Heatwave 9.16
Sunday, June 19
Two screens float in front of you. The first shows your apartment building the way it was. You flop backwards on the couch in Lacey's apartment and huff out an exasperated breath. It is not loss of your property that concerns you; all you took back with you to the apartment were a few changes of clothes. It is the senselessness of the destruction and the loss of life that makes this awful. "Who. The
hell. Did this?"
Samantha comes to a stop, her bone harpoon no longer whipping violently through various weapon forms. She had started them last night while you were preparing for bed, 'to help her calm herself' she had claimed, but when you woke up this morning she was still running through various swings and lunges. Was it possible she had woken up early? Yes, but somehow you doubt that is actually the case here.
She just really wants somebody right now she can bash, slash, and stab in the face.
"Fairyland?" she suggests, leaning on the harpoon. "We hurt and arrested one of their capes, so they came after us?"
"I thought about that, but it doesn't make sense. They'd go after the Privateers, not us specifically. We've never fought them. The only time we've ever seen them fight before this was during the gang war, and we were helping, for crying out loud."
She grunts in acknowledgement. "Winter Hill? Maybe Angel Dust could cook up something like this."
"He's a drug Tinker. The stuff they pulled out against Cadejo was drug-like enough I can believe he could make it, but this?" You wave a hand at the second screen. "I don't see how anything related to pharmaceuticals could let you turn brick and mortar into glass."
"One of the outside gangs."
"But why target
us? We aren't the Protectorate. We're just a couple of independents."
"Maybe it wasn't targeted at us in particular. Somebody decides glassing a random apartment building is a good way to make a splash, and we just had awful luck?" This is the weakest suggestion yet, and she knows it if the grimace on her face is any indication.
"If they wanted to make a name for themselves, they would have claimed credit. They didn't." Prodding the jewel laying on your chest with one finger, you ask, "Storm, any ideas you'd like to throw out there?"
The Intelligent Device throws out an idea, alright, in the form of a third screen showing the apartment's staircase when it was still habitable.
"Security footage from yesterday. 4:27 pm and 10:18 pm."
"How did you find this?" you ask in surprise. "The computers this was stored on should be just as ruined as the rest of the building."
"Data stored in separate location. Owned by security corporation."
"But how would you have found it?" Samantha prompted. "The only person who would know which company it was is the landlord, and his computer's gone… Perfect Storm. Did you hack into the landlord's bank account to find out which company he was paying so you could hack
them and get this video?"
"…Refusal to answer based on potential incriminating circumstances."
You laugh and pat the Device. You really do need to scold it for hacking anything and everything, but in this case its initiative may have cracked the case. "Play the video."
After a couple of seconds of stillness, two men walk up the stairs, each of them lugging a duffel bag and dressed in heavy dark clothing that is blatantly inappropriate for the weather. They don't wear masks, but their identities are concealed by simple virtue of keeping their heads turned away from the camera. One man walks up the next set of stairs, but the other drops his cargo into a trash can and heads back down the stairs.
Abruptly the video changes to a shot at night, and with a flash of light the screen goes dark. Perfect Storm does not wait for your command before it rewinds the feed frame by frame, and you watch in slow motion as an eerily glowing cloud returns to the inside of that same trash can.
"So these are our guys, but we still have no clue who they are," you sum up with a sigh.
"I wouldn't say that." You turn your head to look at Samantha, who is staring at the video with eyes filled with a feral hunger. "I recognize those outfits. They're the same semi-military look as the men we saw when we went with Danny to buy the laser rifle."
That provides the missing context you need, and you rewind the video to show the men again. She's right, and the name of that parahuman comes out in a hiss. "
Coil."
"Coil."
"That explains the who. Now we're just left with the how and the why." You scratch your head. "Why especially. We haven't had anything to do with Coil since we left Brockton Bay. Before, even. Why is he coming after us? It isn't like we're a threat to him. He doesn't even know we know he's a villain—" Pieces click into place. "Oh, that selfish, sanctimonious little bitch."
"What?"
"There's only one way he could know we know he isn't an antihero. His ten-cent whore told him." Your smile is all teeth. "Tattletale."
Samantha hums before remarking in a light voice, "I should have gutted her when I had the chance."
"You might still get that chance. Storm, I have a job for you." The jewel chimes. "Trawl the Internet. Don't go hacking the CIA or PRT or Pentagon or anyplace like that, but I want to know where Coil's from, where he is now, what his name is, who his friends are, who he banged last night, what he eats for breakfast in the morning. Everything."
"And then?" asks Samantha with a knowing gaze.
"And then? Then we're going on a snake hunt."
xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Unfortunately for your smoldering anger, there is little more that can be done about your Coil problem at the moment. Samantha has an idea about pumping the visiting heroes for information about the villains and gangs in other cities, but that leaves you with nothing to do until a quarter past five rolls around and you land lightly in the lawn of Kayleigh's house.
Though 'lawn' and 'house' are slight misnomers. You knew Kayleigh's dad was rich. You didn't know he was rich enough that she lives out in Bryn Mawr, one of the most expensive suburbs of Philadelphia. She doesn't quite live in a mansion, but you still think you could fit five or six of your home back in Brockton Bay into hers and have room to spare. The wide swath of green matches the size of the house, and you look back and forth at the manicured grass for a minute or two before reaching the door and knocking firmly.
It takes longer than you expected for Kayleigh to come into view. "Taylor! Hey! I didn't hear you drive up. Why are you at the back door?"
Your answer is to raise your eyebrow and then rise a couple of inches off the ground before returning to earth. She gives you an embarrassed giggle before waving you into the house. "Come on in. Let me show you around before everyone else gets here. Jill is going to be here at five-thirty on the dot, just you see."
It takes most of the remaining fifteen minutes for her to finish the tour, and sure enough, other teenage girls start pouring in. Jill, Michelle, Fiona, Trish, Marcia, Laura; the number keeps rising, and even though there are only seventeen girls here when the front door is finally locked behind the last, you can't help but feel as though they have filled even the massive den.
It is a good thing that this is entirely a Kayleigh production because you have no clue where you would even start trying to entertain everyone. Instead bowls of chips and dips and plates of finger foods come out of nowhere, and everyone starts talking and laugh and exchanging the latest bits of gossip.
You can't help but curl back up slightly in your shell and instead spend some time people-watching.
There are three distinct groups here, you soon realize. The first is Kayleigh's, a gaggle of girls who seem to take their cues from her. It isn't an exact match to the sycophantic procession of girls who followed Emma around, but there are still similarities that probably have more to do with high school social dynamics than any crime on Kayleigh's part. Rich and popular girl gets followers; it is the nature of the beast. The second is similar, but instead oriented around Marcia. There is some bleed over between the two groups, a few girls who are welcomed among both camps, but you cannot help but notice that Kayleigh's cadre seems just a little more open than Marcia's.
The last 'group' consists of a single member: Laura. Cailleach. Is it because she holds herself above the others due to her status as a cape, or is it the more sympathetic reason that she feels just as alienated among these normal girls with their normal lives as you sometimes do?
A shudder rolls down your spine. There is a reason you never got involved in the social scene even before Emma abandoned you. Kayleigh chooses that moment to strike, and you find yourself pulled into the conversation almost against your will.
Does anyone remember that chapter back in Arc 2 where you guys voted for Taylor to be a complete and utter bitch back at Tattletale? I do. 
Now this is an interesting choice. At least I think it's interesting as someone who knows what's behind each curtain. Taylor will spend time with everybody (because it's her party duh), but who do you want her to spend some time with alone and on-screen?
[ ] Kayleigh
[ ] Marcia
[ ] Laura
If there's anything in particular you want to talk about, feel free to put it in as a subvote.
