the tough edges a little, huh?
Aw... tough to remember somethings that Vista is very young and she, like most of them, had just gone through a very traumatic loss. Good job, Clock.
It must be a shame since Skitter can usually use her bugs to cheat when aiming... except for in social situations.
The PRT already has enough faceless goons, and now they importing AIM troopers?
Also, is this going to be like those bee videos that are on the tik toks?
My God Skitter, had you considered the implications of handing your Image to local government?
Good God, she's lost control of the stingers, next thing you know she'll be making zingers. Everyone, run for your lives!
Heh, she still has really awkward lunches.
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Chapter 15 - Interlude (Shadow Stalker)
Chapter 15 - Interlude (Shadow Stalker)
"Hey!"
The girl flinched, but didn't look at her, her eyes cast down as she picked up the clipboard at the foot of the bed, then made her way to the heart monitor.
"When are you letting me off?" Sophia asked. "I've been all stitched up and ready to go for a while now."
She was ignored once again, as the girl made a show of focusing on the notes she was writing down. Sophia could tell it was all an act from the way the girl's eyes flickered every few seconds to keep track of her in her peripheral vision.
She reached and slapped the pen out of her hand. The girl's eyes widened in shock as it bounced off clipboard and fell to the ground, then she took a step back against the curtain, trying to place herself out of reach. Something about the reaction just pissed Sophia off even more.
"I'm talking to you," she said.
"I'm not allowed to talk to the patients." The girl looked like she was shaking in her boots. Pathetic.
"Well, that's fucking stupid. Why am I still here?"
The girl hesitated, then complied when Sophia snarled at her.
"You've lost a lot of blood. You still need oxygen and IV fluid."
"I feel fine."
She's had worse, really. Countless times, she'd patched herself up with subpar medical supplies in the dead of night, snuck back into her bed and gone to school the next morning.
She's fine.
Maybe the bruises on her ribs made it hard to take a deep breath, and maybe she felt lightheaded and a bit dizzy, and maybe she'd have to steal painkillers from her mom to sleep for the next week or so, but she'd manage. She always did.
What she couldn't deal with was being stuck in a hospital bed when she was fine.
"Are you going to discharge me?" She asked the girl.
"I can't…"
"You should, unless you want me to go get someone competent."
The girl squeaked, then disappeared behind the curtain. Sophia rolled her eyes. She was useless.
If you want something done, better do it yourself.
Bits and pieces of her costume were piled at the foot of the heart monitor, which went silent as she removed the clip from her finger. She took out her IV carefully, knowing all too well that ripping it off like you saw in the movies was a terrible idea. Then, she stood up, and her head began spinning. She sat back down on the bed, eyes closed, inhaling and exhaling a few times to steady herself, then she crouched to retrieve her costume and put it back on.
Already, she felt better, just putting on her second skin. She hurried to use her power, eager for the detached feeling that accompanied it.
That was much better.
The nurse had gone through the curtain's opening at the foot of the bed, so Sophia went through the side curtain to avoid being seen. If she could make it out of the emergency room, she'd be in the clear.
The bed in the neighboring enclosure was empty, with enough blood on the covers to guess the fate of whoever was there before. She moved through the curtain again.
This time, there was someone in the bed.
She reflexively glanced at them, and all thoughts of escaping crashed down as she recognized the features. Letting go of her power, she got closer, a snarl finding its way to her lips.
It was Hebert.
Which meant that Hebert of all people was a cape and had participated in the fight, which felt like a personal insult.
Her first instinct was to make her pay for this. To rip the tubes out of her and shove her off the bed. To lash out in any way she could. To win.
Her second instinct was one of self-preservation. To go back to her bed and pretend she never left. To go after Hebert another time, and fuck her up with no witnesses around.
She hesitated.
First, she needed to know more. Hebert's costume was off, so she checked the clipboard for her cape name.
Skitter. The bug girl.
It fitted that Hebert would get a power as low and disgusting as she was.
Almost unthinkingly, Sophia reached to the small of her back, and retrieved one of her hunting bolts.
It would be so easy to end it right there. Hell, if she was careful, maybe she could even pass it off as Leviathan's work. One more cape who bit the dust following the fight. The hospital probably wouldn't even do an autopsy, as long as she didn't leave recognizable marks on the body.
The tip of the arrow caressed Hebert's skin, tracing a red line against her cheekbone, and the sight of blood made her come back to her senses.
No. It was too risky. She couldn't get away with it here of all places, not to mention that the thought of Hebert being remembered like some kind of hero just felt wrong on so many levels. No. She'd have to come after her later.
She couldn't not do anything about this.
Could she wait until they crossed paths again in costume? Did she have the patience? Or would she simply get her home address from Emma and sneak in in the dead of night, when everyone was asleep?
"In here! She's armed!" Yelled a voice behind her.
Shit.
She whirled around and kicked the nurse to keep her from shouting again, but it was already too late. Rushed footsteps brought Armsmaster in just as the nurse crumpled down.
The thought of going back to being muzzled by procedures after this was unbearable. The thought of being forced to unmask to Hebert, who would then do everything she could to get her in trouble, was worse. What options did that leave her?
In a heartbeat, she made her decision.
She turned to her shadow state as Armsmaster straightened the nurse, and brought her hunting bolt through Hebert's throat, then let go of her power long enough to rip out the arrow with a satisfying spray of blood. Then, she glided to the next enclosure, and went through the window with Miss Militia hot on her tail.
As soon as she met the ground, she went solid again, long enough to discard both of her phones, her earpiece, and her crossbow. It pained her to leave it, but there was a tracker in it, in case it got stolen by villains.
Freed from anything they could possibly use to track her, she ran.
"Your phone," she ordered the man, backing him against the brick wall of an alley with a razor-sharp arrow to the throat. "Now."
He complied, his hand going to his pocket and retrieving an old, scratched flip phone of all things. That thing looked like some archaeologist had dug it up from the turn of the millennium. Was that the right word, archaeologist? Under any other circumstances, she would have mocked him for it. He held it out with shaking hands, and she let go of him to grab the phone, then turned to her shadow state and half-ran, half-flew away from him.
Once she was a good distance away, she turned solid again and called Emma's number, which she knew by heart. She kept running as it rang.
"Hello?"
"Emma," she huffed.
"Soph? What happened? Are you okay? Why aren't you calling from your phone?"
"Fuck! Listen, I have to go on the run. Come join me at my old hideout near the alley where we first met and I'll tell you everything. Trust me, you'll want to know. Bring food and some clothes that will fit me. My old ones at the hideout are too small now."
She hung up without waiting for an answer.
She climbed the first fire escape she could find, then used her power to glide from rooftop to rooftop, traversing the city until she reached her hideout near the Docks.
The condemned building held a backup crossbow and a large stash of ammunition, as well as a few knives, spare clothing and what medical supplies she'd been able to get her hands on to patch herself up after a rough night. She took off her costume, and found fresh blood on her top, so she removed it too to assess the damage.
A long row of stitches over her ribs was bleeding, and the pain that prevented her from taking deep breaths was still present. Had her huffing and puffing after running, despite running being one of the things she did best.
She searched her medical supplies for painkillers, and swallowed three pills before grabbing a wad of tissues to sponge off the blood. Then, she laid down on the mattress, closing her eyes. The adrenaline rush had passed, leaving her lightheaded and dizzy once again.
How much shit was she in?
Even if she hadn't done anything to Hebert, being caught red-handed with a weapon next to an unmasked, unconscious cape was the kind of thing you couldn't just explain away, especially if you weren't even supposed to have access to said weapon. That alone was enough to break her probation and send her to juvie, and she certainly wasn't going there over Hebert of all people.
She felt oddly calm about the prospect of being on the run. How many times had she wished to be free from the Wards? She guessed she got what she wanted in the end, monkey's paw and all. Was that the right phrase?
The door whined as it opened, revealing her best friend.
"What the fuck?" Emma greeted her.
"What the fuck is pretty accurate," groaned Sophia, rising to sit on the mattress. "You got the stuff?"
"Yeah."
Emma set the backpack down beside the mattress, taking out a few sweatpants, t-shirts and hoodies, as well as granola bars, a bunch of apples, a loaf of bread, and a jar of peanut butter.
"Mind giving me a hand?" Sophia asked her. "I pulled my stitches open when I kicked that nurse, and my boob is in the way."
"What happened?" Emma asked, rummaging through the med kit before sitting beside Sophia and carefully removing the existing stitches.
"Some incompetent moron wouldn't let me leave the ER after I was all stitched up and ready to go, so I used my power to leave."
Sophia suppressed a wince as Emma started stitching her up with the steady hand of someone who had done this multiple times before.
"Why break your probation over that?" Emma asked, focused on her task.
"No, no. Here's the kicker. So, I'm trying to leave the ER, minding my own business, and next thing I know, I find Hebert of all people in a hospital bed, in a place where it's supposed to be just capes."
Emma stopped stitching.
"Taylor's a cape?" She asked in a quiet voice.
"She's Skitter. You know, the bug freak from the Undersiders, the one that was at the fundraiser? Fits, doesn't it? Fucking vermin."
How long had she had powers? Skitter was first seen at a bank robbery Sophia had missed during school hours a month ago, so at least that long, maybe longer.
Why hadn't she used her power against them at school, then? How much of a loser did you need to be not to fight back when you had the means?
Emma's eyes were still wide, lost in faraway thoughts.
"Em? You there?" Sophia asked, snapping her fingers in front of her best friend's face. "I need those stitches sooner rather than later."
Emma blinked a few times, coming back to the present and resuming the stitching.
"And you kicked a nurse? Why?"
"She found me looking at Hebert, and I may or may not have had a hunting bolt in my hand at the time. Identities are a big deal at these things, so she shouted for the big guys. I kicked her to stop her, but it was too late."
"So you ran?"
"I fucked Hebert up and then I ran."
Emma's eyes widened, her mouth falling open.
"You… what did you do to her?"
Sophia shrugged.
"Did my thing, using my power on the bolt. Should be enough to rectify that fucking cosmic joke."
Emma winced, and Sophia's eyes narrowed on her.
"What, you care about Hebert, now?"
"What about your probation?"
"What about it?" Sophia challenged.
"You could have waited, come after her later. Told the big guys it was a mistake."
"I was fucked from the moment I saw her," Sophia told her. "Way these things go, they would have made me unmask to her or some shit, or made her join the Wards, and then she would cry about how much of a big meanie I am to get me in trouble like she did at school. I sure as fuck wasn't gonna stay there and play rent-a-cop while she fucked up my life, and I'm not going to juvie because of her."
Emma finished the stitches and cut the thread.
"What now?" She asked as Sophia put her top back on.
"I guess I'll do my own thing from now on. Be a vigilante full time, since I can't go back home. At least I won't have someone always looking over my shoulder, or have to be around a bunch of children pretending to be heroes."
Sophia rose to her feet, tentatively stretching her side.
"Thanks for the stitches. At least I can count on you."
"My dad wants us to go stay at my grandma's in Portland," Emma blurted out. "Until the crisis is over."
Sophia's expression hardened.
"Portland?" There was judgment in her tone. "Are you going?"
Emma bit her lip.
"I don't know if I want to."
"Then what do you want?"
Emma didn't hesitate.
"I want powers. I want to be stronger than Taylor."
Sophia smiled.
Half an hour later, the phone rang with a call from Emma's number.
"What's up?" Asked Sophia, who was lounging on the mattress, eating a granola bar.
"The PRT is at my house," Emma whispered. "They were waiting for me when I got back. I think they know we've been in contact."
Shit!
"How are you making that call, then?"
"I said I had to go to the bathroom. I can't stay too long or they'll get suspicious. Or think I'm pooping."
"Are you gonna tell them about me?"
"No, I swear!"
That wasn't good enough. If they were onto Emma, they could find her easily.
"Did you have your phone with you when you came here?" She asked.
"Of course, I always have it with me."
"Then they can see where you went. They'll find the hideout."
She had already changed into the clothes Emma had brought, so she stuffed the rest in a gym bag, along with the food, her weapons and ammunition, the med kits, and her costume.
"Listen," she told Emma. "I have to go dark. Don't try to contact me; they might put you under surveillance."
"They can't do that!" Emma protested.
"I assure you they can. I mean it when I say I'm in deep shit."
"What are you gonna do? Where are you going?"
"I'm not telling you. That way, you won't have to lie about it."
Emma exhaled on the other end of the phone.
"I need to go," she whispered. "It's been too long already. Hey, Soph?"
"Yeah?"
"Be safe."
Sophia rolled her eyes and hung up.
"You may know me as Skitter, and for that I am sorry. The fight against Leviathan showed me what we are really up against, why heroes are needed. And I cannot in good conscience go on as a villain after that. From now on, you may call me Apiary, and I hope that in time, I can prove myself to be the hero this city needs."
Sophia rolled her eyes. The speech had Glenn's fingerprints all over it, and was just as corny and lame as Hebert was.
She had claimed a computer at the back of an internet-café that had hurried to reopen to offer internet access to those who needed it, near a shelter in the part of town that was barely affected by the disaster. It was crowded too, people either waiting to use one of the computers, or sitting with their laptops or smartphones to use the wi-fi.
Hunched over to be close enough to the computer's speakers to hear over the ambient noise of the internet-café, hair and face partially hidden by her hoodie to avoid being recognized, she watched as Piggot brought the press conference to an end without allowing questions. The video ended, showing the title card, with Legend at the podium and the four Wards standing together beside him, with Armsmaster and Miss Militia behind them.
This was all a joke, the world turned upside down.
They were throwing her under the bus and bending over backward for their new recruit, as if she hadn't been a villain five minutes ago. Disgusting. Were the other Wards playing along? She could imagine Vista being glad to have another girl on the team, as if Sophia didn't count, and the others being their usual moronic selves.
Maybe they all deserved each other.
She laid back in her chair, closing the tab and exhaling loudly.
A glance at her fellow patrons suggested that most were either looking up information about the disaster relief, or getting in touch with loved ones.
She wondered, idly, whether she would see her family again.
She wouldn't say she missed them, not exactly, but it annoyed her that she couldn't go home because of Hebert.
"Sophia Hess?" Came a voice behind her.
She startled at being called by her name, and her hand reflexively went to the knife in the pocket of her hoodie as she whirled around. Behind her, she found a tall, burly man in a suit.
"My employer would like to have a word with you outside," he said.
Something about the authoritative tone and the assured posture set off red flags in her mind. Or maybe it was the concealed weapon at the man's side.
"What if I don't?" She challenged, rising to her feet.
"You will."
He took a step closer, hand going to his weapon, and Sophia pondered using her power to get away, even with the attention it would draw from other patrons. Then, she saw the weapon at his side.
Not a gun. A taser.
That couldn't be a coincidence. How did he know about her weakness? She didn't wait around to find out.
She pushed past him, past the line of people waiting to use the computers, and ran out of the internet-café, then came to an abrupt halt right outside of it. There were two other men in suits waiting there and blocking her escape routes. Each was holding a taser.
Parked in front of her and looking wildly out of place was an armored limousine, the door open.
Already, she was pondering how to get past the two gorillas, but the thought was interrupted by a voice from within the limo.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
The voice was a smooth baritone, eerily normal, but she couldn't see the speaker.
"Where would you even go?" The voice continued. "Back to that dilapidated building, alone, always looking over your shoulder? Aren't you supposed to be a hunter, not a prey?"
"Get in," said one of the men, stepping closer for emphasis.
"I believe I have a proposal that will interest you, if you are done playing the victim," said the hidden man. "Your friend wants powers, doesn't she? I can arrange for it to happen. I can arrange for all of your troubles to go away. All you have to do is kill Skitter once and for all."
A feral smile spread across Sophia's face as she climbed in the limo.
"Hey!"
The girl flinched, but didn't look at her, her eyes cast down as she picked up the clipboard at the foot of the bed, then made her way to the heart monitor.
"When are you letting me off?" Sophia asked. "I've been all stitched up and ready to go for a while now."
She was ignored once again, as the girl made a show of focusing on the notes she was writing down. Sophia could tell it was all an act from the way the girl's eyes flickered every few seconds to keep track of her in her peripheral vision.
She reached and slapped the pen out of her hand. The girl's eyes widened in shock as it bounced off clipboard and fell to the ground, then she took a step back against the curtain, trying to place herself out of reach. Something about the reaction just pissed Sophia off even more.
"I'm talking to you," she said.
"I'm not allowed to talk to the patients." The girl looked like she was shaking in her boots. Pathetic.
"Well, that's fucking stupid. Why am I still here?"
The girl hesitated, then complied when Sophia snarled at her.
"You've lost a lot of blood. You still need oxygen and IV fluid."
"I feel fine."
She's had worse, really. Countless times, she'd patched herself up with subpar medical supplies in the dead of night, snuck back into her bed and gone to school the next morning.
She's fine.
Maybe the bruises on her ribs made it hard to take a deep breath, and maybe she felt lightheaded and a bit dizzy, and maybe she'd have to steal painkillers from her mom to sleep for the next week or so, but she'd manage. She always did.
What she couldn't deal with was being stuck in a hospital bed when she was fine.
"Are you going to discharge me?" She asked the girl.
"I can't…"
"You should, unless you want me to go get someone competent."
The girl squeaked, then disappeared behind the curtain. Sophia rolled her eyes. She was useless.
If you want something done, better do it yourself.
Bits and pieces of her costume were piled at the foot of the heart monitor, which went silent as she removed the clip from her finger. She took out her IV carefully, knowing all too well that ripping it off like you saw in the movies was a terrible idea. Then, she stood up, and her head began spinning. She sat back down on the bed, eyes closed, inhaling and exhaling a few times to steady herself, then she crouched to retrieve her costume and put it back on.
Already, she felt better, just putting on her second skin. She hurried to use her power, eager for the detached feeling that accompanied it.
That was much better.
The nurse had gone through the curtain's opening at the foot of the bed, so Sophia went through the side curtain to avoid being seen. If she could make it out of the emergency room, she'd be in the clear.
The bed in the neighboring enclosure was empty, with enough blood on the covers to guess the fate of whoever was there before. She moved through the curtain again.
This time, there was someone in the bed.
She reflexively glanced at them, and all thoughts of escaping crashed down as she recognized the features. Letting go of her power, she got closer, a snarl finding its way to her lips.
It was Hebert.
Which meant that Hebert of all people was a cape and had participated in the fight, which felt like a personal insult.
Her first instinct was to make her pay for this. To rip the tubes out of her and shove her off the bed. To lash out in any way she could. To win.
Her second instinct was one of self-preservation. To go back to her bed and pretend she never left. To go after Hebert another time, and fuck her up with no witnesses around.
She hesitated.
First, she needed to know more. Hebert's costume was off, so she checked the clipboard for her cape name.
Skitter. The bug girl.
It fitted that Hebert would get a power as low and disgusting as she was.
Almost unthinkingly, Sophia reached to the small of her back, and retrieved one of her hunting bolts.
It would be so easy to end it right there. Hell, if she was careful, maybe she could even pass it off as Leviathan's work. One more cape who bit the dust following the fight. The hospital probably wouldn't even do an autopsy, as long as she didn't leave recognizable marks on the body.
The tip of the arrow caressed Hebert's skin, tracing a red line against her cheekbone, and the sight of blood made her come back to her senses.
No. It was too risky. She couldn't get away with it here of all places, not to mention that the thought of Hebert being remembered like some kind of hero just felt wrong on so many levels. No. She'd have to come after her later.
She couldn't not do anything about this.
Could she wait until they crossed paths again in costume? Did she have the patience? Or would she simply get her home address from Emma and sneak in in the dead of night, when everyone was asleep?
"In here! She's armed!" Yelled a voice behind her.
Shit.
She whirled around and kicked the nurse to keep her from shouting again, but it was already too late. Rushed footsteps brought Armsmaster in just as the nurse crumpled down.
The thought of going back to being muzzled by procedures after this was unbearable. The thought of being forced to unmask to Hebert, who would then do everything she could to get her in trouble, was worse. What options did that leave her?
In a heartbeat, she made her decision.
She turned to her shadow state as Armsmaster straightened the nurse, and brought her hunting bolt through Hebert's throat, then let go of her power long enough to rip out the arrow with a satisfying spray of blood. Then, she glided to the next enclosure, and went through the window with Miss Militia hot on her tail.
As soon as she met the ground, she went solid again, long enough to discard both of her phones, her earpiece, and her crossbow. It pained her to leave it, but there was a tracker in it, in case it got stolen by villains.
Freed from anything they could possibly use to track her, she ran.
"Your phone," she ordered the man, backing him against the brick wall of an alley with a razor-sharp arrow to the throat. "Now."
He complied, his hand going to his pocket and retrieving an old, scratched flip phone of all things. That thing looked like some archaeologist had dug it up from the turn of the millennium. Was that the right word, archaeologist? Under any other circumstances, she would have mocked him for it. He held it out with shaking hands, and she let go of him to grab the phone, then turned to her shadow state and half-ran, half-flew away from him.
Once she was a good distance away, she turned solid again and called Emma's number, which she knew by heart. She kept running as it rang.
"Hello?"
"Emma," she huffed.
"Soph? What happened? Are you okay? Why aren't you calling from your phone?"
"Fuck! Listen, I have to go on the run. Come join me at my old hideout near the alley where we first met and I'll tell you everything. Trust me, you'll want to know. Bring food and some clothes that will fit me. My old ones at the hideout are too small now."
She hung up without waiting for an answer.
She climbed the first fire escape she could find, then used her power to glide from rooftop to rooftop, traversing the city until she reached her hideout near the Docks.
The condemned building held a backup crossbow and a large stash of ammunition, as well as a few knives, spare clothing and what medical supplies she'd been able to get her hands on to patch herself up after a rough night. She took off her costume, and found fresh blood on her top, so she removed it too to assess the damage.
A long row of stitches over her ribs was bleeding, and the pain that prevented her from taking deep breaths was still present. Had her huffing and puffing after running, despite running being one of the things she did best.
She searched her medical supplies for painkillers, and swallowed three pills before grabbing a wad of tissues to sponge off the blood. Then, she laid down on the mattress, closing her eyes. The adrenaline rush had passed, leaving her lightheaded and dizzy once again.
How much shit was she in?
Even if she hadn't done anything to Hebert, being caught red-handed with a weapon next to an unmasked, unconscious cape was the kind of thing you couldn't just explain away, especially if you weren't even supposed to have access to said weapon. That alone was enough to break her probation and send her to juvie, and she certainly wasn't going there over Hebert of all people.
She felt oddly calm about the prospect of being on the run. How many times had she wished to be free from the Wards? She guessed she got what she wanted in the end, monkey's paw and all. Was that the right phrase?
The door whined as it opened, revealing her best friend.
"What the fuck?" Emma greeted her.
"What the fuck is pretty accurate," groaned Sophia, rising to sit on the mattress. "You got the stuff?"
"Yeah."
Emma set the backpack down beside the mattress, taking out a few sweatpants, t-shirts and hoodies, as well as granola bars, a bunch of apples, a loaf of bread, and a jar of peanut butter.
"Mind giving me a hand?" Sophia asked her. "I pulled my stitches open when I kicked that nurse, and my boob is in the way."
"What happened?" Emma asked, rummaging through the med kit before sitting beside Sophia and carefully removing the existing stitches.
"Some incompetent moron wouldn't let me leave the ER after I was all stitched up and ready to go, so I used my power to leave."
Sophia suppressed a wince as Emma started stitching her up with the steady hand of someone who had done this multiple times before.
"Why break your probation over that?" Emma asked, focused on her task.
"No, no. Here's the kicker. So, I'm trying to leave the ER, minding my own business, and next thing I know, I find Hebert of all people in a hospital bed, in a place where it's supposed to be just capes."
Emma stopped stitching.
"Taylor's a cape?" She asked in a quiet voice.
"She's Skitter. You know, the bug freak from the Undersiders, the one that was at the fundraiser? Fits, doesn't it? Fucking vermin."
How long had she had powers? Skitter was first seen at a bank robbery Sophia had missed during school hours a month ago, so at least that long, maybe longer.
Why hadn't she used her power against them at school, then? How much of a loser did you need to be not to fight back when you had the means?
Emma's eyes were still wide, lost in faraway thoughts.
"Em? You there?" Sophia asked, snapping her fingers in front of her best friend's face. "I need those stitches sooner rather than later."
Emma blinked a few times, coming back to the present and resuming the stitching.
"And you kicked a nurse? Why?"
"She found me looking at Hebert, and I may or may not have had a hunting bolt in my hand at the time. Identities are a big deal at these things, so she shouted for the big guys. I kicked her to stop her, but it was too late."
"So you ran?"
"I fucked Hebert up and then I ran."
Emma's eyes widened, her mouth falling open.
"You… what did you do to her?"
Sophia shrugged.
"Did my thing, using my power on the bolt. Should be enough to rectify that fucking cosmic joke."
Emma winced, and Sophia's eyes narrowed on her.
"What, you care about Hebert, now?"
"What about your probation?"
"What about it?" Sophia challenged.
"You could have waited, come after her later. Told the big guys it was a mistake."
"I was fucked from the moment I saw her," Sophia told her. "Way these things go, they would have made me unmask to her or some shit, or made her join the Wards, and then she would cry about how much of a big meanie I am to get me in trouble like she did at school. I sure as fuck wasn't gonna stay there and play rent-a-cop while she fucked up my life, and I'm not going to juvie because of her."
Emma finished the stitches and cut the thread.
"What now?" She asked as Sophia put her top back on.
"I guess I'll do my own thing from now on. Be a vigilante full time, since I can't go back home. At least I won't have someone always looking over my shoulder, or have to be around a bunch of children pretending to be heroes."
Sophia rose to her feet, tentatively stretching her side.
"Thanks for the stitches. At least I can count on you."
"My dad wants us to go stay at my grandma's in Portland," Emma blurted out. "Until the crisis is over."
Sophia's expression hardened.
"Portland?" There was judgment in her tone. "Are you going?"
Emma bit her lip.
"I don't know if I want to."
"Then what do you want?"
Emma didn't hesitate.
"I want powers. I want to be stronger than Taylor."
Sophia smiled.
Half an hour later, the phone rang with a call from Emma's number.
"What's up?" Asked Sophia, who was lounging on the mattress, eating a granola bar.
"The PRT is at my house," Emma whispered. "They were waiting for me when I got back. I think they know we've been in contact."
Shit!
"How are you making that call, then?"
"I said I had to go to the bathroom. I can't stay too long or they'll get suspicious. Or think I'm pooping."
"Are you gonna tell them about me?"
"No, I swear!"
That wasn't good enough. If they were onto Emma, they could find her easily.
"Did you have your phone with you when you came here?" She asked.
"Of course, I always have it with me."
"Then they can see where you went. They'll find the hideout."
She had already changed into the clothes Emma had brought, so she stuffed the rest in a gym bag, along with the food, her weapons and ammunition, the med kits, and her costume.
"Listen," she told Emma. "I have to go dark. Don't try to contact me; they might put you under surveillance."
"They can't do that!" Emma protested.
"I assure you they can. I mean it when I say I'm in deep shit."
"What are you gonna do? Where are you going?"
"I'm not telling you. That way, you won't have to lie about it."
Emma exhaled on the other end of the phone.
"I need to go," she whispered. "It's been too long already. Hey, Soph?"
"Yeah?"
"Be safe."
Sophia rolled her eyes and hung up.
"You may know me as Skitter, and for that I am sorry. The fight against Leviathan showed me what we are really up against, why heroes are needed. And I cannot in good conscience go on as a villain after that. From now on, you may call me Apiary, and I hope that in time, I can prove myself to be the hero this city needs."
Sophia rolled her eyes. The speech had Glenn's fingerprints all over it, and was just as corny and lame as Hebert was.
She had claimed a computer at the back of an internet-café that had hurried to reopen to offer internet access to those who needed it, near a shelter in the part of town that was barely affected by the disaster. It was crowded too, people either waiting to use one of the computers, or sitting with their laptops or smartphones to use the wi-fi.
Hunched over to be close enough to the computer's speakers to hear over the ambient noise of the internet-café, hair and face partially hidden by her hoodie to avoid being recognized, she watched as Piggot brought the press conference to an end without allowing questions. The video ended, showing the title card, with Legend at the podium and the four Wards standing together beside him, with Armsmaster and Miss Militia behind them.
This was all a joke, the world turned upside down.
They were throwing her under the bus and bending over backward for their new recruit, as if she hadn't been a villain five minutes ago. Disgusting. Were the other Wards playing along? She could imagine Vista being glad to have another girl on the team, as if Sophia didn't count, and the others being their usual moronic selves.
Maybe they all deserved each other.
She laid back in her chair, closing the tab and exhaling loudly.
A glance at her fellow patrons suggested that most were either looking up information about the disaster relief, or getting in touch with loved ones.
She wondered, idly, whether she would see her family again.
She wouldn't say she missed them, not exactly, but it annoyed her that she couldn't go home because of Hebert.
"Sophia Hess?" Came a voice behind her.
She startled at being called by her name, and her hand reflexively went to the knife in the pocket of her hoodie as she whirled around. Behind her, she found a tall, burly man in a suit.
"My employer would like to have a word with you outside," he said.
Something about the authoritative tone and the assured posture set off red flags in her mind. Or maybe it was the concealed weapon at the man's side.
"What if I don't?" She challenged, rising to her feet.
"You will."
He took a step closer, hand going to his weapon, and Sophia pondered using her power to get away, even with the attention it would draw from other patrons. Then, she saw the weapon at his side.
Not a gun. A taser.
That couldn't be a coincidence. How did he know about her weakness? She didn't wait around to find out.
She pushed past him, past the line of people waiting to use the computers, and ran out of the internet-café, then came to an abrupt halt right outside of it. There were two other men in suits waiting there and blocking her escape routes. Each was holding a taser.
Parked in front of her and looking wildly out of place was an armored limousine, the door open.
Already, she was pondering how to get past the two gorillas, but the thought was interrupted by a voice from within the limo.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
The voice was a smooth baritone, eerily normal, but she couldn't see the speaker.
"Where would you even go?" The voice continued. "Back to that dilapidated building, alone, always looking over your shoulder? Aren't you supposed to be a hunter, not a prey?"
"Get in," said one of the men, stepping closer for emphasis.
"I believe I have a proposal that will interest you, if you are done playing the victim," said the hidden man. "Your friend wants powers, doesn't she? I can arrange for it to happen. I can arrange for all of your troubles to go away. All you have to do is kill Skitter once and for all."
A feral smile spread across Sophia's face as she climbed in the limo.
SHE SAID THE THING!
- Location
- The Internet?
Finally we get to see the perspective that started it all. Get into her head in that particular moment. I don't think there was a single beat of her actually working to comfort someone or try to make the world better. Very 'me, me, me' which I guess is peak teenager, so we'll done on that. A nice update featuring a nit-so-nice person. The grooming she was doing on Emma made me physically queasy. Good writing, tough topic, well done!
That or the morgue, I guess.
Maybe she should listen to the experts so she doesn't have to behave like a junkie or abused person.
I don't know why people think Armsmaster doesn't spend time with the Wards this is a 1:1 from his school of "Are you gonna fight me?" person alienation series of lectures.
Maybe that's a sign that you should have just sat your ass in bed. It's not weakness to need a minute after getting your shit kicked in. Or maybe it's a sign that their post-endbringer triage procedures are stupid and need review.
Honestly, she might've done more than you. How's that for a kick in the head?
And, like, if you hadn't been a dick, and literally asked for the nurse to get someone else, maybe she would've kept on her rounds and not doubled back soon enough to get on your trail. Clearly all the nurse's fault, and cannot be blamed on anyone else.
You know, I usually shout less when someone kicks me. Good thinking, Soph!
Bravely, like a hero, towards future glory!
It belongs in a museum!
This is like, so close to some sort of self-reflection, I just know it.
Yeah, you tell 'em Soph! Birdcage or bust!
That or the morgue, I guess.
Gosh, I'm sure this will have no horrible effects on your best friend.
How much of a loser do you need to be to spend all your time punching down, instead of trying to help people?
Yeah, make her feel bad about not wanting to stay in a city torn by gang warfare and an Endbringer attack, where she just learned her former victim is one of the scariest new up-and-coming victims... that her new best friend just murdered (Or tried to, but you wouldn't know that). Who knows, maybe they even have therapists in Portland? It could be good for Emma.
That's some real best friend behavior there. No notes.
All because one of there own tried to kill her. Can't people take a joke?
I mean, this is where you go for a phone, or already have it in your hand, dude. Bad approach, Coil.
This tracks oddly, maybe try 'the hunter, not the prey,' or 'not a prey animal,' or 'not the quarry?'
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Chapter 16
Chapter 16
"You know," Assault said as we walked side by side toward an alley, "in the olden times of yesteryear, we actually had to fight the mooks before arresting them. Sometimes they even managed to run away, and we had to give chase, get some exercise in. Now, it's almost boring."
"I… apologize for that?" I wasn't sure how else to answer.
"No, it's fine," he said with an exaggerated sigh. "I guess I'll have to start hitting the gym instead of hitting bad guys to stay fit, if this is what patrolling with you is like. Don't tell Battery that I complained, though, or she'll get started again on the importance of minimizing violence."
We arrived into the alley where four men covered in bees wiggled on the ground, hands and feet bound by spidersilk cords.
The girl they had been on the verge of assaulting was also on the ground, arms around her knees, her back to the wall. She was staring at the men, shaking and crying.
"Do you need medical assistance, ma'am?" Asked Assault.
She startled as he addressed her.
"T-they didn't… T-they were going to… I don't know what happened… All of a sudden there were bees everywhere…"
"It's okay. The bees are the work of our newest Ward, Apiary," he said, clapping a hand on my shoulder. "The police will arrive in a few minutes to pick them up, and we'll stay with you until then. They'll want your testimony too, if you can give it to them."
I was more than happy to let him do the talking as he coaxed the victim into confiding the details of what had happened. That was the part I wasn't so comfortable with. The contact with the public, establishing a connection and reassuring people. Luckily, Assault didn't push me, letting me fall into more of a sidekick role.
As they talked, I felt out through the bugs in my range, searching for any sign of trouble.
Once the police arrived to take over, we returned to Assault's motorcycle.
"Anything else you can feel?" He asked.
I shook my head, and we climbed on.
This was the third incident I'd spotted in less than an hour. The first one had been a mugging, and the second, a group of looters trying to break into houses. Both times, my bees had dealt with the culprits by the time we arrived on site.
A lot of people were desperate. We were just a few days after the disaster, and over half of the city was without power, with even more people without running water. Many had lost their homes, and shelters were full. People were hungry, despite the trucks full of resources that arrived daily, since they were also a prime target for gangs and that supply distribution was still a work in progress.
While I'd been in my own bubble for the past few days, rushing through the motions of being a new Ward and getting things set up, the Protectorate and the other Wards' patrolling schedule had quadrupled in answer to the rampant crime, and now that I had my Image-sanctioned bees, I could finally join them.
Part of me had hoped that patrolling would bring me within range of Coil's base, allowing me to do some discreet recon, but we didn't go anywhere near it. Like Assault had told me a few days ago in the cafeteria, we were following the baby routes, near the Towers, in the nicer part of town that hadn't been touched by Leviathan's destruction. Despite that, the consequences of the disaster had spilled over, making the streets less safe than they used to be.
We continued our patrol as my bugs searched for people out on the street. There was a curfew in place during the state of emergency, which made it easier to spot troublemakers, but there were also many homeless people who hadn't found a place in one of the shelters set up all around town. They hid wherever they could find shreds of safety to pass the night.
I'd asked Assault what we could do for them, and he'd produced a pile of paper from one of the compartments of his bike, maps of the city that marked the locations of the shelters.
"Aren't they full already?" I'd asked him.
"There are buses full of evacuees that leave town several times a day, which frees some places," he'd answered. "And more shelters are being arranged as supplies come in, to try and respond to the demand. We're in touch with one of the coordinators, so we can try to find out where the nearest shelter with vacancies is and direct them there."
That's what we did, whenever I found someone hiding in a park, on a balcony, on a rooftop or behind a dumpster. Again, I let Assault do the talking, while taking notes for the inevitable moment where I would have to step forward and do the same.
Some of the people were hostile when we disrupted them, and some were armed. Some unloaded their stress by telling us all about their troubles. Many were bitter after being turned away from full shelters and hesitant to go to the ones we directed them to. Several were on the streets because they had pets with them that they didn't want to part from, and didn't want to temporarily entrust them to an animal shelter.
There was no easy answer for those.
That was a part of the job that I hadn't anticipated. Criminals, I could deal with, but each person we had to helplessly walk away from felt like a weight on my shoulders, a mental load I couldn't shake off.
It didn't help that the dogs reminded me of Bitch, which brought a different kind of guilt and helplessness.
Tattletale had mentioned that she had lost some of her dogs to Leviathan, and I couldn't imagine what that must be like for her. They were like her family, her closest connections. Not to mention that she had only just started to open up to me in her own way when I quit the team. She probably hated me now, and I regretted not being able to explain my choice to her. She was the only one I knew for sure wasn't involved in the Shadow Stalker leak, since she hadn't been present when I confided to the Undersiders about my trigger event, and I knew she wouldn't care for Coil's games. I hoped that the others were there to support her, but knowing her, she probably lashed out until they left her alone. That didn't make me feel any better.
I set the thought aside as I felt something out of the ordinary at the edge of my range. Two gatherings of people in an alley, on either sides of a street. One of the people appeared to be covered whirling blades of metal, and my bugs could feel a disruption in the air around another. A third held a spear and a shield.
"Is there a supply convoy supposed to pass by Carter street soon?" I asked Assault.
"Yes? Battery and Triumph are doing the ride-along."
"Some of the remaining Empire capes appear to be planning an ambush there, near Lorimer Drive."
"I'll tell them to change course," he said, raising a hand to his earpiece. "Good job."
Once he had relayed the message, I asked: "Can't Déjà Vu see ahead to avoid trouble?"
"She usually does, though sometimes confrontation is unavoidable, but she already exhausted her power earlier today in a scrimmage with Purity's group and the Merchants."
I nodded.
We continued our patrol, distributing tracts to the homeless and intervening to deescalate a confrontation between an armed homeowner and someone squatting in his shed. Then, as we finished giving the man direction to a shelter downtown with a few beds still available, we received a message from the PRT officer on duty through our earpieces.
"We've received reports of Über and Leet causing a disruption at the Battista elementary school shelter, near Mill Point and Belle Vue," he said.
"Assault and Apiary heading there," Assault replied.
"Acknowledged. Sending a squad as backup."
Battista was a private, Christian elementary school, in the same vein as the nearby Immaculata High. It was located South-West of the Towers, not far from our patrol route.
Once we got within a few blocks of the action, I tagged everyone I could find with small, unnoticeable bugs, and they painted a mental picture of the scene for me. The school hastily converted into a shelter had been evacuated because of stink bombs, from what my bugs could perceive. Hundreds of people spilled in the school yard while the shelter's crew did their best to clean and air out the place.
Über, wearing body armor, a trench coat and a helmet that covered his face, was firing rubber bullets at the crowd as people ran for cover, while a similarly dressed Leet hung back in a neighboring street. I relayed the information to Assault.
"Watch out for Leet while I get Über," he told me before parking the bike in front of the school yard.
Today's theme appeared to be Fallout. Über wore a helmet with a modified gas mask and red lenses.
I buried the snitch with bees, depriving Über and Leet of their recording of the fight. It was despicable of them to attack a shelter, and I didn't want them to profit from it. The flying camera went spastic, trying to shake them off, but the bees clung to each other and held on.
Assault jumped the fence and ran toward Über, who fired a flurry of rubber bullets at him, but Assault redirected their kinetic energy to himself and zoomed past Über, bowling him over in a cartoonish way. He bounced off the school's wall and ran back to Über, knocking him down as he was trying to get back up.
Since Assault seemed to have things under control, I focused my attention on Leet. A swarm of bees descended upon him, and through them, I could perceive the vibrations of his scream as he tried to run, only to trip when they tied his legs together with silk. He face-planted, and I cleared the bees in front of him to keep them from getting crushed. Then, they bound his hands together.
I walked over to the neighboring street to find him, but a blinding light flashed as I reached it. It felt like I had crashed against concrete at full speed. I fell backwards, and the connection to my bugs was severed.
No. That wasn't right. There were still bugs around, but they weren't the same. No bees. Only bugs that were naturally present in the urban environment.
Then, I realized that I'd fallen on grass, while the street had been paved.
I blinked a few times to clear the afterimage of the flash from my vision, then looked at my surroundings. I was on a strip of lawn between the side of a building and a fence higher than me.
I'd been teleported.
That wasn't even the most worrying part.
Every half-second, every bug in my range received a singular, crude set of commands ordering them to act normally, to follow their instincts. The signal was stronger the closer they were to me, so the origin of it must be near.
I tried calling them to me, but the order was drowned out, immediately canceled by the competing commands.
"Console?" I said, pressing my earpiece.
No one answered.
I got back to my feet and tried my phone, but it wouldn't open. Whatever Leet had hit me with, it appeared to have fried my electronics in addition to teleporting me.
Movement at the corner of my eye drew my attention, and I squinted at the fence at the end of the pathway, trying to discern what I had seen.
I ducked as soon as I realized what it was, and an arrow flew where my head had been half a second ago.
Shadow Stalker went solid long enough to recharge her crossbow, and I ran to the side as she fired. She recharged, and I turned the corner of the building, heading to the doors.
Locked.
The signal was the strongest just behind the doors.
The fence's gate faced the building's entrance, and was chained closed, tightly enough that I couldn't squeeze through the opening. The fence was high enough that I'd have time to get shot in the back if I tried to climb it.
I ran in uneven zigzag, hoping to avoid any arrows sent my way, and ducked whenever I heard her fire.
Until I arrived at a dead end on the other side of the building.
I turned around, facing Shadow Stalker.
She wasn't running. Instead, she advanced like an implacable predator cornering a prey. She wasn't wearing her mask, just a dark cloak with a hood that fell over her eyes, and from here, I could see a smug smile touch her lips.
"I told you, Hebert," she said as she reloaded the crossbow. "I. Win." She took aim.
Stall, I thought.
"Why does it bother you so much that I have powers?" I asked.
"Why? It's a fucking joke!" She said, gesturing wildly with her other hand for emphasis. "If people like you get to have powers, then having powers means nothing. It's embarrassing. You're nothing. Nobody likes you, you've got no friends, and you're not good at anything. You're a fucking coward too, crying to the big guys because you can't take a joke. You don't deserve powers, even lame, disgusting powers like that."
All the while, she remained solid. She has to stay solid to talk, I realized. It made sense. I could use that.
Stall, I repeated to myself.
"Then you only have yourself to blame," I said.
She frowned, and I continued.
"Haven't you heard? I got my powers because of the locker, back in January. It's all your fault."
Her expression hardened, and threw her crossbow to the side before rushing forward and pushing me against the fence, a gleaming arrow raised against my unprotected neck.
I kicked at her, only for her to become intangible.
It was the opening I needed. I lunged for her discarded crossbow, then she became solid again, crashing against my back, her weight pinning me to the ground.
I blinked back tears as she stabbed the razor-sharp arrow next to my shoulder and dragged it across the top of my back, above the armor around my torso. Pain seared as I struggled to get free.
"I'm gonna take my time with you," she said as she drew criss-crossing lines of pain between my shoulders with the arrow. "Gonna stretch it out as much as I can. Then, once you beg me to finish, I'll know you finally understand your place."
She stabbed the tip of the arrow just below the armor on my arm, and dragged it down to my elbow, ripping the skin as I struggled to remove the arrow that was loaded in her crossbow. I managed to get it free, and swung it behind my head, where hers should have been, but she turned into her shadow state and let it traverse her. I tried to get to my feet, only to receive a kick to the back that set my wounds aflame.
"You really know how to piss me off, don't you?" She said with another kick before sitting on my back and pushing my face against the gravel. "I. Win. Get it through that thick skull of yours. It's… what's the word…"
"Then why did you need my power to be disabled?" I asked, face pressed against the foam inside my mask. "Were you afraid you couldn't beat me otherwise?"
I couldn't see her expression as she huffed, but I could imagine it.
"That's what I thought," I continued. "Big bad Shadow Stalker is afraid of a few bugs."
"It wasn't my idea," she defended herself. "Big guy had it as a condition to set this up."
It had to be Coil, if Über and Leet were involved, and he apparently thought I might win if I had access to my power. I could use that.
"Because he doesn't believe you can beat me in a fair fight," I told her.
"There's no such thing as a fair fight," she spoke in a hard voice.
"He knows you're so weak, you'd loose to a bunch of bugs."
"I. Win," she repeated, stabbing the arrow in my upper back with each word for emphasis. I bit the inside of my cheeks to keep from making a sound, and took a deep breathe to steady myself before speaking, trying to keep my voice even and aiming for a mocking tone.
"Sure, for a coward."
She screamed incoherently, both from the accusation and from the arrow I'd just stabbed in her leg while her guard was down. As soon as she turned to shadow, I scrambled to my feet, crossbow in one hand, and ran to the fence to climb it as fast as I could before she recovered.
It wasn't fast enough.
An arrow materialized in the back of my leg, just above my boot, before being twisted and wrenched out. I continued climbing despite the pain, hurrying to get myself out of her reach, but she was already waiting for me on the other side of the fence.
Holding the fence with my good arm, I lowered myself while kicking and swinging the crossbow at her to force her to go intangible, then jumped to the ground. I ran as fast as I could with my injured leg, carried by the adrenalin rush.
"You want to run?" She yelled after me. "I don't mind a bit of a chase."
I didn't look back. I ran one, two, three blocks in a straight line, before my leg gave out, Sophia on my heels as I collapsed.
"There. Cornered like a fucking rat," she said in a triumphant voice.
I turned around, facing her. She had an arrow in each hand.
"Wrong kind of vermin," I told her.
"Does it matter?" She sounded annoyed. "You're dead, Hebert. Any last words?"
"Look out," I said.
"I'm not dumb. There's nothing behind—"
A mass of bugs fell on her from behind. I'd been calling them while running, more and more responding as I distanced myself from the source of the fake commands, until I reached the end of the effect, where I'd told them to gather.
She screamed in surprise, and as soon as she opened her mouth, bugs forced their way in, much like they had with Clockblocker at the bank. I didn't hold them back from stinging and biting, nor did I tell them to avoid injecting venom. They were more reactive than usual, responding noticeably faster.
Sophia turned to her shadow state, and the bugs that had been on her passed through, but she seemed to have trouble moving with all of them sharing the same space as her. My bugs could feel a faint resistance where she was, so she wasn't completely intangible either. She couldn't turn solid as long as they intersected with her, and was trying to push them out, so I told them to push back.
I climbed to my feet and limped forward as fast as I could, bringing her crossbow with me. I kept going until the bugs stalling Sophia fell out of my range, which was larger than usual.
As I went, I checked my phone again. Still offline and refusing to open.
I had no idea where I was.
Through the bugs present in the urban environment, I felt out for houses that appeared to have power, and found a residential area a bit South.
I made my way there, maybe slower than I could have, but the run had worsened the pain from my wounds, especially my leg, and every movement set them ablaze.
The first house in the neighborhood had its lights off, but through the second house's bay window, I could see silhouettes around a table.
I hid the crossbow behind the garbage cans in the driveway, to look non-threatening, then knocked on the door.
A man answered, rifle in hand.
"Sorry to bother you sir. I'm a Ward, and my phone is dead and I need to get in touch with HQ. May I use your phone, please?"
"I ain't ever seen you before," he grumbled before slamming the door in my face.
Lovely.
I retrieved the crossbow and skipped a few houses before trying again. This time, the elderly couple who answered accepted to let me use their phone. I wasn't sure whether they believed me about being a Ward or if they figured it was better to let the person in costume do whatever they wanted as long as it wasn't violent, but I was grateful.
I didn't know the PRT's number by heart, so I called 9-1-1 and asked to be redirected. When I finally got hold of the PRT officer on duty, I explained the situation, from the fight with Über and Leet to the showdown with Shadow Stalker and my escape. He said that he would send a nearby patrol to pick me up.
The elderly couple hovered, offering me to stay in their house until the patrol arrived, but I insisted that I would be fine outside.
As I waited in front of their house, sitting on the edge of the sidewalk with the crossbow, I noticed that I was shaking, and feeling lightheaded.
How had I ended up in that situation? I knew Coil was involved, for sure. It made too much sense. Was it as revenge for sharing his plan with the authorities? Because Dinah's numbers were better for him with me dead? Both? He must have recruited Shadow Stalker for her grudge against me, and used Über and Leet as bait, knowing when I'd be on patrol nearby. Then Leet fried my electronics and teleported me to Shadow Stalker's carefully chosen, fenced location where my power was canceled, so she could finish me off without me running away or fighting back.
As I waited for the patrol to pick me up, questions kept bouncing in my mind.
Were the Undersiders aware of this plan? Did they condone it? Did they protest? If they didn't know, then I suspected Tattletale would find out eventually, at the very least. Would she care? Would she tell the others? Would they take action against Coil or let him get away with it?
And, especially, why did I care so much, when we were on opposite sides?
About ten minutes after I'd made the call, I heard a motorcycle incoming. To my dismay, it was Armsmaster.
He parked his bike beside the sidewalk and came closer.
"Apiary. Are you alright?" He asked.
I shrugged reflexively, and a fresh wave of burning pain washed over me. I was grateful for my mask, that hid the tears that had escaped me despite myself.
"I'll live," I said through clenched teeth.
He frowned, holding out his hand to pull me to my feet, and I stumbled a bit when I tried putting weight on my injured leg. The adrenalin rush had passed, and the pain was harder to ignore.
"Panacea is currently at HQ for Assault," he told me. "I'll ask her to stay until we arrive."
He muttered a few words, presumably to console or Panacea herself.
"Assault? What happened?" I asked after he finished.
"The squad that arrived after you found him unconscious, most likely from some kind of gas. We suspect the goal was to put him out of commission while you were transported elsewhere, so he couldn't call it in."
"Is he okay?"
"He is now. The PRT officer on duty mentioned that your power wasn't working right?"
"Something else was giving commands and overriding mine," I told him. "A bit like the machine you made to cancel my power on the office floors, but broadcasting all over my range. I guess Coil must have had Leet make it."
Armsmaster remained silent a long moment, expression unreadable, before saying: "Let's bring you back to base."
"You know," Assault said as we walked side by side toward an alley, "in the olden times of yesteryear, we actually had to fight the mooks before arresting them. Sometimes they even managed to run away, and we had to give chase, get some exercise in. Now, it's almost boring."
"I… apologize for that?" I wasn't sure how else to answer.
"No, it's fine," he said with an exaggerated sigh. "I guess I'll have to start hitting the gym instead of hitting bad guys to stay fit, if this is what patrolling with you is like. Don't tell Battery that I complained, though, or she'll get started again on the importance of minimizing violence."
We arrived into the alley where four men covered in bees wiggled on the ground, hands and feet bound by spidersilk cords.
The girl they had been on the verge of assaulting was also on the ground, arms around her knees, her back to the wall. She was staring at the men, shaking and crying.
"Do you need medical assistance, ma'am?" Asked Assault.
She startled as he addressed her.
"T-they didn't… T-they were going to… I don't know what happened… All of a sudden there were bees everywhere…"
"It's okay. The bees are the work of our newest Ward, Apiary," he said, clapping a hand on my shoulder. "The police will arrive in a few minutes to pick them up, and we'll stay with you until then. They'll want your testimony too, if you can give it to them."
I was more than happy to let him do the talking as he coaxed the victim into confiding the details of what had happened. That was the part I wasn't so comfortable with. The contact with the public, establishing a connection and reassuring people. Luckily, Assault didn't push me, letting me fall into more of a sidekick role.
As they talked, I felt out through the bugs in my range, searching for any sign of trouble.
Once the police arrived to take over, we returned to Assault's motorcycle.
"Anything else you can feel?" He asked.
I shook my head, and we climbed on.
This was the third incident I'd spotted in less than an hour. The first one had been a mugging, and the second, a group of looters trying to break into houses. Both times, my bees had dealt with the culprits by the time we arrived on site.
A lot of people were desperate. We were just a few days after the disaster, and over half of the city was without power, with even more people without running water. Many had lost their homes, and shelters were full. People were hungry, despite the trucks full of resources that arrived daily, since they were also a prime target for gangs and that supply distribution was still a work in progress.
While I'd been in my own bubble for the past few days, rushing through the motions of being a new Ward and getting things set up, the Protectorate and the other Wards' patrolling schedule had quadrupled in answer to the rampant crime, and now that I had my Image-sanctioned bees, I could finally join them.
Part of me had hoped that patrolling would bring me within range of Coil's base, allowing me to do some discreet recon, but we didn't go anywhere near it. Like Assault had told me a few days ago in the cafeteria, we were following the baby routes, near the Towers, in the nicer part of town that hadn't been touched by Leviathan's destruction. Despite that, the consequences of the disaster had spilled over, making the streets less safe than they used to be.
We continued our patrol as my bugs searched for people out on the street. There was a curfew in place during the state of emergency, which made it easier to spot troublemakers, but there were also many homeless people who hadn't found a place in one of the shelters set up all around town. They hid wherever they could find shreds of safety to pass the night.
I'd asked Assault what we could do for them, and he'd produced a pile of paper from one of the compartments of his bike, maps of the city that marked the locations of the shelters.
"Aren't they full already?" I'd asked him.
"There are buses full of evacuees that leave town several times a day, which frees some places," he'd answered. "And more shelters are being arranged as supplies come in, to try and respond to the demand. We're in touch with one of the coordinators, so we can try to find out where the nearest shelter with vacancies is and direct them there."
That's what we did, whenever I found someone hiding in a park, on a balcony, on a rooftop or behind a dumpster. Again, I let Assault do the talking, while taking notes for the inevitable moment where I would have to step forward and do the same.
Some of the people were hostile when we disrupted them, and some were armed. Some unloaded their stress by telling us all about their troubles. Many were bitter after being turned away from full shelters and hesitant to go to the ones we directed them to. Several were on the streets because they had pets with them that they didn't want to part from, and didn't want to temporarily entrust them to an animal shelter.
There was no easy answer for those.
That was a part of the job that I hadn't anticipated. Criminals, I could deal with, but each person we had to helplessly walk away from felt like a weight on my shoulders, a mental load I couldn't shake off.
It didn't help that the dogs reminded me of Bitch, which brought a different kind of guilt and helplessness.
Tattletale had mentioned that she had lost some of her dogs to Leviathan, and I couldn't imagine what that must be like for her. They were like her family, her closest connections. Not to mention that she had only just started to open up to me in her own way when I quit the team. She probably hated me now, and I regretted not being able to explain my choice to her. She was the only one I knew for sure wasn't involved in the Shadow Stalker leak, since she hadn't been present when I confided to the Undersiders about my trigger event, and I knew she wouldn't care for Coil's games. I hoped that the others were there to support her, but knowing her, she probably lashed out until they left her alone. That didn't make me feel any better.
I set the thought aside as I felt something out of the ordinary at the edge of my range. Two gatherings of people in an alley, on either sides of a street. One of the people appeared to be covered whirling blades of metal, and my bugs could feel a disruption in the air around another. A third held a spear and a shield.
"Is there a supply convoy supposed to pass by Carter street soon?" I asked Assault.
"Yes? Battery and Triumph are doing the ride-along."
"Some of the remaining Empire capes appear to be planning an ambush there, near Lorimer Drive."
"I'll tell them to change course," he said, raising a hand to his earpiece. "Good job."
Once he had relayed the message, I asked: "Can't Déjà Vu see ahead to avoid trouble?"
"She usually does, though sometimes confrontation is unavoidable, but she already exhausted her power earlier today in a scrimmage with Purity's group and the Merchants."
I nodded.
We continued our patrol, distributing tracts to the homeless and intervening to deescalate a confrontation between an armed homeowner and someone squatting in his shed. Then, as we finished giving the man direction to a shelter downtown with a few beds still available, we received a message from the PRT officer on duty through our earpieces.
"We've received reports of Über and Leet causing a disruption at the Battista elementary school shelter, near Mill Point and Belle Vue," he said.
"Assault and Apiary heading there," Assault replied.
"Acknowledged. Sending a squad as backup."
Battista was a private, Christian elementary school, in the same vein as the nearby Immaculata High. It was located South-West of the Towers, not far from our patrol route.
Once we got within a few blocks of the action, I tagged everyone I could find with small, unnoticeable bugs, and they painted a mental picture of the scene for me. The school hastily converted into a shelter had been evacuated because of stink bombs, from what my bugs could perceive. Hundreds of people spilled in the school yard while the shelter's crew did their best to clean and air out the place.
Über, wearing body armor, a trench coat and a helmet that covered his face, was firing rubber bullets at the crowd as people ran for cover, while a similarly dressed Leet hung back in a neighboring street. I relayed the information to Assault.
"Watch out for Leet while I get Über," he told me before parking the bike in front of the school yard.
Today's theme appeared to be Fallout. Über wore a helmet with a modified gas mask and red lenses.
I buried the snitch with bees, depriving Über and Leet of their recording of the fight. It was despicable of them to attack a shelter, and I didn't want them to profit from it. The flying camera went spastic, trying to shake them off, but the bees clung to each other and held on.
Assault jumped the fence and ran toward Über, who fired a flurry of rubber bullets at him, but Assault redirected their kinetic energy to himself and zoomed past Über, bowling him over in a cartoonish way. He bounced off the school's wall and ran back to Über, knocking him down as he was trying to get back up.
Since Assault seemed to have things under control, I focused my attention on Leet. A swarm of bees descended upon him, and through them, I could perceive the vibrations of his scream as he tried to run, only to trip when they tied his legs together with silk. He face-planted, and I cleared the bees in front of him to keep them from getting crushed. Then, they bound his hands together.
I walked over to the neighboring street to find him, but a blinding light flashed as I reached it. It felt like I had crashed against concrete at full speed. I fell backwards, and the connection to my bugs was severed.
No. That wasn't right. There were still bugs around, but they weren't the same. No bees. Only bugs that were naturally present in the urban environment.
Then, I realized that I'd fallen on grass, while the street had been paved.
I blinked a few times to clear the afterimage of the flash from my vision, then looked at my surroundings. I was on a strip of lawn between the side of a building and a fence higher than me.
I'd been teleported.
That wasn't even the most worrying part.
Every half-second, every bug in my range received a singular, crude set of commands ordering them to act normally, to follow their instincts. The signal was stronger the closer they were to me, so the origin of it must be near.
I tried calling them to me, but the order was drowned out, immediately canceled by the competing commands.
"Console?" I said, pressing my earpiece.
No one answered.
I got back to my feet and tried my phone, but it wouldn't open. Whatever Leet had hit me with, it appeared to have fried my electronics in addition to teleporting me.
Movement at the corner of my eye drew my attention, and I squinted at the fence at the end of the pathway, trying to discern what I had seen.
I ducked as soon as I realized what it was, and an arrow flew where my head had been half a second ago.
Shadow Stalker went solid long enough to recharge her crossbow, and I ran to the side as she fired. She recharged, and I turned the corner of the building, heading to the doors.
Locked.
The signal was the strongest just behind the doors.
The fence's gate faced the building's entrance, and was chained closed, tightly enough that I couldn't squeeze through the opening. The fence was high enough that I'd have time to get shot in the back if I tried to climb it.
I ran in uneven zigzag, hoping to avoid any arrows sent my way, and ducked whenever I heard her fire.
Until I arrived at a dead end on the other side of the building.
I turned around, facing Shadow Stalker.
She wasn't running. Instead, she advanced like an implacable predator cornering a prey. She wasn't wearing her mask, just a dark cloak with a hood that fell over her eyes, and from here, I could see a smug smile touch her lips.
"I told you, Hebert," she said as she reloaded the crossbow. "I. Win." She took aim.
Stall, I thought.
"Why does it bother you so much that I have powers?" I asked.
"Why? It's a fucking joke!" She said, gesturing wildly with her other hand for emphasis. "If people like you get to have powers, then having powers means nothing. It's embarrassing. You're nothing. Nobody likes you, you've got no friends, and you're not good at anything. You're a fucking coward too, crying to the big guys because you can't take a joke. You don't deserve powers, even lame, disgusting powers like that."
All the while, she remained solid. She has to stay solid to talk, I realized. It made sense. I could use that.
Stall, I repeated to myself.
"Then you only have yourself to blame," I said.
She frowned, and I continued.
"Haven't you heard? I got my powers because of the locker, back in January. It's all your fault."
Her expression hardened, and threw her crossbow to the side before rushing forward and pushing me against the fence, a gleaming arrow raised against my unprotected neck.
I kicked at her, only for her to become intangible.
It was the opening I needed. I lunged for her discarded crossbow, then she became solid again, crashing against my back, her weight pinning me to the ground.
I blinked back tears as she stabbed the razor-sharp arrow next to my shoulder and dragged it across the top of my back, above the armor around my torso. Pain seared as I struggled to get free.
"I'm gonna take my time with you," she said as she drew criss-crossing lines of pain between my shoulders with the arrow. "Gonna stretch it out as much as I can. Then, once you beg me to finish, I'll know you finally understand your place."
She stabbed the tip of the arrow just below the armor on my arm, and dragged it down to my elbow, ripping the skin as I struggled to remove the arrow that was loaded in her crossbow. I managed to get it free, and swung it behind my head, where hers should have been, but she turned into her shadow state and let it traverse her. I tried to get to my feet, only to receive a kick to the back that set my wounds aflame.
"You really know how to piss me off, don't you?" She said with another kick before sitting on my back and pushing my face against the gravel. "I. Win. Get it through that thick skull of yours. It's… what's the word…"
"Then why did you need my power to be disabled?" I asked, face pressed against the foam inside my mask. "Were you afraid you couldn't beat me otherwise?"
I couldn't see her expression as she huffed, but I could imagine it.
"That's what I thought," I continued. "Big bad Shadow Stalker is afraid of a few bugs."
"It wasn't my idea," she defended herself. "Big guy had it as a condition to set this up."
It had to be Coil, if Über and Leet were involved, and he apparently thought I might win if I had access to my power. I could use that.
"Because he doesn't believe you can beat me in a fair fight," I told her.
"There's no such thing as a fair fight," she spoke in a hard voice.
"He knows you're so weak, you'd loose to a bunch of bugs."
"I. Win," she repeated, stabbing the arrow in my upper back with each word for emphasis. I bit the inside of my cheeks to keep from making a sound, and took a deep breathe to steady myself before speaking, trying to keep my voice even and aiming for a mocking tone.
"Sure, for a coward."
She screamed incoherently, both from the accusation and from the arrow I'd just stabbed in her leg while her guard was down. As soon as she turned to shadow, I scrambled to my feet, crossbow in one hand, and ran to the fence to climb it as fast as I could before she recovered.
It wasn't fast enough.
An arrow materialized in the back of my leg, just above my boot, before being twisted and wrenched out. I continued climbing despite the pain, hurrying to get myself out of her reach, but she was already waiting for me on the other side of the fence.
Holding the fence with my good arm, I lowered myself while kicking and swinging the crossbow at her to force her to go intangible, then jumped to the ground. I ran as fast as I could with my injured leg, carried by the adrenalin rush.
"You want to run?" She yelled after me. "I don't mind a bit of a chase."
I didn't look back. I ran one, two, three blocks in a straight line, before my leg gave out, Sophia on my heels as I collapsed.
"There. Cornered like a fucking rat," she said in a triumphant voice.
I turned around, facing her. She had an arrow in each hand.
"Wrong kind of vermin," I told her.
"Does it matter?" She sounded annoyed. "You're dead, Hebert. Any last words?"
"Look out," I said.
"I'm not dumb. There's nothing behind—"
A mass of bugs fell on her from behind. I'd been calling them while running, more and more responding as I distanced myself from the source of the fake commands, until I reached the end of the effect, where I'd told them to gather.
She screamed in surprise, and as soon as she opened her mouth, bugs forced their way in, much like they had with Clockblocker at the bank. I didn't hold them back from stinging and biting, nor did I tell them to avoid injecting venom. They were more reactive than usual, responding noticeably faster.
Sophia turned to her shadow state, and the bugs that had been on her passed through, but she seemed to have trouble moving with all of them sharing the same space as her. My bugs could feel a faint resistance where she was, so she wasn't completely intangible either. She couldn't turn solid as long as they intersected with her, and was trying to push them out, so I told them to push back.
I climbed to my feet and limped forward as fast as I could, bringing her crossbow with me. I kept going until the bugs stalling Sophia fell out of my range, which was larger than usual.
As I went, I checked my phone again. Still offline and refusing to open.
I had no idea where I was.
Through the bugs present in the urban environment, I felt out for houses that appeared to have power, and found a residential area a bit South.
I made my way there, maybe slower than I could have, but the run had worsened the pain from my wounds, especially my leg, and every movement set them ablaze.
The first house in the neighborhood had its lights off, but through the second house's bay window, I could see silhouettes around a table.
I hid the crossbow behind the garbage cans in the driveway, to look non-threatening, then knocked on the door.
A man answered, rifle in hand.
"Sorry to bother you sir. I'm a Ward, and my phone is dead and I need to get in touch with HQ. May I use your phone, please?"
"I ain't ever seen you before," he grumbled before slamming the door in my face.
Lovely.
I retrieved the crossbow and skipped a few houses before trying again. This time, the elderly couple who answered accepted to let me use their phone. I wasn't sure whether they believed me about being a Ward or if they figured it was better to let the person in costume do whatever they wanted as long as it wasn't violent, but I was grateful.
I didn't know the PRT's number by heart, so I called 9-1-1 and asked to be redirected. When I finally got hold of the PRT officer on duty, I explained the situation, from the fight with Über and Leet to the showdown with Shadow Stalker and my escape. He said that he would send a nearby patrol to pick me up.
The elderly couple hovered, offering me to stay in their house until the patrol arrived, but I insisted that I would be fine outside.
As I waited in front of their house, sitting on the edge of the sidewalk with the crossbow, I noticed that I was shaking, and feeling lightheaded.
How had I ended up in that situation? I knew Coil was involved, for sure. It made too much sense. Was it as revenge for sharing his plan with the authorities? Because Dinah's numbers were better for him with me dead? Both? He must have recruited Shadow Stalker for her grudge against me, and used Über and Leet as bait, knowing when I'd be on patrol nearby. Then Leet fried my electronics and teleported me to Shadow Stalker's carefully chosen, fenced location where my power was canceled, so she could finish me off without me running away or fighting back.
As I waited for the patrol to pick me up, questions kept bouncing in my mind.
Were the Undersiders aware of this plan? Did they condone it? Did they protest? If they didn't know, then I suspected Tattletale would find out eventually, at the very least. Would she care? Would she tell the others? Would they take action against Coil or let him get away with it?
And, especially, why did I care so much, when we were on opposite sides?
About ten minutes after I'd made the call, I heard a motorcycle incoming. To my dismay, it was Armsmaster.
He parked his bike beside the sidewalk and came closer.
"Apiary. Are you alright?" He asked.
I shrugged reflexively, and a fresh wave of burning pain washed over me. I was grateful for my mask, that hid the tears that had escaped me despite myself.
"I'll live," I said through clenched teeth.
He frowned, holding out his hand to pull me to my feet, and I stumbled a bit when I tried putting weight on my injured leg. The adrenalin rush had passed, and the pain was harder to ignore.
"Panacea is currently at HQ for Assault," he told me. "I'll ask her to stay until we arrive."
He muttered a few words, presumably to console or Panacea herself.
"Assault? What happened?" I asked after he finished.
"The squad that arrived after you found him unconscious, most likely from some kind of gas. We suspect the goal was to put him out of commission while you were transported elsewhere, so he couldn't call it in."
"Is he okay?"
"He is now. The PRT officer on duty mentioned that your power wasn't working right?"
"Something else was giving commands and overriding mine," I told him. "A bit like the machine you made to cancel my power on the office floors, but broadcasting all over my range. I guess Coil must have had Leet make it."
Armsmaster remained silent a long moment, expression unreadable, before saying: "Let's bring you back to base."
- Location
- Earth
Yep.
Armsy made the machine.
- Location
- The Internet?
Hopefully the experience of getting targeted for assassination by the crime boss she warned them about, having her power specifically suppressed (potentially by data leaked from their sieve of a department), and getting mauled by their former teammate (her personal tormentor) whilst being hunted for sport the evulz will engender some sympathy for Taylor from the Wards.
Or maybe they'll just keep being dicks. It's a coin toss.
This was an edge-of-the-seat update, very well done @Octobre!
the Undersiders Assault.
hero, sorry, like a brave person, sorry, like a coward and a bully.
smaster like that, and that this was Coil's other moles getting the data for Leet to make the device, but I'll expect betrayal until our friendly neighborhood cyborg proves me wrong... or gets put on a bus, transferred to Chicago. Oh God, Armsmaster is the one getting a Chicago Wards arc in this story, that's hilarious!
Or maybe they'll just keep being dicks. It's a coin toss.
This was an edge-of-the-seat update, very well done @Octobre!
Yet another reminder that it's much better to fight beside Skitter, and not against her.
The trouble with trying to be discreet against a guy with two timelines is that you can't tell if he hasn't twigged onto it with a Tattletale in the basement, so it's probably for the best.
See one, do one, teach one. But also she's just horribly bad at beig social, outside of her in-canon commented upon Skitter charisma.
Says the girl who talked to her first new friends all about her trigger trauma. A burden shared, even verbally, is a burden lessened.
She hadn't gotten the chance to mention precisely how or why she lost those dogs. That guilt is just gonna grow if she learns that Rachel sent them against Leviathan to save her, specifically.
These dicks, being awfully dickish, to people that have lost a lot. Doesn't seem like their usual MO...
I know that there are some insects that actually cook their foes to death, I hope those circuits friggin' fried.
That's correct, this isn't right. They're setting you up to die, Taylor. RUN.
Leet might have hit you with it, but I wouldn't doubt that there was some Coil spotter with a finger on the trigger, considering Leet was hogtied and swarmed. At least he didn't have time to train up some look-alike to attack
Again, this just reads as odd to me, I think I've usually viewed it as 'their' prey. Also, this asshole. She's trying to look cool. Ohmigod, this edgelord.
So, there we are, she's got me dead to rights...
An extra 'o' in 'lose,' but also, this exchange is hilarious, because you have to think he might have already tried this earlier in the patrol, for this to be the timeline he keeps.
What really stings, in this inversion of canon, is that Taylor's stuck in her Wards issue costume, whereas her Skitter-issue silks would probably turn the blade away, or at least stymie Sophia long enough to phase the arrow in before tearing it out.
This was so well deserved from Sophia, and hilarious to boot. She's the one who let Taylor hobble out of range of the transmitter, out of her desire to... what? Prove she was 'better?' All she did was prove she's still a dumbass.
Give her the Alexandria treatment, give her the bugs in Lung's lungs special!
Like a
At least they didn't kill him. And that suspicious pause is suspicious... I think Octobre wouldn't do Arm
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Are they still deporting Armsmaster, or is his transfer still on hold during the emergency?
Honestly, I can't say I'd be surprised. He tried to have Taylor killed once already, so really, this is just assassination attempt number two, electric boogaloo.
Honestly, I can't say I'd be surprised. He tried to have Taylor killed once already, so really, this is just assassination attempt number two, electric boogaloo.
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Splattered Cloak
Recovering Line Editor
So either Taylor dies or someone notices that Armsmaster built one of the devices that nearly got her killed. Either way, Coil wins. In the short term, anyway...
Chapter 17
Chapter 17
Armsmaster didn't say another word during the ride back to base, nor during the walk to the hospital wing. He came close at one point after noticing that I wasn't by his side anymore, and turned around to watch me limp as I tried to keep up with his pace, but he swallowed his words, his frown deepening. As I caught up with him, he silently produced a halberd from the back of his armor and handed it to me to use as a walking stick.
That was unexpectedly thoughtful of him, but I wasn't about to complain or refuse out of stubbornness. As much as I hated displaying weakness in front of him of all people, every step on my injured leg brought a fresh wave of pain I had to brace myself for with clenched teeth, and I was glad for the reprieve of being able to rest my weight on something other than my leg.
He resumed walking, matching my pace as I hobbled.
The adrenaline rush had passed, letting the exhaustion seep in, but my range hadn't gone back to normal yet, extending outside the bounds of the handful of blocks I'd grown familiar with over the past few days.
It didn't help that the hospital wing was on one of the floors where my power was canceled, which my frazzled mind now interpreted as a prelude to an attack. I could still feel the handful of bugs hidden away in dark corners, but they wouldn't respond to my orders, much like with the machine in the building I was teleported to.
I tried to focus on the differences between Armsmaster's smooth, background white noise and Leet's clunky, shouting-in-your-face commands, to remind myself that it wasn't the same situation, but the part of my brain that expected a threat wasn't governed by logic.
On the rooftop, my bees were on edge, more responsive than usual, gathering at the entrance of their hives to defend them from an imaginary assailant, but I couldn't call them to me for the same reason I couldn't reach out to the bugs already present on this floor. Not to mention that showing up covered in a swarm of bees would probably give Panacea the wrong impression.
That was another source of anxiety. Given our past meetings, I couldn't anticipate her reaction to seeing me again. The threats she'd made at the bank were still on my mind, and I wondered whether she was vindictive enough to go through with them even after I switched sides.
She could very well have decided not to stay despite Armsmaster's request, and I couldn't have blamed her, but as we arrived at the nurses' station, I found her sitting on a chair beside it.
A nurse came out of the station, holding a clipboard, and led me to a room across the corridor as Panacea followed. Armsmaster remained outside with his halberd.
Once in the room, the nurse produced a form entitled Parahuman treatment authorization and consent, essentially laying out that I consented to receive specific medical care for my injuries, and that Panacea consented to administer said care. We both signed, and the nurse signed as a witness. That made me feel somewhat better about the threats. I doubted Panacea would try to take revenge on me on the records.
There was still a measure of apprehension as I removed my glove to allow her to touch me. She poked my hand with one finger, and the pain vanished.
"Deep tissue lacerations on the trapezius and deltoids, left triceps and brachialis, and right soleus," she stated as the nurse took notes. "This will take a minute."
I nodded, observing her as she did the same. She looked tired more than anything, with painted-on shadows beneath her eyes like she hadn't had a good night's sleep since I last saw her in the hospital after Leviathan. She also didn't look too happy to be here, and I couldn't blame her, given our previous meetings.
"So, you're with the good guys, now," she spoke after a moment of silence.
"I am."
"It doesn't change anything," she stated, her expression severe. "You still robbed a bank, took hostages and threatened me along with Tattletale. You still crashed the fundraiser. You were still a villain."
That gave me pause. Was I wrong in my assessment of what she was and wasn't willing to do for revenge? With that line of thought, she might rationalize that I deserved it even after switching sides.
"I can tell that you're nervous," she stated with a small smile.
"I think anyone would be. What was it that you said at the bank, that you'd make me morbidly obese? Make everything I eat taste like bile? Or give me a heart attack or cancer?"
The nurse's eyes widened, and she hurried to scribble something on the form, as I'd hoped for. If nothing else, a paper trail would give Panacea second thoughts. She glanced at the nurse, then back at me with a snooty look on her face.
"You'll just have to trust that I'm a decent enough person not to do anything," she said, with less vitriol than before.
I was reminded of what Tattletale had said about her at the bank. All bark, no bite.
"I'm sorry for what I did," I told her honestly.
She huffed. "It doesn't change the fact that you did it."
"But I'm not a villain anymore. Doesn't that count for something?"
"Again, it doesn't change what you did."
"They're giving me a chance," I said. "I guess you don't have to do the same, as long as you don't give me cancer or something."
She gave me a dirty look, but didn't say anything else until she was done, then she left in a hurry.
"Thank you," I called out after her.
I reached with my right hand to inspect my upper back and left arm, and found only smooth skin beneath my tattered costume, so I put my glove back on and left the room with the nurse. Armsmaster was waiting for me beside the nurses' station.
"Miss Militia wants to see you in her office to do a proper debriefing," he said before escorting me to the elevator, where silence accompanied us to the sixth floor.
After leaving the elevator, Armsmaster led me to a door not too far from his workshop, and knocked.
"Come in," came Miss Militia's voice.
I opened the door and stepped into her office. It was small, unassuming, with boxes of paperwork piled on the floor all around the desk. A map of the city was spread on the wall, as well as team posters of the local Protectorate and Wards, from before Leviathan.
I closed the door behind me.
"Take a seat," she told me.
After I sat down across from her, she asked me to explain in details what happened. I relayed the night's events, as well as my suspicions that Coil was behind it.
"What worries me is that he would make an overt move like that," she said after I finished. "He doesn't strike me as the type who would kill a Ward as revenge for sharing his plan with us. The damage is already done, and it doesn't seem like him to draw unnecessary heat."
"He might be trying to retain plausible deniability by making it look like Shadow Stalker was working directly with Über and Leet," I pointed out. "I mean, we know they work for him, but we can't prove it, unless they confessed."
"Which would be hard since they managed to get away between the moment Assault was incapacitated and when the squad arrived as backup."
I nodded, having expected something like that.
"As for Coil," I continued, "it's possible that Dinah told him that his plan had better chances of succeeding with me dead. But if his only goal was to kill me, he could have teleported me a hundred feet into the air, or into a burning building, or had a squad of soldiers ready to fire as soon as I arrived. Which means that he had something to gain even if I didn't die, though I suppose that my death would have been a nice bonus."
I'd had the time to think it over on the way back to base, and involving Sophia just seemed like an inefficient way to kill me, especially when Dinah could predict the likely outcome. Sophia's presence made much more sense if it was all for spectacle, though I doubted she knew that. Just another pawn on his chessboard.
"That makes sense," Miss Militia said, frowning.
"I think this is a follow up to the Shadow Stalker leak," I told her. "He's creating a narrative and trying to undermine the PRT, especially after all the fanfare about me joining the Wards. The leak got attention all over the country, and so did my debut, which means that he's got a captive audience already. If he can generate enough public outrage against the local PRT, he might be able to force a restructuration and install one of his puppets as leader."
"Which means that he'd be looking to publicize the incident, then."
"I think the building had security cameras," I said. "I'm not one hundred percent sure, since I didn't exactly have much time to look around, but I think I caught a glimpse of one of them. He'll probably leak the footage and blame the PRT for failing to protect me from Shadow Stalker."
She picked up her phone to send a text message, presumably to Piggot. Once she was done, she leaned back into her chair, exhaling loudly.
"We almost certainly still have moles in our ranks, if he knew your patrolling schedule and route and even managed to get his hands on the protected data about your power," she said. "From now on, I'll communicate your schedule directly to you rather than through the memo, and I'll ask Déjà Vu to keep an eye out for you once her power comes back, in case Coil tries anything else. As a preventative measure, you will also be benched from confrontations with any of the parahumans in his organization, not just the Undersiders."
I nodded, and she continued.
"As for the footage, we'll have a response ready by the time it drops. We might also preemptively address the incident to short-circuit the narrative Coil is trying to push and point to him as the culprit. We'll see what the Director decides to do."
She clasped her hands together over the desk and leaned forward before speaking again.
"That was a rather eventful first patrol, and I have to ask. Do you feel comfortable enough to continue patrolling?"
"I do," I said.
I didn't want to stay cooped up inside on perpetual console duty and be treated like I was made of glass because of Coil and Shadow Stalker. Anyways, I doubted he would make another move against me until he had milked this incident for all it was worth, especially if I was right about his main target being Piggot. He might make another attempt later to hammer the point home and try to kill me again, but with Déjà Vu watching out for me…
It occurred to me that he might have engineered the events leading to her power being out of use tonight specifically so she couldn't warn us about the trap, and I shared the thought with Miss Militia.
"That's definitely possible," she said. "We're short-staffed until we get some transfers in, but I think I'll pull her from field work, so she can remain behind the scenes full time, watching out for Coil, coordinating the supply convoys and distribution to avoid attacks from the gangs, and anticipating situations where the Protectorate needs to deploy."
I nodded.
"I was wondering," I said. "Tonight, with Shadow Stalker, she wouldn't have been able to cut through my old spidersilk costume. Could I maybe wear it under the new one? At least, until I can finish the bodysuits I'm currently working on?"
"We'd have to check with Image, but I don't see why not, especially since this is a safety issue. You'll have to see Maureen anyways to get your costume repaired. I assume they issued you a few spares you can wear in the meantime?"
"Yeah."
"Good. If you're okay with it, I was also thinking of assigning you off the records to some of the supply convoy ride-alongs, since you can sense trouble coming like you did today. Coil has his own trucks bringing in supplies, and so far, the teams under him haven't attacked the convoys. It's mostly Hookwolf's group and the Archer's Bridge Merchants. Déjà Vu usually does some last minute adjustments to the schedule or trajectory, but we can't avoid all confrontations, especially when they happen near the delivery points. Your situational awareness would be useful to better coordinate our response, and would most likely allow Déjà Vu to make more detailed predictions."
"Okay," I answered.
"Good. Now, I also wanted to check in, to see how things are going for you," she said, "especially with the other Wards."
"It's fine," I answered, careful to keep my voice even. Kid Win and Vista can barely stand to be in the same room as me, but Clockblocker seems to be making an effort, probably because you asked him to as temporary leader. "I understand that it takes some getting used to from everyone, especially with their losses," I added, more honestly.
"I know things must be awkward, but that's only for a week or two until the transfers arrive."
It was the same thing Battery had said a few days ago, like it would solve all my problems. I doubted it would change much, especially if the Wards being transfered already knew the other Wards. I didn't say anything.
"Are you coming to the memorial's unveiling tomorrow?" She asked after a moment of silence. "I'll ask Déjà Vu to look out for trouble, to make sure Coil doesn't try anything, but the main concern is that the Nazis might try to hijack the event to celebrate Kaiser, and I'd like to have more than one set of eyes watching out."
"I will," I answered.
"Good. Have you been in contact with your father? I know he wanted to hear from you."
"We spoke on the phone yesterday."
"I'm glad. Well, that's it for now, but don't hesitate to reach out if there's anything."
"I will, thanks."
She gestured that I could go, and I did, heading to the elevator.
When I arrived to the Wards headquarters, the three others had already turned in for the night. I grabbed my pajamas and went to the showers to scrub off the crusted blood where my wounds used to be.
I was drying myself off when the alarm rang, announcing a visitor. Discreet bugs converged to them, and found a tall, muscular silhouette wearing armor and a visor. Armsmaster. He walked down the corridor and stopped in front of my room, knocking on the door.
I hurried to get dressed and leave the bathroom, to see what he wanted.
"Apiary," he greeted me as I arrived. "I have a new phone and earpiece for you, since yours are out of commission."
He handed them to me, and I went into my room to retrieve the old ones, then gave them to him.
"I also have this," he continued, giving me a small, cylindrical device the size of the key chain pepper spray my dad had gotten me when I started to run, with two buttons at the top.
"The red button triggers an emergency beacon," he explained. "In case you're ever stranded again without a working phone and in need of backup. It can also deliver a short distance EMP, in the event that you encounter another machine messing with your power. Just aim the bottom of the tube toward it and press the white button."
That was odd. Had he put this together just now? Not a gesture I would have expected from him, though I supposed he had to at least pretend to care about my safety now that we were on the same side.
"Thank you," I told him.
He left without another word.
The next morning, I went to see Maureen to deliver my tattered costume and ask about wearing my old suit beneath the new one.
"As long as it's just the bodysuit, I don't see any problem with that," she said, handing me the box with my old costume. "Don't tell Glenn, though. He'll see it as a metaphor."
I definitely wasn't planning to.
I went back down to the Wards headquarters to remove my costume and put my old bodysuit underneath, before putting the rest back on. Then, I went to the canteen to grab breakfast.
Before I could retreat to my room with my food, Clockblocker waved at me from the Wards' usual table, where he was sitting alone. Like me, he wore a domino mask to be able to eat. He was red-headed, I noted, with blue eyes.
"Kid Win and Vista aren't here?" I asked as I sat down across from him. I'd felt them leave the building while I was changing, and I doubted he would have waved me over if they'd been here.
"They had an errand to run before going to the memorial's unveiling," he answered.
I nodded, taking a sip of my coffee as he observed me.
"Are you okay?" He asked. "I heard about what happened last night."
"Panacea put me back together," I said, shrugging.
Would he try to bring up the bullying again? Awkward silence lingered as I tried to think of a way to deviate the conversation away from it, but I felt like an elephant in a minefield.
"I guess you were right about us not really knowing Shadow Stalker, huh," he spoke awkwardly.
I looked at him, searching for his intentions as he busied himself mixing his bowl of cereal.
"Only took you two assassination attempts to figure that out?" I asked him.
He grimaced.
"In my defense, the first time was presented without context, and you were a villain while she was a teammate. We're generally supposed not to immediately assume the worst about those."
I raised an eyebrow at that.
"Does that go for me too?"
He paused for a moment, eyebrows raised as he observed me, like he hadn't expected me to turn his statement against him.
"I guess it should," he finally said. "You're not what I expected."
"What did you expect?"
"I dunno. Someone more… villainous?" He said, gesturing vaguely with one hand. "The kind of person who would enjoy choking people with bugs?"
"We're all just people at the end of the day," I pointed out. "None of us rub our hands with glee at the thought of hurting others. Except maybe Coil and the Nazis."
And Shadow Stalker, though I didn't want to bring her up again.
"I suppose it's true," he conceded. "Still, it's hard to imagine the people we fight against being anything other than the image they project."
"That's the purpose of image."
His eyes dipped to my costume, then back to mine.
"Speaking of, Glenn doesn't seem to have scarred you too much?"
"We came to a compromise of sorts," I told him. "I'm fine with bees. They're versatile enough. Had to use the rest of my swarm in an unsanctioned maneuver when I got stranded without bees yesterday, but I don't think he'd blame me, given the circumstances."
"I thought your power was disabled?"
"Kind of. There was a machine broadcasting conflicting orders all over my range, canceling mine, but I managed to get away from it."
He nodded, then glanced at the clock on his wrist, and started shoveling cereal into his mouth.
"We'll be late if we don't hurry up," he explained between two spoonfuls.
I finished my bagel and coffee as he worked on his cereal, then we brought our trays and dishes to the rack in the corner and made our way down to the lobby.
Armsmaster didn't say another word during the ride back to base, nor during the walk to the hospital wing. He came close at one point after noticing that I wasn't by his side anymore, and turned around to watch me limp as I tried to keep up with his pace, but he swallowed his words, his frown deepening. As I caught up with him, he silently produced a halberd from the back of his armor and handed it to me to use as a walking stick.
That was unexpectedly thoughtful of him, but I wasn't about to complain or refuse out of stubbornness. As much as I hated displaying weakness in front of him of all people, every step on my injured leg brought a fresh wave of pain I had to brace myself for with clenched teeth, and I was glad for the reprieve of being able to rest my weight on something other than my leg.
He resumed walking, matching my pace as I hobbled.
The adrenaline rush had passed, letting the exhaustion seep in, but my range hadn't gone back to normal yet, extending outside the bounds of the handful of blocks I'd grown familiar with over the past few days.
It didn't help that the hospital wing was on one of the floors where my power was canceled, which my frazzled mind now interpreted as a prelude to an attack. I could still feel the handful of bugs hidden away in dark corners, but they wouldn't respond to my orders, much like with the machine in the building I was teleported to.
I tried to focus on the differences between Armsmaster's smooth, background white noise and Leet's clunky, shouting-in-your-face commands, to remind myself that it wasn't the same situation, but the part of my brain that expected a threat wasn't governed by logic.
On the rooftop, my bees were on edge, more responsive than usual, gathering at the entrance of their hives to defend them from an imaginary assailant, but I couldn't call them to me for the same reason I couldn't reach out to the bugs already present on this floor. Not to mention that showing up covered in a swarm of bees would probably give Panacea the wrong impression.
That was another source of anxiety. Given our past meetings, I couldn't anticipate her reaction to seeing me again. The threats she'd made at the bank were still on my mind, and I wondered whether she was vindictive enough to go through with them even after I switched sides.
She could very well have decided not to stay despite Armsmaster's request, and I couldn't have blamed her, but as we arrived at the nurses' station, I found her sitting on a chair beside it.
A nurse came out of the station, holding a clipboard, and led me to a room across the corridor as Panacea followed. Armsmaster remained outside with his halberd.
Once in the room, the nurse produced a form entitled Parahuman treatment authorization and consent, essentially laying out that I consented to receive specific medical care for my injuries, and that Panacea consented to administer said care. We both signed, and the nurse signed as a witness. That made me feel somewhat better about the threats. I doubted Panacea would try to take revenge on me on the records.
There was still a measure of apprehension as I removed my glove to allow her to touch me. She poked my hand with one finger, and the pain vanished.
"Deep tissue lacerations on the trapezius and deltoids, left triceps and brachialis, and right soleus," she stated as the nurse took notes. "This will take a minute."
I nodded, observing her as she did the same. She looked tired more than anything, with painted-on shadows beneath her eyes like she hadn't had a good night's sleep since I last saw her in the hospital after Leviathan. She also didn't look too happy to be here, and I couldn't blame her, given our previous meetings.
"So, you're with the good guys, now," she spoke after a moment of silence.
"I am."
"It doesn't change anything," she stated, her expression severe. "You still robbed a bank, took hostages and threatened me along with Tattletale. You still crashed the fundraiser. You were still a villain."
That gave me pause. Was I wrong in my assessment of what she was and wasn't willing to do for revenge? With that line of thought, she might rationalize that I deserved it even after switching sides.
"I can tell that you're nervous," she stated with a small smile.
"I think anyone would be. What was it that you said at the bank, that you'd make me morbidly obese? Make everything I eat taste like bile? Or give me a heart attack or cancer?"
The nurse's eyes widened, and she hurried to scribble something on the form, as I'd hoped for. If nothing else, a paper trail would give Panacea second thoughts. She glanced at the nurse, then back at me with a snooty look on her face.
"You'll just have to trust that I'm a decent enough person not to do anything," she said, with less vitriol than before.
I was reminded of what Tattletale had said about her at the bank. All bark, no bite.
"I'm sorry for what I did," I told her honestly.
She huffed. "It doesn't change the fact that you did it."
"But I'm not a villain anymore. Doesn't that count for something?"
"Again, it doesn't change what you did."
"They're giving me a chance," I said. "I guess you don't have to do the same, as long as you don't give me cancer or something."
She gave me a dirty look, but didn't say anything else until she was done, then she left in a hurry.
"Thank you," I called out after her.
I reached with my right hand to inspect my upper back and left arm, and found only smooth skin beneath my tattered costume, so I put my glove back on and left the room with the nurse. Armsmaster was waiting for me beside the nurses' station.
"Miss Militia wants to see you in her office to do a proper debriefing," he said before escorting me to the elevator, where silence accompanied us to the sixth floor.
After leaving the elevator, Armsmaster led me to a door not too far from his workshop, and knocked.
"Come in," came Miss Militia's voice.
I opened the door and stepped into her office. It was small, unassuming, with boxes of paperwork piled on the floor all around the desk. A map of the city was spread on the wall, as well as team posters of the local Protectorate and Wards, from before Leviathan.
I closed the door behind me.
"Take a seat," she told me.
After I sat down across from her, she asked me to explain in details what happened. I relayed the night's events, as well as my suspicions that Coil was behind it.
"What worries me is that he would make an overt move like that," she said after I finished. "He doesn't strike me as the type who would kill a Ward as revenge for sharing his plan with us. The damage is already done, and it doesn't seem like him to draw unnecessary heat."
"He might be trying to retain plausible deniability by making it look like Shadow Stalker was working directly with Über and Leet," I pointed out. "I mean, we know they work for him, but we can't prove it, unless they confessed."
"Which would be hard since they managed to get away between the moment Assault was incapacitated and when the squad arrived as backup."
I nodded, having expected something like that.
"As for Coil," I continued, "it's possible that Dinah told him that his plan had better chances of succeeding with me dead. But if his only goal was to kill me, he could have teleported me a hundred feet into the air, or into a burning building, or had a squad of soldiers ready to fire as soon as I arrived. Which means that he had something to gain even if I didn't die, though I suppose that my death would have been a nice bonus."
I'd had the time to think it over on the way back to base, and involving Sophia just seemed like an inefficient way to kill me, especially when Dinah could predict the likely outcome. Sophia's presence made much more sense if it was all for spectacle, though I doubted she knew that. Just another pawn on his chessboard.
"That makes sense," Miss Militia said, frowning.
"I think this is a follow up to the Shadow Stalker leak," I told her. "He's creating a narrative and trying to undermine the PRT, especially after all the fanfare about me joining the Wards. The leak got attention all over the country, and so did my debut, which means that he's got a captive audience already. If he can generate enough public outrage against the local PRT, he might be able to force a restructuration and install one of his puppets as leader."
"Which means that he'd be looking to publicize the incident, then."
"I think the building had security cameras," I said. "I'm not one hundred percent sure, since I didn't exactly have much time to look around, but I think I caught a glimpse of one of them. He'll probably leak the footage and blame the PRT for failing to protect me from Shadow Stalker."
She picked up her phone to send a text message, presumably to Piggot. Once she was done, she leaned back into her chair, exhaling loudly.
"We almost certainly still have moles in our ranks, if he knew your patrolling schedule and route and even managed to get his hands on the protected data about your power," she said. "From now on, I'll communicate your schedule directly to you rather than through the memo, and I'll ask Déjà Vu to keep an eye out for you once her power comes back, in case Coil tries anything else. As a preventative measure, you will also be benched from confrontations with any of the parahumans in his organization, not just the Undersiders."
I nodded, and she continued.
"As for the footage, we'll have a response ready by the time it drops. We might also preemptively address the incident to short-circuit the narrative Coil is trying to push and point to him as the culprit. We'll see what the Director decides to do."
She clasped her hands together over the desk and leaned forward before speaking again.
"That was a rather eventful first patrol, and I have to ask. Do you feel comfortable enough to continue patrolling?"
"I do," I said.
I didn't want to stay cooped up inside on perpetual console duty and be treated like I was made of glass because of Coil and Shadow Stalker. Anyways, I doubted he would make another move against me until he had milked this incident for all it was worth, especially if I was right about his main target being Piggot. He might make another attempt later to hammer the point home and try to kill me again, but with Déjà Vu watching out for me…
It occurred to me that he might have engineered the events leading to her power being out of use tonight specifically so she couldn't warn us about the trap, and I shared the thought with Miss Militia.
"That's definitely possible," she said. "We're short-staffed until we get some transfers in, but I think I'll pull her from field work, so she can remain behind the scenes full time, watching out for Coil, coordinating the supply convoys and distribution to avoid attacks from the gangs, and anticipating situations where the Protectorate needs to deploy."
I nodded.
"I was wondering," I said. "Tonight, with Shadow Stalker, she wouldn't have been able to cut through my old spidersilk costume. Could I maybe wear it under the new one? At least, until I can finish the bodysuits I'm currently working on?"
"We'd have to check with Image, but I don't see why not, especially since this is a safety issue. You'll have to see Maureen anyways to get your costume repaired. I assume they issued you a few spares you can wear in the meantime?"
"Yeah."
"Good. If you're okay with it, I was also thinking of assigning you off the records to some of the supply convoy ride-alongs, since you can sense trouble coming like you did today. Coil has his own trucks bringing in supplies, and so far, the teams under him haven't attacked the convoys. It's mostly Hookwolf's group and the Archer's Bridge Merchants. Déjà Vu usually does some last minute adjustments to the schedule or trajectory, but we can't avoid all confrontations, especially when they happen near the delivery points. Your situational awareness would be useful to better coordinate our response, and would most likely allow Déjà Vu to make more detailed predictions."
"Okay," I answered.
"Good. Now, I also wanted to check in, to see how things are going for you," she said, "especially with the other Wards."
"It's fine," I answered, careful to keep my voice even. Kid Win and Vista can barely stand to be in the same room as me, but Clockblocker seems to be making an effort, probably because you asked him to as temporary leader. "I understand that it takes some getting used to from everyone, especially with their losses," I added, more honestly.
"I know things must be awkward, but that's only for a week or two until the transfers arrive."
It was the same thing Battery had said a few days ago, like it would solve all my problems. I doubted it would change much, especially if the Wards being transfered already knew the other Wards. I didn't say anything.
"Are you coming to the memorial's unveiling tomorrow?" She asked after a moment of silence. "I'll ask Déjà Vu to look out for trouble, to make sure Coil doesn't try anything, but the main concern is that the Nazis might try to hijack the event to celebrate Kaiser, and I'd like to have more than one set of eyes watching out."
"I will," I answered.
"Good. Have you been in contact with your father? I know he wanted to hear from you."
"We spoke on the phone yesterday."
"I'm glad. Well, that's it for now, but don't hesitate to reach out if there's anything."
"I will, thanks."
She gestured that I could go, and I did, heading to the elevator.
When I arrived to the Wards headquarters, the three others had already turned in for the night. I grabbed my pajamas and went to the showers to scrub off the crusted blood where my wounds used to be.
I was drying myself off when the alarm rang, announcing a visitor. Discreet bugs converged to them, and found a tall, muscular silhouette wearing armor and a visor. Armsmaster. He walked down the corridor and stopped in front of my room, knocking on the door.
I hurried to get dressed and leave the bathroom, to see what he wanted.
"Apiary," he greeted me as I arrived. "I have a new phone and earpiece for you, since yours are out of commission."
He handed them to me, and I went into my room to retrieve the old ones, then gave them to him.
"I also have this," he continued, giving me a small, cylindrical device the size of the key chain pepper spray my dad had gotten me when I started to run, with two buttons at the top.
"The red button triggers an emergency beacon," he explained. "In case you're ever stranded again without a working phone and in need of backup. It can also deliver a short distance EMP, in the event that you encounter another machine messing with your power. Just aim the bottom of the tube toward it and press the white button."
That was odd. Had he put this together just now? Not a gesture I would have expected from him, though I supposed he had to at least pretend to care about my safety now that we were on the same side.
"Thank you," I told him.
He left without another word.
The next morning, I went to see Maureen to deliver my tattered costume and ask about wearing my old suit beneath the new one.
"As long as it's just the bodysuit, I don't see any problem with that," she said, handing me the box with my old costume. "Don't tell Glenn, though. He'll see it as a metaphor."
I definitely wasn't planning to.
I went back down to the Wards headquarters to remove my costume and put my old bodysuit underneath, before putting the rest back on. Then, I went to the canteen to grab breakfast.
Before I could retreat to my room with my food, Clockblocker waved at me from the Wards' usual table, where he was sitting alone. Like me, he wore a domino mask to be able to eat. He was red-headed, I noted, with blue eyes.
"Kid Win and Vista aren't here?" I asked as I sat down across from him. I'd felt them leave the building while I was changing, and I doubted he would have waved me over if they'd been here.
"They had an errand to run before going to the memorial's unveiling," he answered.
I nodded, taking a sip of my coffee as he observed me.
"Are you okay?" He asked. "I heard about what happened last night."
"Panacea put me back together," I said, shrugging.
Would he try to bring up the bullying again? Awkward silence lingered as I tried to think of a way to deviate the conversation away from it, but I felt like an elephant in a minefield.
"I guess you were right about us not really knowing Shadow Stalker, huh," he spoke awkwardly.
I looked at him, searching for his intentions as he busied himself mixing his bowl of cereal.
"Only took you two assassination attempts to figure that out?" I asked him.
He grimaced.
"In my defense, the first time was presented without context, and you were a villain while she was a teammate. We're generally supposed not to immediately assume the worst about those."
I raised an eyebrow at that.
"Does that go for me too?"
He paused for a moment, eyebrows raised as he observed me, like he hadn't expected me to turn his statement against him.
"I guess it should," he finally said. "You're not what I expected."
"What did you expect?"
"I dunno. Someone more… villainous?" He said, gesturing vaguely with one hand. "The kind of person who would enjoy choking people with bugs?"
"We're all just people at the end of the day," I pointed out. "None of us rub our hands with glee at the thought of hurting others. Except maybe Coil and the Nazis."
And Shadow Stalker, though I didn't want to bring her up again.
"I suppose it's true," he conceded. "Still, it's hard to imagine the people we fight against being anything other than the image they project."
"That's the purpose of image."
His eyes dipped to my costume, then back to mine.
"Speaking of, Glenn doesn't seem to have scarred you too much?"
"We came to a compromise of sorts," I told him. "I'm fine with bees. They're versatile enough. Had to use the rest of my swarm in an unsanctioned maneuver when I got stranded without bees yesterday, but I don't think he'd blame me, given the circumstances."
"I thought your power was disabled?"
"Kind of. There was a machine broadcasting conflicting orders all over my range, canceling mine, but I managed to get away from it."
He nodded, then glanced at the clock on his wrist, and started shoveling cereal into his mouth.
"We'll be late if we don't hurry up," he explained between two spoonfuls.
I finished my bagel and coffee as he worked on his cereal, then we brought our trays and dishes to the rack in the corner and made our way down to the lobby.