- Location
- Canada
Hostage Situation [Worm AU Fanfic]
- Thread starter Ack
- Start date
-
- Tags
- worm panacea (worm)
girador
There are only four circles in this picture
- Location
- behind a screen
There was a reason that the man was constantly 1v4ing the Brigade and only got taken out when the brigade unknowingly attacked his daughter.
- Location
- Australia
If your bone is exposed (and once his bone spikes became part of their bones, they were) he can control it.
Canonically, he cut Lightstar's foot, then broke the bones in it.
TheatrclBarristr
Not a barrister
- Pronouns
- He/Him
At first I thought this was Bakuda setting off bombs trying to get to them. After your reply, I reread this and figured out this was the ABB folks screaming as his bone shards pierced them.
- Location
- Australia
Yes, that is correct. Hundreds of bone shards.
Part Thirteen: Luck is Where You Find It
- Location
- Australia
Hostage Situation
Part Thirteen: Luck is Where You Find It
[A/N 1: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]
Sunday Afternoon, April 17, 2011
Office of the Director, PRT ENE
As far as Emily Piggot was concerned, good news came in three flavours. First, there was the good news that stayed good. She'd never actually encountered any of that. Then, there was the good news that ended up just being 'news'. This was something she was somewhat more familiar with. And finally, there was the technically good news that still managed to leave a sour taste in the mouth.
The last type, she was extremely well acquainted with.
"Okay, from the top," she said, closing her eyes so she could hear Armsmaster's voice without having to look at the phone on the desk in front of her. "You say Lung is dead. What's the confirmation status on that one?"
"Seventy-five to ninety-five percent, depending on witness veracity." He, personally, sounded fairly sure of it. "The physical evidence is a metal ball four inches in diameter, showing signs of extreme gravitational stresses, and massing an estimated one point three five tons. I won't know for certain until we can get heavy machinery in to extricate the ball from the sidewalk. Analysis indicates organic matter inside the metal shell. No life signs detected. The metal itself matches the spectroscopic signature of Lung's scales."
"And you're saying Marquis did it?" This was going to be the sucky part.
"That's what the witnesses agree on. He did something—most of them aren't sure what—and Lung imploded. One statement says that it may have been a Bakuda bomb, implanted in an ABB minion's neck, that he tore out and threw at Lung, but the latter part of that is speculation on the minion's part, because he didn't personally witness it."
"Do you have an opinion on the matter?" She would form her own ideas, of course, but his input would be helpful to go on with.
"I'm inclined to believe it. There are two minions who are willing to testify that Bakuda implanted bombs in their necks and Marquis forcibly removed them, and several more who still have them, according to scans. Bakuda is capable of creating devices that do far more than just explode, so one that implodes is entirely plausible."
"And Bakuda herself is still alive." She wasn't sure how she felt about that.
Bakuda had been responsible for many deaths over the last few days, which put her on track to the Birdcage. Despite this being an effective death sentence, it still wasn't a kill order, so regulations had demanded they bring her in alive. It was a fine line to walk: if she'd been killed resisting arrest, there would've been no tears shed within the PRT building, but extrajudicial murder was not to be tolerated. While Emily disliked capes in general and despised villains in particular, that was a line she would never permit her people to cross.
"Correct. Immobilised until I arrived; Marquis had shot bone shards into her skeleton, and those of her minions. He used those to lock all their joints solid and cover over their eye-sockets. Once I tranquillised them, he reversed this process. Scans showed much of her equipment as Tinkertech, so I'll be studying it to see if I can shut down any dead-man switches she might've left active."
"The minions you've captured with bombs in their heads?" There was no way she was going to permit them in her building.
"We'll be holding them at Offsite Alpha, observing them remotely, until we know one way or the other." The Offsite locations were outside the city limits, guarded at a distance by troopers who knew the risks. Generally they were used for captured Tinkertech suspected of being unstable. A lot of Leet's gear had ended up there over the years.
"Probably for the best. And you managed to capture Oni Lee?" A feat she would've rated as being somewhere between 'ridiculous' and 'impossible', a day ago.
Armsmaster's tone managed to convey his agreement with this stance. "Marquis somehow trapped him in a box of bone with no direct line of sight outward. We pumped confoam in there, then tranquillised him. He was holding a live grenade with the pin out. If we'd done it the other way around, he would've died, but he possibly would've taken some of us with him."
Emily grimaced. The ABB assassin's intent was clear; if they'd just tried breaking open the box, he would've teleported at the first opportunity then released the grenade to kill his rescuers. He was that kind of asshole.
"Understood," she said, when he didn't offer any more details. "Keep me posted."
"Will do. Armsmaster, out." The call ended.
Emily heaved a ragged sigh as she leaned back in her chair. This shit never ends.
Sunday Evening; PRT Building Conference Room A
Coil
"I called this meeting to get you all up to speed on the Marquis situation, and to brainstorm potential solutions going forward." Emily Piggot gave the impression of someone who'd been mainlining caffeine for the last six hours and was entirely out of fucks to give, not a great combination for anyone facing her. "Before we start; does anyone here have any prior experience facing him? I took over here after he was put away."
Armsmaster raised his hand. "I fought him once, thirteen years ago. It ended … inconclusively. I didn't have the training or equipment I do now, but he was also younger and less experienced. I'm not sure how it would turn out if we fought again today."
Thomas hid his smirk. Translation: he handed me my ass, and he could probably do it again.
"I'm surprised you're alive to tell the tale." Holbrook, another strike squad commander, raised his eyebrows. "He's got a reputation for being an unrepentant murderer, after all."
Miss Militia cleared her throat. "Unrepentant, yes, but not indiscriminate. I've been reading his file. He clashed with the Brockton Bay Brigade on several occasions, defeating them each time except for the very last instance. On any of those occasions, he could easily have killed or permanently crippled one or more of them, but let them get away with minor injuries. And he was careful to hold back from harming or killing women or children."
"Great," Thomas sneered. "So, he only murders men, and only when he feels like it. I feel so much better now."
"Didn't he kill Iron Rain?" asked Triumph. "I heard somewhere that he did."
"There's a question mark over that in his file," Miss Militia said. "Apparently, a recent conversation he had with Alexandria has posited a secondary scenario, which also fits the situation at the time. But as he's the only witness to the events, and the new interpretation benefits him, we're taking it under consideration rather than adopting it without question."
The Director cleared her throat as a means of getting the meeting back on track. "We're not here to discuss his past misdeeds." Clear in her tone was the inference that such a discussion could go far into the night. "We need to work out a strategy for how to deal with the current problem. In case you hadn't heard yet, he more or less single-handedly captured Bakuda and Oni Lee today, and killed Lung."
"Murdered, you mean." Thomas wasn't usually one to insist on specific wording (unless it benefited him) but Marquis' presence in the city was not something he was comfortable with, and he had zero qualms about steering the discussion in a direction hostile to the bone manipulator. "Lung was Birdcage bound, but he didn't have a kill order."
Surprisingly, it was Piggot herself who shook her head. "Lethal force is permitted to save one's life, and to save others. Lung was, by all accounts, both ramped up and on a rampage. He attacked Marquis, and was threatening Panacea. Marquis used a Bakuda bomb to end him, which argues strongly against premeditation. As much as I hate to admit it, in this particular instance, he's actually in the clear."
And there was the elephant in the room. An uncomfortable silence fell, during which Thomas continued to research (in his other timeline) ways and means of dealing with Marquis.
Director Piggot
"So … we're absolutely certain Panacea is Marquis' daughter?" ventured Holbrook at last. "There's no doubt in the matter?"
"As certain as we can be without an actual DNA test, and Panacea has yet to agree to submit to one." Not that Emily had made the request as yet. She didn't want to alienate the girl any more than she absolutely had to, and she personally believed it was true anyway.
Everything would've been much simpler if he'd stayed in the Birdcage where he belonged, Panacea's little tantrum to the contrary. That hadn't happened. With him released, she'd done her best to keep that fact under wraps. Again, her wishes had been ignored by a capricious universe.
"Before we go any further," Miss Militia said, "I just want to make sure I'm on the same page as everyone else. Our primary aim here is to figure out a way to induce Panacea to voluntarily walk away from Marquis, correct? Once he no longer has her as a protector, he won't be able to dance between the raindrops."
Armsmaster didn't look thrilled at the idea. "The downside of her abandoning him is that he would then feel free to relaunch his villainous career. The man once faced down Jack Slash and made him leave town. Lung was about the only one of our current crop of villains that I would've seen as being able to beat him, and we saw how that went. Eleven years in the Birdcage hasn't slowed him down that I can see."
"Purity's a flying Blaster," protested Triumph. "How could he beat her?"
"He doesn't have to." Emily sighed. "She's friendly with Panacea and she's trying to distance herself from the Empire. If anything, they'd probably make common cause with one another and go after Kaiser together."
Calvert rubbed his chin. "Let's assume we can't convince Panacea to turn her back on him. What would he have to do, how badly would he have to break the law, for her to decide to abandon him of her own free will?" He looked around at the stares he was getting. "Hypothetically speaking, of course. We need to know what we're dealing with, here."
Emily wasn't sure what was going through Calvert's head, but she took the time to remind herself that the man was a snake and always would be one. "Well, hypothetically speaking, if anyone attempted to frame him for a crime he didn't commit, I would hypothetically hang that person out to dry." She met each person's eyes in turn, Calvert's last of all. "So long as we're going with hypothetical situations, of course."
As unpalatable as the Marquis situation was, the last thing she wanted was to have the local villains lose trust in the PRT to negotiate in good faith. While she would jump on any chance to have Marquis re-admitted to the Birdcage legally, she would damn well cross every T and dot every I on the way there.
"Of course," he agreed, so smoothly that she was almost willing to believe that she might've misread the subtext of his meaning. Whether she had or not, she wasn't going to take back what she'd just said. "But what do you think Panacea would allow him to get away with?"
"Anything he's legally allowed to do," Armsmaster said flatly. "Given the missteps we've gone through to get here, that's far more than it should be. But she's also asked him not to commit criminal acts and he's agreed not to, implying that if he goes back on his word, she's likely to lose faith in him."
Emily cleared her throat. "Which means that if we're going to put him back in the Birdcage, we need rock-solid evidence of him committing an unmistakeable felony that Panacea can't call entrapment on. And he needs to have actually done it. Anything short of that isn't going to fly. Are we all clear on this?"
Assault, who'd been leaning back without contributing until this point, sat forward. "Just gonna interject here. Isn't 'not framing someone' supposed to be the standard for deciding whether someone goes to the Birdcage? Or have things changed since I last checked the regulations?"
That generated a few uncomfortable looks around the room, but nobody spoke up against him. It wasn't as though he was in the wrong, after all. Emily's lips pursed as she checked her feelings against Marquis; she hated the man and everything he stood for, certainly, but not enough to break the law over.
"Nothing's changed." Her tone brooked no dissent. "You will, however, admit that the current situation is anything but normal. Marquis was legally sent to the Birdcage, and was released under highly irregular circumstances. By rights, he should be still in there."
"We're going to have to agree to disagree on that one." Assault's light tone belied the serious tone of his words. "He survived ten years in the world's touchiest pressure cooker, denied his Constitutional rights—"
"You and I both know the Supreme Court laid down the legal precedent—" she snapped, cutting off what she knew would otherwise be a lengthy rant.
He rose to his feet, shouting over her. "Because they were scared! They were weak! They feared losing control, so they went straight to fascism to snatch it back!"
"Assault, that's enough!" Armsmaster was standing now as well, even as Battery tried to pull her husband back down into his chair. "Stand down! You're out of order!"
"I'm not the one who's out of order here." But Assault had regained control of himself. His voice was still hard, but he was no longer shouting. "The Birdcage is nothing but a slow-motion death sentence. I know it, and you know it. The difference between you and me is that you're just fine with it." He stepped around his chair and headed for the door. "I need some air. The stink of self-righteous hypocrisy is really starting to irritate my sinuses."
"This doesn't get out to anyone." Emily didn't think he'd do anything stupid, but it had to be said. "Not a word."
He stopped at the door and half-turned to look back at her. "Oh, don't worry. I won't tell a soul that you're in here conspiring behind the back of a man who only got out because of his daughter's wish to know her biological father, seeking any kind of excuse by fair means or foul to send him back there. With the way bad news spreads in this city, I won't need to." Opening the door, he stepped through and closed it behind him, firmly enough that the table vibrated for a second.
Battery stood. "I'll go after him. Someone fill me in later?"
Velocity nodded. "Sure thing."
"Thanks." She darted out of the room, closing the door a little less harshly than Assault had.
Silence fell in the room once more, until Holbrook broke it. "So, I'm assuming we'll be going with some kind of surreptitious surveillance?"
Emily nodded jerkily, pleased that someone else had picked up the ball. "That's one of the stronger options we have. Armsmaster?"
"I can work something out reasonably quickly," he agreed. "Question: should I bring Dragon in on this? She's usually very good with remote units."
"Perhaps." She felt she'd answered too quickly, but that couldn't be helped now. Dragon had shown her views on potentially Birdcaging Panacea, but hopefully those didn't extend to sending Marquis back. "Just so long as she's aware that this is a precautionary measure only."
"I hate to have to suggest this …" Calvert's tone made it almost sound as though he were sincere, which she doubted on sheer principle. "… but what do we do if Panacea ends up being subverted by her father? He's reportedly very charismatic, and she's gone this far for him already. It wouldn't be the first time, or even the tenth, that a troubled hero has defected to the side of villainy."
"Jesus Christ." That was Triumph. "Don't even think about that. Panacea's solid. She's a hero."
"So was Fidelis." Velocity grimaced. It wasn't surprising he'd brought up that name; they shared a military background, after all. The cape originally known as Fidelis had been a Marine at one point, but her power had literally corrupted her to the point that she was now in the Birdcage, having rebranded under the name of Crock o' Shit.
"All the same." Calvert almost steepled his fingers like some fucking low-budget movie supervillain, but then he laced them together instead. "We have to remain aware of the possibility, and have some strategy in place to forestall the outcome if she does."
Emily took a deep breath. "I can't argue against that. If she did end up as a villain at his side, the whole city would be in trouble. But whatever we decide on, we can't jump the gun on it. With all the good she's done, she deserves the benefit of the doubt until we're absolutely certain about what's happening. Understood?"
This wasn't solely for Panacea's benefit, or even mostly so. While Dragon was in Emily's mind as being the most likely to be able to subdue a villainous Panacea, Emily hadn't forgotten the Canadian Tinker's views on unilaterally attacking the girl for something she might choose to do. Holding back until confirmation had been absolutely verified was a recipe for potential disaster, but Emily rarely got to pick and choose her battles these days, and this one had been lost before it began.
Coil
"Of course. I wouldn't have it any other way." Thomas wasn't one hundred percent sure that Piggot was buying his assurances, but it didn't much matter.
PRT strike squad commander Thomas Calvert wouldn't have anything to do with whatever happened to Panacea. While he'd occasionally considered that it would be nice to have her permanently on hand as his personal medic, he'd never actually gone into the dedicated planning required to place her under his thumb. Conversely, if she ever had to heal him in the normal run of affairs, there was a strong chance that she'd make him as a cape.
All of which simplified the math considerably.
Panacea was of no direct use to him, and her ongoing assistance to Marquis made her a liability. Murdering her father, however many attempts it took to get it right, might just trigger a city-killing rage, promoting her from 'liability' to 'mortal danger'. Fortunately, there was an obvious solution to both: the death of Panacea.
He wouldn't do the deed himself, of course, either in his villain persona or as Thomas Calvert. But he had mercenaries in his employ, a few of whom were adept snipers. Even then, it would not do to have a captured assassin admit who he was truly working for.
The man on the street had no particular problem with supervillains hiring people to commit the crimes of theft and murder (so long as it didn't happen to them personally); this was more or less accepted as what supervillains did. But becoming known as the man who'd put a hit on Panacea's head would surely place a target in the middle of his own back. Marquis would bend heaven and earth to get a line on him, and New Wave would quite likely work with the notorious villain toward that end. And once they got their hands on him, his continued survival would be a tricky business at best.
Far better to either ensure that his shooter either never got caught, or didn't live to tell what he knew if he did get caught. Never a sentimental man, Thomas decided to plan for the sniper's demise from the outset. Besides its utility in cutting off unwanted loose ends, this plan also allowed for him to plant false leads for the investigation that would inevitably follow.
None of his sniper-trained mercenaries had sufficiently Asian features to pass for members of the ABB, so that was a no-show from the start. It might be possible, he figured, to send in a sniper who could pass for an Empire Eighty-Eight sympathiser; the backlash against Kaiser and his cretins would be something Thomas could readily take advantage of. But the most insidious concept was the one that held his attention for the longest: what if he was carrying PRT ID?
As ridiculous as the notion initially sounded, he could see it actually working to his advantage, especially in the long run. There was always a vocal minority in the city who were willing to believe the worst of the PRT; they would eat this up with a spoon. But even among the PRT's more moderate supporters, there would be that secret niggling doubt.
The concept of Panacea being taken out of the picture by a PRT covert operative because of her support of Marquis wasn't totally unbelievable, especially given some of their past fuckups. Rumours would fly thick and fast across the city, and the court of public opinion would have a field day. Best of all, Piggot would be out.
Even if the Director was cleared of all involvement (difficult at best with Thomas and his moles deliberately muddying the waters), stringent questions would be asked about how she could possibly have missed something of this nature being planned in her own building. And in the unlikely case that she defended herself well enough to keep her position, one stranger in the crowd with a pistol could put her down for good. All the shooter had to do was shout 'This is for Panacea' before he pulled the trigger, and everyone would automatically assume they knew his motives. No scrutiny at all would fall on Commander Thomas Calvert, stepping into her position in the PRT's hour of need.
Everything was an opportunity, really. The trick lay in knowing how to pull the strings in the right direction.
Purity
Kayden relaxed on the sofa with Aster lying asleep beside her. All was right with her world.
The sound of water gurgling down the drain reached her ears, then Theo stepped out of the kitchen, drying his hands on a dishtowel. "I've finished washing the dishes," he said diffidently. "Is there anything else you wanted me to do?"
"Not right now." Kayden gestured to the armchair. "Come and sit down if you want. I've got to go out later and keep the pressure up on the ABB. If someone doesn't, Lung and Bakuda will think they can just keep …" She paused at the expression on his face. "What?"
"Hadn't you heard?" This was the most animated she'd seen him in some time. "I was looking online earlier, and they were saying that Lung's dead, and Bakuda and Oni Lee have been captured. PHO's going nuts over it. The PRT's being very close-mouthed, but nobody's actually saying it didn't happen, not even the usual ABB shills."
She blinked. "Lung's … dead? As in, actually deceased, not just beaten badly and crawled off to recover?" That last image didn't jibe with her understanding of Lung, but neither did the idea of someone being able to kill him. God knew she'd tried hard enough, every time they'd clashed.
"That's what they're saying." As far as she knew, Theo didn't share her views about how the Asian crime gang was so much worse than the Empire, but he definitely seemed happy about this. "I think the main reason the PRT is trying to sweep it under the carpet is that Marquis is the one who's supposed to have done it."
That was something else Kayden was still trying to get her head around. Panacea being Marquis' daughter was one thing—that particular revelation had given all of Amy's previous talk about her absentee villain father a lot more context—but the fact of him being out and about in Brockton Bay, released from the Birdcage by the PRT themselves, had been quite another. She'd been inclined to dismiss it as a hoax until she saw that the major news services were running with it.
When Brandish had responded to a news reporter's question on the matter with an extremely terse 'No comment', that had nailed it down for her. If he were still inside the Birdcage, New Wave would've wasted no time in broadcasting that fact. Instead, they were acting like someone had kicked all their puppies.
Her phone rang, and she picked it up before it could disturb Aster. "Hello?"
"Hello, Kayden. I presume you've heard the news about Lung's unfortunate passing?" Max barely bothered to hide the glee in his voice.
"Yes. Theo says Marquis was responsible." She kept her tone neutral along with her word choice, just in case there were unfriendly ears listening in. They'd been incautious during their last conversation, and she didn't wish to repeat the mistake. Also, she didn't actually want to give Max any kind of encouragement, even by accident.
"That's what I heard, too." He sounded slightly irritated, as though being robbed of the revelation was a personal slight. "If it's true, the city owes Marquis a debt of thanks. But have you heard the other news, about Panacea?"
She smiled to herself but didn't let it come through into her voice. If Max ever thought I was mocking him … she shuddered. Pass. "That she's his daughter? Yes, actually. It's certainly interesting news, but as far as I'm concerned, it's just more evidence that truth is stranger than fiction."
"Yes," he said patiently (or at least, patiently for him), "but it raises an interesting point. When Purity intervened with Saint to save Panacea's life, that put him in debt to her, wouldn't you think?"
She barely restrained herself from groaning out loud. He was really pushing the 'debt' angle, which was hypocritical as hell given that he only acknowledged his own obligations to people when it was convenient to him. "I'd imagine that would be a matter between the two of them. It's not like anyone who wasn't involved at the time would have a stake in the matter, don't you think?"
"If you say so." That was one of his more irritating phrases, indicating that he intended to undermine her meaning with weasel wording until it conformed with his version of matters. "The last time Marquis was in Brockton Bay, Allfather was still running the Empire Eighty-Eight. He's coming back into the city with minimal support and none of his old minions. If he's smart, he'll be forming an alliance with the strongest faction within the city."
Which of course meant the Empire Eighty-Eight, and thus Kaiser himself. Max could be amazingly subtle in some ways and about as blunt as a baseball bat to the face in others. Marquis had been a big player in the city at one point, and Max was certainly seeing the benefits of having such a well-known cape connected to the Empire by even the most tenuous of commitments.
"From what I've heard, he's not going back into being a villain." Kayden would've said something about hating to burst his bubble, but she didn't want to lie to him. "Panacea's asked him to give up crime, so that's what he's done."
"Still, a debt is a debt, and Marquis is by all accounts an honourable man." Max was nothing if not persistent. "If Purity happened to ask him to do a favour for an associate, surely he would feel duty bound to pay off his obligation to her."
"That's if she asked." She wanted to shut this down but wasn't sure how to do it without being openly rude to him, and she had no desire to open that particular can of worms. "Besides, I'm fairly certain she did it to save the girl, not to get into the father's good books."
"Any court of law will tell you that intent matters less than results." Although his voice was still smooth, she could tell he was starting to get impatient with her. "The deed was done. Saint was ready and willing to hurt or kill Panacea, and Purity saved her. If Marquis doesn't ally with someone before the next fanatic comes and takes his daughter hostage again, she may well end up dead this time. Wouldn't you agree that it only makes sense for him to work with the only people who have acted in his interest since his return?"
She wanted to tell him that he was really pushing the boundaries of plausible deniability, but that in itself would shatter the fragile illusion that they were spinning. "I have no idea, because I'm not him. Personally, I'd imagine that a reformed supervillain would do their best to keep away from any influences that might try to drag them back into the life. But that's just me."
"Let's face it." He didn't even bother acknowledging her point, probably because he didn't want to give it any kind of legitimacy. "In today's climate, any villain who tries to rebrand as a rogue or a hero is only fooling themselves. Nobody's going to cut them any kind of slack. The PRT will be waiting for him to make one wrong step, and that's if they don't manufacture some kind of wrongdoing to catch him on. To be honest, I would not be in the slightest bit surprised to learn that the PRT is actively discussing ways to separate Marquis from his daughter, so as to more easily bring him down when the time comes to lower the boom."
Her eyes narrowed. She'd heard that phrasing before, and it had always preceded something he'd learned from one of his moles within the PRT. "I … see. Wouldn't that look bad for them, if it got out?"
"Well, first it would have to be proven. And even if it was, half the public would refuse to believe it, and most of the remainder would say 'good'. After all, a villain is a villain, and doesn't really deserve the same civil rights as good solid upstanding citizens." Now Max's tone was entirely sarcastic. "And these are the same people that Purity is risking life and limb to try to be a hero for."
Kayden set her jaw. "I don't care. Now that Lung's dead and the others are in captivity, this is her chance to mop up the ABB once and for all."
She could tell that Max was smiling in that irritating way he had. "Wherever she is, I wish her luck." Before she could retort, he ended the call.
Hand clenched around the phone, she carefully put it down. Max could always get under her skin, even when she was determined not to let him put her on the back foot.
"Are you okay?" Theo was looking at her with concern in his eyes. If anyone knew what it was like to have her ex screwing with their head, it was her stepson.
"Yes. No." She grimaced. "Your father wants to make overtures to Marquis, and he's trying to recruit me to do it for him."
Theo looked doubtful in the extreme. "Panacea's a hero. Would she even agree to something like that?"
"I wouldn't have thought so." She paused to run her hand through her hair. "But he made a very good point. Saint's just the first idiot to try to use her as a hostage to get other prisoners out of the Birdcage. If Marquis cares about her as much as I do about Aster, he's going to want to protect her."
"And my father wants you to pitch the Empire as potential protectors," Theo guessed, accurately enough. "What are you going to do?"
"The only thing I can." Kayden picked up the phone again, and looked around. "Pass me my handbag, please?" The card with the number she needed was in there.
A Little Later That Night
Panacea
"Is this really a good idea?" Vicky sounded grumpy. Unsurprisingly so; I'd called her after I got off the line with Kayden, and interrupted her plans to go and see Dean. When she'd heard what was going on, she'd given him a raincheck and come straight over. This didn't mean she was happy with the situation, or anything close to it.
"There is much about this situation that's potentially very bad," Dad noted. "The worst idea possible would be to ignore it and assume everything will turn out for the best. Purity helped save your sister, so we owe her the courtesy of hearing her out."
We'd changed locations for the occasion, going down to the Boardwalk and finding a picnic table to sit and look out over the ocean, anonymous in the evening crowd. Vicky wore a hoodie while I just rocked my usual outfit. Not one person in ten recognised me out of costume anyway; the moronic bank robbery had proven that. Even the Undersiders' so-called psychic bullshit artiste hadn't picked me out of the crowd.
"Well, should we be out in public like this?" Vicky persisted. "You're already a known villain, but if Ames and me were seen meeting with Purity in public, Mom would spontaneously develop the power to bring people back from the dead, so just she could kill us several times over."
I sighed, aggravated. "I told you, she'll be meeting with us out of costume. And don't forget, you pinky-swore not to out her."
Dad chuckled warmly. "Ah, yes, that most binding of oaths."
I stuck my tongue out at him as Vicky said, "It is, between us." She looked around. "Where is she, anyway? And if you trust her that much, why am I here? It can't be as muscle."
Just at that moment, I spotted Kayden. This time she was without Aster, but wearing the same smart clothing as before. Looking at her, nobody would've picked her as the airborne Blaster who'd been one of the Empire's biggest hitters for years.
"Not muscle," I said quietly. "As a witness, so if there's anything I need to tell Carol, you can back me up." I waved to Kayden; a moment later, she spotted me and came over.
"Oh." Vicky nodded. "I guess that makes sense." She'd had a crash course in The Universe According To Carol Dallon recently, and didn't bother claiming that I needed no such witness. Which was good, because me bursting into laughter would've confused Kayden considerably.
"Hello, Amy." Kayden stopped a few paces away. "Marquis, I presume and … Glory Girl?" She didn't back away, but I saw her tense up.
"Patrick Matheson." Dad half-rose from his seat as he introduced himself. "Or at least, that's what my new ID papers say. Amelia Claire, you already know. Her sister, Miss Dallon, is here to observe and act as an impartial witness to our conversation. Please, sit down. You have my word that there will be no undue hostilities."
Vicky nodded. "Yeah, what he said. And I wanted to thank you again for helping me save Ames from that asshole." She snorted. "There wasn't enough of him left to fit in a teacup."
"Well, that was my general plan." Kayden relaxed enough to sit down opposite Vicky, next to me. "I wasn't about to give him the chance to get off one last screw-you shot."
"Which he would've taken, if he could." Dad reached diagonally across the table and shook her hand briefly. "You did an exemplary job of removing the threat. However, you did not contact Amelia on a whim. What news did you have that is so important that you wanted a face-to-face meeting?"
Kayden took a deep breath. "Well, Kaiser called me earlier this evening …"
Glory Girl
"… and so I called you." Purity—if Vicky hadn't spoken to her on the night they saved Amy, she would've had trouble believing the petite mousy woman was her—rounded out her tale. "While Kaiser is a narcissist and an egomaniac of the highest degree, I don't believe he was lying about any of it. And I also think he's not wrong about you being under threat from fanatics."
Amy looked pensive. "I was warned about this possibility by Director Piggot and others."
"Well, how many Teacher stooges are there out there anyway?" Vicky demanded. "I can and will punch them out as needed."
"That won't be necessary," Amy's dad said blandly. "I had words with him following Saint's … craterisation. He refused to see reason, and his existence was an ongoing threat to Amelia's wellbeing. So, I ended the threat."
Amy didn't seem overly troubled by the news, and Purity actually gave him an approving nod. "Wait," Vicky objected. "You murdered him?"
"No, I ended the threat." Marquis repeated his words in exactly the same tone. "It could not be murder, because outside laws do not apply within the Birdcage. I had no recourse to any higher authority to take him in hand, and if he'd managed to contact any of his thralls outside the facility, they would've indeed been willing to repeat the whole sorry scenario again. So, I made certain it would not happen a second time, in the only way I could be certain of it."
"Vicky, enough." Amy kicked her under the table. "Dad said the problem was dealt with, and it's not like we can wind back the clock. Dad, do you think anyone else might try it?"
Marquis frowned, running his thumb and forefinger over his chin. "There are other capes in the Birdcage who have students of a sort out in the world. I don't recall hearing of any with the same level of brainwashing or devotion that Teacher's people had, though."
"Me neither," Purity said. "But that doesn't mean anything. We'll call that a tentative maybe, for now. How about the other problem? The PRT?"
"I still have trouble believing that bit," Vicky interjected. "I know the PRT. It's their job to uphold the law. They've got whole rules and regulations about it."
Marquis raised one eyebrow in a totally bullshit move that Vicky still wasn't able to pull off in the mirror. "That, my dear, is because you've never been opposed by them. They will of course play by the rules when dealing with capes that they approve of. When it comes to the opposition, however, the exact rules and regulations have been known to go by the wayside when it comes to apprehending a problematic target."
"Yeah." Amy spread her hands. "Remember what we were talking about at Dad's house before we dug up that … well, before we did that digging? Carol and Mark and the others would never have beaten Dad if they didn't pull the bullshit they did, and they didn't even know I was there until the fight was basically over and done. Dad had to throw himself in the way of a shot to make sure I was okay."
"But that wasn't the PRT," objected Vicky. "Sure, that was Mom and Dad and Aunt Sarah and the others, but they didn't know you were there. It wasn't like they were deliberately targeting you to force Dad to surrender."
"They essentially were, but without knowing what, or rather, who was in that closet," Marquis corrected her. "They just knew that I valued whatever was beyond that door. But we were speaking of the shortcomings of the PRT, not of the Brockton Bay Brigade."
"Yeah." Amy tapped the table with her finger. "Did the PRT penalise the Brigade for playing fast and loose with the rules, and for endangering a minor? Hell, did they even try to take me away from the team who'd kidnapped me from my father? Nope. They just rubbed their hands together because they'd finally caught Marquis, and ignored the rest of the bullshit that was being pulled under their noses."
"And I suspect the current crop aren't altogether different in attitude," Marquis observed. "While there are a few sticklers for the rules here and there, the vast majority feel so overwhelmed by the new villains arising everywhere that they're willing to overlook a few irregularities here and there, so long as the desired results are arrived at. Which means that if we were to seek any kind of protection for you from the encroaching threat, we would have to look toward some other place than the PRT."
Vicky frowned. "You're Panacea. Surely they'd protect you."
"But they'd separate me from my dad at the first opportunity," Amy pointed out. "And there would be endless excuses as to why I couldn't see him right then. Once they had us apart, they'd bend the regulations into a pretzel to figure out a reason to put him back that they'd be able to spin as 'he broke the law', so I wouldn't go on a permanent healing strike."
"Okay, um, how about New Wave?" Vicky offered. "We can totally protect you."
"New Wave captured him, back in the day," Purity reminded her. "You may be on good terms with him but having faced your mother a few times across the battlefield, I will gladly tell you without any kind of bias that she never lets go of a grievance. And if she was initially opposed to his release, well …" She let her voice trail off.
"She's not wrong," Amy agreed, while Marquis nodded along. "Carol does grudges really, really well."
"So where can you go for protection then?" asked Vicky. "Not the Empire Eighty-Eight. You'd never hear the end of it. I'd never hear the end of it, just from being nearby."
"No, not the Empire," Marquis' tone was definite. "I dislike their core beliefs, as much as they have core beliefs, and Kaiser is indeed a narcissistic egomaniac. We might last a week before I'd be forced to kill him, but that's being optimistic."
"If you killed Kaiser, then the entire Empire would be out for your blood," Purity warned. "Even with me gone, they have a lot of big hitters, and they'd all be wanting to prove their leadership potential by killing you."
Marquis looked thoughtful. "That might be an interesting fight. I wouldn't endanger Amelia Claire that way, of course, and no doubt some of them would attempt to take her hostage."
"Or just kill her, to fuck with you." Vicky was pretty sure she knew what she was talking about. "There are some total assholes in that bunch."
Purity nodded. "I can't argue with that. The trouble is, we've basically ruled out everyone you can go to for protection. So, what are you going to do?"
"I have half an idea, but I don't know how you'll go for it," Amy began.
Vicky looked at her curiously. "If it's better than the alternatives, we're listening."
"Indeed," Marquis agreed.
Amy took a deep breath. "Dad … Kayden … why don't we team up together?"
As Marquis and Purity stared at each other and then at Amy, Vicky found herself undergoing a presentiment of the future. One that involved a lot of yelling.
Mom is going to go fucking batshit.
End of Part Thirteen
Part Thirteen: Luck is Where You Find It
[A/N 1: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]
Sunday Afternoon, April 17, 2011
Office of the Director, PRT ENE
As far as Emily Piggot was concerned, good news came in three flavours. First, there was the good news that stayed good. She'd never actually encountered any of that. Then, there was the good news that ended up just being 'news'. This was something she was somewhat more familiar with. And finally, there was the technically good news that still managed to leave a sour taste in the mouth.
The last type, she was extremely well acquainted with.
"Okay, from the top," she said, closing her eyes so she could hear Armsmaster's voice without having to look at the phone on the desk in front of her. "You say Lung is dead. What's the confirmation status on that one?"
"Seventy-five to ninety-five percent, depending on witness veracity." He, personally, sounded fairly sure of it. "The physical evidence is a metal ball four inches in diameter, showing signs of extreme gravitational stresses, and massing an estimated one point three five tons. I won't know for certain until we can get heavy machinery in to extricate the ball from the sidewalk. Analysis indicates organic matter inside the metal shell. No life signs detected. The metal itself matches the spectroscopic signature of Lung's scales."
"And you're saying Marquis did it?" This was going to be the sucky part.
"That's what the witnesses agree on. He did something—most of them aren't sure what—and Lung imploded. One statement says that it may have been a Bakuda bomb, implanted in an ABB minion's neck, that he tore out and threw at Lung, but the latter part of that is speculation on the minion's part, because he didn't personally witness it."
"Do you have an opinion on the matter?" She would form her own ideas, of course, but his input would be helpful to go on with.
"I'm inclined to believe it. There are two minions who are willing to testify that Bakuda implanted bombs in their necks and Marquis forcibly removed them, and several more who still have them, according to scans. Bakuda is capable of creating devices that do far more than just explode, so one that implodes is entirely plausible."
"And Bakuda herself is still alive." She wasn't sure how she felt about that.
Bakuda had been responsible for many deaths over the last few days, which put her on track to the Birdcage. Despite this being an effective death sentence, it still wasn't a kill order, so regulations had demanded they bring her in alive. It was a fine line to walk: if she'd been killed resisting arrest, there would've been no tears shed within the PRT building, but extrajudicial murder was not to be tolerated. While Emily disliked capes in general and despised villains in particular, that was a line she would never permit her people to cross.
"Correct. Immobilised until I arrived; Marquis had shot bone shards into her skeleton, and those of her minions. He used those to lock all their joints solid and cover over their eye-sockets. Once I tranquillised them, he reversed this process. Scans showed much of her equipment as Tinkertech, so I'll be studying it to see if I can shut down any dead-man switches she might've left active."
"The minions you've captured with bombs in their heads?" There was no way she was going to permit them in her building.
"We'll be holding them at Offsite Alpha, observing them remotely, until we know one way or the other." The Offsite locations were outside the city limits, guarded at a distance by troopers who knew the risks. Generally they were used for captured Tinkertech suspected of being unstable. A lot of Leet's gear had ended up there over the years.
"Probably for the best. And you managed to capture Oni Lee?" A feat she would've rated as being somewhere between 'ridiculous' and 'impossible', a day ago.
Armsmaster's tone managed to convey his agreement with this stance. "Marquis somehow trapped him in a box of bone with no direct line of sight outward. We pumped confoam in there, then tranquillised him. He was holding a live grenade with the pin out. If we'd done it the other way around, he would've died, but he possibly would've taken some of us with him."
Emily grimaced. The ABB assassin's intent was clear; if they'd just tried breaking open the box, he would've teleported at the first opportunity then released the grenade to kill his rescuers. He was that kind of asshole.
"Understood," she said, when he didn't offer any more details. "Keep me posted."
"Will do. Armsmaster, out." The call ended.
Emily heaved a ragged sigh as she leaned back in her chair. This shit never ends.
<><>
Sunday Evening; PRT Building Conference Room A
Coil
"I called this meeting to get you all up to speed on the Marquis situation, and to brainstorm potential solutions going forward." Emily Piggot gave the impression of someone who'd been mainlining caffeine for the last six hours and was entirely out of fucks to give, not a great combination for anyone facing her. "Before we start; does anyone here have any prior experience facing him? I took over here after he was put away."
Armsmaster raised his hand. "I fought him once, thirteen years ago. It ended … inconclusively. I didn't have the training or equipment I do now, but he was also younger and less experienced. I'm not sure how it would turn out if we fought again today."
Thomas hid his smirk. Translation: he handed me my ass, and he could probably do it again.
"I'm surprised you're alive to tell the tale." Holbrook, another strike squad commander, raised his eyebrows. "He's got a reputation for being an unrepentant murderer, after all."
Miss Militia cleared her throat. "Unrepentant, yes, but not indiscriminate. I've been reading his file. He clashed with the Brockton Bay Brigade on several occasions, defeating them each time except for the very last instance. On any of those occasions, he could easily have killed or permanently crippled one or more of them, but let them get away with minor injuries. And he was careful to hold back from harming or killing women or children."
"Great," Thomas sneered. "So, he only murders men, and only when he feels like it. I feel so much better now."
"Didn't he kill Iron Rain?" asked Triumph. "I heard somewhere that he did."
"There's a question mark over that in his file," Miss Militia said. "Apparently, a recent conversation he had with Alexandria has posited a secondary scenario, which also fits the situation at the time. But as he's the only witness to the events, and the new interpretation benefits him, we're taking it under consideration rather than adopting it without question."
The Director cleared her throat as a means of getting the meeting back on track. "We're not here to discuss his past misdeeds." Clear in her tone was the inference that such a discussion could go far into the night. "We need to work out a strategy for how to deal with the current problem. In case you hadn't heard yet, he more or less single-handedly captured Bakuda and Oni Lee today, and killed Lung."
"Murdered, you mean." Thomas wasn't usually one to insist on specific wording (unless it benefited him) but Marquis' presence in the city was not something he was comfortable with, and he had zero qualms about steering the discussion in a direction hostile to the bone manipulator. "Lung was Birdcage bound, but he didn't have a kill order."
Surprisingly, it was Piggot herself who shook her head. "Lethal force is permitted to save one's life, and to save others. Lung was, by all accounts, both ramped up and on a rampage. He attacked Marquis, and was threatening Panacea. Marquis used a Bakuda bomb to end him, which argues strongly against premeditation. As much as I hate to admit it, in this particular instance, he's actually in the clear."
And there was the elephant in the room. An uncomfortable silence fell, during which Thomas continued to research (in his other timeline) ways and means of dealing with Marquis.
<><>
Director Piggot
"So … we're absolutely certain Panacea is Marquis' daughter?" ventured Holbrook at last. "There's no doubt in the matter?"
"As certain as we can be without an actual DNA test, and Panacea has yet to agree to submit to one." Not that Emily had made the request as yet. She didn't want to alienate the girl any more than she absolutely had to, and she personally believed it was true anyway.
Everything would've been much simpler if he'd stayed in the Birdcage where he belonged, Panacea's little tantrum to the contrary. That hadn't happened. With him released, she'd done her best to keep that fact under wraps. Again, her wishes had been ignored by a capricious universe.
"Before we go any further," Miss Militia said, "I just want to make sure I'm on the same page as everyone else. Our primary aim here is to figure out a way to induce Panacea to voluntarily walk away from Marquis, correct? Once he no longer has her as a protector, he won't be able to dance between the raindrops."
Armsmaster didn't look thrilled at the idea. "The downside of her abandoning him is that he would then feel free to relaunch his villainous career. The man once faced down Jack Slash and made him leave town. Lung was about the only one of our current crop of villains that I would've seen as being able to beat him, and we saw how that went. Eleven years in the Birdcage hasn't slowed him down that I can see."
"Purity's a flying Blaster," protested Triumph. "How could he beat her?"
"He doesn't have to." Emily sighed. "She's friendly with Panacea and she's trying to distance herself from the Empire. If anything, they'd probably make common cause with one another and go after Kaiser together."
Calvert rubbed his chin. "Let's assume we can't convince Panacea to turn her back on him. What would he have to do, how badly would he have to break the law, for her to decide to abandon him of her own free will?" He looked around at the stares he was getting. "Hypothetically speaking, of course. We need to know what we're dealing with, here."
Emily wasn't sure what was going through Calvert's head, but she took the time to remind herself that the man was a snake and always would be one. "Well, hypothetically speaking, if anyone attempted to frame him for a crime he didn't commit, I would hypothetically hang that person out to dry." She met each person's eyes in turn, Calvert's last of all. "So long as we're going with hypothetical situations, of course."
As unpalatable as the Marquis situation was, the last thing she wanted was to have the local villains lose trust in the PRT to negotiate in good faith. While she would jump on any chance to have Marquis re-admitted to the Birdcage legally, she would damn well cross every T and dot every I on the way there.
"Of course," he agreed, so smoothly that she was almost willing to believe that she might've misread the subtext of his meaning. Whether she had or not, she wasn't going to take back what she'd just said. "But what do you think Panacea would allow him to get away with?"
"Anything he's legally allowed to do," Armsmaster said flatly. "Given the missteps we've gone through to get here, that's far more than it should be. But she's also asked him not to commit criminal acts and he's agreed not to, implying that if he goes back on his word, she's likely to lose faith in him."
Emily cleared her throat. "Which means that if we're going to put him back in the Birdcage, we need rock-solid evidence of him committing an unmistakeable felony that Panacea can't call entrapment on. And he needs to have actually done it. Anything short of that isn't going to fly. Are we all clear on this?"
Assault, who'd been leaning back without contributing until this point, sat forward. "Just gonna interject here. Isn't 'not framing someone' supposed to be the standard for deciding whether someone goes to the Birdcage? Or have things changed since I last checked the regulations?"
That generated a few uncomfortable looks around the room, but nobody spoke up against him. It wasn't as though he was in the wrong, after all. Emily's lips pursed as she checked her feelings against Marquis; she hated the man and everything he stood for, certainly, but not enough to break the law over.
"Nothing's changed." Her tone brooked no dissent. "You will, however, admit that the current situation is anything but normal. Marquis was legally sent to the Birdcage, and was released under highly irregular circumstances. By rights, he should be still in there."
"We're going to have to agree to disagree on that one." Assault's light tone belied the serious tone of his words. "He survived ten years in the world's touchiest pressure cooker, denied his Constitutional rights—"
"You and I both know the Supreme Court laid down the legal precedent—" she snapped, cutting off what she knew would otherwise be a lengthy rant.
He rose to his feet, shouting over her. "Because they were scared! They were weak! They feared losing control, so they went straight to fascism to snatch it back!"
"Assault, that's enough!" Armsmaster was standing now as well, even as Battery tried to pull her husband back down into his chair. "Stand down! You're out of order!"
"I'm not the one who's out of order here." But Assault had regained control of himself. His voice was still hard, but he was no longer shouting. "The Birdcage is nothing but a slow-motion death sentence. I know it, and you know it. The difference between you and me is that you're just fine with it." He stepped around his chair and headed for the door. "I need some air. The stink of self-righteous hypocrisy is really starting to irritate my sinuses."
"This doesn't get out to anyone." Emily didn't think he'd do anything stupid, but it had to be said. "Not a word."
He stopped at the door and half-turned to look back at her. "Oh, don't worry. I won't tell a soul that you're in here conspiring behind the back of a man who only got out because of his daughter's wish to know her biological father, seeking any kind of excuse by fair means or foul to send him back there. With the way bad news spreads in this city, I won't need to." Opening the door, he stepped through and closed it behind him, firmly enough that the table vibrated for a second.
Battery stood. "I'll go after him. Someone fill me in later?"
Velocity nodded. "Sure thing."
"Thanks." She darted out of the room, closing the door a little less harshly than Assault had.
Silence fell in the room once more, until Holbrook broke it. "So, I'm assuming we'll be going with some kind of surreptitious surveillance?"
Emily nodded jerkily, pleased that someone else had picked up the ball. "That's one of the stronger options we have. Armsmaster?"
"I can work something out reasonably quickly," he agreed. "Question: should I bring Dragon in on this? She's usually very good with remote units."
"Perhaps." She felt she'd answered too quickly, but that couldn't be helped now. Dragon had shown her views on potentially Birdcaging Panacea, but hopefully those didn't extend to sending Marquis back. "Just so long as she's aware that this is a precautionary measure only."
"I hate to have to suggest this …" Calvert's tone made it almost sound as though he were sincere, which she doubted on sheer principle. "… but what do we do if Panacea ends up being subverted by her father? He's reportedly very charismatic, and she's gone this far for him already. It wouldn't be the first time, or even the tenth, that a troubled hero has defected to the side of villainy."
"Jesus Christ." That was Triumph. "Don't even think about that. Panacea's solid. She's a hero."
"So was Fidelis." Velocity grimaced. It wasn't surprising he'd brought up that name; they shared a military background, after all. The cape originally known as Fidelis had been a Marine at one point, but her power had literally corrupted her to the point that she was now in the Birdcage, having rebranded under the name of Crock o' Shit.
"All the same." Calvert almost steepled his fingers like some fucking low-budget movie supervillain, but then he laced them together instead. "We have to remain aware of the possibility, and have some strategy in place to forestall the outcome if she does."
Emily took a deep breath. "I can't argue against that. If she did end up as a villain at his side, the whole city would be in trouble. But whatever we decide on, we can't jump the gun on it. With all the good she's done, she deserves the benefit of the doubt until we're absolutely certain about what's happening. Understood?"
This wasn't solely for Panacea's benefit, or even mostly so. While Dragon was in Emily's mind as being the most likely to be able to subdue a villainous Panacea, Emily hadn't forgotten the Canadian Tinker's views on unilaterally attacking the girl for something she might choose to do. Holding back until confirmation had been absolutely verified was a recipe for potential disaster, but Emily rarely got to pick and choose her battles these days, and this one had been lost before it began.
<><>
Coil
"Of course. I wouldn't have it any other way." Thomas wasn't one hundred percent sure that Piggot was buying his assurances, but it didn't much matter.
PRT strike squad commander Thomas Calvert wouldn't have anything to do with whatever happened to Panacea. While he'd occasionally considered that it would be nice to have her permanently on hand as his personal medic, he'd never actually gone into the dedicated planning required to place her under his thumb. Conversely, if she ever had to heal him in the normal run of affairs, there was a strong chance that she'd make him as a cape.
All of which simplified the math considerably.
Panacea was of no direct use to him, and her ongoing assistance to Marquis made her a liability. Murdering her father, however many attempts it took to get it right, might just trigger a city-killing rage, promoting her from 'liability' to 'mortal danger'. Fortunately, there was an obvious solution to both: the death of Panacea.
He wouldn't do the deed himself, of course, either in his villain persona or as Thomas Calvert. But he had mercenaries in his employ, a few of whom were adept snipers. Even then, it would not do to have a captured assassin admit who he was truly working for.
The man on the street had no particular problem with supervillains hiring people to commit the crimes of theft and murder (so long as it didn't happen to them personally); this was more or less accepted as what supervillains did. But becoming known as the man who'd put a hit on Panacea's head would surely place a target in the middle of his own back. Marquis would bend heaven and earth to get a line on him, and New Wave would quite likely work with the notorious villain toward that end. And once they got their hands on him, his continued survival would be a tricky business at best.
Far better to either ensure that his shooter either never got caught, or didn't live to tell what he knew if he did get caught. Never a sentimental man, Thomas decided to plan for the sniper's demise from the outset. Besides its utility in cutting off unwanted loose ends, this plan also allowed for him to plant false leads for the investigation that would inevitably follow.
None of his sniper-trained mercenaries had sufficiently Asian features to pass for members of the ABB, so that was a no-show from the start. It might be possible, he figured, to send in a sniper who could pass for an Empire Eighty-Eight sympathiser; the backlash against Kaiser and his cretins would be something Thomas could readily take advantage of. But the most insidious concept was the one that held his attention for the longest: what if he was carrying PRT ID?
As ridiculous as the notion initially sounded, he could see it actually working to his advantage, especially in the long run. There was always a vocal minority in the city who were willing to believe the worst of the PRT; they would eat this up with a spoon. But even among the PRT's more moderate supporters, there would be that secret niggling doubt.
The concept of Panacea being taken out of the picture by a PRT covert operative because of her support of Marquis wasn't totally unbelievable, especially given some of their past fuckups. Rumours would fly thick and fast across the city, and the court of public opinion would have a field day. Best of all, Piggot would be out.
Even if the Director was cleared of all involvement (difficult at best with Thomas and his moles deliberately muddying the waters), stringent questions would be asked about how she could possibly have missed something of this nature being planned in her own building. And in the unlikely case that she defended herself well enough to keep her position, one stranger in the crowd with a pistol could put her down for good. All the shooter had to do was shout 'This is for Panacea' before he pulled the trigger, and everyone would automatically assume they knew his motives. No scrutiny at all would fall on Commander Thomas Calvert, stepping into her position in the PRT's hour of need.
Everything was an opportunity, really. The trick lay in knowing how to pull the strings in the right direction.
<><>
Purity
Kayden relaxed on the sofa with Aster lying asleep beside her. All was right with her world.
The sound of water gurgling down the drain reached her ears, then Theo stepped out of the kitchen, drying his hands on a dishtowel. "I've finished washing the dishes," he said diffidently. "Is there anything else you wanted me to do?"
"Not right now." Kayden gestured to the armchair. "Come and sit down if you want. I've got to go out later and keep the pressure up on the ABB. If someone doesn't, Lung and Bakuda will think they can just keep …" She paused at the expression on his face. "What?"
"Hadn't you heard?" This was the most animated she'd seen him in some time. "I was looking online earlier, and they were saying that Lung's dead, and Bakuda and Oni Lee have been captured. PHO's going nuts over it. The PRT's being very close-mouthed, but nobody's actually saying it didn't happen, not even the usual ABB shills."
She blinked. "Lung's … dead? As in, actually deceased, not just beaten badly and crawled off to recover?" That last image didn't jibe with her understanding of Lung, but neither did the idea of someone being able to kill him. God knew she'd tried hard enough, every time they'd clashed.
"That's what they're saying." As far as she knew, Theo didn't share her views about how the Asian crime gang was so much worse than the Empire, but he definitely seemed happy about this. "I think the main reason the PRT is trying to sweep it under the carpet is that Marquis is the one who's supposed to have done it."
That was something else Kayden was still trying to get her head around. Panacea being Marquis' daughter was one thing—that particular revelation had given all of Amy's previous talk about her absentee villain father a lot more context—but the fact of him being out and about in Brockton Bay, released from the Birdcage by the PRT themselves, had been quite another. She'd been inclined to dismiss it as a hoax until she saw that the major news services were running with it.
When Brandish had responded to a news reporter's question on the matter with an extremely terse 'No comment', that had nailed it down for her. If he were still inside the Birdcage, New Wave would've wasted no time in broadcasting that fact. Instead, they were acting like someone had kicked all their puppies.
Her phone rang, and she picked it up before it could disturb Aster. "Hello?"
"Hello, Kayden. I presume you've heard the news about Lung's unfortunate passing?" Max barely bothered to hide the glee in his voice.
"Yes. Theo says Marquis was responsible." She kept her tone neutral along with her word choice, just in case there were unfriendly ears listening in. They'd been incautious during their last conversation, and she didn't wish to repeat the mistake. Also, she didn't actually want to give Max any kind of encouragement, even by accident.
"That's what I heard, too." He sounded slightly irritated, as though being robbed of the revelation was a personal slight. "If it's true, the city owes Marquis a debt of thanks. But have you heard the other news, about Panacea?"
She smiled to herself but didn't let it come through into her voice. If Max ever thought I was mocking him … she shuddered. Pass. "That she's his daughter? Yes, actually. It's certainly interesting news, but as far as I'm concerned, it's just more evidence that truth is stranger than fiction."
"Yes," he said patiently (or at least, patiently for him), "but it raises an interesting point. When Purity intervened with Saint to save Panacea's life, that put him in debt to her, wouldn't you think?"
She barely restrained herself from groaning out loud. He was really pushing the 'debt' angle, which was hypocritical as hell given that he only acknowledged his own obligations to people when it was convenient to him. "I'd imagine that would be a matter between the two of them. It's not like anyone who wasn't involved at the time would have a stake in the matter, don't you think?"
"If you say so." That was one of his more irritating phrases, indicating that he intended to undermine her meaning with weasel wording until it conformed with his version of matters. "The last time Marquis was in Brockton Bay, Allfather was still running the Empire Eighty-Eight. He's coming back into the city with minimal support and none of his old minions. If he's smart, he'll be forming an alliance with the strongest faction within the city."
Which of course meant the Empire Eighty-Eight, and thus Kaiser himself. Max could be amazingly subtle in some ways and about as blunt as a baseball bat to the face in others. Marquis had been a big player in the city at one point, and Max was certainly seeing the benefits of having such a well-known cape connected to the Empire by even the most tenuous of commitments.
"From what I've heard, he's not going back into being a villain." Kayden would've said something about hating to burst his bubble, but she didn't want to lie to him. "Panacea's asked him to give up crime, so that's what he's done."
"Still, a debt is a debt, and Marquis is by all accounts an honourable man." Max was nothing if not persistent. "If Purity happened to ask him to do a favour for an associate, surely he would feel duty bound to pay off his obligation to her."
"That's if she asked." She wanted to shut this down but wasn't sure how to do it without being openly rude to him, and she had no desire to open that particular can of worms. "Besides, I'm fairly certain she did it to save the girl, not to get into the father's good books."
"Any court of law will tell you that intent matters less than results." Although his voice was still smooth, she could tell he was starting to get impatient with her. "The deed was done. Saint was ready and willing to hurt or kill Panacea, and Purity saved her. If Marquis doesn't ally with someone before the next fanatic comes and takes his daughter hostage again, she may well end up dead this time. Wouldn't you agree that it only makes sense for him to work with the only people who have acted in his interest since his return?"
She wanted to tell him that he was really pushing the boundaries of plausible deniability, but that in itself would shatter the fragile illusion that they were spinning. "I have no idea, because I'm not him. Personally, I'd imagine that a reformed supervillain would do their best to keep away from any influences that might try to drag them back into the life. But that's just me."
"Let's face it." He didn't even bother acknowledging her point, probably because he didn't want to give it any kind of legitimacy. "In today's climate, any villain who tries to rebrand as a rogue or a hero is only fooling themselves. Nobody's going to cut them any kind of slack. The PRT will be waiting for him to make one wrong step, and that's if they don't manufacture some kind of wrongdoing to catch him on. To be honest, I would not be in the slightest bit surprised to learn that the PRT is actively discussing ways to separate Marquis from his daughter, so as to more easily bring him down when the time comes to lower the boom."
Her eyes narrowed. She'd heard that phrasing before, and it had always preceded something he'd learned from one of his moles within the PRT. "I … see. Wouldn't that look bad for them, if it got out?"
"Well, first it would have to be proven. And even if it was, half the public would refuse to believe it, and most of the remainder would say 'good'. After all, a villain is a villain, and doesn't really deserve the same civil rights as good solid upstanding citizens." Now Max's tone was entirely sarcastic. "And these are the same people that Purity is risking life and limb to try to be a hero for."
Kayden set her jaw. "I don't care. Now that Lung's dead and the others are in captivity, this is her chance to mop up the ABB once and for all."
She could tell that Max was smiling in that irritating way he had. "Wherever she is, I wish her luck." Before she could retort, he ended the call.
Hand clenched around the phone, she carefully put it down. Max could always get under her skin, even when she was determined not to let him put her on the back foot.
"Are you okay?" Theo was looking at her with concern in his eyes. If anyone knew what it was like to have her ex screwing with their head, it was her stepson.
"Yes. No." She grimaced. "Your father wants to make overtures to Marquis, and he's trying to recruit me to do it for him."
Theo looked doubtful in the extreme. "Panacea's a hero. Would she even agree to something like that?"
"I wouldn't have thought so." She paused to run her hand through her hair. "But he made a very good point. Saint's just the first idiot to try to use her as a hostage to get other prisoners out of the Birdcage. If Marquis cares about her as much as I do about Aster, he's going to want to protect her."
"And my father wants you to pitch the Empire as potential protectors," Theo guessed, accurately enough. "What are you going to do?"
"The only thing I can." Kayden picked up the phone again, and looked around. "Pass me my handbag, please?" The card with the number she needed was in there.
<><>
A Little Later That Night
Panacea
"Is this really a good idea?" Vicky sounded grumpy. Unsurprisingly so; I'd called her after I got off the line with Kayden, and interrupted her plans to go and see Dean. When she'd heard what was going on, she'd given him a raincheck and come straight over. This didn't mean she was happy with the situation, or anything close to it.
"There is much about this situation that's potentially very bad," Dad noted. "The worst idea possible would be to ignore it and assume everything will turn out for the best. Purity helped save your sister, so we owe her the courtesy of hearing her out."
We'd changed locations for the occasion, going down to the Boardwalk and finding a picnic table to sit and look out over the ocean, anonymous in the evening crowd. Vicky wore a hoodie while I just rocked my usual outfit. Not one person in ten recognised me out of costume anyway; the moronic bank robbery had proven that. Even the Undersiders' so-called psychic bullshit artiste hadn't picked me out of the crowd.
"Well, should we be out in public like this?" Vicky persisted. "You're already a known villain, but if Ames and me were seen meeting with Purity in public, Mom would spontaneously develop the power to bring people back from the dead, so just she could kill us several times over."
I sighed, aggravated. "I told you, she'll be meeting with us out of costume. And don't forget, you pinky-swore not to out her."
Dad chuckled warmly. "Ah, yes, that most binding of oaths."
I stuck my tongue out at him as Vicky said, "It is, between us." She looked around. "Where is she, anyway? And if you trust her that much, why am I here? It can't be as muscle."
Just at that moment, I spotted Kayden. This time she was without Aster, but wearing the same smart clothing as before. Looking at her, nobody would've picked her as the airborne Blaster who'd been one of the Empire's biggest hitters for years.
"Not muscle," I said quietly. "As a witness, so if there's anything I need to tell Carol, you can back me up." I waved to Kayden; a moment later, she spotted me and came over.
"Oh." Vicky nodded. "I guess that makes sense." She'd had a crash course in The Universe According To Carol Dallon recently, and didn't bother claiming that I needed no such witness. Which was good, because me bursting into laughter would've confused Kayden considerably.
"Hello, Amy." Kayden stopped a few paces away. "Marquis, I presume and … Glory Girl?" She didn't back away, but I saw her tense up.
"Patrick Matheson." Dad half-rose from his seat as he introduced himself. "Or at least, that's what my new ID papers say. Amelia Claire, you already know. Her sister, Miss Dallon, is here to observe and act as an impartial witness to our conversation. Please, sit down. You have my word that there will be no undue hostilities."
Vicky nodded. "Yeah, what he said. And I wanted to thank you again for helping me save Ames from that asshole." She snorted. "There wasn't enough of him left to fit in a teacup."
"Well, that was my general plan." Kayden relaxed enough to sit down opposite Vicky, next to me. "I wasn't about to give him the chance to get off one last screw-you shot."
"Which he would've taken, if he could." Dad reached diagonally across the table and shook her hand briefly. "You did an exemplary job of removing the threat. However, you did not contact Amelia on a whim. What news did you have that is so important that you wanted a face-to-face meeting?"
Kayden took a deep breath. "Well, Kaiser called me earlier this evening …"
<><>
Glory Girl
"… and so I called you." Purity—if Vicky hadn't spoken to her on the night they saved Amy, she would've had trouble believing the petite mousy woman was her—rounded out her tale. "While Kaiser is a narcissist and an egomaniac of the highest degree, I don't believe he was lying about any of it. And I also think he's not wrong about you being under threat from fanatics."
Amy looked pensive. "I was warned about this possibility by Director Piggot and others."
"Well, how many Teacher stooges are there out there anyway?" Vicky demanded. "I can and will punch them out as needed."
"That won't be necessary," Amy's dad said blandly. "I had words with him following Saint's … craterisation. He refused to see reason, and his existence was an ongoing threat to Amelia's wellbeing. So, I ended the threat."
Amy didn't seem overly troubled by the news, and Purity actually gave him an approving nod. "Wait," Vicky objected. "You murdered him?"
"No, I ended the threat." Marquis repeated his words in exactly the same tone. "It could not be murder, because outside laws do not apply within the Birdcage. I had no recourse to any higher authority to take him in hand, and if he'd managed to contact any of his thralls outside the facility, they would've indeed been willing to repeat the whole sorry scenario again. So, I made certain it would not happen a second time, in the only way I could be certain of it."
"Vicky, enough." Amy kicked her under the table. "Dad said the problem was dealt with, and it's not like we can wind back the clock. Dad, do you think anyone else might try it?"
Marquis frowned, running his thumb and forefinger over his chin. "There are other capes in the Birdcage who have students of a sort out in the world. I don't recall hearing of any with the same level of brainwashing or devotion that Teacher's people had, though."
"Me neither," Purity said. "But that doesn't mean anything. We'll call that a tentative maybe, for now. How about the other problem? The PRT?"
"I still have trouble believing that bit," Vicky interjected. "I know the PRT. It's their job to uphold the law. They've got whole rules and regulations about it."
Marquis raised one eyebrow in a totally bullshit move that Vicky still wasn't able to pull off in the mirror. "That, my dear, is because you've never been opposed by them. They will of course play by the rules when dealing with capes that they approve of. When it comes to the opposition, however, the exact rules and regulations have been known to go by the wayside when it comes to apprehending a problematic target."
"Yeah." Amy spread her hands. "Remember what we were talking about at Dad's house before we dug up that … well, before we did that digging? Carol and Mark and the others would never have beaten Dad if they didn't pull the bullshit they did, and they didn't even know I was there until the fight was basically over and done. Dad had to throw himself in the way of a shot to make sure I was okay."
"But that wasn't the PRT," objected Vicky. "Sure, that was Mom and Dad and Aunt Sarah and the others, but they didn't know you were there. It wasn't like they were deliberately targeting you to force Dad to surrender."
"They essentially were, but without knowing what, or rather, who was in that closet," Marquis corrected her. "They just knew that I valued whatever was beyond that door. But we were speaking of the shortcomings of the PRT, not of the Brockton Bay Brigade."
"Yeah." Amy tapped the table with her finger. "Did the PRT penalise the Brigade for playing fast and loose with the rules, and for endangering a minor? Hell, did they even try to take me away from the team who'd kidnapped me from my father? Nope. They just rubbed their hands together because they'd finally caught Marquis, and ignored the rest of the bullshit that was being pulled under their noses."
"And I suspect the current crop aren't altogether different in attitude," Marquis observed. "While there are a few sticklers for the rules here and there, the vast majority feel so overwhelmed by the new villains arising everywhere that they're willing to overlook a few irregularities here and there, so long as the desired results are arrived at. Which means that if we were to seek any kind of protection for you from the encroaching threat, we would have to look toward some other place than the PRT."
Vicky frowned. "You're Panacea. Surely they'd protect you."
"But they'd separate me from my dad at the first opportunity," Amy pointed out. "And there would be endless excuses as to why I couldn't see him right then. Once they had us apart, they'd bend the regulations into a pretzel to figure out a reason to put him back that they'd be able to spin as 'he broke the law', so I wouldn't go on a permanent healing strike."
"Okay, um, how about New Wave?" Vicky offered. "We can totally protect you."
"New Wave captured him, back in the day," Purity reminded her. "You may be on good terms with him but having faced your mother a few times across the battlefield, I will gladly tell you without any kind of bias that she never lets go of a grievance. And if she was initially opposed to his release, well …" She let her voice trail off.
"She's not wrong," Amy agreed, while Marquis nodded along. "Carol does grudges really, really well."
"So where can you go for protection then?" asked Vicky. "Not the Empire Eighty-Eight. You'd never hear the end of it. I'd never hear the end of it, just from being nearby."
"No, not the Empire," Marquis' tone was definite. "I dislike their core beliefs, as much as they have core beliefs, and Kaiser is indeed a narcissistic egomaniac. We might last a week before I'd be forced to kill him, but that's being optimistic."
"If you killed Kaiser, then the entire Empire would be out for your blood," Purity warned. "Even with me gone, they have a lot of big hitters, and they'd all be wanting to prove their leadership potential by killing you."
Marquis looked thoughtful. "That might be an interesting fight. I wouldn't endanger Amelia Claire that way, of course, and no doubt some of them would attempt to take her hostage."
"Or just kill her, to fuck with you." Vicky was pretty sure she knew what she was talking about. "There are some total assholes in that bunch."
Purity nodded. "I can't argue with that. The trouble is, we've basically ruled out everyone you can go to for protection. So, what are you going to do?"
"I have half an idea, but I don't know how you'll go for it," Amy began.
Vicky looked at her curiously. "If it's better than the alternatives, we're listening."
"Indeed," Marquis agreed.
Amy took a deep breath. "Dad … Kayden … why don't we team up together?"
As Marquis and Purity stared at each other and then at Amy, Vicky found herself undergoing a presentiment of the future. One that involved a lot of yelling.
Mom is going to go fucking batshit.
End of Part Thirteen
Timerider
That guy who really should get out more.
- Location
- The End of the World.
Carol could be listening to Darth Sedious cackling about "Let the hate flow through you" and she'd agree with him.
- Location
- usa
I disagree, I think she'd be telling Darth Sidious that his hate is weak.
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Oh, someone's STILL bitter about the heroes accidentally using his own bullshit on him, isn't he?
Trace Coburn
BattleTech Starfighter Analyst
- Location
- NDBBM, New Zealand
The Brockton Bay Brigade demonstrated perfect willingness to use lethal force and risk fatal collateral damage to what was, for all they knew (and indeed turned out to be), a completely innocent bystander. Their claim to the title of 'heroes' is just a little shaky at that point.
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
So somewhat amoral vigilantes vs a murderous gang boss. Got it.
- Location
- Australia
A 'murderous' gang boss who, despite repeatedly being challenged by and defeating them, had yet to murder any of them.
Intriguingly enough, we never see Marquis murder anyone, either on screen or in a flashback. There are claims, but never substantiated. And the one named character who's actually attributed to him (Iron Rain) wasn't him.
Not saying he was a good guy, or even that he wasn't a bad guy, but there are nuances to him.
Also, I find the whole "holding capes responsible" line to be somewhat hypocritical when they were less than totally responsible themselves.
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She should have structured the deal so that she still goes on strike if they put him back in the birdcage rather than an ordinary prison, unless he actually uses his powers to escape. Then they'd have to give him a normal sentence, which can be appealed.
ThrawnCA
Carbon-based biped
- Location
- Australia
So, I'm thinking Marquis' main weaknesses would be limited range, limited striking power against heavily armoured targets (although he is an expert at seeking out weak points), being ground-bound, and there's only one of him.
And then you add Purity.
And then you add Purity.
Part Fourteen: Wheels Within Wheels
New
- Location
- Australia
Hostage Situation
Part Fourteen: Wheels Within Wheels
[A/N 1: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]
[A/N 2: The reason this (and the chapter of Darker Path preceding) is so late is because I've been on holidays for the last 12 days, and will be for another two. Currently (Oct 12), I'm in Melbourne (Australia), basically on the other side of the country from Townsville, my home town. Over that time, I've visited three capital cities (Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne) and racked up over 2,500 km in the air (with another 2,000 km to go). I've also attended my best mate's wedding, visited Taronga Zoo, gone whale watching, and had a look at the Melbourne Aquarium. Right now, I'm in the middle of a three-day session of visiting the Melbourne PAX convention. It's been fun, if exhausting. Whoo.]
Director Emily Piggot, PRT ENE
Despite the almost universal agreement among the capes and officers under her command (the obvious exception being Assault) that Marquis needed to be kept on as short a leash as possible until the opportunity came to boot him back into the Birdcage, there had been a surprising lack of volunteers to head up the surveillance effort. Emily wasn't sure whether this was an indication of how much respect (or even outright fear) Marquis was held in, a disinclination to piss her off by failing in this remarkably important task, or (least likely but also least palatable) an undercurrent of sympathy for Assault's point of view.
No matter what the reason was, she didn't like it. She liked even less the fact that Calvert had volunteered for the duty; not because she thought he couldn't do it, but because his insinuations at the meeting had her concerned about how he might go about it. Marquis was the highest profile case they had going at the moment, and even a whiff of mishandling would bring down all sorts of unwelcome attention from those above her in the chain of command.
Unfortunately, the fact remained that he was indeed the only volunteer, and Emily really needed this to happen. If she listened to her misgivings and scratched his application, not only would there be zero surveillance on the man at a time when she absolutely needed eyes on him twenty-four/seven, but people like Chief Director Costa-Brown would be asking her pointed questions about why she chose to deny the PRT the chance of getting eyes and ears on a notorious criminal.
She couldn't even articulate why she disliked and distrusted Calvert so much. It was indeed true that he'd shot his superior officer in the back once upon a time, but that had been judged a case of exigent circumstances by a court-martial: not good, but not bad enough to actually incarcerate him for. On the other hand, the court had been operating under the unspoken but very real need to hush up the PRT's repeated missteps and outright blunders during the Ellisburg operation, which had almost certainly (though Emily doubted she'd be able to find a single officer willing to admit to this) swayed the verdict toward 'shut up and go away'.
But beyond all that, there was something else going on with him, something that made her neck hairs stand on end. If he'd been a cape, she would've been able to understand it, because this was exactly how she felt about capes. But he wasn't, so that couldn't be it. She just didn't know what it was.
Still, immediate requirements took precedence over ill-formed worries, so she pushed the latter aside and gave the man standing before her desk a hard stare. "Commander Calvert."
"Ma'am?" Calvert's posture was correct and his tone respectful. She chose to ignore everything else for the moment, because she needed this to happen.
"I've had a brief prepared for you, covering Marquis' place of residence and the places and people he's been visiting so far. You will conduct surveillance on him, specifically according to the guidelines provided within the brief. You will not exceed that mandate in any way without first checking with me personally." That was about as unequivocal as she could get without actually going along on the op with him.
Calvert nodded thoughtfully. "How close are we allowed to get?"
She'd expected questions like this. "It will all be in the brief, but in short: you are not to initiate contact with him. If he makes your people in any way, then you will break contact, report in, and resume surveillance via less direct means."
"And Panacea?" he asked.
"Panacea was never in the Birdcage." She made the observation as blunt as she could. "You will only surveil her in the context of being near him. The strictures against making contact are just as stringent for her, because every time we annoy her, we make it just that little bit harder to put him away again even if he slips up."
"She may carry messages for him." It wasn't quite an objection. "How do we guard against that?"
She'd already considered the problem. It was very much a rock-and-hard-place situation. "For now, the assumption is that she isn't willing to participate in criminal activity for him, and that she's smart enough not to carry a letter to another criminal. If we find proof to the contrary, then I will alter the rules of engagement. But until that time, you will operate to both the letter and the spirit of the brief. Is that clearly understood?"
"Yes, ma'am." They were both aware of the recorder in the desk, ensuring that there would be zero misunderstandings as to who was at fault if Calvert's team overstepped their bounds. She wanted Marquis back in the Birdcage just as badly as the rest of the PRT did, but she knew damn well that if it wasn't done by the book, it wouldn't be done at all. "One more question. What are the options regarding searches for incriminating material, in the case of questionable activity? Who do we go through to get warrants for that?"
"Me." She stood, hands planted firmly on her desk, ignoring the twinge from her calf muscles. "I want you to impress on each member of your strike squad just how important this is. I'm fully aware that that there's a lot of emotion riding on this. We all want Marquis behind bars again, but the last thing I need is any of my subordinates colouring outside the lines to get us there, like the Brockton Bay Brigade did back in the day."
"What they did worked," he protested. "He went to the Birdcage."
"That was ten years ago. Things were different, then. He had a huge number of charges against him, and there wasn't a lawyer on the east coast willing to step up and defend him adequately. If we slip up even once, he almost certainly has the funds to hire on someone like Quinn Calle. Hell, Calle might even choose to do it pro bono, just for the exposure it would get him."
"Calle's just a lawyer—" he began, the hint of a sneer in his voice.
"A lawyer who gets more villains off the hook than any other member of the Bar," she cut in. "I don't want to see even the suggestion of going off the reservation with this. We have to do it by the book, every step of the way. No bullshit beg-for-forgiveness-afterward stunts."
He didn't look thrilled. "It sounds to me like you're tying our hands before we even get started."
"Not my doing." She shook her head. "It's just the reality of the situation. Any case we bring against him has to be even more immaculate than normal. Double-check everything, document everything, and for God's sake have your body-cams running every second you're within a city block of him. Is that understood?"
"Body-cams." It wasn't quite a protest. "Is that an order, ma'am?" PRT strike squads didn't tend to use body-cameras, as delicate electronics didn't tend to stand up to cape powers. Sometimes she suspected they pushed back against the idea more as a matter of principal than out of actual practicality, but this time they were going to be shit out of luck.
"It is very much an order, Commander Calvert. Putting Marquis away again is going to take more than a bit of luck, which means we need to stack the odds in our favour as hard as we can. Also, when it comes to actually slapping the cuffs on him, I don't want either Calle or Panacea being able to claim that we treated him differently to any other suspect."
He took a deep breath but the expected push-back didn't materialise. This was good for his career, because she had exactly zero tolerance for any backtalk from him right at that moment. "Message received loud and clear, ma'am. I'll get right on it."
She didn't smile, because she still didn't trust him as far as she could spit him. Unfortunately, right now she didn't have much of a choice in the matter. Seating herself again, she watched as he left her office, closing the door behind him.
I just hope this doesn't blow up in my face.
Coil
Thomas Calvert didn't slam Piggot's door on the way out, mainly because he had a firm handle on his temper. The nerve of that damned woman! She was all but accusing him of intending to do… well, exactly what he had planned.
She hadn't come out and said it to his face, of course. That made the narrative harder for him to manipulate, which had probably been her intention all along. If she didn't give him something concrete to object to, he couldn't play the injured party. This made it harder for him to put her on the back foot.
The irritating thing was, while he was more inclined toward sneaking and double-dealing, she had ten years of experience in handling people like him. Unlike some who eventually gave way and let him do what he wanted, she had a limit. Beyond that point, she tolerated zero bullshit.
In the other timeline, she had managed to goad him into saying something unwise. She used that as an excuse to relieve him of duty, pending a court-martial for insubordination. While he could kill her in that timeline—something he had done a thousand times before, just because he wanted to—it would get him nowhere.
The only way to continue on as a PRT officer in good standing was to accept the mission as she'd given it to him, and make the best of things. Of course, his capacity for making the best of things was only matched by his ability to lie, cheat, murder and steal his way to victory, so he felt reasonably optimistic in that regard.
The broad strokes of his plan were still viable. Panacea had to die, to make way for the fall of Marquis (whether this led to the morgue or the Birdcage, he didn't care) and the disgrace of Emily Piggot.
His plans would come to fruition, and he would end up on top, no matter how many people had to go down to make it happen.
Few things in life were a guarantee. This was one of them.
Medhall Building
Kaiser
"Have you seen Purity?" Max looked up from his phone, after it had gone to voicemail four times in a row. The first message he'd left had been a masterpiece of restraint, but in the second and third he'd allowed more than a little sarcasm to creep into his tone. His fourth had been downright scathing, but that still got him no closer to speaking with Kayden.
"Hm." James tilted his head in thought. "Not for some little time. She spoke of an errand she needed to attend to. I chose not to inquire as to its nature."
"Well, maybe you should have." Max gave him a hard stare. "With the ABB off the board, we have an opportunity like no other. We can't have our most pivotal members simply vanishing into the ether without giving the rest of us notice, or at least leaving their phones on."
James raised an eyebrow. "She's a proud woman, Max. I have no doubt she needs her space, just like the rest of us do."
"She's my wife." Max's grip on his phone tightened, his voice edged with irritation as he replied. "If anyone's got the right to know what she's doing and where she's going, it's me."
"Hm." This time it was a chuckle rather than an introspective sound. "I've been married for twenty years, and I know for a fact that's a privilege and not a right. If Purity chooses not to accord it to you, then you do not have it."
James's claim might have made sense to some people, but not to Max Anders. "Well, where would she be, if not here or at her apartment with Aster?"
This time, James gave him an odd look. "You do not think she has other places she can be?"
"I know she has her phone on her when she goes shopping, and she doesn't usually shower at this time of day." Max knew he was being extremely generous and fair-minded about the whole thing. He'd given her time to get out of the shower, if that was what she was doing. However, she still hadn't answered or called him back.
"So you do not think she may be simply out for a stroll, or down at the Boardwalk? Is that not where she met Panacea?" James seemed intent on downplaying the whole situation. Were he not happily married, and had Kayden been anyone else, Max may have suspected him of trying to cover up an affair or something similar.
"She knows damn well that she needs to be available at any hour of the night or day." It was only common sense. Her position as his lieutenant in the Empire Eighty-Eight was contingent on her being able to step up at a moment's notice. Also, she was his wife (in his view, the separation was merely attention-seeking behaviour) which put the seal on the whole matter.
"Well, then, have you attempted to call the apartment landline? It may be that her cell-phone is out of charge, or otherwise malfunctioning." James spread his hands and raised his eyebrows, and after a moment Max conceded that he might have a point.
"Okay, fine. I'll call it now." Max had to pause to get the number out of his phone's storage, not being one that he knew by rote. "But if she's not there, then there's something seriously wrong going on."
"I doubt there's any real problem. Anyone who knew her real identity would come after us first, while if someone did attack her and Aster without knowing who she was, it would involve a closed-casket funeral. But suit yourself." James leaned back in his chair and watched as Max located the number.
When he tapped the call icon, it rang several times, to the point where Max was about to end the call. But then it was picked up.
"Hello?" It was Theo's voice. He sounded nervous, but that was normal for the boy.
"Theo." Max spoke firmly. "Tell me where Kayden is."
"Uh … Kayden's fine. She, uh, just stepped out for a minute. Everything's fine here."
Max inhaled sharply, frustration boiling over. 'I didn't ask how she was. I asked where she is. Has she been at the apartment while I called? Where is she, Theo?'"
"Uh, I don't know right now, but she's fine." Max's antennae went up. Something was off. "Uh, gotta go. Aster needs me." The phone handset went down, and the call cut off.
"Well?" asked James. "Where is she?"
"Not certain." Max stared out the window for a second, deep in thought. "Theo said she was fine, that everything was fine … but he didn't call her to the phone. I think he was lying about something."
Now James tilted his head. "Max, I've met your boy. There is no way on earth he would have the nerve to lie to you. Or anyone, to be honest. He's far too timid. Are you sure you're reading the situation correctly?"
Max pinched his earlobe lightly with his thumbnail as he worked his way through the thought process that James's question had sparked. "He'd never lie to me of his own accord. He knows better than that. But if he was put up to it by someone else, he might. Which means …" Abruptly, he stood up from his chair. "I have to get over there, right now."
"What? Why?" James rose as well. "Do you think there's a problem?"
"Well, if there isn't, there soon will be." Max reached under his desk and pressed the button that electronically locked his office door. Then he pressed the intercom button that connected him to his personal assistant. While Ms Harcourt was an absolute gem for organisation and administration, Max still had no idea of her political beliefs, so she hadn't yet been read in on his true identity, or even the secrets of Medhall. It would become remarkably inconvenient if they had to dispose of her because she objected to such things. Better to keep her in the dark and continue to benefit from her numerous talents. "Please hold all my calls and reschedule my appointments for tomorrow. I will be busy for a while."
"Yes, sir." Ms Harcourt didn't ask any questions, which was one of her more endearing qualities. She took the information she was given, and ran with it.
Satisfied all was secure on that front, Max stepped aside from the chair and turned to the back wall of his office. Reaching out, he pressed the hidden switch that slid aside the panel concealing the secret elevator, then laid his hand on the biometric scanner thus revealed.
The elevator door opened and Max stepped in, with James following behind. It was a snug fit, though quite adequate for two adults. Any more people than that, however, would find it somewhat cramped.
There was no need for buttons inside the elevator, as it only had two destinations. Once the door closed, the elevator started its descent. It was fast, but Max still chafed at the time it was taking.
"Talk to me, Max." James seemed to be fully aware of his disquiet. "What do you think is happening at Purity's apartment that requires your presence right at this moment?"
"I'm not one hundred percent sure," Max reluctantly admitted. "But Theo was definitely nervous about something, and either unable or unwilling to get Kayden to come to the phone. This says to me that something's wrong in that apartment, and I need to find out what."
James nodded. "You make a valid point. Do you want me to call the rest of the Empire in on this?"
As the elevator door opened, Max considered that. On the one hand, if Kayden was taking advantage of the current unrest to make some sort of move toward taking Aster out of his reach, he didn't want his marital problems broadcast far and wide through the team. However, on the other, if there was an actual problem at Kayden's apartment, having backup could be invaluable.
"… just the ones who can respond the fastest," he hedged. "Whatever's going on, we don't want to jeopardise Kayden's secret identity."
In truth, Max only cared about that insofar as it was linked to his own secret identity; if she hadn't been married to him, or part of the Empire, he wouldn't have given a damn.
"Understood." James may or may not have picked up on that nuance, but Max didn't give a damn about that either.
They climbed into one of the anonymous cars that Max kept in the sub-basement garage for getting around town on the quiet, and he accelerated toward the exit ramp while James made the call.
If it turned out to be just a case of miscommunication on Theo's part, he would have harsh words with the boy about saying what needed to be said. However, if it was more serious than that, then he absolutely would not stop at harsh words.
One question niggled at him as he drove:
Why is Theo still at Kayden's? He was supposed to be back hours ago.
Kayden's Apartment
Panacea
"Uh, gotta go. Aster needs me." Theo put the phone down, then stepped away from it.
Around the room, the removalists Dad had hired continued to ferry packed boxes out the door while others packed the last of Kayden's belongings according to her instructions. Dad, who had stood by with his hands clasped behind his back while Theo answered the phone, raised an eyebrow. "I presume he didn't buy your act."
"Sorry, sir." Theo's shoulders slumped and his eyes darted away, avoiding contact. "I can never lie to him. I'm too scared to."
I stood up from the sofa I'd been sitting on, allowing two of the guys to pick it up and walk out the door with it, and put my hand on Theo's shoulder. "Hey, don't beat yourself up. What did he say, exactly?"
"He, uh, wanted to know where Kayden was, and why she wasn't answering her phone." Theo shrugged. "I did my best, but he just kept pushing."
"Well, I'm glad you did." Kayden stepped in and hugged him. "If I'd answered it, he'd probably have me half-convinced to stay by now. That man has a talent for getting under my skin."
"But why are you even moving?" asked Theo. "I thought you liked this apartment."
Kayden grimaced. "I do, but I'm entering into a working arrangement with Mr Matheson, and your father won't exactly approve. We both know he doesn't, uh …"
"Take things like that lying down?" Dad suggested. "From what I've seen, the man's a control freak of the highest order."
Theo hunched his shoulders, falling silent. I could see he agreed but was too scared to voice it. I'd only met Theo an hour ago, but he was throwing out all the signs of someone whose upbringing had been less than stellar. I could sympathise.
"That's actually being kind to him." Kayden nodded toward her stepson. "It's also why I want Theo to come with. The moment I vanish, Max is going to assume he knew something whether he did or not, and if I left him behind, the interrogation would not be kind. Besides, Aster needs her brother."
"The need to be with one's family is something I am well acquainted with," Dad assured her. "Whether you move into my main accommodation or one of the subsidiary properties I am in the process of purchasing, there will be room for all of you." He glanced around. "It seems that our work here is almost complete. I've never needed to vacate a premises ahead of a vengeful ex-husband, but there's a first time for everything."
"And that's our cue." I took Theo's arm. "C'mon, let's get Aster downstairs."
"Um, okay." Theo followed, his eyes revealing a swirl of unasked questions. I noticed his hesitation; even without his natural shyness—something I planned to help him overcome—he clearly felt overwhelmed by the rapid pace of events.
Aster, on the other hand, took it in her stride. Despite the ongoing upheaval of almost every part of her life, the little munchkin was at her cutest today, gurgling and pointing at things from her stroller as Theo and I rode down in the elevator. We exited the building and headed for the car—a nice anonymous sedan—that Dad had bought a little while ago. With the spare key fob—Dad had thought ahead—I bipped it open as we were walking up to it.
"Okay, so there's stuff going on that I still don't really understand." Theo got Aster out of the stroller while I opened the back door of the car. I watched as he leaned in and got her settled in the baby seat, a lot more expertly than I would have.
I started to try to fold the stroller down, but I couldn't quite get the hang of it. "Well, ask away. And can you give me a hand with this?"
"Sure." He reached in and flicked a catch I hadn't spotted, and the whole thing just collapsed in on itself. "There you go. Uh, this thing between your dad and Kayden, it's not just a business thing, is it?"
I tilted my head and looked at him speculatively. From the first moment I'd met him, I'd suspected there was a brain in that head, and he'd just proven it. "No, it's not," I confirmed. Reaching down, I popped the trunk and stuck the collapsed stroller on top of the luggage already there, then closed it again, just as Dad and Kayden exited the building. "Let's go."
When I'd made the suggestion that we team up with Purity, her first response was that it was impossible, that Kaiser would work against us at every turn. Whether this came about via pressure in her civilian life, outright attacks on Dad or me by the Empire roster, or somewhere in between, something would happen. The chance of innocents being caught in the firing line as a direct result was somewhat more than zero, and I was not fine with that. Neither, gratifyingly enough, was Dad. To be fair, for him it was more of a public-image situation, but so long as the end result remained the same, I wasn't about to criticise him for his actual reasons.
This had led to the next logical point in our discussion. While we couldn't do much about preventing attacks from the Empire while Dad was out in costume (not that he went out in costume all that much), we could absolutely remove Kayden from the line of fire. Dad was buying properties discreetly, using methods that might have been questionable (but I was reasonably sure weren't illegal) to keep our identities under wraps. Legality aside, I figured the moral aspect was probably more important at the moment.
We climbed into the back seat of the car, with Aster between us, and closed the doors just as Kayden reached it. Behind us, I heard the U-Haul truck (with Dad at the wheel) start up and trundle off down the street. The front door opened, and Kayden got in. "Ready to go?" she asked.
"Absolutely," I said, feeling the adrenaline singing through my veins. We weren't in any danger—at least, I hoped we weren't—but this was still way out of my usual comfort zone. I wasn't quite sure when I'd started to see that as being a good thing, but I suspected meeting Fred Jones had something to do with it.
"Aster's secure?" she asked next, even as she started the car. I surreptitiously tugged at my seatbelt, wondering exactly when I'd done it up—excitement was funny like that—and looked out the window to see if I could spot Kaiser coming. It seemed there was nothing to worry about yet, but that was going to change very shortly if Dad was right (and he usually was).
"Yes," Theo replied as he snapped his belt into place. "I made sure of it."
And then, just after the truck trundled around the corner up ahead, a car came down the street past the corner, moving at speed. Not one person in ten recognised me as Panacea out of costume on a good day, but I ducked down anyway. With my eyes just above the windowsill, even though it whipped past in a fraction of a second, I was absolutely certain that the driver was none other than Max Anders. I didn't recognise the guy in the passenger seat.
"Don't look back," Kayden said quietly as I sat up again. I realised that she and Theo had ducked down as well. "It'll take them a couple of minutes to realise the place is empty. We do not want them recalling a car with suspiciously familiar people in it." With admirable control, she pulled the car away from the curb and started off after the truck.
"No, we don't," I agreed, then let out a long sigh. "Theo, are you alright?"
"Uh huh." Theo's tone was a little higher than it had been before. "Mom, what's this really about? Amelia says it's not a business deal. Is this a cape thing?"
I raised my eyebrows. Theo was connecting the dots a lot faster than I'd expected him to.
Kayden's next sigh was one of resignation. "Yes, it's a cape thing. But I'm going to need you to keep that to yourself, okay? Not just for my sake, but for theirs."
Theo nodded slowly, his eyes going from Kayden to me. "Mr Matheson … he's Marquis, isn't he?"
"Theo—" she began, but I held up my hand.
"It's okay, Ms Russel. Yeah, Theo. He's Marquis, and he's my dad as well. I guess I kind of gave it away just by showing up, huh?" The word that Panacea was Marquis' daughter was only a little less prevalent by now than the word that Marquis was out of the Birdcage. Anyone who was even slightly on the ball when it came to current events was fully aware of both facts.
He shrugged modestly. "I guess. Though most people didn't grow up with capes."
I grinned. As divergent as our lives were on most points, that was definitely an aspect we had in common. "Right back atcha."
Kaiser
"Where the hell is she?" Max's voice echoed through the empty apartment as he stormed from room to room. He threw doors open, the sounds of them hitting the walls echoing through the empty apartment, each thud punctuating his growing anger. Every room was the same: stripped of everything useful, including any clues to Kayden's current whereabouts. There wasn't so much as a Post-it note, or a fridge for it to go on.
When he returned to the living room, he discovered that James had remained by the front door, gazing around with a calculating air. "She's gone, Max. Were I a betting man, I would wager a large amount of money that she never intends to return."
A flicker of understanding crossed Max's face as he pieced together the implications of James's words. "And she's kidnapped both my son and my infant daughter in the process. We need to find her, to get them back." Kayden would pay dearly for this betrayal.
"Hm." James nodded. "Look around. What do you see?"
Irritated, Max did as he was told, but no great epiphany burst upon him. "An empty room, in an empty apartment. What are you trying to show me?"
"How well furnished was it?" pressed James. "Did she have more than could fit into her car?" The car that, at that moment, was still parked outside.
"Yes, it was well furnished." Just the sofa alone would have required extensive disassembly before it would fit into Kayden's sedan, and it would certainly have taken up all available space. "I'm not quite sure what you're getting at."
"Four words." James seemed almost to be savouring Max's current inability to think through the problem. "Who. Helped. Her. Move?"
"Oh." Max's head came up and he looked around the living room with new eyes. Kayden's possessions would certainly have required a considerable amount of effort to move in bulk, especially given that she was living in the place as of yesterday. There was no way that she would've been able to move everything out in less than a week, even with Theo's assistance. "Oh."
James gestured at the open door. "People living in these conditions tend to be nosy. While you were rampaging, I asked a few questions of her neighbours, assisted by a couple of minor bribes."
Max chose to ignore the word 'rampaging'. He was Kaiser. He didn't rampage. "And what did you find out?"
"That a medium to large group of men wearing overalls marked 'Brockton Bay Removalists' spent the last hour emptying out Purity's apartment," James reported. "They were accompanied by Purity herself—not in costume, of course—as well as another man and a teenage girl. No specific descriptions of the man or the girl, save that they were white and average looking. Maybe brown hair, but that's not a given."
"So, basically we're looking at forty percent of the men and girls in Brockton Bay." Max tried not to sound too sarcastic, but it was difficult. "Not sure how helpful that is."
"The company name might be," James prompted. "If we ask them about the job they did …"
Max's brain finally managed to fight off the pervasive distraction and clicked into gear. "Of course! We can get a name for their employer and a destination for where they took Kayden's things!"
"That's what I was thinking, yes." James raised an eyebrow. "Do you think we should also contact the police, over the kidnapping charges?"
For a moment Max was tempted, but then he shook his head. The time for the legal system would come later, after he'd brought Kayden to heel himself. Until then, the police would just get in the way.
Purity
The new apartment can do with a makeover, Kayden decided as she directed where the removalists were to put things. However, it wasn't high on her priorities right then, and it was definitely something she could handle on her own accord. The important part was, she and Aster were out from under Max's thumb (hopefully forever) and she'd managed to take Theo with her too.
She still wasn't quite sure how Marquis had managed this. It certainly wouldn't have been paid for by Panacea; from her own conversations with the young cape, Amelia didn't charge for her services. Turning, she looked at the supervillain and his daughter the hero.
"Will it suffice?" he asked, misinterpreting her glance, or maybe not. The man was a master of tact, when he chose to be.
She gestured around at the apartment, and smiled. "It's perfect. I was just wondering … well, I hope I'm not bankrupting you, that's all. All this, at short notice, it can't be cheap."
His smile, though austere, was genuine. "Hardly. Even if it were twice the price, I wouldn't begrudge you. As you pointed out, and as Max was eager to cash in on, I do owe you a significant debt of gratitude, and I always pay my debts."
Kayden shook her head dismissively. "That's a Max thing, not me. I was never going to call that in, and you know it. Besides, Amelia saved my purse from being snatched the first time we met, and Aster loves her."
His smile widened. "Your daughter does seem to be a good judge of character, I'll grant her that."
"Um …" Theo began, then shut up again.
Dad and Kayden turned to look at him at the same time, which didn't do anything for his assertiveness right then. I gave him an encouraging nod, and that seemed to help.
"If you have something to say, lad, we're listening." Dad echoed my nod.
"Uh, well, I was just wondering … Max has a whole lot of money. Couldn't he, you know, pay those guys who moved all Kayden's stuff to find out where we're living now?" Theo looked from Dad to Kayden, then to me.
"He certainly could," agreed Dad approvingly. "Sound thinking there, young man. Fortunately, your father will have to work a great deal harder than that to get ahead of me. The removalists who packed the truck are not the same ones who are unpacking it. In fact, I hired them from an entirely different company."
Kayden got it first. "So what you're saying is that when Max drops a bundle to bribe those guys, all he's going to get is that they packed the truck and then watched you drive it away."
Dad gave her a measured nod. "That, my dear Ms Russel, is exactly what I am saying."
I couldn't help snickering at that. When I caught Theo's eye, he might have smiled a little before he ducked his head.
At least Aster was happy to laugh at the joke, even if she had no idea what it meant.
Krieg
"I'm sorry, sir."
To James' practised eye, the overweight man behind the counter of Brockton Bay Removalists didn't look nearly as sorry as he would've been, had he known exactly who he was apologising to. Still, he managed a reasonable simulacrum of the emotion, given that he'd just tucked away a sizeable amount of money to give out what should have been confidential information.
Max, who had handed over the money, seemed to be having trouble comprehending what he'd just been told. "What do you mean, your people didn't unload the truck at the other end?"
"I don't know how else to say it, sir." The man—his nametag read GERARD—spread his hands in a supplicating manner. "We were only paid to show up at that address and load the stuff onto the U-Haul that was already there. It was a one and done."
Max let out an aggravated sigh. "Receipt. Now."
"I, uh—"
James leaned across the counter. "If you can't give him anything else, I strongly suggest you give him that." He did his best to sound encouraging rather than menacing, but he suspected a little of the latter had crept in, from how quickly Gerard complied.
"Right, right, uh, here." Gerard turned his computer screen around so that James and Max could both read the information. It had been highlighted, possibly because Gerard could see how close Max was to doing something fatally drastic to him.
"Wait." Max frowned. "Where's the name of the payer?" He turned his attention to Gerard. "Did you at least sight ID?"
"Uh, no. He paid over the phone. As he wasn't hiring a truck from us, all we needed was the address and the cash. The lady who owned the stuff was there, she let our guys in. She had ID, plus a key and everything." He paused then added virtuously, "We check for stuff like that."
James peered at the highlighted line. In the payer column was simply a string of numbers, something he'd seen before. "Very well," he said, straightening up. "We're done here. Very sorry to have bothered you."
"What?" Max turned and stared at him. "We're not done here. They've got information—"
"Nothing we can use." James gestured to the door. "Let's go. I'll tell you outside."
Max gave him a sharp look, but left. James could tell from his posture that he was looking for basically any excuse to go back in and extract his bribe from Gerard, using any and all means necessary. It wasn't that Max needed the money—what he'd handed over basically amounted to a rounding error in his finances—but it was the principle of the thing.
Once they were outside, away from prying ears, Max turned to James. "This had better be good. If I can get the payer's name from them—"
"We'll never get it." James knew Max hated being cut off like that, but it was for the best. "I recognised the number. It's a Number Man account code."
"Oh, for fuck's sake." Max shook his head. "Why didn't I recognise that? There's no way Kayden has access to one of those accounts. I'd know about it, for one thing."
"Well, someone does." James eyed Max carefully. "What are you going to do now?"
"Find her by finding who paid for it." Max turned and started off down the sidewalk toward where they'd left the car. "How many people in Brockton Bay have a Number Man account, anyway?"
James didn't have to think too hard to get an answer. "If Lung had one, access to it died with him. The Empire's got one. Maybe Coil. Nobody else that I can think of."
Max snapped his fingers. "Coil. That's it. He's the one who paid for the removal service. Has to be."
"What? Are you sure?" James frowned as he got into the car.
"No, no, think it through." Max started the car, revving the engine a few times. "He finds out she's Purity, maybe offers her a substantial bribe to come work for him. She knows I'll take Aster away from her if she stabs me in the back like that, so she gets him to relocate her, probably into whatever secret base he's got. And he knows I'll move heaven and earth to find her once he takes her, so this is his big move to keep the Empire on the back foot while he pulls some stunt of his own."
James considered that, then frowned. "The neighbours said there were two people other than Purity on site. Both average looking, one of them a teenage girl. The last I heard, Coil was tall and skinny, which wasn't mentioned at all. And who's the girl?"
Max pulled the car out into traffic. "Well, of course Coil wouldn't show up in person. Showing up would mean unmasking, which he would definitely never do. The man was clearly his representative, and the girl … hmm." He paused, considering. "I'm not sure about the girl."
"If we're following that theory …" James ventured. There were still a few holes in it that he wasn't sure how to plug. "Circus could possibly pass for a teenage girl." The androgynous villain had worked for Coil a few times in the past, or so the grapevine had it.
Max nodded slowly. "So she would've been added muscle in case someone showed up from the Empire Eighty-Eight. That's thoroughly underhanded. Exactly Coil's style." To give emphasis to his words, he accelerated through a traffic light that was just about to turn red, leaving a trail of angry honking in his wake.
"There's one thing I'm still trying to figure out," James mused. "Why would Purity go to Coil in the first place? If she's trying to rebrand as a hero, I can't see that as being the way to go. Can you?"
Max glanced over at him. "When we catch up with her, that's absolutely one of the questions I'll be sure to ask her."
End of Part Fourteen
Part Fourteen: Wheels Within Wheels
[A/N 1: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]
[A/N 2: The reason this (and the chapter of Darker Path preceding) is so late is because I've been on holidays for the last 12 days, and will be for another two. Currently (Oct 12), I'm in Melbourne (Australia), basically on the other side of the country from Townsville, my home town. Over that time, I've visited three capital cities (Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne) and racked up over 2,500 km in the air (with another 2,000 km to go). I've also attended my best mate's wedding, visited Taronga Zoo, gone whale watching, and had a look at the Melbourne Aquarium. Right now, I'm in the middle of a three-day session of visiting the Melbourne PAX convention. It's been fun, if exhausting. Whoo.]
Director Emily Piggot, PRT ENE
Despite the almost universal agreement among the capes and officers under her command (the obvious exception being Assault) that Marquis needed to be kept on as short a leash as possible until the opportunity came to boot him back into the Birdcage, there had been a surprising lack of volunteers to head up the surveillance effort. Emily wasn't sure whether this was an indication of how much respect (or even outright fear) Marquis was held in, a disinclination to piss her off by failing in this remarkably important task, or (least likely but also least palatable) an undercurrent of sympathy for Assault's point of view.
No matter what the reason was, she didn't like it. She liked even less the fact that Calvert had volunteered for the duty; not because she thought he couldn't do it, but because his insinuations at the meeting had her concerned about how he might go about it. Marquis was the highest profile case they had going at the moment, and even a whiff of mishandling would bring down all sorts of unwelcome attention from those above her in the chain of command.
Unfortunately, the fact remained that he was indeed the only volunteer, and Emily really needed this to happen. If she listened to her misgivings and scratched his application, not only would there be zero surveillance on the man at a time when she absolutely needed eyes on him twenty-four/seven, but people like Chief Director Costa-Brown would be asking her pointed questions about why she chose to deny the PRT the chance of getting eyes and ears on a notorious criminal.
She couldn't even articulate why she disliked and distrusted Calvert so much. It was indeed true that he'd shot his superior officer in the back once upon a time, but that had been judged a case of exigent circumstances by a court-martial: not good, but not bad enough to actually incarcerate him for. On the other hand, the court had been operating under the unspoken but very real need to hush up the PRT's repeated missteps and outright blunders during the Ellisburg operation, which had almost certainly (though Emily doubted she'd be able to find a single officer willing to admit to this) swayed the verdict toward 'shut up and go away'.
But beyond all that, there was something else going on with him, something that made her neck hairs stand on end. If he'd been a cape, she would've been able to understand it, because this was exactly how she felt about capes. But he wasn't, so that couldn't be it. She just didn't know what it was.
Still, immediate requirements took precedence over ill-formed worries, so she pushed the latter aside and gave the man standing before her desk a hard stare. "Commander Calvert."
"Ma'am?" Calvert's posture was correct and his tone respectful. She chose to ignore everything else for the moment, because she needed this to happen.
"I've had a brief prepared for you, covering Marquis' place of residence and the places and people he's been visiting so far. You will conduct surveillance on him, specifically according to the guidelines provided within the brief. You will not exceed that mandate in any way without first checking with me personally." That was about as unequivocal as she could get without actually going along on the op with him.
Calvert nodded thoughtfully. "How close are we allowed to get?"
She'd expected questions like this. "It will all be in the brief, but in short: you are not to initiate contact with him. If he makes your people in any way, then you will break contact, report in, and resume surveillance via less direct means."
"And Panacea?" he asked.
"Panacea was never in the Birdcage." She made the observation as blunt as she could. "You will only surveil her in the context of being near him. The strictures against making contact are just as stringent for her, because every time we annoy her, we make it just that little bit harder to put him away again even if he slips up."
"She may carry messages for him." It wasn't quite an objection. "How do we guard against that?"
She'd already considered the problem. It was very much a rock-and-hard-place situation. "For now, the assumption is that she isn't willing to participate in criminal activity for him, and that she's smart enough not to carry a letter to another criminal. If we find proof to the contrary, then I will alter the rules of engagement. But until that time, you will operate to both the letter and the spirit of the brief. Is that clearly understood?"
"Yes, ma'am." They were both aware of the recorder in the desk, ensuring that there would be zero misunderstandings as to who was at fault if Calvert's team overstepped their bounds. She wanted Marquis back in the Birdcage just as badly as the rest of the PRT did, but she knew damn well that if it wasn't done by the book, it wouldn't be done at all. "One more question. What are the options regarding searches for incriminating material, in the case of questionable activity? Who do we go through to get warrants for that?"
"Me." She stood, hands planted firmly on her desk, ignoring the twinge from her calf muscles. "I want you to impress on each member of your strike squad just how important this is. I'm fully aware that that there's a lot of emotion riding on this. We all want Marquis behind bars again, but the last thing I need is any of my subordinates colouring outside the lines to get us there, like the Brockton Bay Brigade did back in the day."
"What they did worked," he protested. "He went to the Birdcage."
"That was ten years ago. Things were different, then. He had a huge number of charges against him, and there wasn't a lawyer on the east coast willing to step up and defend him adequately. If we slip up even once, he almost certainly has the funds to hire on someone like Quinn Calle. Hell, Calle might even choose to do it pro bono, just for the exposure it would get him."
"Calle's just a lawyer—" he began, the hint of a sneer in his voice.
"A lawyer who gets more villains off the hook than any other member of the Bar," she cut in. "I don't want to see even the suggestion of going off the reservation with this. We have to do it by the book, every step of the way. No bullshit beg-for-forgiveness-afterward stunts."
He didn't look thrilled. "It sounds to me like you're tying our hands before we even get started."
"Not my doing." She shook her head. "It's just the reality of the situation. Any case we bring against him has to be even more immaculate than normal. Double-check everything, document everything, and for God's sake have your body-cams running every second you're within a city block of him. Is that understood?"
"Body-cams." It wasn't quite a protest. "Is that an order, ma'am?" PRT strike squads didn't tend to use body-cameras, as delicate electronics didn't tend to stand up to cape powers. Sometimes she suspected they pushed back against the idea more as a matter of principal than out of actual practicality, but this time they were going to be shit out of luck.
"It is very much an order, Commander Calvert. Putting Marquis away again is going to take more than a bit of luck, which means we need to stack the odds in our favour as hard as we can. Also, when it comes to actually slapping the cuffs on him, I don't want either Calle or Panacea being able to claim that we treated him differently to any other suspect."
He took a deep breath but the expected push-back didn't materialise. This was good for his career, because she had exactly zero tolerance for any backtalk from him right at that moment. "Message received loud and clear, ma'am. I'll get right on it."
She didn't smile, because she still didn't trust him as far as she could spit him. Unfortunately, right now she didn't have much of a choice in the matter. Seating herself again, she watched as he left her office, closing the door behind him.
I just hope this doesn't blow up in my face.
<><>
Coil
Thomas Calvert didn't slam Piggot's door on the way out, mainly because he had a firm handle on his temper. The nerve of that damned woman! She was all but accusing him of intending to do… well, exactly what he had planned.
She hadn't come out and said it to his face, of course. That made the narrative harder for him to manipulate, which had probably been her intention all along. If she didn't give him something concrete to object to, he couldn't play the injured party. This made it harder for him to put her on the back foot.
The irritating thing was, while he was more inclined toward sneaking and double-dealing, she had ten years of experience in handling people like him. Unlike some who eventually gave way and let him do what he wanted, she had a limit. Beyond that point, she tolerated zero bullshit.
In the other timeline, she had managed to goad him into saying something unwise. She used that as an excuse to relieve him of duty, pending a court-martial for insubordination. While he could kill her in that timeline—something he had done a thousand times before, just because he wanted to—it would get him nowhere.
The only way to continue on as a PRT officer in good standing was to accept the mission as she'd given it to him, and make the best of things. Of course, his capacity for making the best of things was only matched by his ability to lie, cheat, murder and steal his way to victory, so he felt reasonably optimistic in that regard.
The broad strokes of his plan were still viable. Panacea had to die, to make way for the fall of Marquis (whether this led to the morgue or the Birdcage, he didn't care) and the disgrace of Emily Piggot.
His plans would come to fruition, and he would end up on top, no matter how many people had to go down to make it happen.
Few things in life were a guarantee. This was one of them.
<><>
Medhall Building
Kaiser
"Have you seen Purity?" Max looked up from his phone, after it had gone to voicemail four times in a row. The first message he'd left had been a masterpiece of restraint, but in the second and third he'd allowed more than a little sarcasm to creep into his tone. His fourth had been downright scathing, but that still got him no closer to speaking with Kayden.
"Hm." James tilted his head in thought. "Not for some little time. She spoke of an errand she needed to attend to. I chose not to inquire as to its nature."
"Well, maybe you should have." Max gave him a hard stare. "With the ABB off the board, we have an opportunity like no other. We can't have our most pivotal members simply vanishing into the ether without giving the rest of us notice, or at least leaving their phones on."
James raised an eyebrow. "She's a proud woman, Max. I have no doubt she needs her space, just like the rest of us do."
"She's my wife." Max's grip on his phone tightened, his voice edged with irritation as he replied. "If anyone's got the right to know what she's doing and where she's going, it's me."
"Hm." This time it was a chuckle rather than an introspective sound. "I've been married for twenty years, and I know for a fact that's a privilege and not a right. If Purity chooses not to accord it to you, then you do not have it."
James's claim might have made sense to some people, but not to Max Anders. "Well, where would she be, if not here or at her apartment with Aster?"
This time, James gave him an odd look. "You do not think she has other places she can be?"
"I know she has her phone on her when she goes shopping, and she doesn't usually shower at this time of day." Max knew he was being extremely generous and fair-minded about the whole thing. He'd given her time to get out of the shower, if that was what she was doing. However, she still hadn't answered or called him back.
"So you do not think she may be simply out for a stroll, or down at the Boardwalk? Is that not where she met Panacea?" James seemed intent on downplaying the whole situation. Were he not happily married, and had Kayden been anyone else, Max may have suspected him of trying to cover up an affair or something similar.
"She knows damn well that she needs to be available at any hour of the night or day." It was only common sense. Her position as his lieutenant in the Empire Eighty-Eight was contingent on her being able to step up at a moment's notice. Also, she was his wife (in his view, the separation was merely attention-seeking behaviour) which put the seal on the whole matter.
"Well, then, have you attempted to call the apartment landline? It may be that her cell-phone is out of charge, or otherwise malfunctioning." James spread his hands and raised his eyebrows, and after a moment Max conceded that he might have a point.
"Okay, fine. I'll call it now." Max had to pause to get the number out of his phone's storage, not being one that he knew by rote. "But if she's not there, then there's something seriously wrong going on."
"I doubt there's any real problem. Anyone who knew her real identity would come after us first, while if someone did attack her and Aster without knowing who she was, it would involve a closed-casket funeral. But suit yourself." James leaned back in his chair and watched as Max located the number.
When he tapped the call icon, it rang several times, to the point where Max was about to end the call. But then it was picked up.
"Hello?" It was Theo's voice. He sounded nervous, but that was normal for the boy.
"Theo." Max spoke firmly. "Tell me where Kayden is."
"Uh … Kayden's fine. She, uh, just stepped out for a minute. Everything's fine here."
Max inhaled sharply, frustration boiling over. 'I didn't ask how she was. I asked where she is. Has she been at the apartment while I called? Where is she, Theo?'"
"Uh, I don't know right now, but she's fine." Max's antennae went up. Something was off. "Uh, gotta go. Aster needs me." The phone handset went down, and the call cut off.
"Well?" asked James. "Where is she?"
"Not certain." Max stared out the window for a second, deep in thought. "Theo said she was fine, that everything was fine … but he didn't call her to the phone. I think he was lying about something."
Now James tilted his head. "Max, I've met your boy. There is no way on earth he would have the nerve to lie to you. Or anyone, to be honest. He's far too timid. Are you sure you're reading the situation correctly?"
Max pinched his earlobe lightly with his thumbnail as he worked his way through the thought process that James's question had sparked. "He'd never lie to me of his own accord. He knows better than that. But if he was put up to it by someone else, he might. Which means …" Abruptly, he stood up from his chair. "I have to get over there, right now."
"What? Why?" James rose as well. "Do you think there's a problem?"
"Well, if there isn't, there soon will be." Max reached under his desk and pressed the button that electronically locked his office door. Then he pressed the intercom button that connected him to his personal assistant. While Ms Harcourt was an absolute gem for organisation and administration, Max still had no idea of her political beliefs, so she hadn't yet been read in on his true identity, or even the secrets of Medhall. It would become remarkably inconvenient if they had to dispose of her because she objected to such things. Better to keep her in the dark and continue to benefit from her numerous talents. "Please hold all my calls and reschedule my appointments for tomorrow. I will be busy for a while."
"Yes, sir." Ms Harcourt didn't ask any questions, which was one of her more endearing qualities. She took the information she was given, and ran with it.
Satisfied all was secure on that front, Max stepped aside from the chair and turned to the back wall of his office. Reaching out, he pressed the hidden switch that slid aside the panel concealing the secret elevator, then laid his hand on the biometric scanner thus revealed.
The elevator door opened and Max stepped in, with James following behind. It was a snug fit, though quite adequate for two adults. Any more people than that, however, would find it somewhat cramped.
There was no need for buttons inside the elevator, as it only had two destinations. Once the door closed, the elevator started its descent. It was fast, but Max still chafed at the time it was taking.
"Talk to me, Max." James seemed to be fully aware of his disquiet. "What do you think is happening at Purity's apartment that requires your presence right at this moment?"
"I'm not one hundred percent sure," Max reluctantly admitted. "But Theo was definitely nervous about something, and either unable or unwilling to get Kayden to come to the phone. This says to me that something's wrong in that apartment, and I need to find out what."
James nodded. "You make a valid point. Do you want me to call the rest of the Empire in on this?"
As the elevator door opened, Max considered that. On the one hand, if Kayden was taking advantage of the current unrest to make some sort of move toward taking Aster out of his reach, he didn't want his marital problems broadcast far and wide through the team. However, on the other, if there was an actual problem at Kayden's apartment, having backup could be invaluable.
"… just the ones who can respond the fastest," he hedged. "Whatever's going on, we don't want to jeopardise Kayden's secret identity."
In truth, Max only cared about that insofar as it was linked to his own secret identity; if she hadn't been married to him, or part of the Empire, he wouldn't have given a damn.
"Understood." James may or may not have picked up on that nuance, but Max didn't give a damn about that either.
They climbed into one of the anonymous cars that Max kept in the sub-basement garage for getting around town on the quiet, and he accelerated toward the exit ramp while James made the call.
If it turned out to be just a case of miscommunication on Theo's part, he would have harsh words with the boy about saying what needed to be said. However, if it was more serious than that, then he absolutely would not stop at harsh words.
One question niggled at him as he drove:
Why is Theo still at Kayden's? He was supposed to be back hours ago.
<><>
Kayden's Apartment
Panacea
"Uh, gotta go. Aster needs me." Theo put the phone down, then stepped away from it.
Around the room, the removalists Dad had hired continued to ferry packed boxes out the door while others packed the last of Kayden's belongings according to her instructions. Dad, who had stood by with his hands clasped behind his back while Theo answered the phone, raised an eyebrow. "I presume he didn't buy your act."
"Sorry, sir." Theo's shoulders slumped and his eyes darted away, avoiding contact. "I can never lie to him. I'm too scared to."
I stood up from the sofa I'd been sitting on, allowing two of the guys to pick it up and walk out the door with it, and put my hand on Theo's shoulder. "Hey, don't beat yourself up. What did he say, exactly?"
"He, uh, wanted to know where Kayden was, and why she wasn't answering her phone." Theo shrugged. "I did my best, but he just kept pushing."
"Well, I'm glad you did." Kayden stepped in and hugged him. "If I'd answered it, he'd probably have me half-convinced to stay by now. That man has a talent for getting under my skin."
"But why are you even moving?" asked Theo. "I thought you liked this apartment."
Kayden grimaced. "I do, but I'm entering into a working arrangement with Mr Matheson, and your father won't exactly approve. We both know he doesn't, uh …"
"Take things like that lying down?" Dad suggested. "From what I've seen, the man's a control freak of the highest order."
Theo hunched his shoulders, falling silent. I could see he agreed but was too scared to voice it. I'd only met Theo an hour ago, but he was throwing out all the signs of someone whose upbringing had been less than stellar. I could sympathise.
"That's actually being kind to him." Kayden nodded toward her stepson. "It's also why I want Theo to come with. The moment I vanish, Max is going to assume he knew something whether he did or not, and if I left him behind, the interrogation would not be kind. Besides, Aster needs her brother."
"The need to be with one's family is something I am well acquainted with," Dad assured her. "Whether you move into my main accommodation or one of the subsidiary properties I am in the process of purchasing, there will be room for all of you." He glanced around. "It seems that our work here is almost complete. I've never needed to vacate a premises ahead of a vengeful ex-husband, but there's a first time for everything."
"And that's our cue." I took Theo's arm. "C'mon, let's get Aster downstairs."
"Um, okay." Theo followed, his eyes revealing a swirl of unasked questions. I noticed his hesitation; even without his natural shyness—something I planned to help him overcome—he clearly felt overwhelmed by the rapid pace of events.
Aster, on the other hand, took it in her stride. Despite the ongoing upheaval of almost every part of her life, the little munchkin was at her cutest today, gurgling and pointing at things from her stroller as Theo and I rode down in the elevator. We exited the building and headed for the car—a nice anonymous sedan—that Dad had bought a little while ago. With the spare key fob—Dad had thought ahead—I bipped it open as we were walking up to it.
"Okay, so there's stuff going on that I still don't really understand." Theo got Aster out of the stroller while I opened the back door of the car. I watched as he leaned in and got her settled in the baby seat, a lot more expertly than I would have.
I started to try to fold the stroller down, but I couldn't quite get the hang of it. "Well, ask away. And can you give me a hand with this?"
"Sure." He reached in and flicked a catch I hadn't spotted, and the whole thing just collapsed in on itself. "There you go. Uh, this thing between your dad and Kayden, it's not just a business thing, is it?"
I tilted my head and looked at him speculatively. From the first moment I'd met him, I'd suspected there was a brain in that head, and he'd just proven it. "No, it's not," I confirmed. Reaching down, I popped the trunk and stuck the collapsed stroller on top of the luggage already there, then closed it again, just as Dad and Kayden exited the building. "Let's go."
When I'd made the suggestion that we team up with Purity, her first response was that it was impossible, that Kaiser would work against us at every turn. Whether this came about via pressure in her civilian life, outright attacks on Dad or me by the Empire roster, or somewhere in between, something would happen. The chance of innocents being caught in the firing line as a direct result was somewhat more than zero, and I was not fine with that. Neither, gratifyingly enough, was Dad. To be fair, for him it was more of a public-image situation, but so long as the end result remained the same, I wasn't about to criticise him for his actual reasons.
This had led to the next logical point in our discussion. While we couldn't do much about preventing attacks from the Empire while Dad was out in costume (not that he went out in costume all that much), we could absolutely remove Kayden from the line of fire. Dad was buying properties discreetly, using methods that might have been questionable (but I was reasonably sure weren't illegal) to keep our identities under wraps. Legality aside, I figured the moral aspect was probably more important at the moment.
We climbed into the back seat of the car, with Aster between us, and closed the doors just as Kayden reached it. Behind us, I heard the U-Haul truck (with Dad at the wheel) start up and trundle off down the street. The front door opened, and Kayden got in. "Ready to go?" she asked.
"Absolutely," I said, feeling the adrenaline singing through my veins. We weren't in any danger—at least, I hoped we weren't—but this was still way out of my usual comfort zone. I wasn't quite sure when I'd started to see that as being a good thing, but I suspected meeting Fred Jones had something to do with it.
"Aster's secure?" she asked next, even as she started the car. I surreptitiously tugged at my seatbelt, wondering exactly when I'd done it up—excitement was funny like that—and looked out the window to see if I could spot Kaiser coming. It seemed there was nothing to worry about yet, but that was going to change very shortly if Dad was right (and he usually was).
"Yes," Theo replied as he snapped his belt into place. "I made sure of it."
And then, just after the truck trundled around the corner up ahead, a car came down the street past the corner, moving at speed. Not one person in ten recognised me as Panacea out of costume on a good day, but I ducked down anyway. With my eyes just above the windowsill, even though it whipped past in a fraction of a second, I was absolutely certain that the driver was none other than Max Anders. I didn't recognise the guy in the passenger seat.
"Don't look back," Kayden said quietly as I sat up again. I realised that she and Theo had ducked down as well. "It'll take them a couple of minutes to realise the place is empty. We do not want them recalling a car with suspiciously familiar people in it." With admirable control, she pulled the car away from the curb and started off after the truck.
"No, we don't," I agreed, then let out a long sigh. "Theo, are you alright?"
"Uh huh." Theo's tone was a little higher than it had been before. "Mom, what's this really about? Amelia says it's not a business deal. Is this a cape thing?"
I raised my eyebrows. Theo was connecting the dots a lot faster than I'd expected him to.
Kayden's next sigh was one of resignation. "Yes, it's a cape thing. But I'm going to need you to keep that to yourself, okay? Not just for my sake, but for theirs."
Theo nodded slowly, his eyes going from Kayden to me. "Mr Matheson … he's Marquis, isn't he?"
"Theo—" she began, but I held up my hand.
"It's okay, Ms Russel. Yeah, Theo. He's Marquis, and he's my dad as well. I guess I kind of gave it away just by showing up, huh?" The word that Panacea was Marquis' daughter was only a little less prevalent by now than the word that Marquis was out of the Birdcage. Anyone who was even slightly on the ball when it came to current events was fully aware of both facts.
He shrugged modestly. "I guess. Though most people didn't grow up with capes."
I grinned. As divergent as our lives were on most points, that was definitely an aspect we had in common. "Right back atcha."
<><>
Kaiser
"Where the hell is she?" Max's voice echoed through the empty apartment as he stormed from room to room. He threw doors open, the sounds of them hitting the walls echoing through the empty apartment, each thud punctuating his growing anger. Every room was the same: stripped of everything useful, including any clues to Kayden's current whereabouts. There wasn't so much as a Post-it note, or a fridge for it to go on.
When he returned to the living room, he discovered that James had remained by the front door, gazing around with a calculating air. "She's gone, Max. Were I a betting man, I would wager a large amount of money that she never intends to return."
A flicker of understanding crossed Max's face as he pieced together the implications of James's words. "And she's kidnapped both my son and my infant daughter in the process. We need to find her, to get them back." Kayden would pay dearly for this betrayal.
"Hm." James nodded. "Look around. What do you see?"
Irritated, Max did as he was told, but no great epiphany burst upon him. "An empty room, in an empty apartment. What are you trying to show me?"
"How well furnished was it?" pressed James. "Did she have more than could fit into her car?" The car that, at that moment, was still parked outside.
"Yes, it was well furnished." Just the sofa alone would have required extensive disassembly before it would fit into Kayden's sedan, and it would certainly have taken up all available space. "I'm not quite sure what you're getting at."
"Four words." James seemed almost to be savouring Max's current inability to think through the problem. "Who. Helped. Her. Move?"
"Oh." Max's head came up and he looked around the living room with new eyes. Kayden's possessions would certainly have required a considerable amount of effort to move in bulk, especially given that she was living in the place as of yesterday. There was no way that she would've been able to move everything out in less than a week, even with Theo's assistance. "Oh."
James gestured at the open door. "People living in these conditions tend to be nosy. While you were rampaging, I asked a few questions of her neighbours, assisted by a couple of minor bribes."
Max chose to ignore the word 'rampaging'. He was Kaiser. He didn't rampage. "And what did you find out?"
"That a medium to large group of men wearing overalls marked 'Brockton Bay Removalists' spent the last hour emptying out Purity's apartment," James reported. "They were accompanied by Purity herself—not in costume, of course—as well as another man and a teenage girl. No specific descriptions of the man or the girl, save that they were white and average looking. Maybe brown hair, but that's not a given."
"So, basically we're looking at forty percent of the men and girls in Brockton Bay." Max tried not to sound too sarcastic, but it was difficult. "Not sure how helpful that is."
"The company name might be," James prompted. "If we ask them about the job they did …"
Max's brain finally managed to fight off the pervasive distraction and clicked into gear. "Of course! We can get a name for their employer and a destination for where they took Kayden's things!"
"That's what I was thinking, yes." James raised an eyebrow. "Do you think we should also contact the police, over the kidnapping charges?"
For a moment Max was tempted, but then he shook his head. The time for the legal system would come later, after he'd brought Kayden to heel himself. Until then, the police would just get in the way.
<><>
Purity
The new apartment can do with a makeover, Kayden decided as she directed where the removalists were to put things. However, it wasn't high on her priorities right then, and it was definitely something she could handle on her own accord. The important part was, she and Aster were out from under Max's thumb (hopefully forever) and she'd managed to take Theo with her too.
She still wasn't quite sure how Marquis had managed this. It certainly wouldn't have been paid for by Panacea; from her own conversations with the young cape, Amelia didn't charge for her services. Turning, she looked at the supervillain and his daughter the hero.
"Will it suffice?" he asked, misinterpreting her glance, or maybe not. The man was a master of tact, when he chose to be.
She gestured around at the apartment, and smiled. "It's perfect. I was just wondering … well, I hope I'm not bankrupting you, that's all. All this, at short notice, it can't be cheap."
His smile, though austere, was genuine. "Hardly. Even if it were twice the price, I wouldn't begrudge you. As you pointed out, and as Max was eager to cash in on, I do owe you a significant debt of gratitude, and I always pay my debts."
Kayden shook her head dismissively. "That's a Max thing, not me. I was never going to call that in, and you know it. Besides, Amelia saved my purse from being snatched the first time we met, and Aster loves her."
His smile widened. "Your daughter does seem to be a good judge of character, I'll grant her that."
"Um …" Theo began, then shut up again.
Dad and Kayden turned to look at him at the same time, which didn't do anything for his assertiveness right then. I gave him an encouraging nod, and that seemed to help.
"If you have something to say, lad, we're listening." Dad echoed my nod.
"Uh, well, I was just wondering … Max has a whole lot of money. Couldn't he, you know, pay those guys who moved all Kayden's stuff to find out where we're living now?" Theo looked from Dad to Kayden, then to me.
"He certainly could," agreed Dad approvingly. "Sound thinking there, young man. Fortunately, your father will have to work a great deal harder than that to get ahead of me. The removalists who packed the truck are not the same ones who are unpacking it. In fact, I hired them from an entirely different company."
Kayden got it first. "So what you're saying is that when Max drops a bundle to bribe those guys, all he's going to get is that they packed the truck and then watched you drive it away."
Dad gave her a measured nod. "That, my dear Ms Russel, is exactly what I am saying."
I couldn't help snickering at that. When I caught Theo's eye, he might have smiled a little before he ducked his head.
At least Aster was happy to laugh at the joke, even if she had no idea what it meant.
<><>
Krieg
"I'm sorry, sir."
To James' practised eye, the overweight man behind the counter of Brockton Bay Removalists didn't look nearly as sorry as he would've been, had he known exactly who he was apologising to. Still, he managed a reasonable simulacrum of the emotion, given that he'd just tucked away a sizeable amount of money to give out what should have been confidential information.
Max, who had handed over the money, seemed to be having trouble comprehending what he'd just been told. "What do you mean, your people didn't unload the truck at the other end?"
"I don't know how else to say it, sir." The man—his nametag read GERARD—spread his hands in a supplicating manner. "We were only paid to show up at that address and load the stuff onto the U-Haul that was already there. It was a one and done."
Max let out an aggravated sigh. "Receipt. Now."
"I, uh—"
James leaned across the counter. "If you can't give him anything else, I strongly suggest you give him that." He did his best to sound encouraging rather than menacing, but he suspected a little of the latter had crept in, from how quickly Gerard complied.
"Right, right, uh, here." Gerard turned his computer screen around so that James and Max could both read the information. It had been highlighted, possibly because Gerard could see how close Max was to doing something fatally drastic to him.
"Wait." Max frowned. "Where's the name of the payer?" He turned his attention to Gerard. "Did you at least sight ID?"
"Uh, no. He paid over the phone. As he wasn't hiring a truck from us, all we needed was the address and the cash. The lady who owned the stuff was there, she let our guys in. She had ID, plus a key and everything." He paused then added virtuously, "We check for stuff like that."
James peered at the highlighted line. In the payer column was simply a string of numbers, something he'd seen before. "Very well," he said, straightening up. "We're done here. Very sorry to have bothered you."
"What?" Max turned and stared at him. "We're not done here. They've got information—"
"Nothing we can use." James gestured to the door. "Let's go. I'll tell you outside."
Max gave him a sharp look, but left. James could tell from his posture that he was looking for basically any excuse to go back in and extract his bribe from Gerard, using any and all means necessary. It wasn't that Max needed the money—what he'd handed over basically amounted to a rounding error in his finances—but it was the principle of the thing.
Once they were outside, away from prying ears, Max turned to James. "This had better be good. If I can get the payer's name from them—"
"We'll never get it." James knew Max hated being cut off like that, but it was for the best. "I recognised the number. It's a Number Man account code."
"Oh, for fuck's sake." Max shook his head. "Why didn't I recognise that? There's no way Kayden has access to one of those accounts. I'd know about it, for one thing."
"Well, someone does." James eyed Max carefully. "What are you going to do now?"
"Find her by finding who paid for it." Max turned and started off down the sidewalk toward where they'd left the car. "How many people in Brockton Bay have a Number Man account, anyway?"
James didn't have to think too hard to get an answer. "If Lung had one, access to it died with him. The Empire's got one. Maybe Coil. Nobody else that I can think of."
Max snapped his fingers. "Coil. That's it. He's the one who paid for the removal service. Has to be."
"What? Are you sure?" James frowned as he got into the car.
"No, no, think it through." Max started the car, revving the engine a few times. "He finds out she's Purity, maybe offers her a substantial bribe to come work for him. She knows I'll take Aster away from her if she stabs me in the back like that, so she gets him to relocate her, probably into whatever secret base he's got. And he knows I'll move heaven and earth to find her once he takes her, so this is his big move to keep the Empire on the back foot while he pulls some stunt of his own."
James considered that, then frowned. "The neighbours said there were two people other than Purity on site. Both average looking, one of them a teenage girl. The last I heard, Coil was tall and skinny, which wasn't mentioned at all. And who's the girl?"
Max pulled the car out into traffic. "Well, of course Coil wouldn't show up in person. Showing up would mean unmasking, which he would definitely never do. The man was clearly his representative, and the girl … hmm." He paused, considering. "I'm not sure about the girl."
"If we're following that theory …" James ventured. There were still a few holes in it that he wasn't sure how to plug. "Circus could possibly pass for a teenage girl." The androgynous villain had worked for Coil a few times in the past, or so the grapevine had it.
Max nodded slowly. "So she would've been added muscle in case someone showed up from the Empire Eighty-Eight. That's thoroughly underhanded. Exactly Coil's style." To give emphasis to his words, he accelerated through a traffic light that was just about to turn red, leaving a trail of angry honking in his wake.
"There's one thing I'm still trying to figure out," James mused. "Why would Purity go to Coil in the first place? If she's trying to rebrand as a hero, I can't see that as being the way to go. Can you?"
Max glanced over at him. "When we catch up with her, that's absolutely one of the questions I'll be sure to ask her."
End of Part Fourteen
- Location
- parker colorado
Kaiser was so close, but so far. Oh well he couldn't be going after a better target.
- Location
- Here
"...See, she's been subverted by the Riddler and plans to work with Two-face, and that's how she'll kill the Batman!"
"Oh. Of course, if you say so sir!" ~James, apparently.