Grey's Army

---Kings Row: Grey’s Army Base---

It had been a slow week for Grey’s Army since Charlene came back from the Rogue Isles. Randall was a little worried about her welfare, considering the fact that there were numerous rumors about what had happened out there and she was getting involved with a place known for shooting “heroes” on sight when she was seven months pregnant.

Still, she seemed perfectly fine. For the first time, the group got to hear the voice of Sol’Ra, her Kheldian. Chirping, the Peacebringer happily told Randy how proud she was to work with his wife and how quick and defiant she was when dealing with intimidating odds.

“Oh, it wasn’t so bad,” the young-seeming woman waved down the praise amusedly, “It’s not like when I took on that Shadow Cyst Crystal directly… Remember that?”

“Oh my…” the voice emitted from Charlene’s mouth as she held it open, “That was terrible… There I was, exhausted by the Unbound Nictus assaulting us, and you drew a shotgun to finish the crystal off!”

Charlene beamed as her large husband looked worriedly at her. She eased his mind by hugging him about his waist and assuring him that everything was alright.

With the Grey family spending the week together, the rest of the group wasn’t getting much official hero business. Kipland Durj found himself having to throw more of the BWO’s junk into the room they’d stolen and he found Matt “Dirty Ice” Jones passed out in Randy’s microbrewery one morning, but things were otherwise quiet.

One afternoon, he zipped into the base, sandwich in hand, and checked to see what Sheldon was up to. Apparently, the inventor had just developed a new scanner for use with the communicators and wanted to show Kip.

“Hey, Felix,” he said to the pudgy animal sitting on the table and when it started reaching for his sandwich, he continued, “No! No! My sandwich! My sandwich! Get your own! Sheldon!”

“Yeah?” he heard the inventor call from a back room, “What is it?”

“Where’s this scanner you wanted me to see?”

“Just a second, I’m still working out a couple bugs.”

The short man shrugged and went to bite into his lunch. There was a high-toned roar and he looked over in time to see the mutant gerbil leaping for the roast beef and cheese he held. Kip had a moment to consider that the animal had a surprising mouth of sharp teeth for something altered from a rodent before the little bear-like thing had the food snatched out of his hand.

“What the Hell?” he shouted as the critter landed on a display case containing a Rikti Rifle and started munching happily, “Sheldon!”

“What?”

“Get out here and see what Felix did!”

“What?”

The white-coated young man stormed out of the back storage room, his face screwed up in confusion. When he entered the workshop, he looked around the floor and shrugged.

“What is it, Kip? Did he go to the bathroom in here? I don’t smell anything…”

“What? No!” Kip pointed to the display case, “Look!”

“At what?”

Kip turned to point out the animal eating his sandwich, but it was gone. Confused, he looked behind and around the case, but Felix was nowhere to be seen. Then he heard the tell-tale sound of the critter over where Sheldon stood.

“Ah-HA!” he rounded on Sheldon and pointed, “There’s the bugger…”

“Kip,” he pulled the fat little bear-like gerbil out of his lab coat pocket, “Felix has been with me all day.”

The scrapper stared, bewildered, at the critter. It was dressed up in a little gray suit that was covered in electronics. Suddenly, his blood ran cold and he remembered that Felix had both altered another animal, Katie, and built that suit himself.

“Sheldon…”

There was a rattling sound next to the table where they built devices to help them in their adventures through the city. Turning, the two vigilantes saw a circular vent sitting next to it.

“Where does that lead?” Wallace asked, “I’ve seen them throughout the base, but… Randy said this place is surrounded by a sewer, and the furnace upstairs doesn’t feed into here…”

Kip leaned in close and tried to peer between the slats of the vent. In Sheldon’s hand, Felix seemed to be getting more and more agitated.

“I think I hear something,” the scrapper grunted as he started pulling at the edges of the vent, “Help me get this thing off of here, Shel…”

The controller aimed his arm-length glove at the metal protrusion and gave a sharp yank. Kip was aware of something moving near his head before the vent popped off the wall of its own accord, throwing him backwards to land on his butt on the floor.

“I’ve been working on the energy aspect of my gauntlets,” Wallace explained as he took a screwdriver from one of his pockets and started adjusting something in his right gauntlet, “Throwing nanites at my enemies in the hope that they’ll orbit him fast enough to hold him in place hasn’t been as effective as I expected. Perhaps if I’m directing vector forces themselves, I hold a higher chance of success at holding them still. Also… I’ve been working on the energy delivery system of my devices… Perhaps if I’m not drawing off my own body heat, I can utilize my systems longer. Batteries and power cells are finite, though… I’m thinking I should draw energy from my opponents…”

“What does that have to do with anything we’re doing now?” Kip almost shouted at his friend.

“I’m trying to explain why I used too much force to wrench that vent off the wall and subsequently caused you to land on your backside… With these new methods I’m practicing, I’m having a little trouble at the finer points of my control.”

“Ah…”

Kip rolled forward again and reached his hand into the duct behind the vent. Scrabbling his hand about, he felt something fuzzy and grasped it. A moment later, he felt something sink its teeth into his hand.

“Ow! Dammit!” he shouted as he started pulling whatever it was out of the duct, “Come on… Come on!”

Once Kip pulled his arm free, Sheldon gasped as he saw what was hanging off his wrist. It looked like Felix, only bigger, with darker fur. It was busy trying to gnaw into the scrapper’s hand, but was having trouble getting through the peculiar energy field that protected the young man when he was in danger. That didn’t mean Kip couldn’t feel it, and it hurt like Hell, but the critter eventually stopped and looked up at Sheldon.

Or rather, it looked up at Felix. When the scientist realized the deferment, he turned to his pet, who was busy slapping his paw against his forehead in a familiar mannerism related to disappointment and annoyance at the same time.

---

“What the Hell are they?” Kip hissed into Sheldon’s ear.

In the same hour that they found the impostor Felix (actually, it was still a different one; they didn’t find the one that stole Kip’s sandwich until five minutes later, when it burped), the base came alive with the sounds of critters scrambling around the ducts and vents surrounding the base. Sheldon utilized the opportunity to practice his new brand of vector force control to pop the vents off the walls and pull or push the little buggers out of their hiding spots.

There were around thirty in all. Each of them looked different from one another, some all brown, some had tan or brown spots or splotches on white fur, some were all white and some were calico. They were various sizes, some bigger and burlier than Felix, most about the same size as the pudgy little furball, and others were the same size as Katie, the lab mouse Felix had mutated so he would have a friend.

Either this was a litter, or somebody had learned how to replicate Sheldon’s mutagenic formula.

“How did this happen?” Kip asked, unconsciously picking up one of the tiny ones to pet it, “Where’s Katie?”

“With Sarah,” Sheldon replied, “And I think I know how this happened…”

He set the only one wearing any kind of clothing on the couch with the rest. Felix looked up at him in a way that showed he was afraid. It wasn’t so much fear for himself, but he was worried what would happen to his friends.

“Speak,” Sheldon intoned, “Come on. I know you can read, I know you know what I’m saying…”

“Mrah!” the little animal replied, joined later by a small cacophony of similar noises from the other animals.

“Come on. I know you can do better than that.”

“Mrah…” Felix moaned, but after looking to his friends, he looked up to Sheldon, his eyes filled with worry, “Mruh… Pruh… Pluh… Pleeeeeease… Please. Please do’h… do’hn… doooohn’t hurrrrrd us…”

Kip and Sheldon stared blankly at the little animal. Kip figured his friend knew the whole time that the little animals could talk. Sheldon didn’t know how to tell Kip he’d been bluffing.

----------

“How long have you known, Snuffy?”

They called her in since it was her day off from working as a bartender or waitress in Pocket D. Since she was a psychic, and had a penchant for communicating with the animals, they had at first figured she could help explain things. However, they wound up getting far more information when she nonchalantly informed them that she already knew about the numerous critters.

“It’s only been a couple months,” Sarah replied as she set Katie in with the others, “Felix and Katie were running into rats and escaped lab animals that came through the walls or the base portal… They didn’t want to kill them. Actually, the idea came from Ni…”

Her cat had been rubbing against Kip’s leg, obviously enjoying the fact that for once, he was the good animal. Once Sarah outed his responsibility in the affair, however, he hopped away before the scrapper could punt him down the hall.

“What!?” the second-in-command of Grey’s Army shouted, “This isn’t making any sense!”

“Ni suggested he and Katie make more like them and have a group to help keep this place tidy… I mean, let’s face it, with Cedric and those BWO guys, this place would become a mess in a matter of hours…”

“Hey!” they heard from down the hall, “I can hear you, you know!”

“Shut up over there, Daren,” Kip shouted back, “this doesn’t concern you!”

“So, Felix hopped on Sheldon’s computer and started looking for the notes on how to make the mutagen. He had to wait until you guys had brought enough materials into the base, and he covered what he was doing by making that cute little gravity control suit that makes him look like a little rocketeer!”

She rubbed Felix’s cheeks and the little bear made a happy humming noise. Sarah followed this up by rubbing his chin and petting him on the head.

“So… They’re intelligent,” Sheldon sat against the pillar and started hyperventilating, “They’re reproducing, and they’re intelligent…”

“Not exactly reproducing…” Sarah corrected him, “Not yet, anyway. They’re still getting used to their new forms. Those bigger ones, for instance, the ones made from rats, they’ve got bigger claws, bigger teeth, and spikes that shoot out of their backs.”

“Like, shoot-shoot, or just extend?” Kip asked worriedly.

“Extend… Felix and the others his size, made from gerbils, hamsters, guinea pigs and one’s a chinchilla…”

She pointed at the one that had a fuzzier coat.

“…They’ve got the spikes, too, but they’re smaller. And the tiny ones, like Katie… They’ve got no spikes and are just super cuddly!”

Sarah picked up a handful of the little ones and hugged them close. They responded by licking her cheek and snuggling her neck.

“This is too much cute…” Kip muttered, “Someone better do something gruesome, quick…”

One of the bigger critters suddenly made a chomping noise and they looked to see it was chewing on a steak. He looked up at them with an expression of "Did I do good?" However, Kip rounded on Sheldon again.

“Where the Hell did he get that!?” he shouted, to which the inventor merely shrugged.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

---Location: Unknown---

He awoke as light broke through the window and gurgled. He must have missed the alarm clock and that was really going to ruin his day. He’d had everything planned…

Wake up at six. Eat breakfast. Head to the Kenealies’ and fix their toilet. Head to the Johnson’s and fix their window. Head to the new tenant’s and look for the leak in her bathtub that she was talking about. He’d get lunch after that, then turn to the Lawrence’s children’s room and the hole their kids had put into the wall while roughhousing.

However, now his time was up. He would have to hold off on the window today…

Wait…

This wasn’t his room!

Roland turned his head left and right. Everything was white and bright, where his room was tan trimmed with brown (like every other room in his building). Looking to his right, he saw there was a window, a storm window. Next to it, on a shelf, was what looked to be a stuffed animal shaped like a unicorn.

“What the!?” he croaked as he noticed a weight lying on top of him, “Hey…”

He lifted the covers and saw blonde hair resting on his chest. Blinking, he poked the head and the girl mumbled something. With a chill down his spine, he realized whom she was.

“How long was I asleep? What day is it? How did I get here?”

“Megan,” he said quietly, still gently poking her to wake her up, “Hey… Megan… Wake up!”

“Hey sweetie…” she murmured, apparently still asleep, then she hugged him a little tighter.

“What!?” Roland almost coughed, then he pushed a little harder, “Hey! Megan! Wake up!”

“Mm-whuh?”

The heroine opened her eyes and her skin went cold. She had recognized the voice talking to her in her sleep and reacted to it thinking it was a dream. When she realized she could hear his heartbeat, she shot up and looked him in the eyes.

Roland looked back at her, his blank expression turning to shock as he saw how few articles of clothing she wore to sleep (specifically, none). Screaming, Ms. Liberty jumped off the bed, dragging the blankets and sheets with her in a flurry, hitting the nightstand before she hit the floor. Roland was left lying on the mattress in his shorts and a bewildered state of mind.

“Are you okay?” he asked as he finally collected himself to say something.

“GET OUT!”

“Okay…”

Roland stood up on the opposite side of the bed and looked around for his clothes. Not finding them, he decided to make do and leave anyway. Opening the door next to the bed, he beheld Megan Duncan’s wardrobe and his brain had another synaptic dissociation.

“This is a closet,” he said blankly, and the woman giggled, “You okay?”

“No…” she said, her voice a sad squeak, “I hit my head…”

With his face a mask of confusion, Grey walked around the bed and peered at the young woman whose house he happened to be unintentionally invading. She had the sheets and blankets wrapped tightly about her athletic figure and she was gently rubbing where she’d struck herself in her mad dash to get away from him.

“What are you doing here, Roland?”

“I don’t know.”

The look on her face showed that she clearly didn’t believe him.

“I don’t know! I don’t know how I got here!”

“Roland…”

“Look,” he slapped the foot of the bed, “The last thing I remember, aside from this… Wonderful surprise of a morning… Is going to sleep… In my bed! Now, if today isn’t Friday, I’m missing some time…”

“Today is Friday…” Megan’s confused tone showed that she was starting to worry, “…I think…”

She reached up and felt for her communicator on the night stand. Not finding it, she searched around herself and found it under the bed. None of this eased the look of worry on her face; in fact, it seemed to grow worse.

Finally getting to see the date on her communicator, she finally relaxed. This pulled the blankets down from her a little. Realizing the sudden draft, she snatched them back up, her face reddening fiercely. Roland hadn’t seen anything this time, however, as he had moved to the other door in the room.

“Well?” he asked, “Is it Friday? Saturday? Next week? Last week?”

“It’s Friday… The thirteenth…”

“Makes sense.”

“The day before Valentine’s Day,” she glared at him this time.

“That doesn’t have anything to do with me,” he muttered and opened the door, “What the-? Where are my clothes!?”

----------

An hour later, he was sitting in her living room. Ms. Liberty emerged from her room, dressed and ready for the day. She regarded the half-naked husky man sitting on a wooden stool next to the counter that marked where her living room ended and her kitchen began.

“Well?” she asked, “What’s the word?”

“Nester’s on his way to pick me up,” he said with remarkable confidence, considering his lack of apparel, “He’s bringin’ my clothes and the like. I didn’t know the address, so, I used some of the mail you’ve got stacked up on that counter next to the phone to figure out where I am. Jessica.”

Megan Duncan froze a little when he said her name. Looking at the stack of papers he indicated, she saw that they were addressed to both “Megan Duncan” and “Jessica Cole.” The issue of her real name was something of debate between various heroes throughout the city. The whole ordeal had been going on for so long that she didn’t know how to go about correcting it.

“It’s a weird thing… Going by ‘Megan’ and ‘Jessica,’ which you apparently do on a regular basis. I suppose it’s some sort of middle name thing, but then, I don’t go around calling myself ‘James.’”

“It’s complicated, Roland…” she sighed.

“So, which name’s the real one?”

“They both are. I really don’t want to get into it, alright… My family history is… Complicated…”

“So when I first met you and my communicator said your name was ‘Jessica…’”

“It was reading my civilian I.D., because I was technically off the clock.”

She didn’t know what she had expected if he ever caught on to the deception, no matter how minor. They were supposed to be friends, however unlikely that was, and she had deliberately lied to him. It wasn’t completely a lie, though, it was just complicated.

He didn’t seem bothered. Instead, he started chuckling. He gestured about the house and shook his head.

“If I’d never seen this place and found out, I’d probably be ticked. But… Megan… Jessica… Whatever… You don’t live here, do you?”

“What do you mean?” she asked indignantly, planting her fists on her hips in aggravation.

“Everything’s too clean, too tidy, too neat…” he explained, “I considered making breakfast to make up for the embarrassment this morning… But all you’ve got here are pop tarts and stale cereal. Your perishables, like the eggs, for instance, have… Perished. Your television’s plugged into the wall, so is the cable, but the DVD player’s not, its cord is still wrapped up and bound in packaging wire behind it. Your collection… It’s all still in its original packaging except for a few cases. I wouldn’t be surprised if all you did was come home after a day of work and go to sleep.”

“So? So what if that’s what I do? What does it have to do with anything?”

“Well, it just shows me that you don’t know how to live normally… I don’t mean that there’s a normal way to live, we’re not 1950’s America, but there are certain tenets to life that are usually just assumed. It’s generally assumed that you’ll go to your own house and decompress for a couple hours. It’s generally assumed that you’ll learn to cook real meals for yourself instead of buying cookware and just shoving it into your cupboard with the advertising stickers still on it. I mean, cripes… It may look clean on the outside, but your whole refrigerator needs to be cleaned out! Your baking soda was pleading with me to put it out of its misery! I almost jumped out of my skin when that happened.”

“What?” she walked over to the refrigerator and opened it.

“Please!” the portly young man mock whimpered in a strange, high-toned voice, “Throw me away! The sewers would be more welcome!”

Ms. Liberty closed the refrigerator quickly. Roland was right, the odor was starting to become overpowering. When she looked at him, he leaned onto the counter, smirked at her and hugged his arms close to his chest.

“It’s a little chilly in here,” he explained, “Well, in any case… I can get why you didn’t understand my hospitality, now. You know? How you keep thinking I want something more between us?”

“Most guys would want something more with me, Roland.”

“Maybe if we’d met under different circumstances instead as different people,” he shrugged, “But there’s no blood coming from that stone.”

Before they could continue, there was a knock at the door. Thinking it was Nester, Roland got up and walked across the living room to answer it.

“I’d love to finally hammer this issue out with you some day,” he called over his shoulder, “Preferably when I’m fully clothed… You’re clearly still worried that I’ve got some form of puppy love brooding in the back of my head…”

“That’s not what I’m thinking, Roland…” she replied as she followed him into the living room, “It’s just… It’s just hard to accept, under any circumstances, that you’re not playing some angle… I mean, even this morning… I’m still half-convinced you planned this.”

“What!?” his hand dropped on the handle of the front door and he started opening it, “I don’t even know where to begin to shoot that one down… I’ll start with saying that I still don’t know where I am…”

“That’s a fact,” a familiar female voice chirped from the other side of the door.

“Oh no…” the color drained from Jessica’s skin and her face dropped into a mask of horrified shock, “Close the door!”

Roland tried to, but a force stronger than his weight pushed it open (though not without struggle). Backing away from the opening door, he beheld Mynx and Valkyrie walking in. They both wore expressions of amusement or (as in Valkyrie’s case) “triumphant approval.” Ms. Liberty, however, seemed to start suffering from a migraine.

“No… Oh no…”

“You were late for the morning meeting, Sidechick,” Mynx explained, “Swan sent us to make sure everything was okay.”

“It’s good to see everything is…” Valkyrie regarded Roland with an appraising leer, “Well in hand…”

“Nothing happened, you… Hanyaks…” he grumbled.

“What?” the catgirl asked, her tail twitching to demonstrate her confusion, “What the Hell does that mean?”

“Where I’m from, we usually say it when somebody does or says something ridiculous…”

“It sounds Eastern European in origin…” the golden-armored swordswoman mused.

“That would make sense… There were a lot of Polish immigrants in northern New York…”

“Look, you two,” Jessica interrupted, glaring pointedly at her fellow Vindicators, “Roland and I are having a very strange morning, and I ‘m not in the mood to be poked fun at right now… You see I’m okay, so you can go and tell Swan I’ll be over to the base as soon as I can.”

There was a knock at the door and Roland looked out the window this time. Breathing a sigh of relief, he turned to leave.

“Well, it looks like you can go, anyway,” he said as he opened to door, “Nester.”

“Hey man, here’re the clo-woah!”

His best friend from high school stared, dumbstruck, at the company he found the big man in. Roland grasped the clothing and asked Ms. Liberty if he could use the bathroom for a moment. She agreed and he left the elder Durj brother in the company of three of the city’s favorite heroines.

“I…” he began, but his throat closed slightly and he choked on his own words, “…Uh… Ah… Um… Did I say ‘I?’”

“Indeed,” Valkyrie smiled and extended her hand for him to shake, “I’m Valkyrie…”

“Oh thank God!” Nester shook her hand vigorously, “I was starting to worry my friend had fallen in with a group of those shameless rip-off hero-er-ines… You know, the ones who haven’t got a unique thought in their head, so they copy the appearance of more popular heroes and heroines and make their name sound similar or throw numbers in place of letters, and I’m rambling, I don’t know why, I guess I’m just surprised to be standing among such celebrities, I should probably stop shaking your hand now, huh?”

Valkyrie withdrew her hand from the light grip of the young man and started chuckling. Nester was forced to deal with an awkward silence between him and the notable females for a few minutes before Roland finally re-emerged from the bathroom.

“Ready to go?” he called, causing the heroines to turn and regard the younger Grey brother.

“Yeah. Jessica… Megan… You have a good one, okay? Let me know if you find out anything about how I wound up here… Please? And, hey… Again… I’m sorry about the trouble.”

“It’s okay, Roland. I’ll let you know if I find out anything.”

As the two men walked to the idling car, they could hear Mynx talking very loudly behind them.

“That’s it? You’re not going to give your boyfriend a kiss goodbye? No ‘have a good day, honey,’ nothing!?”

“Shut up, Mynx,” was the tired reply before the door closed.

“Dude!” Nester shouted at Roland.

“Don’t believe what you just heard…”

“Dude!”

“Just get in the car and get me back to the apartment…”

“DUDE!”

----------

---Atlas Park: Roland Grey’s Apartment---

On the car ride back, Roland explained everything, starting with his meeting a random civilian late one night who was about to get ambushed by a Hellion thug and finishing with the fight at Manticore and Sister Psyche’s wedding. There were a couple other things afterward, but he figured his friend could fill in the blanks on his own for the more recent events.

“…So, that’s the whole story,” Roland finished.

“Oh man…” Nester leaned back against the couch, his hands resting on his knees, “I asked her if she was lemon-flavored…”

“She got a chuckle out of that, actually. She said it was a reminder that she should take her cover stories more seriously.”

“So… You’re not dating her, I can accept that… But… Why aren’t you considering it?”

“Maybe this is why I never told you about it,” Grey’s eyes narrowed as he wondered if every conversation from here on out was going to be like this, “I just don’t think about it, man. She’s… She’s not my type.”

“Bull, dude! She’s every guy’s type!”

“True…”

“So what’s the problem?”

“I don’t know… I just… She’s not who I fell for, okay?”

Roland turned to his room while Nester mulled the words over. One possible meaning was simply unthinkable to him. The other…

“Wait!” he shouted as is portly friend fit on his tool belt, “You fell for her cover story!? You wanted to go out with Starburst?”

“What can I say? Adventuring with her, fighting alongside her, puzzling through some things early in my ‘heroic career…’ I figured it was fate, kinda’.”

He shrugged and started heading for the door.

“I was just starting to think things were off when her evil twin showed up for no reason and stomped on me. Cedric and your brother showed up to save my [butt], and Statesman apparently didn’t tell Meh-Jess-er… Ms. Liberty… About it until after their little soiree in the ‘D’ with those Rogue Isle [witches]. Really ticked her off, too…”

“Rough, man,” Nester shook his head, “So… Why do you still hang out with her? Better yet, why does she hang out with you?”

“You use her reason for a bed,” Grey grumbled, “I don’t know what I was thinking when I said I wouldn’t mind staying her friend. In the time since, though, I’ve stuck to my decision and it’s brought me nothing but trouble and that bow…”

He indicated the Christmas gift she’d given him two months prior. He still hadn’t used it. While it seemed a good bow, he just had a feeling that he shouldn’t field it, yet.

“…So far,” he kept grumbling, “I think the scales are a bit unbalanced. Now… If you’ll excuse me… I gotta go fix a toilet and a leaking bath tub.”

----------

“I don’t get it,” he muttered as he looked over the tub and the bathroom, “There are no water spots, no puddles… I don’t hear any hissing…”

The new tenant was an unusual woman, in the sense that she was exceptionally physically attractive and swore up-and-down that she was not a heroine of the city. Roland had his doubts, especially since she seemed to have the most common super power among female heroes; but after that last battle he helped fight against the Circle of Thorns in Steel Canyon’s Icon outfit store, and the models he saw there, he could believe almost anything in this city.

Anything, that is, except the attention the young woman was giving him. Rose Dawson was her name, and she’d just moved to Paragon City for college. Not wanting to stay in a dormitory, she used some of the money her family allotted her to rent an apartment, which happened to be in Roland’s building. She seemed to explain all of this in one breathless sentence, as well as a number of other bits of inane chatter, while he inspected her bathroom.

The first thing she did to introduce herself was inform him that her bath tub seemed to be leaking. In order to do this, she wore a tight-fitting black top that had a very low-cut neckline. When he arrived to do the work, she was a little more modestly dressed, though her sweater seemed to disappear while he was inspecting the room.

“Are you sure?” she asked, swaying gently from left to right while she pouted at him, “I could have sworn I heard something dripping while I was taking my bath…”

“Yeah, I’m sure…” Grey replied professionally, “You don’t have any water spots, there aren’t any on the ceiling of the room below this one…”

“Well, maybe I should take another bath and you could wait and listen for-“

“No! Now, look! I’ve had about as much as I’m willing to take! I don’t know you, you don’t know me, and there ain’t a damn reason why you should be coming on to me like this! If there’s nothing wrong with your apartment, don’t come complaining just so you can flaunt yourself at me!”

Rose blinked sadly at him, but it seemed really insincere. There was a strange, mischievous light in her eyes, and he brought her to attention by clapping his hands in front of her face.

“Hey! That doesn’t mean you can go and start breaking stuff in here, either! I know you’re away from your family, and you probably want to break whatever mold you may have had before,” he left the bathroom and started leaving the apartment, still rambling off his aggravation, “But you can find plenty other, better, and more willing people to help you elsewhere in this city. Leave me out of it.”

“What else is going to go wrong or otherwise irritate me today?” he thought, as he stalked down the halls to fix the Kenealies’ toilet. At least they were a family of three and wouldn’t harry him with this trite.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

Nothing else went wrong for Roland that day. Aside from a moment of being called into the base to help decide what to do with the peculiar mutant critters, Roland’s day went like clockwork, otherwise. He was even able to fix up the window he thought he’d have to wait on and get measurements on the hole in the Lawrences’ apartment.

However, the next morning, he found himself in a similar situation as the day before.

“Let’s see,” he murmured, “Tan walls, brown trim, my dresser over there… My alarm clock’s off… I must have forgotten to set it… Hm. There’s a weight lying on top of me…”

He pulled the covers back a bit and saw Jessica Cole snoring quietly on top of him. Her head rested on his chest, just above his belly. Just like yesterday, only she was wearing a t-shirt and he assumed there was some kind of underwear. For a moment, Roland wished he could just accept something like this, but his stoic logic was already telling him he knew better as the thoughts passed through his head. This was a false gift, because nothing could come from it but trouble.

“At least this time she’s wearing something…” he said as he nudged her shoulder, “Wake up, Meg… Uh… Jessica… Jessica!”

She woke up and looked to his face. Seeing him, she pulled the covers back over her head.

“Oh…” her muffled moan indicated she was as unpleased with the situation as he expected, “Again? Who is putting you in my room?”

This caused the rotund man to bark out a laugh unexpectedly.

“Well, it’s almost like yesterday. Today, you’re in my room.”

“What?”

She threw the covers off her head and looked about. Disappointed in what she found, she rolled over and buried her face in the mattress.

“Who is doing this to us!?”

“Someone who must think this is a joke,” Grey answered, “Well, no sense in wasting time about it… What’re you gonna do for clothes, because I’m sure whoever zapped you here today forgot to bring you a change just like they did for me, yesterday.”

“Oh, I have a spare outfit.”

“What? I remember agreeing to letting you leave some things here, but I don’t remember those things being clothes! Wait, where is this outfit? I don’t want my brother finding it and giving me [dreck] again…”

She shrugged and pulled the blanket back around herself, “That’s another secret, I’m afraid. Look, this whole thing has got me unbelievably stressed… Do you mind if I rest here a little longer, Roland?”

He nodded and got out of bed. Grabbing some clothes from his dresser, he headed for the door. Ms. Liberty’s voice stopped him for a moment, though.

“You wear shorts to bed all the time?”

“Yeah. They’re more dignified than boxers and feel about the same. Saved us a lot of embarrassment yesterday, don’t you think?”

“Please don’t remind me… Until this is settled, I’ll have to worry about whether or not I’m dressed properly for waking up in the middle of Atlas Park…”

----------

Roland emerged, fully dressed, from his bathroom and Nester was looking at him over the back of the couch.

“You’re up early,” he said while wiping his bleary eyes, “Or is it late?”

“It’s still morning,” Roland explained as he headed to the kitchen, “Almost ten. I’m gonna make pancakes.”

“Yeah?” Nester pushed himself off the couch and rolled his shoulders, “What’s the occasion?”

“Well, we’ve got a problem… See… What happened to me yesterday, happened to Ms. Liberty today…”

“A hot red-head came on to her?”

Roland’s eyes narrowed and he glared at his friend. Nester scratched the back of his head and chuckled a little.

“No… She’s in my room right now and neither of us have a clue how this happened.”

“Sounds like somebody’s trying to set you two up!”

There was a gleam of what looked to be hope in the thinner man’s eyes. Roland could only assume that his buddy was more or less happy that he seemed to be on the verge of achieving a relationship. However, he knew better than that.

“Wipe that smile off your face. I’m not dating her, Nester, and I’m fairly sure she’s got no intentions for me. This is just a massive annoyance, and I’ve got no clue how we’re going to resolve it if we don’t know who’s doing this to us.”

“Some Marty Sioux you are…” the other grumbled as he rifled through his bags for his day’s outfit, “Well, maybe you and her can work on that today. Maybe the culprit will be at that Pocket D Spring Fling dance tonight…”

Roland was mixing the dry pancake ingredients together in a bowl. As he stirred it up with a whisk, he realized what Nester had said.

“Are you trying to get me out of the apartment for the night?”

“Well… Kind of…”

“Who’s your date?”

“Mindy,” Nester replied with a shrug, then realized Roland’s face was reflecting a lot more worry than he had about the situation, “Oh! I forgot… The past few days in LaGrange, I’ve been finding little notes… At first, I thought it was one of the women I worked with, but that happened the first week after Mindy left me and I nipped that problem in the bud by nearly scaring that girl out of her skin! Plus, these notes… They’re sprayed with her favorite scent of perfume…”

“So, you haven’t actually talked to her, but you expect to see her tonight?”

“Yeah.”

“Here? In my apartment?”

Roland was already considering how much it would cost him to repay the building’s owners for various kinds of structural damage and numerous times realized he’d probably have to sell his house back in Kingdale. Cursing, he set the bowl down and started cracking eggs into it.

“Look,” he finally called over his shoulder, “You can meet her here, but don’t stay, alright? I mean, it’s nothing against you or anything, it’s just… After what her friends did to your apartment, I don’t want to wind up evicted, too.”

“Gotcha,” Nester agreed, “Well… I’ll see what happens. I hope we don’t wind up shot…”

----------

Jessica needed Roland to drive her to her mother’s. Despite having a spare outfit, she didn’t have the critical piece of equipment that gave her super powers. She didn’t say what it was, but Grey had a feeling it had something to do with the sword she wore on her belt, which was also missing. On the way, they tried to talk about the situation and who could possibly be teleporting them to each other’s apartments.

They had ruled out the Menders for the whole thing being beneath them. The group saw itself as dedicated to preserving the future of the world and circumventing a monstrous cataclysm. They wouldn’t waste their resources on something as trite as what was pretty much a game or an attempt to embarrass Ms. Liberty.

For a brief moment, she considered Vanguard. After the resurgence of the Rikti conflict, she had attempted to get the city to reject Vanguard’s presence in the city and place the responsibility of driving back the alien menace in Freedom Corps’ and Longbow’s hands (also subsequently allowing her and her forces to round up every rogue meta human in their employ for the duration of the incident). After an internal conflict within the United Nations military organization was resolved by one of the very rogues she was worried about and a band comprised of both vigilantes and rogues, she’d withdrawn her demands. Vanguard seemed to let the incident slide, but this could have been blowback from that.

Other groups, like the Council, the Nemesis Army, the Malta Group or Arachnos, were far too serious to have considered attempting something like this. It would have been considered far too expensive a joke, and they had more important concerns for which to focus the use of whatever teleporting technology they had. Simply put, this just wasn’t important enough for them.

It didn’t quite rule out Nemesis, though, but they did anyway. Roland didn’t know it, but Ms. Liberty was still keeping that lunatic in the back of her mind. Sometimes, he really was crazy enough to try something like this as a cover for something else. It would have been a perfect way to focus attention away from… From… Something…

On the way to her mother’s house, she pointed where Roland had to turn and in which directions. He complied wordlessly, only letting out a light whistle as they pulled into the more expensive neighborhoods.

“So, you told me your mom was killed back in the Sixties and you wanted to try to fix things… But I’ve been doing my own research… You weren’t born back then… You’re mid-Eighties, like me… Now… I don’t know how-“

“The source of my power slows my aging, but it’s not the same as my grandfather.”

“Okay… Well… The fact of the matter is that Alexis Cole, the daughter of Statesman and current Organizational Head of Freedom Corps, or whatever you call the leader of the organization, is still quite alive, and in fairly decent health…”

“Look, Roland, I really don’t want to talk about this, okay? It’s just… If that hadn’t happened to my mother, she probably would have been Miss Liberty longer and… I don’t know… It’s just that after that happened, it’s always been a sore spot in her memory, and I was thinking if I could get there in time, I could change the past enough so that she could still be there in the final battle to protect Marchand…”

“And you always wind up just too late?” Roland arched an eyebrow at this, “You know, power breaker said he ran into you when he did that once…”

“Probably did… Probably had a whole army of criminals with him…”

“No… He went solo. He wanted to see what the Hell Tesseract was going on about. He didn’t understand how he was involved in Recluse becoming the current leader of the Rogue Isles, and he still doesn’t understand it. I mean… Wouldn’t Recluse have remembered something like that? Wouldn’t your mother?”

“I don’t know… She… She went to Hell and back after that fight, Roland. Literally. It’s why I don’t like talking about it. She saw some terrible things, and it’s always made her cry when she tried to tell me about it…”

“I’ll stop asking, then,” he slowed as they approached another intersection and looked around.

“Oh,” Jessica realized she still needed to give him directions and pointed through the windshield, “Left here, and it’ll be the second house on the right.”

----------

Roland decided it would probably be best if he waited in the jeep. The situation was weird enough without having to deal with the parental pressures of a mother who no doubt wanted her daughter to look into making a family of her own (and grandchildren). He shuddered a little at remembering how his mother had the same conversation with him. It was never a request. Never.

Almost ten minutes later, Ms. Liberty emerged from her mother’s house, her face a little red. She glared at the jeep as she walked to the passenger side and opened the door.

“I should have sent you in there,” she said exasperatedly, “My God… If I’m not taking my work too seriously, I’m sleeping around. If I’m not sleeping around, I’m too shut off from the world, or I need to 'meet this nice young man I heard can throw fire from his hands...' That, or learn to settle down with someone who I can sleep next to comfortably…”

She leveled her gaze on the grizzled driver and he shrugged.

“Good thing none of this is comfortable,” he finally grunted, “Look, I… I don’t know how to help you with this. I mean, who you want to date is your business, and, frankly, I’m not int-…”

He stopped and stared into space as he realized what he was about to say. In the back of his mind, he could picture Cedric sitting on a bar stool and scarfing popcorn out of a bag before laughing himself out of his seat.

“Go on,” the woman leaned into his field of view so he could see she was glaring at him through narrowed eyes.

Sighing, Roland finished his sentence.

“I’m not interested in any more out of our relationship than what we’re doing now. That’s all. I know that’s hard to believe, but… Dammit… What do you want out of it?”

“I just feel I haven’t given you the attention you deserve,” Jessica replied, leaning back in the passenger seat and fastening her seatbelt, “I mean… You’re more hospitable than I’ve ever seen anybody. You cooked me breakfast this morning for goodness sake!”

“There was enough for myself, you know. I cooked Nester breakfast, too.”

“True…”

“Look, that’s how my mom and dad raised me, that’s all. And, yeah, you’ve shown up uninvited numerous times, but I can’t count how often that happened to me growing up. It’s not like you’re trying to hurt me, so I don’t see any reason to be inhospitable.”

“So… You’re not into me at all?”

“I don’t think about it.”

Roland started the jeep and pulled out of the driveway. The silence in the vehicle’s cabin was palpable, and he tried to ignore it as best he could.

“How can you not think about it?” Ms. Liberty finally shouted, “Isn’t this the sort of thing guys think about when it comes to the women in their lives?”

“Probably. Maybe if they thought they had a chance, or deluded themselves into thinking they have a chance. From where I see myself on the scale, Infernal or Malaise have a better chance at forming a strong relationship with you.”

She looked at him with shock at that. She didn’t even know where to begin with telling him how wrong that was.

“Look… Infernal… Infernal isn’t really interested in me,” she finally explained, “If there were someone I’d expect him to be with, it would be Valkyrie. And Malaise… Well, I don’t talk about him because sometimes he makes me so mad sometimes that I get angry just thinking about him! Rrr… I mean, just a couple days ago, he had the gall to tell me he could ‘accidentally’ read my mind when I fant-!”

She stopped suddenly and rolled her eyes awkwardly. Grey looked askance at her, but kept driving silently.

“…My fantasies,” she finished.

“My sister told me something about that,” he commented neutrally, “She said that… A part of psychic power involves… Actively thinking… And that sort of stuff is considered to be ‘surface thought,’ and it’s right there, pretty much getting broadcast to anything capable of perceiving it. To pull up things like memories and such requires more effort because the mind isn’t actively recalling it.”

“Oh… So that’s why Swan told me to leave him alone…”

“Isn’t Swan a psychic? I think that’s what my brother’s friend said… Couldn’t she have told you about that?”

“I guess… Her or Aurora… But…”

Ms. Liberty blinked, then looked at Roland with horror. It wasn’t necessarily directed at him, but a symptom of a dawning realization. Biting her lower lip, she reached for the door handle and tapped the window.

“Look… Um… You can drop me off here. I’ll walk home…”

Roland didn’t know what the deal was, but he could tell from the sound of her voice that it wasn’t a request. Something had upset her and it was enough that she wanted to be alone for a while to mull it over. At least, she wanted to be away from him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked as he stopped the jeep next to the curb, “I mean, it’s only a couple more blocks, and you’re not really dressed for… Nevermind… There goes another hero…”

A barely dressed modern-day gladiator hurdled the fence in pursuit of a Hellion and Roland shook his head as he watched them run by. Ms. Liberty chuckled a little, but she didn’t get back into the jeep.

“Sorry, it’s just… I can’t talk about this right now…”

“Well, you don’t have to.”

“Well, it’s just… I think I know who did this to us these past couple days, and I don’t want to get into the why of it…”

Roland didn’t answer. It didn’t make sense to him.

“Well, can I at least know who you suspect?” he finally asked.

“No, because I’d have to explain why… Just… Let me handle this on my own, okay?”

“Alright… Okay. Good luck.”

She nodded and closed the door. He could hear her muffled “Goodbye” before she jogged in the direction of her home. Bewildered and more than a little irritated, Roland pulled his jeep away from the curb and started heading back for his apartment.

---------

---Atlas Park: Freedom Corps Offices: Affiliated Supergroup Offices---

Agent Wild looked over the records on the various groups he was involved with. The Redeemers were reporting increasing hostilities between their various teams and Grey’s Army seemed to be petitioning to break off the affiliation. As much as he would like to go ahead and grant Randy’s wish, he still had to file the request through the Retention offices and let them determine whether or not the small group was worth keeping.

He didn’t even know where to begin with the Redeemers, though. After the incident with the thing called Grendel in Skyway City, the hostilities within the group had been growing worse. A lot of them had gotten hurt and they felt they were inadequately cared for afterwards. They’d all received the same health care and financial support that would have gone to the greatest of heroes in the same circumstances. Perhaps it was just their old selfish mentalities bubbling to the surface again. He didn’t know how to combat that.

His e-mail box dinged and it drew Wild’s attention away from the issues. Bringing up the program, he saw it was a query from MedCom. Curious, he opened it and looked it over. As he read it, he didn’t understand what the problem had to do with him. It was a simple complaint about a misappropriation of MedCom resources to transport an individual from one set of coordinates to another. The individuals weren’t injured in any way, shape or form, and seemed to be sleeping at the time.

Curious, Kevin plugged the coordinates into his computer’s city map program. One brought him to a building address he knew, but he couldn’t quite remember why. The other was a home in a more expensive residential district just outside Atlas Park. He couldn’t figure out the connection and went to finish reading the e-mail.

It was being surprisingly circuitous about the name of the individual that apparently resided in the expensive residence. Apparently, according to the transport record, it was a female of average height and athletic build, but that was all it had to say. The other, however, was a husky man of average height that Agent Wild realized he knew very well once the e-mail finally informed him of Roland Grey’s identity.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

Agent Wild found Ms. Liberty in the briefing room. Since it was the Valentine’s Day holiday, there seemed to be an ethereal force inhibiting a lot of the criminal activity throughout Longbow’s jurisdiction. As a result, the relatively few Freedom Corpsmen on duty were somewhat bored out of their skulls.

“Ma’am,” he whispered quietly so as not to alert the other agents, “I have something I think you need to see personally.”

“Yes agent,” she replied, somewhat wary that this was some sort of cheesy Valentine’s Day request, “What is it?”

It wouldn’t be the first time she’d had to deal with it. The prior year, she had no less than three hundred invitations to the Pocket D party. If it weren’t for Manticore’s wedding, she didn’t know how she would have dealt with the situation.

She wasn’t familiar with Agent Wild, though. His record wasn’t very exceptional. He was one of probably five or six different “Wilds,” and she usually ran across their names when looking for Agent Wilder’s records.

“Ma’am, you would probably rather hear about this in private...”

“Agent…” she started with an irritated tone.

“Ma’am, this is of a matter that concerns you and one of the affiliated heroes that I liaise with.”

Curious, Ms. Liberty agreed to meet Wild in his office in five minutes. After she cleared the rest of the agents from the briefing room she made her way to the liaison offices. She found Wild’s office and walked in just as the agent finished sliding some papers into a manila folder.

“Ah,” he said quietly and handed the folder to her, “Ma’am, this is information I’ve gleaned after a query from MedCom. An individual who sends reports to me for filing in the Freedom Corps databases was teleported to a particular set of coordinates.”

Ms. Liberty didn’t quite see what the agent was getting at, or what this had to do with her, and voiced her opinion.

“Well, ma’am, I didn’t realize what it could have to do with you until I learned the relevance of this second set of coordinates… You know what… I’m tired of this professional circuitous crap! It’s giving me a freaking headache! Somebody teleported Roland Grey to your address while he was asleep and you to his address last night. Whoever it was-!”

“-Used MedCom’s system to do it,” Jessica looked at the report and map pictures printed from the atlas program, “I… Thank you, agent… I appreciate your… Discretion…”

“It’s my job, ma’am,” the agent replied, “I hope the information helps you.”

“It does… I know who’s messing with me, now…”

Without explaining, she rushed out of Wild’s office and headed for one last check of the briefing room before calling an early day. She had a target in mind and she wanted to be able to yell at him while she was still more angry than amused.

----------

Roland was testing the pressure of his compound bow when he heard the knock at his door. He didn’t have any materials for more repairs and wasn’t particularly interested in hearing about anything new.

“Come back on Monday, I’m taking the weekend off. I’ve had a really weird weekend, so don’t push me…”

There was another, slightly more urgent knock.

“If you’re Rose, you better not have broken anything in there or I’m gonna be really [ticked]!”

There was another knock, this time it was slower, more deliberate and forceful. Grumbling, Roland stood up and marched to the door. Opening it, though, any dark thoughts he might have been mulling over disappeared as he saw Megan/Jessica Duncan/Cole standing there. She looked a little irritated, her arms folded over her chest and one eyebrow arched at him, but her eyes twinkled with some amusement.

She wasn’t in her uniform. Instead, she was in a pair of blue jeans and what looked to be a brown imitation leather jacket. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and she wore a pair of shades to keep glare from snow off her eyes.

“Oh, thank God,” he grunted, “I was worried you were one of the tenants. They’re good people, mostly, but there’s this one…”

“Who’s Rose?” she asked, a slightly mischievous lilt tingeing her voice.

“New tenant. I can’t remember her last name. She moved in down the hall and… And… Something’s off about her.”

“Like what?”

“Well, she looks like she could have any man she wants, and for some reason, she came on to me.”

Ms. Liberty smirked at that and shook her head.

“Sounds to me that there’s something off about you,” she remarked, “An attractive girl throws herself at you and you decide to take issue with it… Yeah, that sounds smart…”

“Well, maybe I’m just not interested yet.”

“Guys are always interested, Roland,” Jessica sighed as she shook her head in disbelief and produced the manila folder, “Look, I just got this from your Freedom Corps liaison. You know Wild, right?”

“Yeah,” Roland shrugged, took the folder and started flipping through the documents, “Well, this is pretty bare bones… MedCom? The hospital guys?”

“Somebody hacked their system and transported you into my house. I’m sure you know what they did the next day… MedCom took issue with Freedom Corps because, apparently, our fingerprints are all over the incident.”

“What, because you and I were the victims of the hack?”

“No…” Ms. Liberty grinned at her portly friend, “We’ll need to go see the culprit behind this and give him a piece of our minds. Get your keys.”

As they descended the staircase that led to the front door of the apartment building, they ran into the fiery red head that was being slightly less than obvious to the building superintendent the previous day. She was carrying in groceries and met them on the stairs. Ms. Liberty craned her neck to examine the other young woman, but otherwise said nothing.

“Heya, Rose,” Roland intoned, “Do you need any help with any of that?”

“Now, I knew you had a kind heart!” the pretty girl replied, “But no thanks, I can get it myself. Who’s this?”

“Oh, this is Megan. She hangs out once in a while when work at her office gets too hectic and she needs to decompress.”

“Oh!”

“We’re just friends, Rose,” the civilian clothed heroine smirked at the fellow and gave him a friendly shove on the arm, “You know, buddies, pals… Chums…”

“Aw, I’ve been demoted back to chum? Dang…”

“Whew,” the younger girl gave her brow an exaggerated wipe and chuckled a little, “I was getting worried that I was hitting on your boyfriend yesterday, and you’d probably kick my [butt]! You’ve got some years on me!”

Ms. Liberty turned a cool gaze to the redhead and tilted her head again.

“I mean, you’ve probably been around a few times, so you probably know a few things,” the girl continued and Roland started rubbing his left temple, “What? Did I say something wrong?”

“We should get going,” the hunter replied, “Rose, remember what I said. If you break something, it better not be on purpose.”

“I understand.”

Despite the submissive tone, her posture indicated that she would find a way to make future incidents look accidental. Roland was already allotting a budget for headache medicine in his mind before they got out the door to the sidewalk.

“I don’t like her,” Ms. Liberty finally said as they made it outside, “Did you hear what she called me?”

“Yeah,” Grey replied glibly, “She called you an old-!”

“Don’t finish that sentence!”

----------

The drive through Paragon City after that was tensely quiet. Roland could practically feel steam spewing from his passenger’s ears. On the surface, however, Ms. Liberty was the picture of calm. After almost a half hour of driving, thankfully, they pulled up to the Sinclair mansion and brought an end to the palpable tension.

“I’ve seen enough of these places to know I hate every last one of them,” Roland grumbled, “I know the guy does good work for the city, but he’s got this expansive lawn, this huge house, and… The fact that a guy’s fortunes are mounting while kids starve in Kings Row is exceptionally unsettling to me.”

“I know what you mean, Roland, and I know it’s one of Manticore’s concerns, too. However, he could use his money to feed those poor people, clean up the streets in Kings Row, fix everything up alright… And six months down the line, everything would be right back to the way it is now and Manticore would be destitute. We need a solid solution in places like that, we can’t just throw money at their situations.”

“I know, but while that solution is looked for, things keep getting worse. You remember that block party my dad threw? Things were on the up-and-up for a solid month after that. People knew they had law enforcement supplements among them. They knew we cared, and we still do… We try to show it every day, but we’re just regular guys with a little bit of gusto. We’re not epic symbols of justice like Manticore, Sister Psyche or your grandfather.”

“You’d be surprised how wrong you are about that, Roland,” the heroine replied, her gaze meeting his so he could see the sincerity, “There are times when my grandfather wishes he could look at justice in the simple terms people like you or your father do. A person does wrong, they get punished for it… But he’s had to see the consequences of his actions and inaction, he’s lived long enough to see the repercussions of the mistakes he’s made and even the ones from his successes. A lot of heroes give him Hell because they think he’s out of touch… He’s just afraid they’re going to run into the same problems he has and he’s trying to keep them from making the same mistakes he has. In the end, though, he’s better at making speeches than talking personally to other heroes…”

“My dad did say it always seem like he was being talked at rather than to…”

“…So he often comes off as a horse’s [butt] to most of the newer heroes,” Liberty finished, “It’s sad. He’s the best of us, but he can’t lead us.”

“It’s hard for anybody to lead a group as diverse as meta humanity can be. It’s more than just races or genders, it crosses species, it crosses ages, it crosses the expanses between the stars…” Roland shrugged, “You’re right… I was looking at it through a narrow scope… There’s a lot going on and my perspective only scratches the surface…”

“It’s a better perspective than a lot of heroes have. Most are obsessed with their own revenge and any help they do is more or less a happy coincidence. At least you’re looking for more of a purpose behind what you do.”

“I’m having trouble finding it, though. I’m having trouble seeing what help I am.”

Ms. Liberty patted her friend on the shoulder. She wondered how many other heroes were having the same trouble. Life was a difficult thing to deal with, some often used their mask to escape from it and others used their lives to escape their masks. Others were forced to integrate their lives with their super-powered life, as their facial features, skin color or other metaphysical aspects, like glowing eyes or a sparkling aura, obviously set them apart from normal people. When someone who just had a gaggle of gadgets to help him combat evil had to choose between his normal life and fighting criminals who hardly even noticed him except when he was shooting arrows at them, what would he ultimately choose if finally given the chance to walk away? What would he do if, in a moment of intense emotional stress, he realized he could just walk away?

She didn’t like how that made her feel. For all Jessica knew, Roland would just leave once things got too rough for him. The fact that he’d stuck through a Praetorian Invasion, the resurgence of the Rikti, and had seen his own fair share of fights up to this point had crossed her mind, but they were all conflicts that he had no stake in, and could just as easily contribute to his finally getting fed up and leaving the city.

Before she could talk to him about it, Grey pulled the vehicle up to a call box next to the wrought iron gate that served as the entrance to the Sinclair estate. After rolling down the window, he pressed the buzzer and waited for the inevitable question for identification.

“I’ve been expecting you two,” came a rich, deep, somewhat static-distorted voice, “Come on up. I’ll have the butler, Jeffrey, show you up to my study.”

The two exchanged glances as the gate opened, but said nothing. Once the gates were parted sufficiently, Roland put the jeep in gear and drove the half mile to the large house. It was an impressive structure. The young man estimated it was probably four or five times bigger than the farmhouse he grew up in. With brown siding and a white trim, it was what he liked to call “Modern Wealthy,” where the owner tried to look more down-to-earth than he really was.

Of course, once Roland thought that, he considered that he was probably being too harsh. He had no clue what this man had been through in life or what he was trying to do. Ms. Liberty had chastised him lightly, earlier, and he figured she was probably keeping a very strong opinion to herself out of respect for someone who had been humble enough to earn her trust.

“Best not to overstep my bounds,” he thought to himself, “Just keep quiet and speak when spoken to. Don’t go on a tangent and everything should be alright…”

He parked the jeep before the front doors and they got out. Approaching the mansion, Roland found that the building was far more impressive up close, and changed his estimate to possibly six of his childhood houses. Heck, his whole school could probably fit inside the mansion.

The butler greeted them with a warm smile, even giving Ms. Liberty a friendly hug. She introduced him to Roland and they exchanged a firm handshake.

“Would you like me to give you a tour on the way, sir, or would you prefer to just meet with master Sinclair and conduct the business you and the young miss have with him?”

“I’ll probably take the tour some other time,” the hunter replied, “But thanks for the offer.”

“Of course.”

Jeffrey led them up three flights of luxuriously carpeted stairs. Roland kept quiet, and despite his earlier indication of dislike toward such lavish décor, he couldn’t help but be somewhat awestruck. There was more here than he could hope to acquire in three of his lifetimes. Suits of armor and weapons from across the world, expensive decorative and antique furniture, and the carpet felt like it was six inches thick. It was probably still less than an inch, but it still felt plush.

“I could probably sleep on the floor, right here, and it would be almost like sleeping in my bed,” he mused.

When they finally reached Justin Sinclair’s study, Roland half-expected to see the man in his Manticore outfit. It was about the only thing he thought was a good criticism of the man’s marriage to Sister Psyche, that he did it while still in his hero outfit. Something seemed abhorrently silly about that, like the procession was being treated as a joke, but the man had been dead serious in his commitment and the two seemed to remain a dedicated and very much in love couple in their few public appearances since then.

Fortunately, Justin wasn’t in his outfit. Well, he was, but his hood was drawn back and tucked under his civilian clothes, so Roland couldn’t tell. Finally getting to meet the man, though, Grey was forced to reconsider his opinion that the guy made a mistake wearing his costume. There wasn’t much of anything that separated Manticore from the multitude of “model handsome” heroes throughout the city. If he hadn’t been wearing his costume, who would have known it was really him?

Once Jeffrey admitted and announced them, causing the veteran hero to chuckle and wave his trusted friend out, the two took the seats provided for them in front of the desk. Manticore informed them he’d be a moment and finished signing his name to a few more contracts he’d been looking over before finally turning his attention back to them.

“Alright…” he was having trouble keeping from laughing as he folded his hands together over his desk and leaned toward them, “Let’s not play around with the issue. I know why you’re here. Now, tell me, what’s the problem?”

“You had no right to do that to us!” Ms. Liberty almost shouted, “Do you have any idea how embarrassing this could have been!?”

“Oh, come on! Jess, you haven’t been on a real date in years! Yeah, I know you’ve had a few boyfriends, here and there, but you and I both know you weren’t taking those relationships seriously!”

“That still doesn’t give you any right! How would you feel if somebody figured you shouldn’t be with Shalice and started thrusting you into close and personal situations with, oh… Swan!?”

“Funny,” the expert archer murmured with amusement, “She’s the one who told me about your relationship with this young man…”

“And what relationship is that?” Roland asked, “I doubt if Sister Psyche just dropped by your place once in a while to vent her frustrations, you’d have figured you were close enough to her to get married.”

“You’d be surprised how often a situation like that can bring two people closer together,” the veteran countered, “And it was the opposite, my rotund aspirant. I often confided in her when I felt frustrated. That didn’t guarantee a thing when I finally realized how I felt about her…”

“Realized,” Grey’s voice sounded like rocks tumbling off a mountain as he repeated the word, “You’re trying to say we don’t know how we’re feeling? The funny thing, is that when we’re younger, the adults are telling us we don’t know how we feel when we want to be together. When we say we don’t when we’re older and know better, they’re telling us the opposite…”

“Now hang on, it’s not that simple…”

“Yes it is!” Jessica retorted, slapping the desk with her palm for emphasis, “This is just more of you, my mother and my grandfather butting in where you’re not wanted or needed, and I’m sick of it! When I’m ready to settle down or I find the guy who makes me feel like I can’t live without him, I’ll deal with that situation myself! For now, stop trying to control my life, and let me have my friends!”

With that, she got up and stormed out of the study. Roland blinked and sighed. Manticore merely shook his head, however.

“Someday,” he explained, “you two will wish you’d figured things out sooner. You’re the kind of guy a girl like her needs, you know?”

“Don’t you remember the old song?” Grey shook his head and stood up to leave, “Someday never comes. Besides, If I were what she needed, I’m sure our reactions would have been a lot different. Instead, we’re pretty ticked at you, awkward around each other, and this probably drove the final stake into the heart of whatever ambiguity was left between us… You probably just killed our friendship.”

Manticore shrugged as the younger man stood and waited for his reaction at the doorway.

“We shall see.”

-----------

Outside of the mansion, Ms. Liberty waited for him. She was resting against his jeep and chewing her lower lip in consternation. When she met his gaze, there were some tears I her eyes.

“I’m sorry…” she whispered, “I don’t know how you feel about me… I… I didn’t mean to crush any hopes you might have…”

“It’s alright. I decided a while back how seriously I would take things. You’re my friend, but you’re living your life. I’ve got no right to interfere in your decisions. Besides… Like you were saying today, I don’t know your world. I can’t even begin to be that major a part of your life when I can’t identify with you.”

“But you don’t have to, Roland… All it takes to make you a part of my life is just the two of us being with each other… But…”

“You don’t want that.”

“Not with the way my life is,” she held her head and sighed, “Look, you’re a great guy and all… But I know you, too. You’re the kind of guy who’s looking to settle down, or at least… Find stability… Or… I don’t know…”

“I get it,” Roland leaned against the jeep next to her and stared at the steps leading to Manticore’s mansion, “I understand. I got it when I found out you weren’t the up-and-coming heroine I was starting to crush on… I get that I’m not the kind of guy you’re looking for and it doesn’t bother me.”

“That’s not it… It’s not that simple…”

She grasped his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. It was difficult trying to figure this sort of thing out, knowing how good a person was but understanding why you didn’t feel a connection. Her mind raced to find logical reasons for not wanting him to be with her, but also wanting him to stay. In the end, all she found was complete paradox and contradiction.

“It all boils down to the moment, I guess,” she finally said, “Roland, I like you as my friend. You’ve been a great comfort to me these past couple years, and I’m really glad to have known you, but I just don’t feel any kind of… Well…”

“I know,” the hunter started chuckling, “Look… This is uncomfortable. We know what we’re trying to say, right?”

“Right…”

“We’ve said enough, don’t you think? Different circumstances, different time... Maybe things could have turned out differently between us. Since there's no sense on dwelling on any of that, it’s time to move on, don’t you agree?”

“Yeah,” relieved, she smiled and gave him a hug, “Thank you.”

----------

---Pocket D---

That evening, after his day’s business with Jessica Cole was over with, Roland was chilling at the bar where his sister worked in Hero section of Pocket D. The music of the Valentine’s Day Spring Fling Dance boomed and hummed all around him. After a few minutes of him sitting silently, Sarah walked over and handed her brother a Kahlua.

“Here you go, bro. Don’t worry, I covered the charge. You okay?”

“Nah… Just thinking about stuff I never think about.” He gave the drink a sip and winced a little, “Coffee? Didn’t they try that in a comedy show?”

“Well, I like it,” she shrugged, “You just look like you need something to ease your spirit.”

“You know what I’m thinking about, don’t you?”

“Round, your mind’s running about a mile a minute right now. It’s not often I see you this… I don’t know… Distressed. Why aren’t you home in your apartment to mull things over?”

“Nester’s using my apartment right now.”

“So?”

“He’s expecting company.”

“Oh…”

Sarah blinked, prepared another drink and handed it to one of the other patrons. It was handy being a psychic in her job. She was able to mix drinks just the way people wanted them. She never got any complaints, though she did catch a lot of awkward stares whenever she told the guys to stop staring at her chest or undressing her with their eyes or her cat or Gnarl were going to teach them some manners. When they asked what she was talking about, she would produce one or both of the animals, Ni from under the counter or Gnarl from off her shoulder. This often got laughs.

The laughter would end, however, with screaming once one of the animals got fed up with being mocked. Ni often went for the neck, taking names and slashing throats as he went. Gnarl must have been super strong, because the one time he leaped at a man who disrespected Sarah, he delivered one punch to the man’s jaw and he was out like a light. The part that depressed the girl was that he was a hero.

“Here,” she handed her brother Katie and the cute little furball crawled up onto his shoulder and nestled into his neck, “She’ll probably help put you at ease.”

“Thanks, sis,” Roland raised the glass of liqueur to her as a light toast, “I appreciate it.”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

Cedric emerged from the base portal, resplendent in his tan exploration outfit and gripping a pair of boxes of beer, and paused. He wasn’t where he’d expected to be. He could have sworn he’d plugged the frequency button for his father’s base, but he didn’t recognize the room he was in now.

Normally, the portal opened onto a raised platform. Descending the platform and heading down one way led to teleportation machines that were hardcoded for Steel Canyon, Skyway City, Talos Island and Overbrook, and beyond that chamber was where his dad kept the microbrewery. The northern doorway led to a magical teleportation chamber with three rings enchanted to take a user to Atlas Park, Galaxy City, Kings Row, Pocket D, and the hazard zones, Perez Park and the Hollows; past that room was the BWO’s chamber where they’d made themselves quite at home. South was supposed to be the base’s workshop and led to much of the rest of the base’s workings and East was the power room.

Now, however, everything was topsy-turvy. Cedric was on the bottom landing of a three-tiered room. Stairs to his left and right led up past a gray metal cylinder with a symbol floating over it. He relaxed a little when he saw it was the blue and gray “Four Elements” symbol Randy had chosen to be the group’s emblem.

“Hello!?” the tanker called out, “Is anybody in here!?”

“Ced!” he heard his father’s booming-yet-gravelly voice from somewhere deeper within the base, “Where you been, boy? You bring the beer?”

“Yeah…”

Cedric made his way up the two small flights of steps and deeper into the base. He found himself in what looked to be a recreational chamber. A set of view screens sat on the north wall. Most of them depicted surveillance images of various city zones, but one was set to a popular television show about two middle-aged brothers and the dimwitted son of the one who was twice-divorced. He looked to the couch sitting between two support pillars and saw his sister and her husband watching the show together with a small bear eating a pizza slice while cuddled in between them.

“Sis, what the Hell is going on?”

“Daddy and some guys did some renovating and remodeling,” she replied in her cheery, chirpy voice, “We’re just chilling out and watching T.V. while they finish up.”

“Yeah, but in a week?” Cedric seemed more surprised than agitated, but that didn’t stop him from flailing about in mock anger, “I mean, come on! I was just in here last week! I had magazines hidden in the air ducts!”

“Oh, those are gone, Ced. Long gone.”

Sarah rubbed her thumb along the gudar’s head and the little animal made a low happy whine as it chewed. This one, Karrl, had been one of the many to make a nest out of her brother’s shredded lewd entertainment. She wasn’t about to tell him this, however.

“Dammit!”

“Cedric!” Randy’s voice called out again, “Where’s that beer?”

“Are you sure, boss?” the deep bass of Ryat99 asked, “I thought you had a drinking problem…”

“I had a drinking problem. I drank in a depressive funk. Now, the cause of that depression’s gone, so I drink in celebration.”

“Hm…” the android sounded neither convinced nor skeptical, “I suppose if your vice no longer interferes with your life, it’s not quite so terrible…”

“That’s usually the initial indication of an addiction for people,” Randy chuckled, “’Has it become a problem for others?’ My drinking doesn’t get in anybody’s way anymore, so it’s not an ‘addiction.’”

“That’s not a very good way of looking at it, boss,” Kip’s voice argued as Cedric arrived to the room in which they were working, “Even if the end-results only affect you, slogging back the brews nonstop is still an addiction.”

“Well, I’m glad we’ve gotten to that distinction,” the big man grinned as his son tossed him a cold one, “See, my intake has gone down significantly. Before I used to slam a case down at the end of my patrol. Now, I’m lucky if I even get to finish two every other day.”

“Having mom back did a lot to boost your spirits, huh?” Cedric asked, “Hey! How long until the baby arrives?”

Randy’s eyes rolled and he shook his head. He almost lost his mind when his wife took up Delilah Stein’s invitation to the Etoile Isles. He was glad she had made it back, but now the preparations were underway for the baby’s birth. While Charlene was preparing for the trip to the hospital, Randy was preparing to have to protect the child from the forces of evil, especially the Council.

“Look, Cedric, I’ll talk to you about it later,” he gestured to the machine he and a strange lizard-like man were working on, “For now, let’s take a look at this. Groul, meet my son.”

The red-skinned draconian humanoid stood and extended a clawed cybernetic hand to shake Cedric’s. The tanker shook enthusiastically and offered a beer.

“No thanks,” Groul replied, “I’m about to go on patrol. For now, I’m just explaining to your father how I wired this teleporter. I programmed it so you’ll have access to the more intensive locations throughout the city all in one handy location. This is a vast improvement over the original method you had employed, which had you jumping from room to room to find the right machine. Now they’re all right here.”

“What about the hazard zones?” Cedric asked, cracking the beer he’d earlier offered and drinking from it himself as he did, “Or the less-intensive cities?”

“Before the tune-ups for this machine, I finished the re-enchantments on the portals in the southwest chamber. They’ll get you where you need to go if you’re looking for a challenge. Your friend, Cory, he worked on the northern chamber. I’m not too certain the fluorescent lights Randy installed will be enough for those trees, but the irrigation Mr. Bibbins and I installed should prove efficient enough.”

“They’re the same kinds of bulbs used in hydroponics setups,” Randy explained between sips, “Essentially white sunlight made artificially but without the nasty side effect of ultraviolet radiation. We moved the microbrewery, too, and I’m gonna look into some kind of lock or security system to put in place. Matt, that [dung]head, keeps drinkin’ what I make.”

“I was wondering why you told me to bring brews,” his son chuckled.

“Well, I wouldn’t say your father has quite gotten the hang of his alchemy yet,” Groul said with a light chuckle as he closed a hatch on the conglomerate teleportation machine, “Alright… You should be able to use any pad to get where you need, but each one is still hard-coded for particular points. The computer was a little archaic, so I was only able to code a few points, but…”

“Let’s give it a test run,” Randy gestured for Spearhead Lambda to proceed and the draconian started plugging buttons into the computer.

“In a moment, I should wind up in Peregrine Island—” he said before energy coalesced around him and he was gone.

Randy drew his communicator and spoke into it.

“You where you expected?”

“Yep,” came the reply, “You might want to check the other places, too, just to be sure. Peregrine’s code works fine, though.”

“We’ll give it a test in a moment. Thanks for all the help.”

“Alright, then. I’m on patrol. Spearhead Lambda, signing out.”

“I like that guy,” Randy grumbled as he shut down his communicator, “Met him after that Rikti Earth incident. He’s been helping fix things around here ever since.”

“You certain he doesn’t have ulterior motives?” Sam Bibbins asked as he fastened the final bolts to hold the new teleportation apparatus to the floor, “I mean… Well… He looks funny…”

“Sam, I don’t think you’ve looked in a mirror lately. Hell, look at me. I look downright monstrous.”

“You are a monster, sir,” the big man replied, “but I get your point.”

“Sure, I figure Spearhead’s got his own agenda. Heck, I’ve got about ten people in the group who have their own agendas and almost nothin’ to do with us. The things they’ve got in common is that they’re registered with the F.B.S.A. as vigilante enforcers and they’re tired of dealing with groups that force them into the group’s business to exclusion of everything else. Heck, that’s why I made the Army in the first place. That guy I’d worked with before… He was a tad demanding.”

“Don’t I know it,” Kip set the unopened beer Cedric had tossed him back into the box, “You should check out the new lab, Ced. Sheldon’s gonna cream his pants when he sees it.”

“I never took Sheldon to be that much of a nerd,” the older man replied as he looked around the machine, “Holy! That’s so many gadgets… [I feel like a kid in a toy store]!”

----------

When the group members arrived, Randy started the show with a bit of a yelling session at the BWO members.

“I want you idiots staying in your little corner of the base, you got me!? It’s bad enough you’re taking up an entire room, you’re gettin’ into my microbrewery and makin’ a mess of everything! I’m talkin’ to you, pussbag!”

He finished by pointing at Matt “Dirty Ice” Jones, who shrugged unknowingly. Apparently, when he’d broken into the microbrewery, he was already very inebriated.

They then proceeded through the base as Randy explained each room and its capabilities. Some rooms were the same as before, such as the base’s computer room (though it now had a new storage rack for extra stuff) and the medical bay. The microbrewery also remained, and Randy again gave a hard glare to the BWO members and a low-growled warning to stay out of it.

“We’re grown men, Randy,” Draven said back, “We know to stay out of your business.”

“I would have thought so, too,” the big man muttered before leading them away.

“Randy, the only bathroom in the base is right next to the brewery, though,” Psycho13 announced, “I mean… Matt was snockered when he broke in there, and a lot of us are likely to be snockered when we hit the toilets. If we wind up near the microbrewery in such a state, well… It’s not likely we’ll heed these warnings in such a state…”

“You damn well better. If you don’t, I’ll break ya.”

“Randy,” Charlene chided and rubbed his big forearm, “Let it alone. The boys say it wasn’t that good, anyway.”

“How was I supposed to know?”

Pillars remained installed wherever they could be without getting in the way of the group members. These pillars helped support the apartment building above and keep it from sinking into the street. Randy also had done some work with the Ryat androids in the damaged sewers outside the base, including the Abandoned Network below, to install more supports.

Despite Kip’s earlier claim, Sheldon was actually rather reserved in his reaction to the new laboratory. He was a little more concerned with Ryat12’s use of what looked to be a vertical wind tunnel in the corner of it. It seemed she was using it to clear dust out of her body’s plating.

“It seems an exceptional misappropriation of resources,” he explained as the little android stepped out of the device, “You said Lambda designed this?”

“Yeah,” the group leader answered, “He said he wanted to install a proper mad scientist’s lab.”

“And you hired him after our ordeal in Rikti Earth?”

“Yes…”

The scientist said nothing more, but tapped the worktable next to the strange case of reinforced glass-like material. Felix crawled up the man’s white coat tail, up his back and onto his shoulder before nestling in and going to sleep.

The portal chamber to the north of the machine Lambda had been fine-tuning was no longer a simple affair of three mystical teleportation pads and little else. It was now full of trees and shrubs. There were a couple birds flitting to and fro and the whole room felt positively alive. The center of the chamber was dominated by the three teleportation circles, now fused together into a triad that surrounded a rune embedded into the floor. Where the points of the circles’ metalwork met were crystal balls that sparkled faintly as wisps of energy lanced through them.

Sarah caught one of the birds on her finger and petted it a little. Her cat, Ni, reached out to it, but she let the feathered animal escape and lightly tapped the feline’s snout with her finger.

“This is amazing,” she whispered, “It’s almost a shame that it’s next to their chamber…”

She referred to the room the BWO had commandeered for their stay. It remained choked with clutter, numerous cots, tables, desks, chairs and three cubicles with no true function other than to be crashed into at a moment’s notice. They even installed a podium with their “buzzsaw blade” symbol and three tapestries on the north wall spelling out the letters “B.W.O.” Randy just chuckled.

“Hey, one of these days, I’m stepping in that ring, and I’m gonna take a few rounds outta you boys for thinking I’d let you just make this place your home.”

“Yeah, just like you said you’d beat up Statesman,” Matt barked before he knew what he was saying.

While Randy took a few rounds out of the fire brute in the ring, the tour continued to the trophy room to the south of the teleportation chambers. They’d already passed it a couple times, but no explanation had been given. Of particular concern was the presence of three trophies of some notoriety.

One was a set of teeth. Mako’s teeth, to be exact. They were the same ones Randy had plucked out of his skin after the short invasion into the Rogue Isles to recover Sheldon. After the big tanker returned, he explained that it actually wasn’t that rare to find Mako’s teeth after a fight. Sharks typically lost hundreds, if not thousands of teeth in their lives and regrew them almost as quickly as they lost them, and Mako apparently had the same sort of physiology.

Another looked like a green gelatin mold. It was some of the Hamidon’s cytoplasm. Cedric asked how they acquired it and his father demonstrated by slapping a couple globules of goo together, making a larger piece of goo.

“Essentially did the same thing for that, there. I stopped once it started moving and threw it in the case.”

“Ew,” Sarah murmured, pressing a button next to the container that sent an electric shock into the mass, “Heh, cool.”

Finally, sandwiched between the other two, there was the battered helmet of Lord Recluse. Nobody in the group had even met the villain, much less vanquished him in battle… Except one man.

“Power Breaker, like many of Recluse’s ‘Destined Ones,’ met the man in some form of decimated future,” Randy explained, “After dueling him to the death, he returned with the man’s head and showed it to him in an effort to show the futility of Recluse’s Project Destiny. Recluse, obviously, was unconvinced by the story of a future exhausted him being beaten, so the experiments continue. Well, Breaker incinerated the head and turned to disposing of the helmet. He suggested I take it, so here it is.”

“Eerie,” Cedric said as he swayed from side to side in front of the display, “The eyeholes are following me…”

The rest of the trophy chamber had a hammer from the Carnival of Shadows, a Nemesis Rifle, numerous non-working pistols, rifles and shotguns from different factions, including the Malta Group and Arachnos, and even two Arachnos Nullifier Maces. There was even the hammer of the Croatoa giant, Jack in Irons, but it was really a plaster replica as the real thing couldn’t leave Salamanca without turning into a gnarled tree branch.

“Well, that’s it,” Randy explained, “What do you think?”

“The new lab is a little cluttered and claustrophobic,” Sheldon replied, “But I can manage. Otherwise, everything seems fine.”

“I love the new recreational room,” Sarah chirped, “It’s so warm in there.”

“I rather like the mystical teleportation chamber to the north,” Cory intoned evenly, “And not because I helped design it. It’s lush, it’s green… It’s simply alive, and it feels wonderful to be in there, regardless of the pain our friends are heaping on themselves in the next chamber…”

“I like the medical bay,” Matt Jones announced as he rejoined the group, “I always like the medical bay. It patches me up after I’ve been broken to bits by a drunk mountain.”

“I ain’t drunk,” Randy chortled, “I had one beer and weigh almost five hundred pounds. It takes more than that to get to me.”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

---March… 3rd Week…---

A somber pall hung in the air of the base. The hallways were dark, save for the infrequent flash of the teleportation machine. The members of the Brutal Warriors Order, embroiled in their own problems, steered clear of their hosts and hunkered low in the chamber they had claimed for themselves, for there was no longer much humor to be spared.

A great and terrible crime had been committed against the group, especially its leader and his family, and there was Hell to pay. Cedric was in prison for his reaction, and Kip hadn’t slept in days. Charlene clung to her husband ceaselessly, both out of distress and intense rage, and in an attempt to restrain the big man from leveling a city block in an attempt to find their lost daughter.

They thought they were ready for anything, but out of nowhere, the doctor simply told them Angel Daring Grey was gone, and he had no idea how it had happened. One of the nurses was missing, though, and that was enough to tell them the rest of the story. Whoever had stolen the child had either paid off or seeded the nurse into the LaGrange Medical Center’s maternity ward and had her abscond with the child.

Nester countered the “espionage” theory, though. He’d worked with the missing woman a number of times, and she’d always been behind on her bills. All somebody had to do was offer enough money, and she would do the deed.

Roland, however, found that whoever had made the offer wasn’t willing to play it straight. Just two blocks away from the very family she’d victimized, he stepped carefully away from her apartment door and called the police to bring in an investigation team. She was dead, and it looked like she’d been pulled inside out.

----------

The entrance portal flared once again and Kipland Durj came storming down the hall. Zeke stepped in his path and put a hand up to stop his son.

“No time to waste, dad, I gotta move on this tip,” the short young man barked as he tried to step around his father.

“Hang on, Kip… Cathryn called me this morning and said she was worried.”

Zeke swung his arm out and pressed his hand against his son’s chest. A tendril of smoke-like black-purple energy wafted from his fingertips and Kip got the hint that his father was prepared to use the powers of the Warshade within him to stop the angry scrapper. To show his distaste, he turned his head to face the older man and his eyes blazed fiercely. Zeke arched an eyebrow at this, but not because of the attitude.

For almost two years, his son’s eyes had glowed purple, like a Warshade’s. It had been a side effect of almost having a Shadow Cyst Crystal grow through his body and make some kind of horrid abomination. At least… That’s what they’d thought…

“What’s this I hear about you not sleeping?”

“There’s work to be done,” Kip replied, turning his head to the teleportation machine, “I have to get Angel back…”

“Don’t think you can do that alone,” Zeke said softly, “We all want to help in this, and we know precisely who is involved in the kidnapping. There’s only one guy in the Council who has had such a vested interest in the Kheldians of our group.”

“I’ve been looking for information on Zack…”

Kip showed his father his communicator. It had the map of Paragon City displayed upon it as well as several of the “red burst” markers to indicate Council base locations. Many had dark streaks slashed through them. One, located in Baumton, was marked green instead of red or yellow (the common color of an inactive objective).

“What’s that?” the father asked, “the green one.”

“Archon White’s base,” Kip slid the communicator back onto his hip, “I went there first and he said he hadn’t seen Zachariah for the better part of the year. Color me crazy, but I believe him. The whole base was well within the advanced stages, complete with control and observation rooms, a prison, a medical bay, and that damn reservoir. Plus, I’m not sure, but I could have sworn I heard some kind of machining going on, like in a car factory. Something weird’s going on in the Council, and the Center’s shoring up his defenses. Not the Council’s, just his. Positron recently arrested Requiem… His report indicated he was doing much the same. They’re scheming independently of each other, now.”

“It would be terrible if Angel wound up in the middle of a power struggle… Kip… We can’t settle this on our own, flying blind. We need all the feelers we can get. We should get some more dedicated help.”

“Who do you suggest?”

----------

“Shadowstar,” Ezekiel called out, straining to keep his voice warm and friendly, but also with the touch of urgency to indicate he was there for business, “I’d like you to meet—!”

The Warshade coordinator turned to them and her eyes widened. Shouting something about “knowing he’d never change,” she hurled a blast of dark energy at them. The beam split apart, one arcing for Zeke, the other for Kip. Zeke’s dissipated harmlessly off his body, but Kip was knocked flat on his back where he started coughing and trying to recover his breath.

“What the Hell!?” Androm’Geizzer’s voice issued from Zeke’s mouth, echoing along with the human host’s, “Shadowstar, what’s gotten into you!?”

The woman reared for another attack, but Zeke closed in and caught her by the wrist. Looking angrily into her eyes, but with a lot of bewilderment as well, she realized she was making a terrible mistake.

“I… I’ve heard rumblings,” she stammered, “My contacts… They’ve been talking about Arakhn moving fast and working big deals… I thought… I thought you’d come to try to kill me…”

Androm’s silence worried Zeke this time. How much longer was the Nictus going to take this abuse? He’d argued until he was metaphysically hoarse that he had turned a new leaf, but nobody would believe him. Lately, he’d just been putting up with the verbal punishment. When Zeke asked him about it, the creature had simply replied “My actions have spoken for me thus far; I should have known better to think my words would sway them now.” Ever since, he’d been quiet about it.

“No problem, dad,” Kip groaned as he pushed himself up off the concrete, “I’m just fine over here…”

“You’ve been fighting this fight much longer than me, son,” Zeke shook his head at him, “I would think you could take it.”

“Your son’s a Void Hunter?” Shadowstar almost shrieked, the shock in her voice almost causing it to crack.

“What?” the other two asked in unison, their confusion mounting.

She calmed and looked to the two of them. She looked at Kip again. To her, his body seemed to glow with a bright light, unlike the shadowy tendrils that emanated from the bane of her kindred. She also didn’t sense the disruptive energies of a Quantum Array Rifle, which was odd for someone who had energy like this flowing through him.

“Zeke… Kip… It’s a little off, but… You look like a Hunter to me…”

---------

“Who was it that said there’s not much difference between a Kheldian and the human soul?” Kip asked as he feverishly stroked his goatee.

“It was Androm, actually,” Zeke replied, “At least, he’s the last one I heard say it.”

Kip cursed and slammed his fist against the new table. Sheldon shouted for him to calm down and Kip almost yelled back, but the inventor kept talking explaining that emotional outbursts weren’t going to solve anything. Agreeing, Kip shut his mouth and sat back down in the chair.

They were sitting in the lab, far away from the entrance portal in case of the odd chance that Randy would show up and tear his way to the portal. Nobody wanted to be in the path of the old man, not at this time. So far, he’d said nothing aside from occasional grunts and “yes” and “no” responses to everyone… Everyone except his wife. Nobody knew what the two were saying to each other except Sarah, and she could only hold her husband and sob for the past few days.

“He was inside me! That whole fricking time!”

“He was probably that monster in your nightmare before your second lease on life,” Androm offered, “Considering the fact that Shadow Seeds, N Fragments and the Nictus are all essentially the same stuff, it’s believable. Here you thought it was a Quantum Array round, turns out it was an N Fragment growing strong on your gumption. But it’s mind was broken… You probably knocked some sense into it that night… But… Why didn’t it make you like your father and me?”

“Zachariah took a shot at me once… Just one shot, and he didn’t do anything else. I ran up and kicked him in the chin, but I didn’t think about what happened… The quantum stuff hit me and I felt cold and fuzzy… But I also felt fine, like… Like nothing had happened… I didn’t feel torn asunder, or whatever you said you feel when you get hit with it, Dad…”

“Right.”

“Well… I think… Whatever he was… He didn’t want to make the power he was pumping into my body so overt… If he made it as intrinsic to my physiology as it is for you and other Kheldians, that quantum stuff probably would waste me. Instead… He tapped into something within me… Worked on that…”

“What did he tap into, though?”

Kip stayed quiet. He never told his father about the crazy adventures he’d been having in high school. He hardly ever told anyone, really, about his life as Kingdale’s Warden, and those he did had trouble believing any of it. Few could understand the idea of magical power running amok and taking form, or troubleshooting troublesome freaks and monsters that forgot their humanity in order to feed on that which surrounded them.

Cory knew… So did Sheldon… But others still didn’t understand. Kip had an inkling that Randy knew about it, too, and that the big man may have been the predecessor that the green fae “Fern” had told him dealt with much worse problems before his turn at the wheel. Apparently, a bartender at the King’s Pub was filling the role, now.

Fern had told him that he wouldn’t have access to the power attributed to a Warden (not like a Freedom Corps or Longbow Warden, it was a regional term; other communities used “Guardian, Sheriff, Hunter, Ranger, Slayer, Defender, Protector, Custodian, Troubleshooter” and other terms that insinuated the role involved dealing with problems and cleaning up messes) after his term was up. He’d delivered a beat down to a renegade Elf Baron who thought he’d start carving an empire out of the area for himself and didn’t realize how similar to a stereotypical mafia boss he was acting. Then Kip’s senior year ended and he was getting ready for college…

Then the Rikti War hit and everything went topsy-turvy. Kip lost track of Fern, but Cory had informed him she’d made it out okay. Most fae were essentially civilians now, even a lot of the more combative ones, so they’d laid low at a time when their magic would have proven especially useful. What Kip hadn’t realized was that he’d broken some sort of rule subconsciously, and his soul (or something in the fiber of his being) had clung hard to the ancient power, enabling him to help fight against the invaders.

This had followed him through his career. From being able to ignore the demented whispers of the Circle of Thorns spectral demons, to even shrugging off the arrows of Cupid (not exactly, the arrows of Cupid’s helpers were hardly composed of the same potency, and “Steve” had informed Kip after he started dating Cathryn that the ones he’d been using that first time were actually the demon/cherub/thing’s instead of the god’s), his old Warden powers crept up repeatedly to protect him. When he’d been cloned by the Crey Corporation, Kip figured it was the lack of the Warden power that got the copy killed during the “stress tests.”

“I’ll tell you about it in detail, someday, Dad,” he finally said, “But for now, I’ll explain it as this: I was a monster killer in high school and the power conferred upon me in order to do that work has stuck with me since the Rikti War broke out. I’ve been thinking that’s what’s been keeping me going since, that whatever that thing was inside me was my soul and it was turning the Nictus energies about and twisting them around for my purposes…”

“Instead,” Androm’s voice sounded delighted, “It seems the broken Nictus used your power to cleanse itself… But what is it about you now that has Shadowstar thinking you’re a Void Hunter… But… Slightly off?”

“I don’t know… I used to think it was because I started dating Cathryn that I stopped hearing him… I guess he’d lost his use for me and had hopped into another body. Otherwise, I’d call him out and ask.”

“If that was all he did, you wouldn’t have any of the power you have now. You wouldn’t be the… Anomaly… That you are. Unless…”

“What?” Zeke asked, “Androm, you’re shutting me out again…”

“What’s your theory?” Sheldon asked, his voice taking an edge that indicated he was coming to a similar conclusion.

“Angel Grey… She’s the new host.”

----------

Cedric never told people how often he spoke to his Praetorian. Cedric the Gray was never going to die, he was immortal within his relic, now, and this had vastly improved his disposition. Through Cedric, he also got to enjoy the finer things in life (and even some of the more lewd). For the hero's particular zest for life, the spirit was thankful, and helped however and whenever it could.

If anybody could have heard what they were thinking when they learned that Cedric's baby sister had been kidnapped, all they would have heard was a stereo-like incoherent roar of rage. This roar carried Cedric through several Council recruitment stands throughout Steel Canyon.

He wasn't even asking questions, he was just chopping the terrorists to bits. Many died. People fled as much from him as they did the criminals that day.

As he hunted down an Archon, a green burst struck him on the side of his head and he stumbled to the ground. When he looked up as he fumbled for his axe, Positron hovered down to him. While he couldn't see the man's face, Cedric just knew the veteran hero was looking at him with pity.

"I have to arrest you," he said sadly, "Please stand down, Mr. Grey."

"We don't want to have to hurt you," Valkyrie said as she stepped around a corner with her glowing sword in hand.

"You won't have to," Cedric replied, his brain still screaming for blood, but his heart knowing full-well what would happen if he continued.

He was weird like that, his emotions often having the better track than his thoughts.

He set his axe down, knelt next to it, and waited patiently for the police to arrest him.

Now, three days later, he sat in a cell. They didn't take him to the Zig. For heroes, especially heroes the police didn't particularly feel bad about the crime he was accused of, transfer paperwork tended to move very slow.

So, while he waited inside the new silence of his mind, he was taken a little by surprise when the elevator doors opened and the police shuffled in a depowered super criminal. He was doubly suprised when they opened his door and threw the guy in with him.

"You stay in there until all this mayhem gets sorted out!" the guard barked, "You two share a cell so we can keep an eye on both o' ya!"

"You pigs're gettin' lazy!" the villain shouted, "Soon, that monster will break in here, bust us out, and we'll tear this city down around ya! You'll rue the day you ever met me, Broken Mourning!"

"Would you shut up?" Grey asked, "I can't even hear myself think through your shrill voice..."

"Ah! Ah-ha! You coppers have made a huge mistake in putting two super-powered criminals in the same cell! When the Eviscerator releases us, you won't be able to stand against us!"

"Dude, I ain't helpin' ya escape!"

"What're you talking about?" Broken Mourning hissed at him, "On this side of the law, we have to stick together! We have to... Wait..."

The criminal shifted his position to get a better look at Cedric in a different light.

"Oh my God... I saw you on the Television! I saw them haul you away! Whoo! Whoo-hoo-hoo! I'm sharing a cell with a celebrity! I'm with the cape that went too far!"

He slapped Cedric across the face and sneered into his eyes. He didn't notice the slow way Cedric turned his head back to face him or the suddenly amused expression on the former tanker's face.

"How does it feel, hero? They're gonna lock you away forever! They're gon-*hurk*!"

The guards didn't act when the conversation suddenly cut off with a wheezing choke. The guards didn't say anything when they heard the loud sounds of someone being slammed against the walls and metal toilet. They barely flinched as Broken Mourning screamed for help, his voice gasping wetly as his head was slapped repeatedly against the heavy, reinforced door. When Cedric was finally done with him, the criminal would be remembered as Broken Pulp, and he told him as much before spitting on the battered body.

When Eviscerator showed up and waylaid the guards, they acted like Mourning was still in a condition to fight. The crazy little man hacked and slashed at the door until it shattered and Cedric rewarded his efforts with a sucker-punch to the jaw as the smoke cleared.

In all too quick a moment, Cedric vented his mounting frustration on the Eviscerator, bouncing his bald crimson head against the corners of the pillars of the jail until he was certain the red wasn't from the brick. He finished by stomping the little man into the corner while shouting a litany of expletives and stapling him to the floor with his own knives.

When the Longbow troops and precinct chief arrived to try to subdue the crazy villain, they found Cedric sitting next to him, reminding him how the MedCom system would simply throw him into one of the cells, and then it was only a matter of time before he got to him again.

"Mister Grey," the Longbow agent said as she approached carefully, "You need to return to your cell."

"Alright," he replied cordially, "I hope you don't mind my choice in extracurricular activity. You can only read porno mags for so long before you get bored."

"There aren't any magazines in there..."

"I've been really bored, then..."

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

“I’m sure it tastes great,” he muttered to the fire-haired young woman thrusting the pie under his nose, “But… Look, Rose… You’re nice and pretty and all, but you came on too strong, too fast, and for a guy like me and the work I do outside this building… It just makes cause for concern. Okay? I can’t accept it.”

The shapely woman pouted and nodded with disappointment. Roland watched her turn and walk away. He didn’t watch her for very long, just enough to make sure she wasn’t going to try to come back. When he turned back into his room, Nester gave him a reproachful look.

“Come on, man,” he said quietly, “She’s just trying to be friendly.”

“I don’t know what her game is, but she ain’t being friendly. A girl built like that doesn’t come on to a guy who looks like me at first sight. I don’t care what the circumstances are.”

“Really? Or is it just because you can’t accept anyone who isn’t—?”

The bigger man’s narrow-eyed glare cut him off.

“You’re like a brother to me, man, so I’ll let it alone if your commentary ends here. I would trust you to leave this part of my life to me.”

Nester sighed, shrugged and nodded. Most the rest of his friend’s family had either lost their minds with rage or shut down. Nobody could believe that someone had just stolen the latest member of the Grey family, a child born under somewhat bizarre circumstances, and the stress was certainly pressing upon them. Only Roland seemed unaffected, publicly, but in the safety of his apartment, Nester saw his grief.

It was in little, subtle things. The deliberate way he went about his work, the sullen footsteps to the apartment door when he had to leave, or even how he seemed to take every pause just a little bit longer than the last one. He was suffering quietly, angrily, and he didn’t know how to deal with it. He wasn’t a brawler like his brother or Kip. He was barely even an effective vigilante, no matter how many weird arrows he volleyed at the criminals.

Nester turned his thoughts from his friend for a moment to consider the problem causing the grief. He still couldn’t figure out why his little brother was ransacking random Council cells. While the Council had been known to hunt Kheldians regularly (what with two of their commanders being Nictus, their mass manufacture and sale of Quantum Array guns, the training of the Void Hunters, and their Galaxy troops apparently incubating the next generation of Nictus invaders), there was no proof the Council, in its heightened state of paranoia and alert, had the concentration to accomplish a spur-of-the-moment kidnapping. In Nester’s experience, it was more likely that the Malta Group or the Nemesis Army wanted the child. Heck, if it weren’t for the fact that Arbiter Taylor had calmed down his vendetta against Cedric, he’d think Arachnos had a hand in it as well.

“Archon White gave dad a heads-up,” Roland replied when Durj voiced his concerns, “Said he didn’t know exactly who was going to move on the hospital, just that the Center was giving fair warning.”

“Why would the Center care about your family’s affairs?”

“Don’t know.”

Roland popped open a pair of sealed plastic containers and started pulling marinated fish from one and plopping them in the other container that seemed full of some sort of bread crumb and seasoning mixture. He then filled a pan with oil and started heating it.

“I don’t know what a man in charge of a cult-like, nationless army would want from my father…” Roland slapped one of the coated fish into the pan, “…My mother… My brother… Me… My sister… Or my newest sister… I just know he’s taken some kind of mild interest, and it’s gotten Angel kidnapped!”

He watched the fish sizzle and Nester gripped his shoulder. When the big man turned to his friend, his eyes were wet with tears, but that was as far as they were going to get. Roland Grey never made much of a show of his emotions. Nester wondered briefly if he even knew how to.

After dinner, the stoic man went to his room. Nester got dressed and prepared for the late shift in LaGrange Medical Center. He volunteered for it a lot lately. It was the only thing that helped him sleep. It was the only thing that got his mind off the troubles his family and friends were suffering. He still couldn’t believe that he was in love with a Knife of Artemis, that his mother was one, too, or that his father was host to what could possibly be a dangerous, malevolent force waiting to claw its way out of him and wreak terror on the world. He didn’t let his dad know his worries about Androm’Geizzer, but the stories he’d heard some of the other Kheldians mention made his skin crawl, and the Warshade practically admitted the legends were mostly true. It made trusting Geizzer’s redemption that much more difficult.

There was a knock at the door as he finished dressing. Upon answering it, he found a young blonde woman standing there that he certainly knew of, he just didn’t know her well.

“Hey,” he whispered, “Um… I don’t think Roland’s in the mood for company.”

“I know,” Jessica replied, “I heard about it. How’s he holding up?”

“Not too good, not too good at all. He puts up a strong front, but he’s a mess inside.”

Jessica Cole nodded and stepped inside. Nester would have stopped her, but he felt that Roland shouldn’t be left alone at this point, either. Checking his watch, he took his leave and departed. He would have preferred to stay for a moment to make sure things stayed alright, but he was starting to run late.

Ms. Liberty found her friend sitting quietly in his room at the edge his bed. He seemed to just be staring at the window sill. One shoe sat on the floor next to him, the other was untied, but remained on his foot.

“You okay?” she asked as she stepped softly to his side of the bed.

“No,” he replied quietly, his voice even and soft in a way she’d never heard before, “I’m not okay by a long shot.”

Sitting next to him, she put her arm around his shoulders and started giving him a hug. He turned to her suddenly, his right hand moving up to push her hand off.

“I’m just trying to comfort you,” Jessica explained, “like-”

“I wouldn’t feel comfortable with Nester trying to comfort me like this… And I feel much the same about you, but for entirely different reasons.”

“So… What? You think you’re the only one who’s allowed to give out hugs?”

She clamped her hand on his shoulder and finished the half-embrace. Roland’s hand remained on hers, but he gave it a gentle squeeze instead of trying to pry it off. They remained like that for a moment, quietly absorbed in the emotion.

“I don’t know what to do…” he whispered after a couple minutes.

“Nobody does,” she replied, “It’s a terrible thing, Roland, and I’m sorry it’s happened to you and your family. You don’t have to deal with it alone, though.”

“I’ve been trying not to.”

“I know… But… Your family and your friends… You’re all so intrinsically linked… I think it’s hard for any of you to concentrate properly on this…”

“Some would disagree.”

“Yeah… Your friend, Kip, he’s ruined about five or six investigations into the Council’s plots because he’s ransacked bases we’ve been monitoring. Still, that brings me to my point… Freedom Corps could help you guys! We could provide information on anything our network comes across! Roland… You’ve been a good friend to me, above-and-beyond what I’ve ever expected out of anybody outside of my Vindicators. Let me do this for you… Let me help you find your sister.”

“You have information on what happened?”

“Well…”

“And you didn’t bring it to us immediately?”

Jessica removed her arm from Roland’s shoulder and clasped her hands on her knees. Biting her lower lip, she tried to come up with a proper explanation.

“Your father filed for secession from Freedom Corps…”

“Right. He doesn’t see the benefit anymore, what with the fact that you’re no longer footing the bill for a basic base plot.”

“Well, we had to make some cutbacks in order to maintain our other operations… Roland… We also have a policy of… Withholding information from unaffiliated groups until the data has been reviewed and the security clearance of the recipients checks out…”

“Meaning?”

Roland’s eyes narrowed and he leveled them squarely on Jessica’s.

“Meaning that we got some intelligence on the Council… Look, Agent Wild wanted to tell you guys, he really did, but the Security Division was forcing him to go through hurdles… He finally told me about it… Roland… I’m so sorry…”

“My sister… Was kidnapped…”

“Roland…”

“…Not by Bureaucratic Red Tape, but by a nurse who was bribed,” the portly man sighed, “Look… I would expect that sort of thing, but we were already informed of something going down and we took what precautions we could… In the end… It wasn’t enough. They snuck her out of LaGrange as easily as if they could have walked in and picked her up themselves. Even if you’d told us that the Council was on the move, we’d have come to the same end.”

She took his hand into hers and gave it a squeeze. It always seemed silly to her that this guy who was about as tall as she was had such a massive paw for a hand. Still, she was able to make do and smiled at him when she looked up and saw his face had softened.

“We could still help in the search,” she finished, “If we have our eyes and ears open for any information that could help, I’m certain we could locate Angel and mount a proper rescue!”

Roland chuckled a little and pulled his other shoe off. He muttered something that Jessica didn’t quite catch. When she asked him about it, he looked at her again, his eyes twinkling with mild amusement.

“Only in a world like this can a kidnapping be resolved by people in spandex-clad jumpsuits and a session of fisticuffs. If only it were so easy…”

“I know I’m making it sound simple,” Cole patted his shoulder and stood to leave, “But I’m serious, Roland. Whoever did this hurt you, and if they hurt you, they hurt me, because you’re my friend. I don’t take lightly to anyone who hurts me or my friends. I’m going to help you any way I can to make sure this monster pays.”

“Thanks,” Roland nodded appreciatively and smiled at her, “It’s nice to know we’ve got someone in our corner. I guess I never thought of it like that.”

“Get some rest, Roly,” Jessica said as she headed out, “You look like you haven’t slept in days.”

“I’ve slept,” he muttered back, “I just never got much rest out of it…”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

“Dad… Roland said the nurse who kidnapped Angel had been pulled inside out…”

They were crossing the expanse of Boomtown when Zeke’s communicator warbled his son’s comment. In the back of his mind, he could hear Androm curse. Despite the fact that some of their thoughts and memories had merged when they’d initially bonded, the intervening time since had placed some powerful mental blocks between the two of them. Durj didn’t know if his symbiotic energy being was hiding something from him, and the tone sounded very aggravated.

“What are you trying to say, Kipland?” he asked back.

“Was it you?”

“As far as I know…” Zeke sent one last thought back to Androm and left control to the Nictus, “No.”

“You’re not lying to us, are you, Androm?”

Kip had a lot of love and respect for his father, but he showed it in a very subdued way. If it turned out the dark thing inside the old man was really just hiding in plain sight, Kip was fully prepared to do what he could to rip the monster out. Fortunately, he had no need of such savagery, but he didn’t know that. The sound of Geizzer’s exasperated sigh issued over the communication broadcast and it tried to explain.

“Kipland, I could no more control your father’s actions than I could roam free without dissipating into nothingness. Because of the time I spent comatose after saving Ezekiel’s life, I lost my connection to a large number of motor functions throughout your father’s body, while he developed an unusual connection to my power. We still function phenomenally when acting concert, but my dissension does not cause him to act against his will. While I agree it was a fitting end for a fool who would dare come between a maternal parent and her child, I was not the one to do it. I suppose it could further set your mind at ease if I were to say that I feel no displeasure at the fact. Indeed… I feel it’s a mark of my own retribution that I do feel a twinge of regret at the poor woman’s fate, regardless of my feeling the punishment was justified.”

“But Mrs. Grey couldn’t have done it…”

“I’m not saying she did. I’m saying I understand the punishment, but I doubt that’s what this was. I’m fairly certain someone was trying to send us a message…”

“Which is?” Zeke asked.

“Who was that Nictus that we fought a couple years back? You know… When we broke that big crystal…”

“Shadowstorm,” Androm replied, “Shifted back into his Galaxy soldier host and we forgot about him after dealing with the Seed… Of course…”

Zeke missed out on the rest of the musings because Androm went back into his own mind. It was just as well, though. He had arrived at the base that last Archon had told them might have answers. Reaching toward his son, he flexed his fingers and felt the energy around his hand twitch. He never thought of how his world had changed since becoming a Warshade, at least, not much. He’d always looked at life as doing what you could with what you had, so the transition was a lot smoother for him than it was for others. Still, he figured he should have had a harder time getting used to opening the very fabric of space and time to pull comrades out of hotspots or to shorten the travel time to an objective.

“Thanks, Dad,” Kip murmured as he lurched to the door while fighting off dizziness, “I guess teleportation just isn’t for me… I don’t know why the base machine or the arcane rings treat me differently, maybe it’s because I’m always ‘standing’ when I use those, but with your or Sheldon’s wormholes and Cory’s ‘Recorder Recall’ spell, I feel sick to my stomach and like I just got thrown through a hurricane…”

“Maybe you should try waiting for the other individual to reach the objective, go from standing to standing, instead of your ‘air-to-ground’ method.”

“Tried it once… Same difference. I think it’s the travel itself… It’s like space folds around me.”

“It’s all well and good to discuss this sort of thing, but the longer we stand out here, the more time the Council soldiers squatting in this building have to mount a credible defense.”

“Good point, Androm,” Kip nodded and his eyes flashed white, “Let’s do this!”

----------

The two of them smashed through the ranks of Council soldiers, Kip taking the lead while Zeke snuck in and debilitated the more annoying enemies. At one point, the younger Durj attempted to eliminate a Quantum Array wielding Galaxy soldier, only to be beaten to the chase by his father who teleported behind the man and caught him with a Gravity Well that held him fast.

“I’ve had to go my time alone, too, Kip,” the gray-haired man explained through the haze that masked his presence, “I’ve learned a few nasty tricks in how to deal with these guys…”

A solid punch to the soldier’s jaw knocked him out cold and he drew some of the energy out of the unconscious man to replenish his energy. Kip took point again, and Androm pointed out something.

“You know, Kipland, I think I see what Shadowstar was talking about. You have energy radiating from you in a manner similar to what comes off from Void Hunters as they fight my brethren. However… It’s more intense. You’re like the opposite of a Void Hunter…”

“Cool,” the young man said curtly as he edged around a corner, “Whatever. Dad, you’ll want to see this…”

A triad of Shadow Cyst Crystals sat in the center of the next chamber. In the middle of them, a Kheldian Bright Nova floated calmly. A low growl issued from Zeke’s throat that surprised Kip and Androm’Geizzer.

“I hate traitors,” Zeke explained in a low tone, “Especially those kinds. It’s bad enough they turned against their own people, but they help capture Peacebringers and Warshades in an effort to be the last ones eaten…”

“They see me as the traitor, too, Zeke,” Androm reminded him, “In order to maintain such a pure stance, I would recommend you bond with a Kheldian like your friend, Charlene. They never switched sides, they have been fighting the good fight since the beginning.”

“You and other Warshades are working to cleanse your sins. They’re intentionally helping the Nictus to cannibalize your species.”

“I never had much of a problem with that, actually. I mean, for certain Kheldians, yes, I would prefer not to devour them, but others, I had no qualms about using their life force to sustain mine. They often had opposing views to mine and I felt they argued their points poorly. They also didn’t fight hard enough to survive…”

“Tell him to shut up, Dad,” Kip hissed, “What he’s saying is reminding me of Amy’s plight with her father, and I’m having trouble remembering that it’s you that thing is hiding inside.”

“Oh, come on, Kipland. You of all people should know that when a person wants to avoid a dire fate, they simply have to fight hard enough. Were it not the case, you certainly wouldn’t be here anymore…”

“That’s not a lesson most people can swallow, Nictus! People aren’t brutal anymore, life doesn’t have to be brutal! I’m brutal because I prefer it, but I’m not going to pity someone who doesn’t, nor am I going to victimize them! You would do well to take that lesson to heart, or your redemption will never be certain.”

There was silence then and they could hear the Kheldian speaking to the crystals. The language was impossible to interpret, however, except Zeke was startled to learn he understood it.

“The Kheldian’s name is Havoc Ellipses, and those crystals aren’t normal Cysts. They’ve been damaged somehow, so they can only be used for communication purposes. This is a hub of contact between various Galaxy or Nictus cells!”

“Have they said anything about Angel?”

“No… Not yet…”

The Kheldian suddenly stopped and looked around. Zeke and Kip ducked behind the corner before it saw them and waited a few minutes. The peculiar sing-song chatter of the Kheldian started up again and Zeke shook his head.

“It knows we’re here. They’re shutting the base down.”

“Damn…” Kip growled before bolting around the corner.

It wasn’t a long fight. Kip rushed close as beams slammed into his chest and delivered a savage kick into the center of the floating alien’s form. Havoc Ellipses fell against the wall and writhed about as he tried to right himself. Kip was stomping on its head as Zeke launched a volley of dark energy into its form that started tearing it apart. In short order, it exploded, Havoc screaming Kheldian curses as it was wiped from existence.

“Great,” Kip panted, “Now it’s dead and we don’t have any information on where Angel could be.”

“Oh…” came a voice from one of the Broken Cysts, “That’s what you’re after? I believe I can help you with that, young hero. There are some conditions I request, however…”

----------

“It’s unfortunate they explode like that if they lack a host,” Androm intoned as they left, “It would be easier to interrogate them if they maintained a link to the body that originally sustained them. Instead, they teeter on the edge of oblivion, waiting for someone to smash them out of the continuum. Perhaps their consciences are getting the best of them…”

“It was decent of that one crystal to tell us where we could find Angel, though,” Kip muttered.

“You could have honored your deal to not break them, too,” Zeke grumbled, “I mean, it’s not like they were doing anything in their cracked states…”

“Actually, Ezekiel, I have to agree with Kip on that call. The Shadow Seeds should all be destroyed, no matter the condition of them.”

"That wasn't the deal and you know it, Dad," Kip muttered, "I said I'd think about leaving the crystals alone. Sending the two of us to another base full of Council troops to beat up is hardly worth my preserving their resources. Besides, the more damage we do to the Council's communications, the better it is for everybody."

"I suppose," the old man sighed.

Kip took to the sky and started heading south for Steel Canyon and his next objective afterward. Zeke took a moment to reflect on his son's glib take on the situation. Either he'd been doing this too long or the stresses of the hero life were starting to take their toll on the young man's psyche.

"I just hope that Dobson girl helps turn him around..." he sighed.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

---Brickstown---

The soldiers didn’t know what beast had torn into their base. They didn’t know the cops were on to their Archon and a band of heroes would be sniffing them out and hunting them down every chance they got. However, it wasn’t Ezekiel and Kipland that had driven into the center of their base and eviscerated their Archon before asking questions.

It was Mad Matt McGinty.

“I am the rocker!”

He raked his blade across the bellies of three soldiers and they staggered away.

“I am the roller!”

He punted a Galaxy trooper into the Adjutant behind him and they toppled over. As they struggled to stand, he hopped up and brought the blade back down, using the momentum of his shifting weight to increase the power of the stroke, cleaving the Galaxy trooper neatly in two and slashing the Adjutant across the torso.

“I am…” he stabbed the point of the blade into the Adjutant, pinning him to the floor, “The out-of-controller!”

“Whuh… Why?” the soldier gurgled, “I thought… I thought…”

“It’s not my job to worry if your boss got a MedCom for you,” the intense man hissed, “It’s my job to punish you monsters for daring to touch a child!”

He twisted the blade a little for effect. The Adjutant howled in pain, and bulging muscle and fur started splitting the uniform open. Matt hopped back as the now-War Wolf leaped to its feet and roared in his face.

However, the Scrapper simply swiped the blade across the monster’s muzzle, splitting the already wide grin. His follow-up kick to the jaw was a disturbing sight for the remaining soldiers.

“Lock on!” one of the troops shouted.

Matt turned around and felt the sword vibrate briefly. As soon as the strange sensation was over, the world suddenly seemed more in focus.

“Fire!”

The soldiers’ assault rifles blazed away, but for some reason, it looked to Mattock like they were shooting in slow motion. He snaked his sword about and deflected the rounds, scattering them into the walls and equipment surrounding him. Some wound up driving into the Adjutant War Wolf, signaling a death knell for the altered beast.

When the magazines ran dry, Matt slid the blade across the floor, leaving five bullets in a trail. The soldier ordering his compatriots balked at this, going so far as to remove his mask in the mistaken worry that his red lenses were deceiving him.

“You’ve got one last chance,” he growled, “If you’ve got anything… Anything at all that could tell me where she is… You live.”

The soldiers finished reloading and the one ordering them was giving the command to resume firing. McGinty hopped up, twirled, and landed with a swipe that sent the bullets hurtling through the air. There was the sound of glass breaking as the lenses of Council soldiers’ masks were hit and the men dropped to the floor. The one on Matt’s far left spasmed and gripped the assault rifle, squeezing off a few rounds that plunked into the floor.

“Dispatch,” the scrapper muttered into his radio, “I didn’t find any Council soldiers in this base. I recommend just sealing the hole with dynamite and moving on to the next cell.”

“Are you sure?” the officer asked, her voice tinged with worry, “Our reports were very clear that-!”

“I’m telling you I didn’t find anybody alive down here,” he grumbled into the radio, “Seal the hole. Don’t let anybody else use this place as their base.”

----------

---Kings Row---

Randall was staring at his television and holding his distraught wife when there was a knock at the door. Charlene looked up at him, and he nodded.

He gently curled her up in a blanket and stood to answer the door. The sheepish looking young man waiting for him looked even more intimidated as he saw the big, glowering tanker.

“Um… Sir… I have a… Have a message for you…” the man stammered, “From… Mister Jordan White…”

“I’ve been waiting,” the big man’s voice, despite being kept to a low tone, still seemed to make the hallway tremble, “What took so long?”

“I don’t know the story, sir. I’m just the messenger.”

Randy stared down at the man for a moment longer before turning back to his wife. She glowered back at him, her eyes glowing a violent shade of white.

“You know what I’ll do if they don’t give us back our daughter,” she said in a strange, double voice.

“I do,” the big man replied, then turned back to the visitor, “Alright, twig boy. Lead the way.”

----------

---Steel Canyon---

“I don’t care about this preliminary crap, Nosferatu,” Arakhn hissed as they walked down the hall, “I want the… Thing out of the flesh so it can be studied more closely!”

“That would require killing the infant,” the twisted scientist rasped.

“And?”

Nosferatu stopped in his tracks for a few seconds. However, it wasn’t any kind of compassion for the child that gave him pause. Arakhn’s human half shuddered a little as she considered what the demented little man could possibly have been thinking.

“This should prove interesting…” the Vampyri progenitor clapped his clawed hands together, “Very interesting…”

They reached their destination, a section of their base that looked similar to an operating room. In the center was a specially crafted incubator to contain Angel Grey and her Kheldian. If the energy being tried to escape, the machine would simply sap it up into one of the crystals the Nictus Queen had stolen from the Circle of Thorns.

Nosferatu moved for his surgical instruments and started preparing himself for what would be a certainly exquisite extraction (in his opinion). Arakhn circled around the incubator and peered into the glass.

When she shouted, the Vampyri rounded in surprise.

“Where is it!?” she shouted, her voice sounding less human in her rage and more like…

…Like something that scared him.

“Where… What?” the mad scientist stammered, “What do you mean? The girl should be right there…”

“She’s not!” Arakhn grabbed the twisted man by his black outfit and wrenched him over to see for himself, “Who did you leave here last!?”

“I don’t… I don’t understand… There were no alarms… I left the child in the care of the Ascendant Archon…”

Arakhn glared at him and for a moment, Nosferatu was worried that she’d blast a hole right through his head.

“You know… The Archons Ascendant… Those specialized guards who-!”

“I didn’t want the Center to know about this, so I didn’t request any,” Arakhn replied calmly, “There shouldn’t have been an Ascendant here.”

“Then…” Nosferatu’s eyebrows almost lifted enough for the goggles to drop out of his eye sockets, “That means…”

He wasn’t able to finish the thought. The observation window above them smashed into the operating room, raining bits of glass and the broken body of a Galaxy trooper down on the two Council leaders. Arakhn shook the body off and hissed as the hero that had thrown the man through the window landed between her and Nosferatu.

The Vampyri moved to intercept the young man, but he spun around and delivered a kick to the madman’s head. Catching the freak at the temple, Kipland continued to press the force and wound up driving him into the same table that held his surgical equipment.

As he left the dark-dressed man moaning on the floor, Durj rounded on Arakhn and his eyes started to flash a dangerous shade of red. She regarded him coolly, not realizing that he was the same young hero the Void Hunter, Zachariah, had been investigating.

“You’ve made a big mistake, [dog],” he said darkly, “I’m going to beat the [snot] out of you, now. I just want you to know.”

“You think you can stop me, boy?”

“Oh, Arakhn,” Androm’Geizzer’s voice sounded from above, “I’m quite certain he’s more than capable of breaking you open.”

She looked up at Ezekiel, Androm’s host, and cursed. The gray haired man simply shrugged and took an observer’s seat. She looked back at Kip and he was in a combat pose.

“Is your host ready to watch his son die?” she intoned as she took her own stance.

“No,” Ezekiel replied, “But Kip already told me I gotta let him have this out.”

----------

---Baumton---

“Welcome to my base, Randall,” Archon White went to shake the bigger man’s hand, but the tanker merely glowered at him, “Right… May as well get you your daughter…”

The base itself wasn’t too spectacular. There wasn’t much special about it, save the large training floor in the central chamber. Hundreds of soldiers were practicing martial arts, shooting, drill, and enduring a number of stress tests. In one corner, Randall could see an Archon squaring off with a War Wolf.

Archon White led the big man to the final chamber. It was the closest approximation to an office complex the cavernous fortress could be converted into. With steel grating for a floor and the same tan walls as one would find in other Council bases, it still all looked the same to Randall.

They headed for one of the sections that contained multiple levels and Archon White led his charge up the stairs. Each level had lightly armored or just uniformed Council soldiers typing into computers and pushing various types of paperwork. On the top floor, however, there was a band of Archon Ascendants. They didn’t aim their weapons at the big man, but they did turn to look at him as he approached.

“Mister Grey,” the one standing behind the desk announced, “On behalf of the Center, I would like to extend our apologies for this… Grievous offense.”

“He really expects that to save him in the end?” the big man’s gravelly voice conveyed his discontent at the apology.

“The kidnapping of your child was not our leader’s plan… It was the plan of one of his agents. A plan she tried to keep secret from us…”

One of the Ascendants nodded to the one speaking and he chuckled a moment.

“…And she is currently suffering for her indiscretion.”

“Where’s my daughter?” Randall asked in the same growl he’d used before.

“Right here,” the Ascendant Archon hefted a basket and set it on the desk.

Randall approached and looked inside. The bright, glowing eyes of his daughter blinked back up to him and she smiled.

“Have I doomed my family?” the big man thought to himself, not for the first time, “Will we never be free of this? Not even the youngest of my family remains untouched by this… This strange destiny… And I don’t even believe in fate.”

“Alright. I’m taking my child and going. Just be glad you got her to me in time. If we had to wait much longer, well… Let me just say that we wouldn’t have stopped with what my son did in Steel Canyon.”

“Randall,” Archon White placed a hand on the big man’s wrist, “You have to understand, we didn’t want this! Randy… The Council… It’s… It’s facing hard times…”

“Things aren’t as cohesive as the Center would like them to be,” the Ascendant Archon agreed, “Again, the Center would like to apologize for involving your family in the ongoing struggles.”

“Just don’t let it happen again.”

Randy leaned in close to the silver-armored soldier and glared into the dark visor. The soldier stared back, unflinching. With nothing else to say, the big man hefted up the basket, picked the baby out of it by cradling her in one of his large hands, and proceeded to leave.

“That was too close, Archon White,” the Ascendant Archon muttered as he removed his helmet, revealing the aged face of Paolo Tirelli.

“I’m sorry, sir,” the young man gasped as he leaned against the desk, “It’s just… You can’t stop someone that size unless…”

“Not about that,” the old man barked as he took a seat, “I’ve been pummeled by the big man while wearing this armor before. It’s not so bad. What I’m more concerned with is Arakhn and Requiem going behind my back… Again. I could care less about their galactic civil war with the Kheldians, but when they threaten my world and its future…”

“Sir, what can we do? We need them, don’t we?”

The Center stroked his chin for a moment as he looked at the werewolf. He didn’t know how or why Jordan White was able to change forms, but he knew it had nothing to do with the War Wolf program Requiem had instituted. It also had nothing to do with the Scion Experiment, as White’s family was certainly not involved in the Column or the Council before.

“Things are changing again,” the old man sighed, “I think it’s time we started taking a good look at our fellows again.”

----------

---Steel Canyon---

Kipland drove his heel into Arakhn’s stomach and launched her into the wall. She shrieked and lunged back at him, raking her dark energy wrapped, claw-like hands across the young man’s chest in successive swipes.

The Scrapper caught one of her wrists on the fifth swipe and yanked her into the incubator. There was an electric pop and the machine exploded, slamming a panel into the woman’s shoulder as she stumbled next to it. This wasn’t about to stop her, however, and she whirled around with a dark quantum blast from her eyes.

Kip felt cold a cold burning sensation, but he still rushed her with a howl and a flurry to the chest. On his third punch, he felt a rib crack under his fist and he followed up with a drop kick that caused her to stagger around the incubator again.

As he started to pursue, however, Nosferatu was in his face again. The vampyri caught Kip with a claw across the face and the scrapper was spun about. The scientist pressed his advantage by jabbing his wicked fingers into Kip’s back, but when he went to bite into the young hero’s neck, Kip’s head backed into his chin.

Nosferatu cursed loudly and Kip followed up his desperate attack with a stomp on the twisted man’s foot, breaking the bridge of it and causing him to stumble back. When the vampyri fell to the floor, Kip spun around and his eyes flared red before twin beams of energy lanced into the fallen man’s abdomen. Nosferatu’s eyes flared open suddenly and he started convulsing violently.

“Arakhn!” Kip shouted as he searched the chamber for his enemy, but she was already fleeing the chamber down another tunnel.

Kip ran to pursue her, but she made a motion with her hand and a burst of dark energy flipped a switch for a blast door that slammed shut just as Kip reached it. Cursing, he kicked it a couple times before turning back to Nosferatu.

Unfortunately, whatever had disabled the vampyri earlier had worn off and the twisted man was on Kip again. Too bad for the Progenitor, Kip was too angry to keep playing things nice.

As Nosferatu’s claw slashed across the scrapper’s forearm, a silvery-white metal seemed to form there. A bright flash followed and the hero was covered in a white armor reminiscent of the Roman-era armor he had before.

“Oh, now what the Hell is this?” he shouted as he saw the new look, “Can’t anything ever stay the same?”

Nosferatu went to strike him again, but he caught him at the wrist and spun him about before kicking him in the spine. He then ran up and drop-kicked the Council leader in the back of the head, smashing his face into the incubator’s glass cover.

“Hey!” Geizzer shouted, “You sure there’s nothing in there, kid!?”

“Yeah,” Kip replied as he grabbed the villain by the back of the head and started smashing him against the interior, “I got a call from a friend before we got here. But YOU! You hear me, you Dracula-wannabe!? I heard what you said! I know what you planned to do! I should [fricking] kill you!”

He wrenched the vampyri out of the machine and hurled him against the wall. Nosferatu, tensed and the wounds on his face healed instantaneously. However, in that instant, Kip closed with him again and delivered a side kick that vaulted him against one of the lights.

As he tried to get up, Durj grabbed him by the head and started bashing it against the stone wall and the steel flooring. He didn’t stop until the Council leader was bloody and he saw one of the pointed teeth lying on the floor. The vampyri looked up at him weakly, one of the lenses in his goggles was broken, so he squinted that revealed eye shut. Despite all this, he started laughing.

“Why’re you laughing?” Kip growled, “Remember that shock you felt when I blasted you not ten minutes ago? You so certain the MedCom device your boss installed survived? Even if it did, you sure it didn’t need to reboot?”

Nosferatu kept laughing and Kip punched him in the face. He delivered about six more before the monster stopped laughing and started struggling through the pain, but the hero pinned him fast and jabbed a thumb into the exposed eye, eliciting a gurgled shout from the vampyri.

At that moment, Kip felt a hand on his shoulder. Before he could do anything, he was yanked backwards and thrown against the base of the incubator. As he scrambled to his feet, he felt a rush of air and Zeke was next to him, gripping his shoulder a lot less roughly than the new guest.

“Hold still, son…” Zeke whispered, “It’s over.”

“Damn right it is,” the newcomer said smoothly as his cloaking device shut down, revealing the scarlet-clad form of Manticore, “You have any idea how close you came to killing this man?”

“That’s a very loose use of the definition of ‘man,’” Kip growled.

“Well, you beat him, kid. I was getting ready to clear this place out myself, but I didn’t realize Arakhn was using it, too. Now, she got away before back-up got here, but I’m not gonna fault you that. We still got him.”

Nosferatu was busy tapping a button under his rolled down glove and cursing darkly as he didn’t seem to get the result he was looking for.

“You can go ahead and cut that out, Noss. I’ve got an inhibitor here, you can’t get to Striga… Not on the Red Cross Express, anyway.”

The vampyri whimpered and passed out. The heroes looked down at him, and Kip winced as the armor on his body faded away, revealing his normal street clothes.

“Look, I know better than most how much you guys want to basically kill everybody who does you wrong, but take it from me, it’s not going to fix anything!”

“I know that,” Kip barked, “I know that as well as anybody can! Revenge isn’t about fixing anything, though, it’s about punishment! These [frickers] kidnapped an infant and deserve to die for that!”

“And where would it stop?” Manticore leaned in on the slightly shorter hero and pointed into Kip’s chest.

“I would have settled for his, Arakhn’s and Requiem’s heads on plates. I think I’d be square after that. It’s not like Vandal or Maestro ever did anything to me or my friends and family.”

Manticore blinked at him.

“Look,” he muttered, “Longbow’s already saying that the Council chatter is declaring your situation over and done with. Can I get an assurance from you that you’ll stop with this wanton assault?”

“Until they mess with us again,” the younger hero replied coldly before walking away, “I’m done.”

“That’s the best you’re going to get from him,” Zeke intoned as the Phalanxer watched the young guy wander off.

“That’s a lot to get from someone,” Justin said appreciatively as he nudged the unconscious body with the toe of his boot, “A bit much for Statesman’s tastes…”

“Trust me. Kip knows where to draw the line and he never crosses it. He might have killed Nosferatu right there if you hadn’t stopped him, but then, he told you where he’d drawn the line.”

“Right.”

“Thanks for dropping by to help when you did,” Zeke made to shake Manticore’s hand, “Kip may have stopped, but I’ve heard stories about how devious Nosferatu can be…”

“Speaking of which,” Manticore drew an arrow from his quiver with his free hand as he shook Zeke’s hand and jabbed it into the vampyri, “Just to make sure…”

Nosferatu made to lunge at them, but the arrow activated and an electric shock, one that was much more powerful than the one that accompanied Kip’s eye beam blast, jolted through the villain and he writhed uncontrollably on the floor before passing out for real. Zeke nodded appreciatively and clapped the veteran hero on the shoulder.

“I guess that’s why you’re one of the top dogs.”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

The trial was a surprisingly speedy affair. A scant few weeks after Angel had been recovered, and they were already looking at the verdict and sentencing.

Cedric felt something that he could only call “anti-pride” at being prosecuted by the city’s famous Chris Jenkins, the lawyer that had a penchant for trying to extort money from heroes after they’d laid the smack down on some criminals. This time, however, he’d hoped to make his career, or at least set a precedent, by representing the city itself as it tried one of the many people who “claimed to defend it” (Jenkins’ insinuation was that the heroes were simply undermining the city’s real defenders, the police and military, in an effort to soften the populace up for later exploitation).

The judge, Hawthorne, was a surprisingly grim and somber man. For a moment, Grey was reminded of the first time he read the Crucible, but the man in that story didn’t hold a candle to the serious attitude being conveyed by this one. He was extremely hard on Cedric’s defense attorney, so much, in fact, that Cedric decided he would make his own closing argument.

It was an impassioned speech, and he had to be redacted a number of times for cursing, but he felt he got the point across. What he did, he would have done for anybody who had lost their child, their sibling, their parents, and he did it to send a message to the monsters who thought they could get away with such a heinous atrocity. He did what any self-respecting person would have done in the search for a member of their family, and he would do it again in an instant for any other person.

Jenkins’ closing argument pointed to a supposed mental instability in Cedric. He deplored the city’s obsession with costumed freaks and monsters and their unwillingness to stand up for themselves and what was “right” (despite talking about things that were wrong about the heroes, he had little to say about what could be otherwise right). He urged the jury to condemn Cedric for the mass murder of Council soldiers (he was stopped short of saying “innocent civilians”) in the streets of Steel Canyon and started ranting how “If you don’t, surely, God will!”

It started making the tanker laugh, but he quelled it quickly as Judge Hawthorne turned one of his glaring, vulture-like eyes on him. Jenkins lost his composure upon hearing the chuckle, but recovered enough to close his statement with dignity. The jury deliberated for almost an hour and Cedric almost started to worry.

When they returned to deliver the verdict, he could feel his dad’s hand gripping his shoulder. Cedric squeezed the paw back and leaned forward as the foreman started to read.

However, Hawthorne stopped the foreman to address Cedric.

“Mister Grey,” his deep, resounding voice seemed to bounce off the man, “You do remember the fact that you waved your right to a jury of heroic peers, right?”

“Yes your honor,” Grey replied after standing, “I figured it would be best this way.”

“You understand you can’t file for appeal based on grounds that the jury wasn’t ‘of your peers’ since this was your decision, right?”

“Yes, your honor.”

“Mister foreman, you may resume.”

The foreman nodded, smiled and unfolded the paper carefully. For how brief his message was, he was certainly taking his time.

“We the jury, find the defendant… Not guilty.”

Jenkins was probably surprised when Cedric joined him in shouting “WHAT!?”

Cedric was so certain he’d be going to prison. He wasn’t sure what he’d do while in there, but it probably would have involved a lot of broken bodies as he fought with the countless idiots he helped put in the Zig or anyone who had a grudge against a “former” hero. Really, he was just hoping he could go to the Zig so the whole affair could be over and life could go on; he’d figure his way out from there. Now, however, Jenkins was likely to draw the whole affair out to the Supreme Court.

“Order!” Hawthorne shouted over the din of the courtroom, his voice sharp and commanding enough that he didn’t even need the gavel, “Shut up!”

The room quieted and he looked at the jury foreman. He looked over the jury members, one-by-one, and finally turned to the courtroom audience. Jenkins visibly paled as the gaze settled on him, and Cedric felt a cold chill run up his spine as the hawk-like gaze turned to him, but Hawthorne’s speech addressed everybody.

“The other members of the jury are in agreement?” he growled.

The other jurors nodded and the judge sighed before continuing.

“Look at this. Look at the mess you’ve made. We hold our lives at the mercy of freaks and killers and you wouldn’t have it any other way. I suppose it makes sense, they keep us safe from more monstrous freaks and killers, ones who would just as easily victimize any of you if it meant furthering their goals. But that doesn’t excuse Grey’s, or any hero or heroine’s, actions when it comes to murdering people in the streets. There has to be law, there has to be order! We cannot simply allow the costumes and capes to have their run of the city or we’ll be no better than the Etoile Isles or the wild West.”

He turned to Cedric…

“Because of this, I’m sentencing you, Cedric Grey, to two thousand hours of community service, despite the verdict. I am also suspending your hero license indefinitely until such time as you have proven your capability to operate within the bounds of the law. Ladies and gentlemen, you are dismissed.”

With one last rap of the gavel, the people in the courtroom started to disperse. Cedric’s lawyer tried to tell him that they would appeal and that he would get his hero’s license back, but he waved the man off with a promise that he was still getting paid.

“Let it go, I’ll live with it. It’s fine.”

The lawyer seemed a little put off by this, but he couldn’t do anything once his client had made a decision. He packed up his papers, shook Cedric’s hand, and departed. Afterward, Randy and Charlene asked if he was ready to go.

“You guys go on without me,” he replied, “I’m gonna go talk to the judge for a bit.”

---

He arrived at Judge Montgomery Hawthorne’s office just as Chris Jenkins’ tirade ended. The prosecutor was not happy at the verdict, but the judge was surprisingly unsympathetic.

“Let me tell you what’s going to happen, Mister Jenkins,” his somber tone seemed to make the lawyer stammer and choke on whatever he was about to say, “First, I’ll begin with where you should have known you were doomed from the start. You’re prosecuting a hero in a hero-defended city. Regardless of how you cut the jury, they’re going to know people who’ve been saved by heroes, been saved by heroes or be heroes. You’ve already got ninety-nine percent of the populace against you. Your case comes across as devious and rife with contempt not only for the heroes, but for the people that put their faith in them as well, and they’re not likely to help you if you keep insulting them. Now, you could have moved for a change of venue, but we both already know what that would have led to. You’d be in Skyway, Atlas Park, Kings Row… In the end, it would have been the same result.”

Jenkins nodded and Cedric knocked on the door frame.

“Mister Grey,” the judge growled, “I hope you’re not planning to make a motion for your license back or to get your community service lessened. If that were the case, I would strongly recommend you have your lawyer present.”

“Come to gloat, cape?” Jenkins’ muttered in his self-important, boorish tone.

“No, I came to talk to the judge,” he replied.

“Let me finish, then,” Hawthorne gestured for the suspended hero to sit and returned to what he was saying to Jenkins, “Now, normally, you couldn’t appeal; your life isn’t on the line. However, you’re probably intending to make some kind of argument about how this case sets a precedent for meta human/human relations, and try to take this all the way up to the Supreme Court, which is where it would have to go considering the fact that all courts from here through State go right through, you guessed it, this city, and there’s nobody in this city who hasn’t been rescued, inspired by, or plain old has been a hero. Now… Once you go to D.C. and bring this case to the Supreme Court, I have to ask you, Jenkins… What do you think the chances are that none of those Justices haven’t been saved, in some way shape or form, by members of the Freedom Phalanx, the Vindicators, or any of the numerous groups that have members that hail from the D.C. area in their rosters? How good do you really think your chances are of winning the case? Suppose the more likely fact that you lose. How likely do you think your chances are that you’ll be able to escape with any professional integrity once the whole ordeal is over?”

Jenkins blinked and swallowed hard as he realized the futility of his situation. Judge Hawthorne rested against his desk and with a nod toward the door, indicated that the insufferable man should leave. He returned to his seat as the door closed behind the prosecutor and flipped through some paperwork before finally addressing Cedric.

“That idiot is the same kind of bottom-feeding agitator that gives lawyers everywhere a bad name,” he growled, “Just a few years ago, he was suing heroes who legitimately put the goon squads of numerous criminal leaders away just to make himself rich. Some he succeeded, others… Not so much. Now… I guess he thought he could make it big off your back.”

“Well, I’m sorry to disappoint,” Cedric said without remorse, “I just… I just wanted to say that I kind of expected to go to prison, your honor.”

“So did I, Grey,” the judge replied, “But I can’t sentence something like that when the jury finds you innocent. The most I can sentence is community service… Which is stretching my powers quite a bit. I’m surprised your lawyer didn’t barge in here before Mister Jenkins, or at least get stuck in the frame along with him.”

“I told him to lay off. You’re surprisingly personable all of a sudden.”

“And you’re surprisingly civil for a mass murderer who butchered several men in the streets of my city,” Hawthorne shrugged, “But the jury acquitted you and there’s nothing more I can do.”

“Well, Judge, what can I do to reacquire my license?”

“I recommend you work on the community service, first. I was going to have my office mail you when your hours start, but I guess it won’t hurt to tell you to invest in some decent road work clothes before Monday.”

“Alright.”

“We’ll play it by ear after that. With the time I gave you, you’ll be indebted to Steel Canyon for a little over a year… That is, if you dedicate yourself to five hours a day, every day.”

Cedric nodded.

“Well, then I guess I’ll see you when you feel you’ve re-earned your right to swing an axe in defense of this city,” the Judge stood and Cedric stood with him to shake his hand, “Just remember, Cedric, just because you had to kill when you were in the service doesn’t mean you have to kill out here. You need to listen to your head more and your gut less when being a protector of the peace. This isn’t the same kind of war as you see in the desert or the jungle. Believe me. I know.”

“I know that, sir,” Cedric grinned as he used his other hand to push back the judge’s sleeve, revealing a Marine Corps tattoo, “We recognize our own. And in my case, it’s the opposite… I’m much better off with going by the gut. What I did out there in Steel Canyon? I planned. I had very coolly decided and planned to quarter those bastards as an example to the rest of the Council… My gut wanted me to just beat them bloody.”

“Alright then,” Hawthorne shook his head exasperatedly, “Go with your gut from here on out. Your brain’s too demented.”

“Yeah… My gut’s the only thing that saved me from a Section Eight!”

With that, Grey bounded out the door to meet his family outside. Judge Hawthorne watched him go and shook his head. He knew he should worry about letting what had to be a dangerous individual loose on the city, but there was something odd about him… Something stable that didn’t make sense in such an unstable man. It was like he knew his actions were the stuff of madness and chaos, but this element within him helped guide them toward protecting order and sanity.

It was difficult for the judge, but he couldn't help but feel he'd done the right thing. Despite the verdict, he still punished the former hero for the murders of the unmourned men and Grey found the ruling to be fair (despite losing his license over the ordeal). It could have been a fiasco, but with some careful moderation, Hawthorne felt he was able to avoid disaster. He knew there would still be some social and political fallout, especially once the various media outlets dug their hooks into the story, but the overall damage would be minimal. The status of the super-powered vigilantes as protectors of the city's populace would remain undamaged in the end.

He figured things would be fine... At least for a little while longer.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

The clouds over Grandville thundered ominously, but Daniel Taylor paid them no mind. He had business to attend to in the Tower, business that would keep him warm and dry while the Atlantic storm raged outside. Arbiter Rein greeted him at the door with a handshake and they exchanged small talk.

Rein hadn’t seen Taylor since he’d been cast out from the Arbiter Corps. Taylor was quick to remind him that, yes, he had, and that the “lowly Soldier of Arachnos” had actually come to see him while in search of a suitable patron. In fact, it was Rein’s advice that got him working for Scirocco, largely due to the fact that the Arbiter remembered his old friend having a penchant for the “right and honorable” (though Taylor’s experience under the sorcerer was hardly as adventurous as other “Destined Ones;” the most he’d done thus far was quelling a minor Mu Mystic uprising, but it didn’t have the chance to reform and summon Hequat by the time he cut them down).

It had been a grueling year. He’d fought his way from being an outcast operative to being one of the trusted agents of one of Recluse’s lieutenants. However, he was still largely under the radar in terms of professional recognition. It didn’t help that Daos was blackballing him every chance he got.

“All I want is to get back into the Corps,” he explained to Rein as he plugged the buttons that activated the door next to his friend, “I don’t get why Daos is making it so difficult. I mean, sure, I had a couple hiccups, but who doesn’t in careers such as ours? Look at Sands, for God’s sake!”

“Sands has leverage, though,” Rein reminded him, “I mean, Hell, we don’t even know the guy’s name! I know you and him were pals, and don’t get me wrong, I think he’s a great guy, but he’s got a loose-cannon way about him that gets Daos all butt-hurt. He’s tormenting you essentially to punish Sands… And it’s working. I haven’t heard of anything the guy has done lately as far as crazy schemes go…”

“He got me involved in something that fizzled out,” Taylor grumbled as he remembered a botched assault on the Pentagon itself, “I never should have agreed to do it, but… It would’ve meant so much if we were successful…”

Rein nodded. He’d heard about Ghost Widow’s crazy plan and the political near-paralysis it had caused through the sheer audacity of it. The assault on the Pentagon had failed, the U.S. government was hording toys that would make the Malta Group weep with envy, but it had also poked holes into what the U.S. government had thought was an insurmountable defense.

“Well, look at it this way, your time as a freelance Soldier has revealed the dark secrets of this island city state’s various denizens to you. Now, you’ve done enough work and gained enough leverage to be able to hold it against anybody who’d want to do harm to your professional career at this point… Probably if they wanted to do real harm to ya, as well.”

“That’s a pretty good way of looking at the situation,” Taylor agreed, “I mean, I joined Arachnos out of high school. I rose through the ranks knowing almost nothing outside of my Port Oakes neighborhood… Now I know almost every nook and cranny of this place!”

Rein nodded as the door opened to admit the operative. With a wave, he let his friend go and bid a silent well-wishing that he’d regain his prominence as an Arbiter. In Rein’s opinion, they needed more go-getters like Daniel in the Corps. They needed Arbiters who were willing to go out and work the will of Arachnos, not just stand around and look menacing.

Inside, Taylor removed his helmet and breathed in the specially conditioned air. Always kept at a comfortable seventy-two degrees, not too hot or cold, the air was somewhat sterile in that fact that it was repeatedly filtered and processed before being pumped into facilities. This was officially done to protect the people working inside from chemical attacks, but the operative was more than certain that it was done for the comfort factor.

It was odd thinking that Recluse would want his fortress to be comfortable. Considering the intimidating nature of the premier meta human, most would assume that he would have electrified the walls, floors, chairs and medical Reclaimators just for kicks.

“Hiya, Danny,” one of the few people he could call a friend from his tumultuous adventures of “troubleshooting,” the enigmatic Bane Spider Executioner known as Exterminator Null, greeted him just inside the door and handed him a cup of what smelled like coffee, “All set for another day of pencil-pushing?”

Taylor took the cup and grumbled something about filing that needed to be done. For as amazing as his struggle to be able to operate in Grandville again had been, his actual work in the fortified city had become mind-numbingly dull. It was strange that some of the most proficient killers and assassins the world had seen often found themselves filing reports or welding portions of “The Web” together. He didn’t envy the guys who had to do plumbing in Bane Spider armor.

“Just a few hundred more pages to go and I’ll be able to get back to proper work for a man of my skills,” he finally said legibly, “I can’t wait to have Daos off my back…”

He gave a curt nod to the bald man with the golden leggings and shoulder pads. Daos and his assistants glared back at him, but turned away as Null turned his helmet visor in their direction. Nobody messed with the Exterminators. Nobody.

As they reached his desk in an office complex three floors up, they found Arbiter Sands waiting for him.

“Seems I’m Mister Popular today,” the operative grunted as he circumvented his friend and took his chair, “What can I do for you today?”

“Woah! Woah! Woah!” the eccentric Arbiter held his hands up in exaggerated mock defense and backed away from Taylor, “Can’t a guy just drop by to chat with his buddy over a cup of coffee?”

“Well, his good buddy is already here,” Null countered quite suddenly, “And we’ve already got our coffee.”

“Was I talking to you? Nevermind, shut up!” Sands held his hand up to Null’s faceplate and reached for a cup sitting on Daniel’s desk, “That’s mine… Now we’re all cozy.”

“You and I clearly have differing definitions of the word,” the Exterminator growled before extending a drinking tube from his helmet and slurping up some of the coffee in his cup.

With the unknown variable sufficiently distracted, Sands turned to his old friend. For as odd as the Arbiter was, Taylor supremely confounded him. Sands and his cadre of friends were known for pulling one over on anybody that worked with or for them, often in a convoluted gambit intended to reap great rewards for everybody involved. However, Taylor wasn’t conniving. Instead, he was one of the few people who was genuinely trying to make the best out of a bad situation. Oddly enough, he almost always succeeded at it.

This didn’t mean Taylor was above certain vices, like petty vengeance. However, Sands knew the guy was trying to find a way to safely extract the Kheldian from the female heroine he’d been studying. He knew his friend would have encouraged the woman’s daughter to join the Fortunata program once she’d seen all that Arachnos had to offer. Still, the things he did and said in anger often made him out to be more of a jerk than he really was.

“Look, Danny, I know that was a bit of a bum ticket I sent you on. At least the people you were with turned out to be capable in their respective fields…”

“They were lunatics, Sands,” Taylor logged into the terminal and brought up where he’d left off the day prior, “The same kinds of monsters Arachnos never should have brought in these Isles… We should be rising above the violent nature and base desires that drive the multitudes of humanity, but now we’re being forced to not only employ individuals that embody vice, we’re ordered to encourage them! And look what happens to them, too, when they fall out of favor with Recluse by not living up to the standards of Destiny, or they stray from the path the Fortunatas want them to take… They wind up wallowing in some crap-sack, gutted-out hotel only to be fed to the wolves at a moment’s notice. How long until they do that to me? How long until they do that to you!?”

“Shh!” they heard in the next partition, “You don’t want them hearing you talk like that!”

“Considering how many times they’ve almost killed me already, I could care less.”

Null chuckled. He figured it would be best to let Taylor think that the few times he knew about plots to kill him were the only ones that had happened so far. Fortunately, there wasn’t anybody left alive to facilitate the operations he didn’t know about. He and the peculiar Night Widow, Shadeheart, were very thorough when it came to protecting the troubled Arachnos agent.

“Well, be that as it may,” Arbiter Sands said between sips of coffee, “You’ve got potential, and I hate to see it go to waste. So… I’ve got something on the docket that may finally help you get back in the good graces of Daos…”

Taylor stopped typing and stared at the screen. Sands lied. A lot. However, he was never dishonest. It was strange, but the Arbiter genuinely strove for success… The problem was that he let the Devil have his way with the details, so situations were hardly ever as simple as he presented them.

“Do I have to beat Statesman with a butter knife?”

“No!” Sands laughed much more than he had to, and Taylor wondered briefly if he had actually guessed the task correctly, “But it does involve a rampaging meta. See… We all know how Ghost Widow likes to take in stray large brutes and turn them into her unholy army of the damned, right?”

“Yes,” the other two replied at the same time (actually, it was three voices in unison, the eavesdropper spoke before he knew what he was doing).

“Well, one of them isn’t so appreciative and needs to be put down.”

Sands withdrew a datapad from his belt and set it on Taylor’s desk. There was a picture of what looked to be a man in a horned medieval great helm and a dossier that classified the individual as “The Sanguimancer.”

“Seems he’s lost his mind to whatever gave him his power. He’s slaughtered an entire base and is currently ripping and shredding it into his own personal lair. Frankly, Recluse would normally use it to shred unwitting heroes who stumble into the G-ville. However, with a few whispered promises and a little bribery… He gave the assignment over to me.”

Taylor and Null turned to the datapad. They didn’t want to hear what Sands had used to bribe the Rogue Isles monarch. Unfortunately…

“Who knew he’d get tunnel vision and sign anything after a bottle of scotch and some surveillance footage of Ms. Liberty…”

“I think he probably just wanted the foot-“ Null started but Taylor stopped him with a horrified shake of his head.

Sands' smile, however, was reminiscent of a kid in a candy store and he'd just found a pile of sweet, sweet taffy.

“In the shower, Null," he was almost giggling, "You didn’t let me finish. She’s in the shower in the videos.”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

“You don’t really think Arbiter Sh-Sands really has that video he described, do you?” Exterminator Null asked as he sighted in the building through a powerful scope.

“What was that?” Taylor asked back as he stalked through the building’s body-strewn corridors, “You know, I kind of wish you were here with me…”

“Not my mission,” the enigmatic Arachnos soldier chuckled through the transmission, “Besides, from what I’ve read about this freak, it’s well within your capabilities. And I was asking if he really had footage of Ms. Liberty in her shower.”

“While I wouldn’t put it past him to try, I doubt he’d actually be capable of that,” Daniel reached a corner and gave a quick peek around it, “He tries to keep himself as safe as possible, but he wouldn’t be able to keep it quiet if he really did have such an item. There are too many people who want to defame Ms. Liberty, and they’d come gunning for him if they ever thought he seriously had something like that… And that’s just the people who don’t have some form of… Amorous obsession… For her…”

Null simply chuckled.

“Then there are the heroes, those who feel it’s their duty to protect her good name would seek him out on just the rumor… Then there are the capes with the aforementioned amorous obsession…”

Taylor shook his head with worry. The bodies strewn about the office building halls and rooms were dismembered, disemboweled or otherwise mutliated. Sometimes, it looked like a set of massive pincers had done the job, but the reality was that it had been two swords, one curved back, almost in a “C,” the other curved forward, like a Kukri. However, the weapons were extremely old, and possibly interdimensional. They came from the time of the first war between Oranbega and the flying city of the Mu. They, along with the armor, made the rampaging monster known as the Sanguimancer.

The name was a misnomer. Usually, anything with the suffix “-mancer” was thought to be some form of frail, wizard-like practitioner of a very narrow (yet often quite powerful) branch of magic. The Sanguimancer, however, was a large, powerful brute that basically bathed and washed its weapons and armor in the blood of its victims. It didn’t matter from whom, but the armor and weapons demanded a near-constant supply of blood. The power they fed the wearer of the armor apparently was enough to corrupt his mind, and he became a nearly uncontrollable berserker.

Recently, a group of Sky Raiders found the lost tomb of the legendary warrior. The walls were scrawled with writing that depicted him first as an agent of Oranbega, then the Mu as their offer proved more desirable. Considering the armor and weapons’ thirsts, it could only be inferred that the reward was a massive body count. At first, the two opposing forces made increasing bids on the warrior, but the Oranbegans eventually realized they were a step away from damning themselves (as this apparently happened before their leadership went ahead and did it anyway), and decided to wage a small war against the man.

Many wizards died in the battle. Ice, fire, lightning, the elements were resisted by the monster... At first. In the end, a charred corpse was pulled from the pristine armor. The surviving wizards used their magic to build a temple in a region that would eventually become part of the nation now known as the Republic of the Congo. The Sky Raiders located it and one of their captains became the modern-day Sanguimancer, one who was ruled by the artifacts, rather than the ruler of them. There was some theory that maybe the original warrior's soul was inside the armor or weapons, but nobody could be certain as he wasn't much for conversation. He wasn’t as powerful as the prior bearer of the armor, but that would change in time.

Ghost Widow thought she could control him. For a while, she was right. Similar to the Wretch, he was a mindless thug she could aim and launch at the enemies of Arachnos. He was used to smash a number of Longbow patrols and bases, just as a message to the organization. However, as he failed to actually slay anybody (according to the file, he had expressed frustration about the whole “MedCom” problem numerous times), his attempts to empower himself were either inconsequential (barely sustaining the rampant bloodlust of the artifacts) or too slow. Apparently, the frustration had come to a head when he was assigned to provide an ambush against some bothersome rogue Arachnos was trying to get rid of. Though she doesn’t know how, Ghost Widow found that her connection to him was severed and witnesses reported hearing gunfire in one of the buildings near the Crey complex in the Nerva Archipelago at about the same time she reported sensing the break.

Now, Operative Daniel Taylor, former Arbiter and current semi-freelance Soldier of Arachnos, had the assignment to bring the monster down. Seeing the broken bodies of average Arachnos soldiers strewn about the halls of the largely unconverted apartment complex, he shook his head miserably.

“I was asking what you were saying before, though,” he muttered quietly through the communicator, “You almost called Sands something else.”

“Oh,” Null shrugged and swept the scope across the building, “I almost called him by his first name. Well, what we think his first name is.”

“Jeez, man. Not even Rein or Apolis know his first name, and they’re probably as good friends as he’ll ever get.”

“You sure? They could just be lying to you…”

“Well, Apolis never really says much, and Rein almost never stops talking… But even when they have spoken about Sands, very little of the guy’s life is known from before his time in the Arbiter Corps. One would think that something would slip out if either of them knew… ‘Tell your secrets to one, but beware of two…’ and all that.”

“What was that?”

“Ah, an old phrase I picked up when I was with the Arbiters. It goes, ‘Tell your secrets to one, but beware of two. All know what is known to three.’”

“Makes sense,” Null said in an amused tone.

He started adjusting his scope and glared through it again. Growling, he keyed the communicator again.

“I don’t know what’s going on, but I think the Sanguimancer is on the next floor up. There’s some weird distortion on the magnetic resonance… Thermal’s all hot up there… Think maybe he started a fire?”

“Not really,” Taylor hit the elevator button and waited for the doors to open, “Frankly, I doubt he’d be smart enough to disable the alarms before-!”

Daniel stopped as a blade stabbed through the door seam and the point stopped a few inches from his face. A bell sounded and the doors parted. The Sanguimancer pushed them open the rest of the way and glared down at the black-and-white armored operative. They made quite a contrast, one of average height and build, the other a massive, medieval armored bulk that was adorned with brown-red designs and spikes.

“Nevermind, Null, he’s right here…”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

A red, back-curved crescent blade that smelled of death and decay arced through the air and crashed against the tempered steel of Taylor’s Nullifier Mace. The second blade, a similarly colored, slightly less-curved weapon that was also bent forward instead of back, swung up from below, narrowly missing the operative as he pulled his head back in the nick of time.

Daniel drew his assault rifle with his left hand and, bracing it against his hip, he fired a volley into the belly of the armored brute. Bullets spanged off the enchanted steel, and the Sanguimancer merely laughed, but he didn’t notice the spiked mace swinging through the air to smack against his head.

Unfortunately, Taylor’s balance was off, so he only landed a solid blow against the monster’s shoulder. The Sanguimancer sidestepped after the blow and was able to avoid a follow-up strike, but was unable to reach the now-fleeing operative.

Roaring, he chased after the smaller man. All he knew was rage, and he had to feed his blades and armor with blood. Ghost Widow had tried to use his need for violence, as the brute was a surprisingly effective weapon, but his inability to distinguish friend or ally from foe had grown worse and worse as the months wore on. It was barely a year since she’d acquired him, and now he was a complete and utter detriment to Arachnos.

Hopping over the broken bodies of his erstwhile companions, Taylor once again had to consider just how messed up the overall plan of Arachnos had to be. Hiring freelance criminals was one thing, but to employ strange and unstable things like this was a threat to the goals of the organization, regardless of what the final outcome would originally be.

“Have I told you I’m considering retirement, Null?” he gasped as he tore down the hall.

“After all you’ve accomplished?” the Exterminator replied, “When you’re done with that thing, you might want to check upstairs… I can see you fighting him clearly, but I still can’t see up on that top floor.”

Taylor wasn’t paying much attention anymore, though, as he’d reached a balcony and did the first thing that came to mind. Bracing the head of his mace against the floor at the base of the rail, he threw himself over the top and landed his feet just on the other side. Leveling his assault rifle on the Sanguimancer, he lobbed a pair of grenades at him and pulled up his mace, causing him to drop to one of the decorative trees below. The big armored man chasing him roared as the rounds connected and detonated, the first unleashing the corrosive venom that degraded the integrity of a target’s armor, the second a classic fiery blast that singed the man inside the armor.

When Taylor looked up from the branches he’d landed in, he saw his target glaring down at him, red eyes glowing fiercely as smoke wafted from the creases and articulations of his armor. It was a surprisingly mobile suit, allowing for an incredible amount of agility, but Taylor knew that the more complex the armor, the more weak points it had to have and the easier it was to get at the man inside.

Still, that wasn’t accounting for magic supplementing those weak points, but from what he’d seen so far, that didn’t seem to be the case. He should be able to fight this logically.

With that in mind, he leveled his Nullifier Mace at the roaring brute and fired off an energy grenade that blasted the monster back. The Sanguimancer stumbled back to the rail and pulled itself over the side. When he hit the ground, the pain he suffered only further fueled the rage burning through his head. He would have his revenge on this puny man who thought he could stop him from drowning these islands in an ocean of blood.

He stood and chopped his back-curved blade through the tree. The operative had to be in there somewhere, but the smaller man was gone. Slightly confused, but no less enraged, the Sanguimancer started randomly hacking and slashing into the walls. However, when he went to take a breather, he felt a heavy weight smash against the back of his head.

“Cloaking device,” Taylor hissed as he materialized.

The Sanguimancer swung with a backhanded left that brought the back-curved crescent blade arcing for Taylor’s head. The operative backed away, barely getting clipped on the front of his helmet and he stumbled back into the wall. As the Sanguimancer advanced, he leveled the mace on the big man and fired a volley of energy that slammed into the brute and toppled him over.

Before the Sanguimancer could push himself back up, he felt something press against the side of his helmet. Turning, he saw the red gem of the Nullifier Mace and a bright dark-hued, multicolored flash slammed into his eyes. As the big man lied on the floor, Taylor walked away, muttering.

“Thanks for giving me a clear shot to your face…”

There was a roar, and he looked back to see the armored brute vaulting back to his feet and charging after him. Daniel ducked and rolled out of the way, barely avoiding getting trampled by the spike-armored boots, and the Sanguimancer slammed through the wall. Confused as to how the big man could still be able to fight, the operative tried to activate his cloaking field. As his form wavered in-and-out of focus, the big man slammed through another wall and crashed into him, throwing him through the previous hole.

Stumbling and confused, Taylor looked up to see the crescent blade coming down for his head. He twirled away and leaned heavily against the corridor wall. He could see his mace a little further down the hall, but the Sanguimancer didn’t seem too likely to let him retrieve it. The forward-curved blade came racing at him and Taylor dropped to the floor. Kicking the brute’s knee with his shin guard, the big man dropped as well and Taylor followed up with another kick to his face.

This was his chance! He had to get to the fallen weapon. He could have just stumbled back into the other room and retrieved his assault rifle, but it lacked the power to take down truly super-powered threats, it simply helped him weather the minions of the various organizations he found himself pitted against and provide small advantages against his stronger foes, but to really stand a chance, he needed the mace.

Pushing himself to his feet, he staggered down the hall. The Sanguimancer pushed himself up shortly afterward and threw one of his blades at the fleeing operative. Taylor cried out as the crescent blade carved his thigh and he dropped to the floor. The blade returned to the chuckling monster as he stood back up and started plodding toward the fallen man.

“I almost think I enjoy this more,” the big man’s voice sounded deep and gravelly, “Cutting down you whelps who think they can stand up to me. I can’t wait to see how well I fare against even the likes of Lord Recluse and Statesman… Once I’ve buried their cities under mountains of dead…”

“It’s always the same,” Taylor gasped as he crawled away, “Everybody always thinks they can take on the big dogs… Some [motorscooter]’s always thinking he can ice skate uphill…”

“I don’t know why you’re still trying,” the Sanguimancer jabbed his forward-curved blade into Taylor’s leg, poking through the calf muscle and pinning him to the floor, “You’re doomed. Your whole planet is doomed, and I’m going to slaughter everybody, one-by-one. I started with your friends in that pathetic squad the ghost woman assigned to watch me. Now I’m going to continue with you and that strange thing I heard you talking to.”

Fighting through the dazzling pain lancing through his leg, Taylor popped open the panel on his wrist guard and hit a button. A red light started blinking and he grunted as another blade found its way through his armor and into his shoulder blade.

“And just what was that supposed to do, Operative?”

Turning his head as far as he could, Daniel pulled back his right arm and balled his hand into a fist. To answer the Sanguimancer, he extended his middle finger and slumped to the floor in exhaustion.

A heavy weight slammed into him afterward and was rapidly removed. He felt the blades slide free of him and he writhed painfully for a few seconds before looking up to see that the Disruptors he’d called in were busy hammering the brute down with electrical blasts. Surprised, exhausted and injured, the Sanguimancer dropped to one knee before Taylor reached his Nullifier Mace, leveled it, and blasted a glowing scorch mark into the bigger man’s back.

The Sanquimancer slumped to the floor again, gurgling, and one of the Disruptors jabbed into the visor with one of its legs to be sure he was dead. Taylor started applying doses of Regenerator to his wounds and radioed Exterminator Null.

“I think he’s down… He got back up a while back, knocked me around… I had to call in Disruptors…”

“I saw,” came the reply, along with a strange thudding sound; strangely, it didn’t sound like he was outside anymore, either, “Hang on, I’m almost there.”

A moment later, there was a small gust of air as Null appeared in the hallway next to Taylor. He looked about cautiously, but the scene was clear. Without a word, he approached the prone form of the Sanguimancer, removed the helmet, and crushed the head with the elaborately decorated Nullifier Mace many Arachnos agents had come to call the “Executioner’s Mace.”

There was no red energy burst to signify that the Sanguimancer was teleporting to a nearby Arachnos medical facility. His insurance was revoked. He was dead.

“Ghost Widow and Scirocco are definitely going to want that armor,” Taylor muttered, “I hope we can convince Sands to find a way to avoid making the delivery.”

“Somehow, I don’t think that will be difficult,” the Exterminator replied, a small hint of disgust tingeing his voice as he approached Taylor and looked him over, “You going to be okay?”

“Yeah…” Operative Taylor muttered, “I think I’ll be alright…”

----------

“No problem, man.”

Sands was almost laughing as his troops wrapped the armor up in some strange polymer sheet and tossed it into reinforced crates. Apparently, he really didn’t have any intention of turning the suit and weapons over to Ghost Widow. However, the promised rewards were somewhat lacking.

“Now’s the part where you tell me that I can’t get into the Corps yet,” Taylor growled as Sands opened his mouth, then as he shut it, “Damn it, man… Why am I even helping you?”

“Because you like torturing yourself?”

The Operative and the Exterminator leveled cool gazes at the Arbiter and Sands nodded.

“Look, man, I tried talking to Daos, but the guy is definitely blackballing you on this. If you want back into the Arbiters, you’re going to have to do something for yourself.”

“I have settled all sorts of issues! I risked my life on a God damn suicide mission! This was trivial compared to that, and this… THIS was what you told me would get me back in, and you lied to me!”

“I never explicitly said-…”

“You implied it, and you know it! You’re playing me, Sands, and I’m sick of it!”

Daniel removed his helmet so his old friend could see his face clearly. While the Operative certainly seemed angry, he didn’t look like he’d lost his faculties. He seemed calm and collected, as if he knew exactly what he was saying.

“I’m not doing anything for you anym-!”

“Sir!” another operative shouted, from above, “You’ve got to come see this!”

----------

The top floor of the building was a charnel house. Entrails and gore were splattered on the walls, floors and ceilings. There were bodies from all the various factions that operated throughout the Isles, from the Coralax and small gangs like the Skulls, to the military organizations like the Council, Malta Group and even Longbow. It seemed like the Sanguimancer had amassed quite the collection of grisly trophies, turning his abode into a literal nightmare.

“What’s that sound?” Sands asked as he wandered the chambers.

“It’s what you need to see, sir,” the operative seemed exceptionally disturbed, “It’s just at the end of the hallway here…”

They continued on while the two companions stopped to look about in bewilderment. The Exterminator’s head was flitting about in rapid agitation. He seemed to be taking the whole spectacle in as quickly as he could, and his friend thought he might be enjoying it at first.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Null murmured as he looked closer at the wall, “Daniel… It’s all still red…”

“I can see that,” Taylor replied, somewhat relieved that his friend wasn’t entirely a bloodthirsty assassin, as he nudged a Longbow soldier’s leg with his boot, “Still soft. Kind of hard to amass a collection like this in a couple days.”

“This wasn’t a couple days’ worth of bodies. Not even for something as deranged as that guy.”

“Weeks? Then, shouldn’t this place smell a whole lot worse?”

“Oh my God!” they heard from ahead and rushed to join Arbiter Sands. They found him standing, horror-struck, in the middle of a large chamber. All along the walls, ceiling and floors were a series of what looked to be vines, but they were too fine and delicate at times. Some brown and tan patches provided a method to cross the blood vessels without damaging them, but the surface was peculiarly soft and spongy. In the center of the chamber was a bizarre sack that pulsed and throbbed…

“Oh my God,” Taylor gasped, “It’s… It’s their HEARTS!”

The entire chamber, the entire top floor of the building, was alive. Every corpse, every critter the Sanguimancer had collected, he’d intertwined. He made them live off each other, constantly in pain, constantly feeding the monster who’d done this to them a never-ending supply of blood. It was hideous, it was aberrant.

“I don’t even think Mako would do something like this,” Arbiter Sands whispered, his eyes locked on the sack of hearts, “Just… How!?”

“Perhaps he could manipulate flesh like that,” Taylor suggested, “I mean, all the research we have on the Sanguimancer just has him as a powerful warrior, little more than a berserker… But you really think that’s all that would frighten the Oranbegans or the Mu?”

“But this is beyond the scope of Vahzilok! This is completely insane!”

Taylor smirked.

“This is what Recluse wanted. Now the monsters are in our back yard, turning our playgrounds into warzones, our homes into dungeons.”

“That’s exactly why you can’t come back, Danny,” Sands replied, “You’re not a believer anymore.”

“And you are?”

Sands didn’t reply. Instead, he waved for the exit.

“Everybody out. Get out, now!”

“Sir,” the operative who’d brought them to the top floor protested, “We have to catalogue this! This needs to be reported!”

To answer that, Sands spun around and unloaded his assault rifle into the sack of hearts. Here was a horrible keening sound as the people interconnected throughout the chambers died, but when it was over, the operatives knew that they’d done some good.

“We didn’t find anything here,” Sands muttered, “Just to be sure… Burn it.”

“Yes sir,” the operative gave a quick salute and rushed downstairs to get other operatives to help.

The other three stood silently in the Heart Chamber, staring at the gory mess that surrounded them, but the Operative and the Exterminator were looking more at the Arbiter. This had been a good example of a situation growing out of control, but what was worse was that this was merely one among thousands.

“How many actually apply to Operation Destiny?” Taylor asked, “How many just turn their backs on us and go about turning the world into this? We’ve opened up the loony bin, and the scum of the Earth are tearing apart our doorstep!”

“And I take care of it!” Sands shouted, rounding on Taylor angrily and punching him in the face, “You want to know where my loyalties lie!? I’m with Arachnos! Why? Because they’ll win! How do I know that!? Look around you! This is the sort of thing Arachnos uses! There is no such thing as ‘too far’ for us! We will pay any price, make any sacrifice! And when things get out of control, I will take care of it!”

“But you didn’t take care of it!” Daniel came rushing back, shoving his old friend against the sack, “You see this!? This is all you did! One magazine of bullets! I killed the guard! I killed the maker! You, and the rest of the Corps, you don’t get it anymore! When we have to call someone else to do the job, we’ve already failed! Everything Lord Recluse wanted, we should have been the ones to do it! It should have been us! We should have been the Destined Ones! But you don’t do anything for yourselves anymore!”

“You don’t know what’s going on!”

Sands shoved his friend back and stepped away from the hearts. Some were still beating, but they couldn’t support the mass. They’d be consumed in fire soon enough, anyway.

“I know what the future of the Destined One is,” Taylor said coldly, “He dies, or she dies, the operative word is ‘dies.’ We all die. Recluse picks up the pieces, if there are any, and rules an empty, broken world. That’s why I don’t have faith in Arachnos anymore. It’s why I wanted back into the Arbiters. I wanted to make a difference. I wanted to change the situation.”

“You can’t do that,” his old friend sighed, “You wouldn’t be the first to try.”

“And I’m not going to.”

Daniel turned and started walking away.

“I’m done with this.”

“They’ll come after you,” Sands called after him, “And they’ll send your friends to do it!”

Null didn’t say anything as he watched his friend leave. Sands continued as if he hadn’t made an implication as he followed Taylor to the elevator chamber. As the doors to one of the cars opened, he shouted.

“That Night Widow with the cute butt? She’ll be the one to stab you in the heart!”

“I’ll die, then,” was all Taylor said before stepping into the elevator and pressing a button, “Goodbye, Jeffrey.”

Sands’ eyes went wide as the doors closed. He pounded against them angrily, but there was nothing more to do.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

--Port Oakes--

Daniel was surprised when he heard a knock at the door instead of a crash from one of the windows. Considering the fact he’d installed various defensive turrets in any room in his apartment that has windows, he should’ve been more surprised he didn’t hear something smash through the front door or simply lob some kind of nuke into the place.

He hadn’t been to work in two weeks. He’d already received the call from his supervisor, Senior Operative Vargo, about how a notice had come in explaining that Taylor was barred from Grandville’s facilities anyway. To his credit, Vargo sounded confused that one of his best and most dedicated operatives had been blacklisted, and he even explained that he had a team looking into how they could help him.

Taylor knew they couldn’t help him, though.

“Hello?” he heard Null’s voice after a familiar clicking and unlatching sound, “Dan? You in here?”

“May as well get this over with,” the rogue operative sighed, “I’m in the living room, Null.”

“Get this over with?” the Exterminator asked as he walked into the central room, “You sound depressed. What kind of attitude is that to have?”

“You’ve been sent to kill me, haven’t you?” was the reply, and Daniel didn’t even make a motion for the assault rifle and Nullifier Mace resting on the coffee table, “If it were anybody else, I’d be trying to fight. Well, maybe not if it were… Nevermind. Night Widows are trained not to let their emotions get in the way…”

Null merely chuckled.

“Well, before you do it, I guess I should just tell you that I know you’re not human. At first, I thought the whole dragon face thing was an elaborate disguise to help blend in with the crazies… Then… Then I realized nobody would dedicate themselves to that kind of trouble for so long…”

“It was a bit naïve of you,” the armored extraterrestrial said amusedly, “Though, you should know that I’m not here to kill you. I just wanted to see how you were doing.”

“Really?” Daniel pulled his face out of his hands and stared incredulously up at his friend, “But… Why? Won’t this blow your cover?”

“I don’t see why it would. I was in Arachnos before I met you and I’ll be in it a while longer, regardless of who I have to kill to continue doing my thing.”

“So… Why would you let me live? Wouldn’t it be easier to kill me off?”

“Probably. What would be the fun in that, though? Leaving you alive means I have to deal with squads that are sent to kill ya and we can go on adventures together. Now that’s fun!”

“But it’s over, Null… I’ve had to fight nearly ten different squads of Bane Spiders since I stopped the Sanguimancer. The creepiest one was the group that talked as one and said ‘You’re not like us! You must die!’”

“Well, you should rest easy knowing that none of the contracts have come across my desk… And the ones I’ve intercepted don’t seem to have Sands’ name on them.”

“Well, that’s good to know,” Daniel sighed.

“Is that really his name? Jeffrey?”

“Maybe. Working as a clerk, I ran across a lot of old paperwork that needed resorting. One of the documents was the application of one Jeffrey Sheldon Sands, about a year before I applied to join Arachnos. There were some more documents decorating the eventual Arbiter Sands, and one that was a promotion notice to Huntsman that had Marshal Brass’ note on it saying that he ‘needed to keep an eye on this one.’ You see why I feel discontented about all of this?”

The Esxterminator was scratching the top of his helmet.

“I thought you said you and Sands went through Arbiter training together…”

“Yeah. Me, him… Apolis, Rein… A few others, too. I was smart and athletic in high school. The recruiter recommended me for Arbiter training immediately. I guess I also scored high on some loyalty exams. The job is pretty much just making sure nobody riots or actually makes a doomsday device that will break the Isles into even MORE chunks.”

“It is unusual, isn’t it? Arachnos has all these freaks and lunatics, yet none of them ever seem able to get ahead. Heck, the Sanguimancer was on his first steps to surpassing the rest of the Destined Ones, and look what you had to do to him.”

Null walked across the room to peer through a door and through the window beyond. His motion sensors were showing him how that peculiar woman was dispatching the latest free-agent assassin that had been hired by Daos to kill the young former Arbiter. It was starting to get weird, as if Arbiter Daos didn’t even know why he wanted Taylor dead. It would explain why the goons he hired were becoming less and less capable.

“So, why do you think Sands just goes by Sands?” he asked as he nodded in approval to Shadeheart’s antics, “It’s not like ‘Jeffrey,’ if that is his real name, is such a terrible name. If it bothers him, he could go by ‘Sheldon,’ right?”

“I guess,” Daniel shrugged, “I mean, what’s wrong with the name Sheldon?”

----------

--Kings Row: Grey’s Army Base--

“I hate my name sometimes,” Sheldon Wallace muttered as he appeared from the blue energy field that served as the remote entrance to the Grey’s Army base, “I just got back from a seminar in Steel Canyon. The class was disappointed I wasn’t a tall, lanky, neurotic and anal nitpicker like out of that show…”

In the lounge, Kipland’s cackle was not encouraging. His girlfriend, the orange-skinned Cathryn “Fire-Shield” Dobson, gave him a reproachful look, but continued snuggling against him on the couch.

“Sorry, man,” Kip finally said, “It’s just, now I won’t be able to watch that show and not think of you.”

“Then the answer is simple,” the inventor’s eyes narrowed behind his dark sunglasses, “stop watching the show.”

“Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.”

“Guys!” Cedric shouted as he ran into the lounge, “Have any of you been hitting the fridge!?”

“For this beer,” Kip shook the empty can at his friend, “And Cath’s peach, here. Why?”

“Where’d the steak go!?”

“What steak?” Kip’s head turned from the televisions on the wall and he glared at Cedric, “There was steak?”

“Maybe one of the other heroes Randy hired ate it,” Sheldon offered, “That Spearhead Lambda certainly looks the carnivorous type.”

“Nah, man,” Cedric seemed panicked, “He put it in the fridge like this morning!”

There was a strange murmuring sound in the next room. When they looked to the mystical portal chamber to the south, they saw one of the mutant rodents wandering in. It was a particularly large specimen, probably based on a sewer rat and about the size of a Shi-Tzu; it had a bit of steak hanging from its mouth. It plodded in heavily and looked up at the humans in the chamber.

“Oh no,” Sheldon moaned, “Barry…”

“Mrah!” the animal replied.

“He’s not smart enough to talk, but he grilled that sucker up,” Cedric growled, then added after sniffing, “He spiced it, too!”

“Spiced what?” they heard the gravelly tone of Randall Grey’s voice from the entrance chamber, “Hey, what smells so good?”

Barry the gudar chewed the last bit of steak and swallowed. As the humans looked at him, he started panting happily like an oblivious puppy.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

The room was silent. Kip almost dropped his bottle of beer into his lap while Cedric struggled to breathe. Sheldon and Cathryn merely looked worriedly from the miniature bear to the towering mountain of a man who was glowering down at him.

“Dad,” Cedric finally said, “Don’t punt him across the base…”

Randall leaned down and got his craggy face close to Barry. The pudgy animal seemed oblivious to whatever danger it was in as it licked the tanker’s nose happily.

“You like that steak?”

“Mrah!”

“You want more?”

“Mrah! Mrah!”

“Well,” Randy reached over and cupped his massive hands around the gudar in order to lift him up, “You gotta earn it! I can’t be having you little [turds] eating all the food in this place and pay for it with just a little tidying up! You got a good nose?”

Barry nodded vigorously and happily. While the humans thought Randy was being intimidating, the little bear could smell that Randy was more amused than anything. Besides, that piece of meat he’d eaten was about to go past its prime, anyway. The little critter thought it would be best if somebody ate it the way it was meant to be tasted.

“Smell this,” Randall waved a red rag under Barry’s nose, “I found it in the laundry room of my building a few minutes ago.”

“What is that?” Cedric asked.

“It’s a piece of cloth from a Circle robe,” his father replied, “Aren’t you about to be late for your appointment?”

“Nah, I got plenty of time. I just came by here to grab my canteen when I saw your steak was missing… I thought you were gonna flip out…”

“Life’s too short to sweat stuff like that. Besides, I kept forgetting it was there. I’d come in to get it, see some work I had to do, then it would slip my mind. I guess it was about ready to spoil, right boy?”

“Snffl-Mrah!” the little animal replied as the big man cradled him under his arm.

“Okay, boys, miss, I’m headed back out. I’ll see you later.”

“Bye dad!” Cedric called as he headed into the portal chamber next door, “Later, guys. I’m off to Steel Canyon to work on the road!”

“Later guys,” Kip hollered, then looked up at Sheldon, “So… You going to say something socially awkward?”

“You’re planning on making out with her and you’re trying to make me leave, aren’t you?” Sheldon asked, manipulating his voice into a high-toned murmur as he did.

“And you wonder why they liken you to that idiot on T.V.,” the scrapper cackled as he turned back to the televisions and hugged Cathryn close again.

“Don’t get used to it, Kip,” Sheldon returned to his usual even monotone, “I’ll be in my lab, making noise.”

“We’ll be in here, making more,” the orange-skinned girl giggled, “Bye-bye, Shel.”

“Stop short of having sex on that couch,” the inventor grumbled on his way out, killing whatever mood they had building up, “We don’t want to have to burn it.”

“Aw, you’re no fun,” Kip mock grumbled at his friend’s retreating back.

----------

--Kings Row--

Randall rapped on the door when Barry was sniffing at the foot of it exclusively. The thin old man who answered was hardly what the big man was expecting, though.

“Hi there,” Grey grunted, “I’m Randy, the building’s superintendent.”

“Hello,” the old man said calmly, favoring the big man with a warm smile, “There’s nothing wrong with my apartment. At least, I haven’t noticed anything.”

“Well, then you mind telling me why my fuzzy little friend here is telling me I can find the own of this at this residence?” Randy tossed the scrap of robe on the floor in front of the old man, “And by the by, this apartment’s not supposed to have anybody in it. Don’t know how you’ve been here all this time, probably some magic mumbo-jumbo, but I know who’s in my building. You ain’t here.”

“Oh…” the old man’s eyes flashed green and he frowned at Barry, who was growling and bristling at him, “What the Hell is this little monster?”

“That’s my privileged information,” the big man pushed one of his thick fingers against the old man’s forehead to get him to look back up at him, “And it ain’t relevant to your current situation anymore. What’re you doin’ here?”

“I was sent to keep an eye on vigilante movement in this area…” the old man’s voice was rasping now as he shut down his illusory enchantments; behind him, his well-furnished apartment warped and wavered before reverting to a dusty abandoned chamber, “Not ones like you, Mister Grey. You’re pretty ‘obvious.’ I was meant to ferret out the ones that like to hide their real identities behind crude masks…”

“Well, now this obviously angry vigilante is going to bore your skull out…”

“With your thumb?”

“What would the fun in that be?” Randy asked with a frightening smile.

The wizard seemed horror-stricken.

“What? I was talking about using my pinky…” and Randy waved his hand in front of the old man’s face, finishing the wave by poking him in the head with the little finger on the end of his hand.

The wizard stumbled back and snarled. A bruise was forming on his forehead and his green eyes were starting to emit green fire. He raised his arms up in a manner that kept them in front of his chest, parallel to each other with the fists just under his chin (called “the Horns of Power”) and lightning started to crackle between his forearms.

Before the two could do battle, though, Barry leaped through the air and tore right through the old man’s form. A large gash was torn out of the wizard’s hip and he fell to the floor. Dust was tumbling from his body as the ethereal energies holding hi m together faded away. He seemed to be keeping his vision locked on the strange little abomination that had ended his false life before everything went black. Barry merely chewed the bit of sweater he’d torn free and stared back defiantly into the inhuman eyes.

“Good job, Barry,” the tanker grunted as he kicked the remains apart, “But next time, I want to take the [jerk] alive. They just come back later, usually gunning for revenge.”

“Mrah?” the gudar didn’t seem to understand, but dropped the scrap of sweater and pressed against Randall’s leg.

The big man chuckled and scratched the tiny bear behind his ears.

“You did good. Let’s get you something to chase down that horrible dusty stuff.”

----------

--Steel Canyon--

Cedric arrived on the scene with a bright smile on his face. The other workers, both normal contracted street builders and a few other community service hires (not all of which were on judiciary sentences like Cedric), looked at him worriedly before the foreman arrived.

“Okay, folks,” the foreman grunted, “Got some new people, so let me introduce myself. I’m Jonas Grand, and I run this crew pretty simply. You do right by me and I’ll do right by you. Now, I’m sure you’ve all heard that we’ve got a former hero in our little group today, so, let’s have a round of applause for Cedric Grey. He’ll be working with us until his court order is up… In about five or six years.”

“I might get time off for good behavior!” Grey chortled.

“Right. Well, our job’s simple. We fill potholes. The truck’s coming around with the fresh asphalt, so everybody grab your vests, helmets and shovels, and we’ll get cracking. We’re working in the Bronze Way today, not far from the precinct there, so be on your best behavior, parolees. I’m sure Cedric can tell you they don’t mess around in that precinct!”

“No they don’t,” Grey was already pulling on a bright vest and hard hat, “But they’re nice people, too.”

As they worked, they talked. Cedric found out that most of the people he was working with were involved in less-serious crimes, like petty theft or vandalism. Of course, the conversation eventually came to Grey. When they found out he was assigned this job despite being acquitted of multiple murders, they were shocked and slightly scared.

“Relax!” Cedric waved off their concerns, “You know how the Council is. Those idiots had it coming.”

“Yeah, but… You murdered them!”

“I killed them, yeah,” he shrugged, “And their organization, their whole organization, is responsible for numerous atrocities throughout the city, including murder, fire bombings, and more than a few kidnappings… Like what happened to my baby sister. I figured it was time they realized that a jail sentence isn’t the only thing they have to fear from us when they cross the line.”

“But you took the law into your own hands,” one of the normal workers, a rather cute red head named Victoria, complained, “Statesman himself said that’s not what you’re supposed to do!”

“Statesman gets to live past eighty and keep his twenty-year-old physique,” Cedric countered, “And nobody has a problem with the sort of violence I mete out when they see it in the movies.”

“Right on, brother,” a young, dark-skinned man, Sean, cheered the former hero on.

Cedric looked askance at Sean. He was another of the parolees on the job. He’d been busted for a street fight involving some Hellions and his brother. It seemed the young man was looking for some kind of justification for his actions.

“Now, I’m not saying I was completely right,” Grey continued as he shoveled some more asphalt into a hole, “I shouldn’t have been slicing and dicing incoherently. I should have been beating the Hell out of them with my own two hands…”

“Incoherently?” Foreman Grand laughed, “How does somebody slice and dice incoherently?”

“Simple,” Cedric held up his shovel to demonstrate, “You swing the axe about… Then you shout out gibberish and snippets of phrases without really getting your point across. It helps if you’re not hitting anything normally vital, like shoulders and thighs. The damage I did, though… Hoo boy…”

“You talk as if you enjoyed it,” Victoria said darkly.

“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. And I wasn’t wrong to attack those jerks… And I wasn’t wrong for killing them… I feel I was wrong taking the whole thing public and trying to make the streets run red. That was too much to ask.”

“Of whom?” the woman continued to be indignant.

“Of everybody. I took my grievance public and started by making an example of those idiots… But nobody remembers the ‘why’ of it, they only remember what I did and focus on it. Oh, it’s so terrible that I killed people who live every day to victimize civilians like you; yet, if you had the same opportunities and the same situation, I bet every one of you would have done the same.

“While I agree with that, Grey,” Grand grunted as he slapped another batch of asphalt into another hole, “I have to also point out that it’s a slippery slope. Revenge can make a person see things in a darker light…”

“The world’s as bright to me today as it was before then…”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Yes it was,” Cedric countered, “I know exactly what you meant and my metaphor is in keeping. The world still has all the same luster as before, and I maintain my same ideals. My ideals just happen to include bloody retribution for those who wrong me and my own.”

“But Christ teaches us forgiveness,” Victoria was starting to look quite shaken by the taller man’s diatribe.

“I won’t get into my feelings on that,” Grey almost growled, “Save this. Teaching and doing are two different things. Life doesn’t work like the Book tells you, and the Book has its own problems in getting its lessons straight. Forgiveness works when you have nobody to turn to except God or the gods, which usually means the situation is well out of your hands. But when there’s a life to save, I would expect you to give your all to save it.”

“It’s easy for you to talk,” the redhead walked over and jabbed her finger into Cedric’s chest, “You had some sort of magic protecting you! Normal people can’t dodge bullets!”

“Hey now!” Grand shouted, “Calm down, you two! Vicky! You want to take a break?”

“No, Jonas, I’m fine…”

“Take a break anyway. I’ll talk to them…”

Victoria leveled a dark glare at Cedric. Oddly, the tall man looked impassively at her and shrugged. When he was displaying anger earlier, it wasn’t at her. Cedric had always disliked religion in its shapes, but not its philosophies. The problem was extricating the two from each other, which most practitioners of faith found to be a wholly abhorrent approach to theology.

“Look, you need to calm down,” the foreman gasped exasperatedly, “Vicky’s a nice girl, but you can’t go insulting her like that…”

“She’s the one attacking me,” Grey replied calmly, “I’m expressing my opinion and my philosophy to defend myself when I don’t even need to. That’s already been done for me. If I really wanted, I could be in court right now, fighting to have this community service repealed. Still… I’m not going to dilute how I look at things to spare her feelings.”

“Well, watch what you’re saying about religion, then,” Jonas warned, “That crap you said about getting the lesson straight can be seen as an attack, and I don’t need that!”

“Right,” Cedric nodded, “Right.”

Jonas glared at Cedric, narrowed his eyes at Sean, then left to talk to Victoria. Sean walked up and clapped the tall man on the shoulder.

“Yeah! You showed that self-righteous-!”

“It was right of you to fight to protect your brother,” Cedric interrupted, “But I don’t need a cheerleader for an argument.”

“Wait… I didn’t even get to tell my story…”

“Sean York, twenty-five. Convicted of ‘Disturbing the Peace.’ First time offense, relegated to community service.”

Cedric turned his communicator off and clipped it back to his belt. Not everything from his sanctioned vigilantism days had been confiscated when they took his license. Right now, M.A.G.I. was back to studying his Praetorian Axe, trying to figure out how the Soul Drinker enchantment worked and how Cedric the Gray had altered it. The other stuff, his outfits, trophies or other gear, had little-to-nothing to do with his heroics, so they let him keep it.

“I know you feel like you’ve still got something to prove, man,” he explained, “But trust me. You’ve done enough. Let other people fight their own battles now.”

“What about you? What have you got to prove?”

“I’m not proving anything anymore,” Grey chuckled as he went back to pounding asphalt into potholes, “I’m getting this job done and moving on to the next one. In the meantime, I’m reapplying for my F.B.S.A. license and physically training for when they finally do let me fight again. Otherwise, I’m good.”

“But you were arguing with Vicky…”

“Yeah… That started with me trying to allay your guys’ fears that I’m a threat to ya, but it just got out of hand. Seriously, my lines of life are drawn, I don’t cross them.”

“So… You’ve got no problem with killing criminals?”

“They’d have to give me a reason, a really good reason,” Cedric pointed at Sean, “A few punches, keying my truck’s paint job, or taking some money from me? Nah. Not worth a person’s life. Killing a friend of mine? Kidnapping a family member? These things deserve the most severe punishments. They’re things that don’t deserve leniency, I don’t care what the excuse du joir is.”

Sean seemed to understand that and nodded. They went back to working, this time talking about sports. They were comparing college basketball teams when Victoria and Jonas got back. She still seemed shaken, but Cedric apologized and offered his hand to shake.

“I don’t mean to disparage your faith,” he explained, “And I don’t want you to think I’m going to come after you. That’s not me. That’s not what I do.”

Victoria shook his hand, but she didn’t say anything. Instead, she went back to working on a pothole with Jonas. Cedric sighed and went back to working with Sean.

Everything seemed to be going smoothly for the few hours to lunch after that. They were discussing who would ride with who to which restaurants when the world suddenly exploded.

The apartment building across the street erupted in flames. Glass scattered all over the ground and there was screaming. Hellions were rushing the streets like they owned them, shouting “Fire it up!” and “Let it burn! BURN!” Cedric knew the cries well, but he also knew others.

He could hear people shouting from the upstairs floors. People were trapped in the fire! Reaching for his communicator, he clicked a button to call everybody in Grey’s Army currently on patrol.

“This is Cedric Grey! If anybody can hear me, I’m in the Bronze Way district of Steel Canyon! There’s a fire over here and people need help! I need help!”

“I’m on my way,” came the even-toned voice of Ryat99, “Where are you in the building, Cedric?”

“I’m not in it, yet,” he shouted as he started running across the street, “But I’m about to be!”

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

--Steel Canyon--

Cedric vaulted himself across the street, heedless of the people shouting for him to stop. He could hear children crying in that apartment building, so this was no time to stand idly by.

As he crossed the street, it seemed a mob of Hellion gang members had materialized to practically worship the horror they’d wrought in the burning building. One of them got in Cedric’s way and he kicked the guy in the chest, doubling him over backwards and tumbling into his friends.

“Get the cape!” a Damned Hellion shouted as fire erupted from his hands, “Burn it all!”

He received a shovel to his face for his efforts. Cedric shoulder-tackled another and yanked his submachine gun from him. Firing shots into the mess of red-orange outfits, he barreled into the door of the building.

Hold your breath, Cedric…

Squinting and crouching low, he made his way for the staircase at the other end of the hall.

---

Flying in circles over the burning building, Ryat99 made some calculations. He could locate the people Cedric had indicated, as well as Cedric’s form rushing into the flames.

“Crazy human,” the android mused to himself, “I would say he’s going to get himself killed one of these days, but I’d be wrong.”

Indeed, he wasn’t. His thermal imaging registered Cedric’s form rushing out of the heat again, this time on a higher floor. He was making his way to the first batch of civilians that needed rescuing.

“Well, time to do my part…” the machine muttered as he scanned for a good entrance point, “That hole in the ceiling should be perfect to prevent making an influx…”

A moment later, he’d crashed through a hole that had been scorched into the roof of the apartment building. As he landed, a cloud of coolant sprayed from his body and pushed back the flames.

“Fuel and heat…”

He aimed his arms down the hallway to the civilians he would be rescuing. The entire corridor was simply flooded with flames. A moment later, however, a more focused cloud of coolant was being pushed down the hall. Fire faded as it came in contact with the icy solution and soon the hallway was clear.

“The floor’s structurally unsound,” Ryat99 said more to himself than anyone, “Going to have to walk on the edges…”

Rocking his massive frame back and forth, he made his way to the room where a pair of panicked children prayed fervently for something to save their lives. A large section fell away underneath him, but with his feet planted on the beams that made up the base of the walls and the edges of the floor, he was able to keep moving along steadily.

“Hello in there!” he announced loudly, “My name is Ryat Ninety-nine, and I’m here to help! I’m going to be breaking the door down now…”

Forming a blade of ice with a careful swarm of nanites, he reared back and swung. The damaged door fell in easily, splitting in half loudly and violently. Some flames licked at his back and the big machine extended his wings to keep them from advancing into the room.

“AUGH!” the young boy screamed, “It’s a monster! A demon!”

“Um…” the big android’s deep voice rumbled quietly, “I already told you… I’m here to help…”

“I think he was talking about me.”

Turning, Ryat99 saw what appeared to be a fiery demon. It wasn’t like the ones that worked with the Circle. It seemed too human, and in fact was too human. A quick biological analysis revealed a 92% match to human physiology. It was probably just another meta human with fire powers, playing at being a demon to hang out with the Hellions, who of which he was dressed like, albeit a little uniquely as he wore a yellow vest instead of an orange or red one.

“You look like an ifrit,” the machine replied emotionlessly, “Brown, almost black skin, with a reddish tint… Tiny, spiraled, curling horns jutting from your forehead… Yellow, fiery eyes to match the flames wrapped about your body that don’t seem to damage your clothing…”

“Fool!” the meta human shouted, “You face the great demon king, Baal! I will melt your modern abomination of a body down to make the nails for my throne!”

“Really? That’s what you’re going with?”

“Kneel before me, mortal!”

“Um. No.”

Ryat99 took two wide strides down the hall and poked the fiery meta human in the chest. A jet of coolant sprayed out and wrapped about the foolish young man who called himself “Baal.” What a lot of people didn’t know about Ryat99’s coolant was that it was made up of the same nanite solution that made up his fluids and lubricants. It helped him make his armor when he vented it and it helped make weapons as he shaped it. In this case, he was encasing the rogue, deluded meta human in a block of ice. Most of the “ice” really was water, drawn from the local moisture in the air, but it could also be the nanite solution, which in this case it had to be, as there was very little water to work with.

Shocked, “Baal” stared dumbly at the big machine, his arms held up as if to protest his treatment at the hands of the heroic android. Ryat99 looked on impassively, his visor glowing brightly over his featureless voice emitter. Without a word, he poked the block and pushed it back through the hole that had collapsed through the hallway floor earlier.

“Baal” fell to the next floor down with an undignified scream that ended with a grinding crash (as ice tends to sound like). Turning back to the children, Ryat99 was a little concerned that they both still looked terrified.

“It’s alright,” he said softly, “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m here to help.”

The children looked back at the burned out hole and Ryat99 followed their gaze. Looking back at them, he chuckled a little.

“He’ll be fine. You saw how he was on fire, right? Well, right now, fire’s bad. Ice is good. Ice will keep you from getting burned.”

The girl, chewing her lower lip, gingerly approached him. Her brother tried to stop her, shouting that they couldn’t trust “the big scary metal monster.” Ryat99 wasn’t paying attention, however, as he noticed smoke wafting up out of the floor of their apartment. He could also hear “Baal” behind him, clawing his way back up to the floor in order to get his revenge.

Uttering a hasty apology and withdrawing the ice from his arms and hands, he hefted up the children, cradled them to his chest, wrapped his wings about them and blasted off for the window. No sooner did he do this, than fire erupted in the apartment, engulfing the floor and walls in flames. “Baal” hurled a fireball after them, but it struck the window sill, causing an explosion to highlight their escape.

Spreading his wings, Ryat99 pulled the children away from his frozen chest and landed softly to let them gently scamper away once they were safely away from the building. They were terrified, of that he was certain, and part of it was about him. He didn’t look human, which he wasn’t, so that took away a lot of the comfort they could have felt.

Briefly, the android considered that he needed a human form, or at least a human face. It made sense, he did have an alternate housing configuration that utilized a humanoid face, but it looked like something out of a horror movie and the ocular units were all wrong and much too large. Still, he had people regarding him in Portal Corp as if he were like Citadel, so there was merit to the idea.

Until he had a human face, people would fear him. He wasn’t even a lunatic, like the eldest Grey child, who had just smashed out a third-story window with his work shovel and leaped from it with a young woman clutching to his muscled torso. Somehow, he landed without hurting himself, or the woman, by rolling as he hit the street. Hopping up with a cheer, and tumbling the girl into the crowd from the momentum, he didn’t seem to notice the Hellion walking up behind him. This was proven false when he ducked the baseball bat swing and whirled around to drive an elbow into the aggressor’s abdomen.

The baseball bat hit the pavement with a wooden clatter and Grey moved on to the next one. Heroes were gathering now, many of which were fighting the flames and Ryat99 joined them, taking to the sky to combat the flames above with his own arsenal of ice. Cedric, however, decided it was time to turn his attention to the people who’d started the fire. Left and right, he did battle with the punks. He was careful to use skills he hadn’t considered much since acquiring his axe, but were the difference between life and death now.

His Marine skills came back to the forefront, and with quick grapples and joint twists, he disabled and disarmed the thugs as they came at him. At first, they came one-on-one. When that proved futile, they tried to rush him, crowding themselves as much as they crowded him. Plus, he had some weapons, a baseball bat, some knives and a pistol, from his prior victories. The punks flailed and swung haphazardly at him, hurting their friends as they didn’t pay attention to what they were doing. In one hard swipe from the former tanker, the small semi-circle of punks tumbled to the ground.

The Damned at the doorway was about to throw fire at him. Without hesitating, Cedric dropped to one knee and drew the pistol he’d taken. As fire wrapped about the Damned Hellion’s hands, Cedric fired three times, once in the right hand, once in the left forearm, and once in the leg. The Damned dropped out of the doorway, screaming in pain.

However, another young man appeared behind him. He looked like a mix of a demon and a genie… And his expression was all-too serious for the ridiculously stylized Hellion outfit he was wearing. “Baal’s” disadvantage here, however, was that Cedric was taking him just as seriously as he was acting, unlike Ryat99, who was willing to let him alone on account of his stupid name.

“I will burn the flesh from your miserable bones!” he shouted in an inhumanly deep voice.

Cedric fired a round into the fiery man’s torso. The bullet stopped against a supernatural armor of fire, but “Baal” doubled over in pain. Realizing he wasn’t as tough as he thought, he turned instead to breathing fire at the former hero.

Cedric tossed the pistol aside as the flames reached him. He didn’t need the bullets exploding in his hand. Crooking his left arm, he turned away and crouched lower.

Ryat99 looked down in time to see his boss’s son get wrapped in flames. The torch continued for the better part of a minute, and the big machine worried that he would have some bad news to deliver.

“Cedric!” he shouted involuntarily.

Emotions were a new bit of creeping code in his system. He and his siblings were supposed to be emotionless, but lately had started to be happy, sad, angry… Right now, Ryat99 was feeling a lot of worry. He wasn’t so concerned for the building fire, a decent number of heroes had arrived and the flames were dying faster than the few Hellions left could restart them. However, Cedric was flesh and-

The flames from the breath of fire died down, and Cedric stood back up. Flames stuck to his roadwork outfit, but they were dying out. Casually, he batted at the fire and smothered the last of it. “Baal” stumbled backward a little, and the last thing Ryat99 saw was Cedric body-tackling the unique Hellion into the building. Some fire spewed out of the entrance, and for a brief moment, nobody knew what happened.

Ryat99 maneuvered himself back to ground-level and looked into the doorway. Some smoke billowed forth, along with ash-polluted water. A moment later, Cedric’s scuffed, stained boot emerged from under the smoke, followed shortly by the other as he walked his way out of the burning building with “Baal” slung over his shoulder. As he reached the doorway, he twisted around violently and smacked the Hellion’s back against the frame. “Baal” cried out, and Cedric suddenly looked very worried.

“Oh, I’m sorry, man…” he said disingenuously, “I meant to hit your head!”

And he swung the Hellion again, smacking his head against the other frame. One of the horns cracked and broke away, trickling a little blood out of the base of the break. If it hurt “Baal,” he couldn’t say anything, as he’d passed out from the blow.

-----

The police were gathering up the criminals and helping apartment residents file insurance claims. The children Ryat99 had saved were clinging, terrified, to their mother. They couldn’t take their eyes off the big machine, the girl apparently in awe, her younger brother in shock. The woman Cedric had saved was busy trying to straighten her hair in an attempt to get him to notice her. Unfortunately, he wound up distracted at that moment.

“Boss, how are we gonna handle the rest of the day’s work?” he asked.

“There is no rest of the day’s work,” Jonas answered, his form visibly shaken by the noontime events, “Go home… Do whatever… I’ll give your case worker the paperwork to cover this afternoon’s dismissal when I’m done with it.”

“Cool, thanks.”

“Cedric, you should be dead,” Ryat99 announced as the man started walking away, “Those flames… That fire… You should have died long before you saved that girl.”

“Well, I didn’t,” he replied dismissively, “I got lucky, I guess…”

“That wasn’t luck. You’re surrounded by an unidentifiable energy field. You should see the F.B.S.A. Magi and Elite divisions.”

“I knew it!” one of the heroes who helped stop the fire shouted, “You’re still acting as a hero! An unlicensed, super-powered hero!”

A thin man in dark blue armor marched up to them and pointed his finger in Cedric’s face. The former tanker seemed oddly amused by the behavior.

“Officer!” the shorter man shouted again, “Officers! You need to arrest this man! He’s acting as a hero without a license!”

“I’ll give you one more chance to turn around, walk away and learn how to look at law by degrees,” the taller man said quietly.

“Arrest him!”

“Now hang on,” Ryat99 rumbled, “This man didn’t kn-!”

“No, no, bug guy,” Cedric gently took the smaller hero by the head and spun him out into the street, “Let me handle this.”

Following the little guy into the street, he spread his arms out wide. Grey wanted the angry young man to be sure he wasn't trying to hurt him.

“What do you want, little guy? What did I do that was so wrong?”

“I already told you! You can’t go around acting like a hero without a license!”

Cedric almost laughed.

“A little scrap of watermarked paper, laminated in stylized plastic, doesn’t determine if I’m a hero or not!” he said with a little anger tingeing his usually smooth voice.

“But it’s what you need to do heroics in this city!” the younger man continued shouting.

“How so? Unlicensed people do heroic things in this city every day! That scrap you’re so worried about just means we can handle the extra violent stuff!”

“No!” the hero was still indignant, “No! No! NO! Officer! Arrest this man!”

“You aren’t my superior, boy,” the uniformed officer replied darkly, “I don’t know what your problem is, and I don’t see what this guy’s done that’s so wrong.”

“If you let him get away with this, it could set a precedent!”

“Max,” one of the hero’s companions, a young woman in a bright-pink, form-fitting spandex outfit and a blue cape pleaded with her friend, “I know you’re agitated, but this isn’t the time or place!”

“Look man, calm down,” Cedric tried to reason, “Take a breather and think this through. The only people that got hurt were the thugs that started the fire. Innocent lives were saved because of my actions! Is this so terrible?”

“No! You’re a murderer!” Max was growing less vehement, but still had something to get in edgewise, “I remember the story! You slaughtered those men in the streets!”

“Council soldiers. They were barely human, and only in the most open of biological definitions.”

“That’s not justification!”

“Nothing is,” Cedric shook his head disappointedly, “To a civilian who’s never faced death.”

“Come on, Max,” the young heroine whispered as she reached her friend, “Let’s go. We’ve helped out what we could, here.”

“This isn’t over,” Max said as he was led away, “I’ll be filing a complaint!”

“Yeah, yeah,” Grey shrugged and walked over to Ryat99, “Any chance you could fly me to City Hall?”

“Sure, hop on my back,” the big machine replied.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

Cory had hoped that the dwelling of a Circle of Thorns spy would yield more information and artifacts. He was disappointed, however, for the apartment was Spartan and devoid of all but the extremely basic necessities.

Randall had described a rather plush living room when he’d first arrived. Apparently, the entirety of the furnishings were magic-based and illusory. They were probably strong illusions, capable of supporting weight, but the wizard had probably done away with them once he was free of company.

“I certainly wish I could have spoken with him,” Simmons sighed as he continued to trace his fingers along the walls, following the patterns of residual mystical energy, “Perhaps we could have arranged an information exchange…”

“You don’t trade with demons,” Randy grumbled from the reinforced steel chair he sat on next to a cooler in the center of the living room, “And there ain’t no good deals with the Circle. They’re one and the same!”

“I know, Mister Grey,” a young woman said tersely, “What Cortland meant was… Well…”

“The exchange would have been very little from our part,” Cory finished for his girlfriend, Gertrude Youngs, “And very much from him. There are ways of torturing demons that don’t necessarily involve harm…”

“Psychological damage,” the big old tanker growled happily before popping open a can of beer, “So much more powerful…”

A pale-faced woman in a black dress joined Cory in the bedroom. She was shaking with her disturbed sensation.

“That man is a brutish sort,” she whispered, “It’s hard to believe he’s really a hero…”

Cory nodded. Early in Randall’s career in Paragon, he had helped numerous heroes thrash through the Cabal in an attempt to help save Salamanca. He gave it up when his efforts seemed to just be the same fight, over and over. It wasn’t until Cory gave the region a look that somebody was able to explain things in a manner the big man could understand.

Even then, Cory feared he only just barely got through to his boss. Randy had his mind on other things, though, and had moved on to more personal goals. As such, he was hardly a hero of the city, but more just trying to get by in the small community. He left the hero work up to people who were better suited for it, like Kipland and Cory.

Still, every so often, he stumbled on a situation like this. The sorcerer and his semi-spectral girlfriend started scanning the chambers more closely. Behind them, they could hear the rhythmic tapping of fingers on a keyboard.

“Woah!” Roland suddenly shouted, “Uh… Dad? This guy… Whoever he was… He was bad. Really bad.”

“That kind of bad, huh?” Randy’s previously jovial voice had turned dangerously cold.

“Yeah. I want to delete this whole partition, then set fire to the motherboard.”

“Can’t. It’s evidence.”

Randy obviously sounded like he agreed with his son.

“Rest assured he’s suffering a terrible penance, son… Or at least his body was destroyed.”

Growling to himself, Roland went back to typing into the laptop and trying to find how the Circle wizard had stayed in communication with his fellows.

Cory couldn’t understand it. There were no parchments, no books, no crystals, nothing. He’d incinerated the futon that had been the man’s sleeping pad and all that remained were ashes. While most wouldn’t understand the idea of setting fire to something that may contain flammables, even the weakest scrying scrolls had enchantments on them to protect them from flames. It took effort to make the pages, and wizards weren’t about to let something as simple as a misplaced candle destroy hours, if not days, of work.

But nothing remained. There were no artifacts here. Just a telephone, a laptop computer, and a futon.

“HA!” a female voice shouted from the hall.

Cory narrowed his eyes in consternation, and looked away from where he held his fingertip. Randy’s boisterous laughter filled the apartment and he could see a young woman walk uncertainly into the living room with two small daggers in her hands.

“Uh…” the girl said timidly, “Didn’t an old man live here?”

“Yeah,” the big tanker grunted, “And he got killed when I was trying to find out what he was doing here.”

“What!?” the girl shouted, horrified, but not because she was opposed to the wizard’s demise, “But I wanted to kill him! I had it all planned out…”

“You were gonna burst through the door, shout ‘Ha’ and stab him repeatedly?” Roland queried in his usual stoic, dismissive tone, “Don’t get me wrong, it’s a solid plan, but how’d you know he was worthy of death? We only just found out ourselves…”

“Then why’d you do it?” the girl asked.

“This little guy chewing on a steak thought the interrogation had gone on long enough. Ripped a chunk clean out of the wizard’s hip.”

Cory could just picture the big man scratching the little bear’s head. Leaving a scorch on the wall to mark his place, he decided to go out and have a look at the young female heroine.

“Iron Spyke, right?” Roland asked.

“Yeah…” the girl replied.

“I think I found what we’re looking for, Dad,” Roland showed his father the laptop as Cory walked into the living room.

Iron Spyke whirled when she saw the sorcerer, then held up one of her knives defensively. Simmons waved casually and a light film of frost coated the blade.

“You have much to learn, young avenger,” he said smoothly, “I recommend you first learn how to relax. We’re all friends here.”

“I don’t trust wizards,” the Spyke hissed as she hastily wiped the blade of her knife on her pant leg, “The whole lot of you can burn in Hell…”

“I suppose you trained under Gregor Richardson, then,” the sorcerer sighed as he walked over to where Roland was frantically pulling up files for his father to see, “So, the demon kept all of his information here?”

“Where a wizard probably wouldn’t look,” Roland replied, “There’s information here on Iron Spyke, a guy in the building across the street called Arcane Blaze… There’s even a note here on Fire-Shield.”

“A note?” Randall asked.

“More like a ‘who is this?’ kind of note, but it shows they were taking interest in her. It seems everybody in the files is some kind of little-known magician.”

Cory scratched his head. He was about to ask if he were on the files, but Roland shook his head before the question was even half-finished.

“You’re not exactly a celebrity, Cory, but you’re known. The people in this, the wizards didn’t know them. Hell, almost nobody does…”

“Um… I’m right here,” Iron Spyke sheathed her knives, rested her fists on her hips and started tapping her foot as she glared pointedly at Roland, “And I don’t appreciate being called a magician…”

Cory didn’t have the heart to tell her she had an easily identifiable mystical aura. It looked like it sped her up and heightened her senses, much like the enchantments bestowed on Mattock McGinty. He supposed the source wasn’t so much her cold iron knives, which must have been her namesake, but really the dull bronze amulet on her neck. The flows of energy seemed to use that as a nexus. It must have been a deeply personal heirloom.

“A wizard of some kind did something cruel to your mother, correct?” Cory asked.

Iron Spyke stared at him in shock, the color draining from her face. Gertrude walked into the room and clucked reproachfully.

“Cory, that had all the tact of a cannonball…”

The young female scrapper backed quickly out of the room. As she ran away down the hall, Randy, barely able to keep himself from laughing, shouted that he’d get her a copy of the police report.

It was the least he could do for mucking up her first real investigation.

“There’s information on thirty or so mystical heroes and heroines here,” Roland muttered, “And another forty or so of mystics who were just passing through. This demon… We’re using ‘demon,’ right?”

“Yes,” I replied, “For the Circle, it’s more appropriate.”

“Well, this demon was keeping tabs on the local magic-based heroes. The young ones, new ones, or ones that have up-until-now stayed off the radar. At least, that’s what I’m getting from this summary. There are a few notes on us, Dad, but they don’t seem too concerned with our involvement. I suppose they either figured we weren’t a threat or we wouldn’t get involved.”

“They figured wrong,” Randy burped, “They weren’t counting on how bored I’ve gotten, lately.”

“Having you daughter kidnapped left you bored?” Gertrude asked worriedly.

Randy leveled her with a grim stare.

“When he said bored,” Simmons explained, “He meant he’s been itching to break something apart.”

Grey nodded and sipped his beer with animosity. It was hard to believe it could be done, but the big man did it anyway.

“I’m sorry,” Gertrude apologized quickly, “I didn’t mean to offend…”

“No offense taken,” the big man growled, “So, how’re you here, anyway?”

“This ring,” she explained, “Normally, the Cabal doesn’t craft or hand out relics like this often… But… My romance with Cory here… Well… It could be useful to us. Mary MacComber herself decided I should have the ability to be with him outside Salamanca… Even if it’s only for a few days at a time.”

“We were lucky,” the sorcerer chuckled, “The Circle destroyed the last one they gave us.”

“Foul beasts,” the slim girl whispered, “Cory… I don’t think we need to check for anymore wards, glyphs or enchantments. I believe the Circle was trying to keep its investigation of this area secret from mystical eyes.”

“But what were they looking for?” Roland asked, “There’s nothing in here about an overall goal. Just the dossiers of these different heroes.”

“Maybe he didn’t have the chance to share his findings with his fellow demons,” Cory offered, “Or perhaps…”

Cory and Roland both looked at the telephone.

“Ah, it makes sense now,” the wizard sighed, “The information is wherever he phoned it to…”

“I’ll get on the horn with the telephone company,” Randall grunted, “Find out where this phone was calling to.”

“You can do that?” Roland asked, “I mean… You’re a civilian…”

“I’m the custodian for this building and two others in the neighborhood, son,” the big tanker pushed himself out of the reinforced chair, “On top of that, I’ve got a top-level vigilante security identification, which puts me on par with most of the rest of the law in this city! I’ve got every right to find out everything I can from the local utilities about the resources being leached from the buildings under my protection!”

“Okay,” Roland muttered, “But it just strikes me that this would have been a good time to still be under Freedom Corps’ influence. They could have smoothed things over with the phone company for us…”

Randall was about to say something very foolish, but stopped when he saw Cory and Gertrude both shaking their heads at him. Instead, he just grinned satisfactorily at his son, who was looking back up to him impassively.

“Well, that ain’t the case, son. For the little good they do for us, I ain’t havin’ them tell me what to do. I can deal with small discomforts like this for the freedom of being able to do what I want, when I want.”

And with that, the big man left the apartment. Shrugging, Roland shut down the laptop and started bundling it up.

“I’m getting this to Joe and out of my hands,” he explained before Cory or Gertrude could ask, “He’ll be able to find who to take it to. That thing was lucky it got killed by Barry, there…”

The little bear was finishing the steak Randall had given it.

“If dad had found this, the demon’s death would have been slow and agonizing…”

“Merely a prelude to the interminable and agonizing torment that awaited him,” Simmons added, “Demons don’t treat failure kindly, and this demon had certainly failed. If it had been more successful, there would certainly be something in that laptop more than some threadbare vigilante dossiers and unmentionable filth.”

Roland nodded and started making his way out of the apartment. Barry scampered after him and attached himself to the portly man’s back. The round man grunted from the sudden added weight, but kept strolling as Barry crawled up to his shoulder.

Cory and Gertrude followed their friend, hand-in-hand. Gertrude didn’t know why Cory had been so against the speech Randall had been prepared to make against Roland’s suggestion that they regain ties to Freedom Corps, but she could sense a sudden spike in frustration, from both young men, and had decided to help solidify the front. She’d been surprised Roland was able to keep his appearance so calm, but she knew both of them had expected the same thing from the big man.

“I’ll explain some other time,” he sent to her mentally through the Aether, “Roland has a bit of a complex relationship with someone of importance in Freedom Corps, and Randall keeps ribbing his son about it.”

“A complex relationship? Is it romantic?”

“Not to hear Roland explain it… But he works so hard to control his emotions, it’s hard to tell what the whole story is. The other… She’s not very talkative to the rest of us.”

He didn’t have the heart to tell her how close the portly hunter was to some of the most dangerous operations in the world. It would depend how things progressed. While he knew Roland certainly believed that things had settled, he knew that these sorts of situations could be chaotic with the smallest elements involved. Indeed, his own relationship with Gertrude had suffered once or twice already simply because other women had made mention that they knew him.

Fortunately for the warlock, though, he had the benefit of the Aether to convey the truth and sincerity of his innocence. Roland was not so lucky, however, and had to struggle in the same dramatic way most other mortal men and women had to when social relationships were the slightest bit damaged.

In the streets of Kings Row, they ran into Cedric Grey. The eldest of Randall’s children had just finished talking to the patriarch before the big man had left. He was still wearing the singed remains of his roadwork outfit.

“Yo, Cory, why didn’t you tell me I’ve got an aura?”

“I thought you knew,” the dark-skinned warlock replied, “Why?”

“Turns out my Praetorian is still sending magic energy my way,” the tanker grunted, “While M.A.G.I. studies my axe, he’s got me dangerously close to violating my suspension. I’m not really complaining, though… I was able to help some people today and avoid getting burned up for it. It’s just a little unexpected is all…”

“But your suspension…” Roland started.

“Yeah, like the authorities are going to tell me I shouldn’t be helping people…”

Roland frowned, but nodded to his brother. It was a fine line.

“I suppose, so long as you didn’t harm anybody, things should be fine,” Cory offered.

“Oh no. I hurt people. I hurt a lot of people. Hellions. With my road work shovel.”

“Then there will be issues…”

“I don’t think so…” Cedric shrugged, “I was acting in self defense. It’s not my fault I know how to fight a group of unruly high school dropouts.”

Cory didn’t know what to say about that. He supposed they would have to wait until the reports came back from Cedric’s incident in Steel Canyon.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

((The following has some risque material in it. God, I hope I didn't push the limit too far on this... I'd hate to have to put a link here instead. It seems so cold and sterile.))

--Later That Week...--

Roland returned to his apartment after running errands in Kings Row. He didn't know why his father had him deliver the report to Iron Spyke, but he did it because he had little better to do.

Well, he did have better to do. There was a leak somewhere in his apartment building's basement, and he needed to fix it fast. His building manager had made it clear that a leaking faucet wasted more energy than leaving a computer on all day. He was certain it was a pipe, perhaps a coupling had busted over the winter.

Kings Row wasn't known for much, but hardware like the new couplings he'd bought and the pipe wrench he needed could be found for very reasonable prices. Heck, he was even able to find a good auto parts store just next to the tunnel to Galaxy City.

He was just starting to think about what the Circle could possibly want with his father's neighborhood when there was a knock at the door. Grunting in consternation, he walked over to the door to greet his visitor.

"Hi!"

It was Rose, the perky woman down the hall with an almost boundless ignorance for boundaries. She almost tackled him as she hopped into the room without his permission.

"What have I said about that?" he grunted, " Calm down, girl. You're worse than a cat."

"Aw..." she murmured, but perked right back up again as she saw he was getting his toolbelt, "Whatcha doin'?"

"There's a leak in the basement, I have to go fix it," Roland replied, "Sorry for being short with you, but I've got a lot on my mind right now and I need to get this done."

She smiled and stepped in his way as he tried to leave. Looking perplexedly at the strange buxom redhead, he tried to step around her, but she got in his way again.

"I really don't have the patience for this," he said darkly, catching himself just before he started growling.

"And I'm sorry," Rose sighed as she flicked her foot back to close his door behind her, "But my plane leaves in a few hours, I don't have time to wait anymore and I really don't feel like doing this in the basement. It's icky down there."

"Do what?" Grey asked, feeling like he was missing something.

"This!"

Rose jumped up to tackle him and wrapped her arms around his neck. Surprised, Roland couldn't react in time to keep her from kissing him, and then it felt like smoke was spewing into his throat.

He wrenched the bizarre girl off and she tumbled to the floor with a squeak. He, however, was finding it extremely difficult to breathe. It was like his throat was on fire, but he swore he could smell flowers and taste nectar. His left leg suddenly went slack and he crumpled to the floor, bouncing the back of his head against the couch.

"Rghhhghl..." he gurgled, "Wh-what did... What-d-ja jus-just do to me?"

He could see purplish smoke wafting from his mouth. It was weird stuff, it had little stylized hearts in it.

"What the... What the [frick]?"

"I was so worried before," Rose chirped as she hopped back up to her feet and bounced over to his prone form, "I came here thinking you'd be itching to jump into bed with me. Imagine my surprise that you saw my aggressiveness as a bad thing!"

"Not bad... Un... Unusual..."

Curse me for a fool! he shouted inside his head, I should have known there was something wrong with this girl! What the Hell is going to happen now?

Rose dragged him away from the couch by his arm. Despite his girth, she was able to move him easily.

Oh yeah... That's doing wonders for my calm...

"Why can't I move?" he wheezed.

"It's my Kiss," she replied, "It shuts down most of your muscle control so I can... Work."

Euphemisms... Yay.

But he couldn't stop himself from asking "Work?" Her sly smile and twinkling eyes told him all he needed to know.

It was hard for him to describe his reaction. For one thing, Roland was intensely curious as to what this would be like. On the other hand, however, the logical, pragmatic mindset he prided himself on kicked his rage into overdrive and tried to rail against whatever it was keeping him unable to move.

Unfortunately, all he was able to do was barely lift the fingers of his right hand. Growling angrily, he narrowed his eyes at the crazy woman.

"Let me go! Why are you doing this, anyway?"

"Simple!" Rose replied, unperturbed by his reaction, "I was paid! It was really strange... I usually take contracts for corrupt politicians, corporate executives who abuse their power, that sort of thing. You know, anybody willing to take advantage of a naive young girl and have their way with them. Of course, what they don't know is..."

She giggled a little.

"I feed off them."

"Feed-!?" he almost asked.

The curious portion of Roland's mind ceased its inquiry at that. The implication was terrifying. Her patting his belly appreciatively as she undid his tool belt did little to allay his fears.

"And oh boy, are you going to be a feast!"

"Dear God no," he grumbled, "No... No. That's not right... That can't be possible..."

"Oh but it is if you're a succubus!" Rose giggled as she stuck her tongue out at him.

Despite the impending doom, he couldn't help but notice that she was still ridiculously cute.

Oh yeah... Succubus. The rest of his thoughts were filled with a litany of curses and loud, panicked shouts of terror.

Oh, hey! There's an idea!

"HEL-!" he got out before she jumped up and clamped her hands over his mouth.

"Aw... Roland! Don't be like that! This should be a special moment, one between just you and me. There's no need to involve anybody else... Look, if it makes you feel any better, I'll let you in on a little secret..."

She pulled herself up so she could sit on his belly. She had to hold herself up a little as she straddled him because he couldn't brace his belly to support her.

"Oh, sorry about that," she patted his shoulder sympathetically as he gasped to breathe, "I forgot that happened... I'm usually sitting a little lower on the body by now."

"I think you were saying something about a secret," he murmured.

"Oh... Right... Well, it goes like this: I really don't want to do this to you."

Roland blinked at her.

"Don't look at me like that! It's not easy for a succubus-oh, excuse me, half-succubus-to admit! Usually we just want to... Well... You know. All the time."

"You're being timid?"

She gave him a strange, pouting kind of smile and patted his cheek.

"I'm not some vulgar beast, Roly-poly. Sometimes I like to be sweet... Especially with a nice guy, like you. I like you, and it didn't take sitting on your magic couch to get me to. Beneath your rough layer, you're a good guy."

"If you like me, then why are you doing this?"

Rose looked a little sad and she sighed.

"Well... The contract was from... Silver Mantis. She said she wanted me to do it because of my... Unique assassination technique. She said it would send a message."

The litany of curses coursed through Roland's mind again.

"Well, time's a wastin', Roly," the demonic girl chirped, "I've got to get this done and it's going to take a long time to drain you. Not even MedCom will be able to help once I'm done, you'll be so depleted."

"I've got little recourse," the portly man said in exasperation, "Rose..."

"It's Lillian, actually. My mother named me in honor of our queen..."

His eyes rolling in aggravation, he continued.

"Look... Please don't do this. I'm sure living here hasn't emptied your funds, you can pay back Silver Mantis and forget about this contract."

"Roland, I really want to," she said sadly as she made her way to his waistline, "I mean it. Seriously. Nice guys like you shouldn't die like this... Well, actually... They should. All of my victims have had bright beaming smiles on their faces when they finally went!"

"Spectacular..." Roland said glibly.

"But you haven't done anything to deserve getting killed! I feel really bad about doing this..."

She started reaching for his belt and he knew his time was almost up. There was no sense holding back anymore.

"I'm a virgin," he announced matter-of-factly, "I haven't made love in my life, and I certainly haven't been laid. Most women I've run into in my life have barely noticed me, and what ones have never feel particularly inclined to spend the night with me."

"Lillian Rose" stopped and blinked. She looked askance at Roland's face, her own screwed up in irritation. She opened her mouth to say something, then clamped it shut as she rolled off of him and stared at the wall for a few seconds.

"You [frick]er!" she shouted as she swatted him on the belly, eliciting a light grunt, "You totally ruined the mood!"

It wasn't entirely true. She would have done it to him anyway, but this gave her an excuse to stop.

"I don't think that a guy's first time should be his last," she murmured, "I... I won't do this to you."

"Really? Oh, thank Heaven..."

"Unless you're lying!" she perked up and leaned against his torso playfully.

"Can you imagine a guy lying about that?"

Lillian grimaced, still cutely, and shook her head. She gave him a hug across his belly.

"So... Will this paralysis fade away?"

"Yeah, eventually. I've spat it at guards before and they got better. I'm not a fighter."

The door to the apartment splintered at that and they both looked to see Ms. Liberty standing in the doorway. While she looked furious, it didn't match the blur that sped past her as Roland's sister, Sarah, tore into the room, screaming with rage as she hooked the half-succubus by the neck and vaulted her over the couch.

Pleading incoherently, Rose tried to keep the white-haired psychic from killing her. Sarah levitated the buxom magical freak and hurled her into one of the chairs, causing her to tumble across the floor and slam into the wall.

"Snuffy!" Roland barked, "Hey! My apartment!"

"Oh!" his sister snapped out of her anger and looked down to her brother, "Oh my gosh! Are you alright?"

"How'd you know I was in trouble?"

She blinked her dark eyes at him, then tapped her temple twice.

"I'm psychic, Round! Remember?"

"So you keep tabs on me?"

"And mom. And dad. And Cedric."

"Come on," Ms. Liberty hissed as she lifted Lillian to her feet, "You're going to the Zig, the easy way or the hard way."

She leaned in close and whispered "Resist arrest... I really want to send you the hard way."

"I'll be good," the demon wimpered, "I'm sorry."

-----------

--The Next Day: Grey's Army Base--

Roland's recovery took a quarter of a day, and even after a good night's sleep, he still felt a little uneasy on his feet. The ordeal didn't seem to have affected his mentality too much, he had just talked his assailant out of killing him when he was rescued, but Ms. Liberty noticed he seemed to be keeping his distance from her.

She found him in his group's base the next day. Randall had recently acquired a lease for expansion for his base, and was apparently setting to work immediately. Roland was shaking every time he started moving, so the group was letting him relax in the lounge.

"You okay, man?" Kip asked as they sat on the central sofa, "You don't feel emasculated?"

"Why would I?" Roland looked askance at his friend and shrugged, "I got ambushed by a succubus and rescued by my psychic sister because she was the only person who could hear my mental shouts for help. I'm a pragmatic, Kip. I take what good I can get."

"Well, whatever makes you feel better, Louis."

"Louis?"

"Yeah. Louis Lane. Or maybe I should call ya Marty Watson."

Roland glared at Kip. He'd have been mad if he didn't feel like laughing so hard.

"Wait!" they heard as the base portal made a zapping sound to signal that Cedric had arrived, "Where's my brother!?"

The tall man barreled into the lounge and grasped his younger brother by the shoulders. He was wearing a business suit that looked freshly made.

"I already called him Louis," Kip chuckled, "And Marty."

"Aw! Dammit!" Cedric spun around and punched the nearest pillar, "I had to see my case worker and I missed it!"

"Hey, shut up!" Roland barked, but not without amusement.

---

“You see,” Randall growled amidst the small androids working on the new expansion to his base, “This is precisely why I don’t see the advantage to being associated with your organization.”

Ms. Liberty frowned at the big man and folded her arms over her chest. She had just got done greeting Roland and the violent Kipland Durj when her friend's gargantuan father beckoned her to speak with him.

It wasn't like talking to her grandfather. Statesman always spoke in terms that still denoted some brand of respect, even when he was being condescending. This gray-haired tanker, however, was gruff and crude. Contempt was radiating from him. He obviously saw a little girl when he looked at her.

“Mister Grey, we can’t keep tabs on everything going on in this city. It’s why we need the help of you and the other heroes… But… I really wish I’d seen the signs that freak was living in Roland’s building. I’d have dealt with her a long time ago.”

Randall looked impassively to the young woman. When she went to say something, he popped open his can of beer and started drinking. At his size, towering at eight feet in height, it wouldn’t do much to his sobriety, but the message was clear. He was irritated that his son’s association with the heroine had once again brought him in harm’s way, and he didn't much care about anything she had to say in protest.

"Mister Grey, I care for your son. I don't even know how things got this way, but... He's important to me."

"He's important to his mother, too, and his sisters, in case you didn't figure that out! His brother went into a rampage when my youngest was kidnapped, what do you think he'll do if something happens to Roland!?"

"I never thought-"

"Brothers treat each other differently than one would a sister. It doesn't mean love ain't there, it's just treated different."

Jessica Duncan shuffled her feet. There was an implication the big man was pacing around. It was the same implication she had to deal with whenever she sought advice from the Vindicators about her male friends.

"Is this really the only thing people think happens between guys and girls, or is it just wishful thinking?" she thought darkly to herself.

“Look, you two better figure things out,” Randall grunted, “I wouldn’t mind if my son died for something that had meaning instead of some skirt leading him on. If that happens…”

He crumpled the unfinished can of beer in his hand, causing foam to spew from the cracks between his fingers.

“…I will be very upset.”

“I’m not leading your son on, Mister Grey!” she hissed, “God! What is it with you people!?”

“We’re like chickens,” Roland answered as he slowly walked up behind her, “We find something irritating about someone and keep pecking until they’re raw and bleeding. Then we peck some more.”

Seeing the spilled beer, the portly young man looked up at his father and gave an inquisitive upward nod. Randall shrugged.

"Your father was just finishing threatening me if anything ever happens to you," Jessica muttered.

Her friend looked askance to her, then back to his father.

"I'm just concerned, son."

"I'm old enough to handle my own conflicts, Dad. I'd have been alright, even if Megan and Sarah didn't show up. We wouldn't have caught Rose, but I'd have been alright."

"I'm glad we did catch her. Now we can find out why Silver Mantis wants you dead..."

Roland looked away a moment, then sighed.

"I would say it's obvious," he explained, "She's trying to hurt you. Look what it does to my family. You read the reports from when we hit Sharkhead to get Sheldon back. That was for a friend. Then there was the rampage Cedric went into when Angel was kidnapped..."

"What does that have to do with me, though?" Liberty furrowed her brow and looked to the two heroes.

Randall wasn't paying attention anymore. A loud noise in the new machine shop had alerted him and he was watching the progress of the Ryat androids more intently. Roland, however, pulled her down the hall to a more secluded room.

"A brewery," Jessica muttered as she saw the setup in the elevated corner, "Figures."

"Look..." Roland sighed as he tried to collect his thoughts, "What I'm about to tell you, I'm not supposed to. The Menders swore each of us to secrecy, but... Frankly, it's too obvious not to be explained and considered."

Ms. Liberty turned to her friend. A worried expression had crossed her face and Roland didn't quite know how to continue, so he decided to start from the beginning.

"A couple weeks ago, the Menders plucked a few heroes and heroines from their business and showed them the future. They normally wouldn't have, but this was about the future of Paragon and it apparently had something to do with how prepared we would be for 'the Coming Storm' they keep talking about. In our case, it was us and how close we could get to you."

She blinked at him, and the corners of her mouth tugged back to give her a small smile.

"And how close do you get?"

"The Menders said I have the capability to marry you."

He said it like he was reading a grocery list, or like he was saying he needed a new filter for his jeep. Ms. Liberty's smile vanished and she leaned against the refrigerator.

"They said I'm capable, not that it will happen," the portly archer continued, misreading her reaction, "But they showed me some futures where it does happen... And in each one I died."

"Oh!" Jessica perked up at that and looked worriedly to him, "Then-!"

"Often it was Silver Mantis who did it, other times Ice Mistral... This one time, it was this woman named Olivia Darque who hired the assassin. In the end, it was always the same. You stormed into the Isles, demanded to see Recluse, and he always let you duel Mantis or whoever in gladiatorial combat... Then you would kill them and Recluse would corrupt you and turn you into his weapon against Statesman..."

Ms. Liberty blinked and leaned against the refrigerator again. She had to brace against something to keep from trembling. Roland wasn't talking like he was reading anymore. He sounded like he was genuinely concerned, and it was a plan that made a disturbing amount of sense. It just required the catalyst of her falling in love.

"My point," he finished, "is that these people don't need to wait to do this to you. And it wasn't just me, Jess. I knew a couple of the other heroes I saw... Blue Battler, Apex... Apex was on his way out when I arrived. He looked about as happy as I turned out to be."

"So, any one of you guys could wind up in a relationship with me, and get assassinated?" the heroine slumped to the floor, "Great..."

"They're not waiting on us, Jess," Roland walked over and slumped next to the fridge around the corner from her, "They're going after the people you care about now. People the rest of the world won't notice at first..."

"So that's why he said he needed to rescue War Witch!" Ms. Liberty seemed a little lost in thought, but she was still paying attention.

"That's what we're dealing with. I wasn't necessarily surprised I got hit by an assassin... But the method... That jarred me a little. Rose said she was hired because it would send a message, and I'm guessing that message was for you."

"So I'm not allowed to have anybody close to me?" Liberty snorted derisively, "Mom never had to deal with crap like this when she was active. She was able to find a sweet guy and fall in love..."

"I wouldn't say you can't have anybody close to you," Roland turned to face her, "But you have to find a way to look out for them."

She studied his posture carefully. Sometimes, it really irked her when he was working to maintain a neutral, professional attitude. Often, she wondered if he ever felt anything for her outside the platonic relationship they'd developed after he found out she wasn't just another little-known heroine. He'd been feeling romantic before, but when he learned who she was...

"I've already got Agent Wild keeping an eye on you," she said after she determined he wasn't about to re-enact a movie cliche, "But he's got other problems, too..."

"I'll work something out with him, then," he said before turning away and resting his head against the refrigerator door, "Oh man... I just felt dizzy there..."

She patted his shoulder sympathetically and stood up. She had to stop worrying herself. He wasn't going to try to take advantage of her delicate emotional state. Still... This was a bit of a bombshell. Arachnos forces were already plotting to harm anyone and everyone close to her? Just to corrupt her?

"I should get going," she sighed, "I'm glad you're okay, Roland."

She looked down to him and helped him up as he tried to stand. He thanked her and leaned back against the refrigerator.

"Still a little dizzy," he explained, "Anyway... Thanks. It's... It's nice to know you, you know? I never thought this sort of thing would happen in my life."

"I know what you mean," Jessica smiled and hugged him, "Get better soon."

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

--Kings Row: Grey's Army Base--

Days passed and the expansion of the base continued at a steady pace with the support of the androids. In mere hours, they converted sections of the city's disused sewer network into new chambers for the base, a process that would have taken normal workers days, if not weeks. The machines worked with enthusiastic precision and efficiency, but they had little idea as to what they were doing.

A chamber to the west, next to the medical bay, was turned into a larger, expanded manufacturing lab. Here, Sheldon and Dale Simms would be able to work on bigger projects. It was based on the lab in which Sheldon had reconfigured a Warhulk into a walking tank and turned Malta Group Titans into a personalized robot for the group he first called the Grey Titan and later Ryat Dreadnought. He'd had to disassemble that that laboratory during one of the prior renovations and never got around to rebuilding it. Now, however, Randall said they had the room to keep it.

The laboratory was already outfitted with a construction bay. A platform sat near the center of the room, cornered with four posts emitting soft light. Particles floated from it as a weak antigravity field generator similar to that in Nester Durj's belt hummed. Four turrets flanked the bay. Sheldon had explained that they were designed to protect everybody in the base in case one of his experiments got out of hand, but he also noted it would make a decent panic chamber in a pinch, because the four posts could emit a protective field for a few minutes.

The inventor found he was quite proud of the manufacturing laboratory. He just wasn't sure where most of the stuff crammed into it had come from. It seemed the androids had hauled in a damaged power core from a large machine... And he still didn't know what was in some of the large storage crates that remained.

He didn't have time to dwell on it, however. Work was taking longer on the chamber the androids currently found themselves in. It looked like a high-tech garage, installed just to the east of the manufacturing lab. A channel ran down the center of it, from east to west, leading to the lab. On the east wall, a set of fans had been installed to absorb exhaust.

"Sheldon," the deep bass of Ryat99 sounded during the lull in the construction, "We need to talk..."

"Can it wait?" the inventor replied as he tapped buttons on his communicator, "I'm struggling to get clearance for-"

"Just put this in the back of your mind, then," the big android interrupted, "I think you need to start working on more 'human' appearances for my siblings and me."

"What do you mean? What for?"

"A couple days ago, I was helping Cedric rescue people from a burning building. I ran into some children, and... Well, I believe my appearance is frightening. Any appearance."

Sheldon looked up from his communicator and turned to the android. Before, the Ryats didn't need human forms. They went into dangerous situations and bizarre places where their unusual armored appearance wouldn't stand out on first contact.

It also wasn't an issue in Paragon City, where robots, other androids and even heroes clad in powered armor were a common occurrence. Still, Ryat99's request was a valid concern. He did seem quite intimidating.

"Interesting," he finally answered, "I'll look into it. For now, I need to work on getting these forms to clear this hangar pushed through the F.B.S.A."

"This is a hangar?" the android asked, "Underground?"

"The roof there leads to the empty lot behind Randall's apartment. We're trying to get clearance to pop it open at times and fly vehicles like Levi's hover bike or a Chaser Matt rebuilt out."

"I was wondering why we installed tracks into the walls up next to the ceiling... What about the pavement?"

"I'm requisitioning a hard light hologram to place over the plates we install to cover the opening. It should prove interesting."

----------

--Brickstown--

He'd been waiting for almost a half an hour at the Brickstown Green Line station. If this went on much longer, he was going to tell the company that he quit. They were wasting his time.

Finally, a vehicle with dark-tinted windows arrived. The driver exited and the hero almost choked on some of the peanuts he'd been eating.

"It took you long enough," Kip shouted at the driver of the sport utility vehicle after he recovered, "What are you doing here, Eisenherz? Where's Genny?"

Eisenherz was a man his brother had met during a brief, but massive, conflict with invading Praetorians. He was a grimly efficient tanker, normally protected by a suit of magic armor. In this case, however, he was wearing a flak jacket with heavy padding on its front.

"She couldn't make it," the grim blonde man replied, "She was fine yesterday but she said she felt sick this morning."

"Has this been happening a lot?"

"She has infrequent bouts of nausea. The doctors at LaGrange Medical say it might have something to do with her mutant physiology and the stresses her strength has on her body."

"Will she be alright?" Kip asked, his voice registering a real note of concern.

"She should be," Eisenherz replied, his own voice faltering a little to a worried croak, "Look, we need to get started. Get in."

"Why? Just give me your radio frequency and I'll fly."

Eisen shook his head and motioned for Kip to enter the S.U.V. Kip shrugged and got in the passenger side.

"Alright, why are we riding in a jeep?"

"Well, Kipland, what did Genny tell you our job is?"

"She just said Blue Talon works security. She didn't say what kind."

Eisen nodded. He pulled down an alley and brought the vehicle to a stop.

"Blue Talon works security in all aspects in this city. We protect V.I.P.'s, armored trucks, and any other valuables we've been hired to protect. Genny should have given you a handbook..."

Kip shook his head and shrugged.

"...Oh well. You'll catch on fast. The major thing you need to keep in mind is that Blue Talon's working on a reputation for going above and beyond the call of duty. We don't just protect our charge, but all people in the vicinity. We try to preserve public and private property, and if an emergency situation occurs within our vicinity, we assist in any way possible. We're in direct competition with Crey's security forces and they... Well... You might see in today's job."

"What's today's job?" Kip asked, his curiosity slightly piqued.

"We're shadowing an armored car for Family Jewels. They've been getting hit by the Freakshow for the past couple weeks, and none of the jewels have been showing back up on the streets. Cops have a few theories as to what's going on, but..."

"But we can't act on those theories unless there's hard evidence?" Kip asked, "Sounds like we should hope we get hit so we can rip the hard evidence out of them!"

"That's not our job, Kip. Blue Talon doesn't run investigations, we just deal with deflecting assault and robbery. Investigation is meant for cops, P.I.'s, Detectives, and those heroes who take it upon themselves to track down criminal activity."

"We could make it our job!"

"No," Eisenherz's tone indicated he would broach no discussion on the topic, "It's not just me saying this, Kip. The company's head, Mister Jerod Wells, has written the policy in no uncertain terms that we can't run investigations on company time."

Kip glared at the tanker. Eisen turned to him and gave him a knowing smirk.

"You've run investigations on personal time?" Kip asked, "A straight-and-narrow kind of guy like you?"

"A couple times... Like if I came across something that dealt with the Council. I... I really hate them."

"They do something to you?" Kip asked, "They've done a few things to my friends and family, too."

"No... They didn't do anything to me, personally... But... They're the inheritors of resources and philosophies of people my family dealt with back in World War Two, so... I like to hit them any chance I can."

Kip nodded. There was a story the lean man was keeping back, but he knew better than to pry.

The radio crackled and a voice on the other end called for all personnel to "look sharp."

"Alright," Eisen muttered as he put the truck into gear, but kept his foot on the clutch, "Here we go..."

----------

--Cimerora--

"Thank you," Ezekiel said calmly to Julia Pria, "I'm sure these vegetables will prove more nourishing than what I find in my land."

"We appreciate your business and all the help you and your kin provide us in our troubled time," she replied sweetly.

"...Despite the fact that you look like one of the monsters who plague my people," Zeke could hear Geizzer's voice as he walked away from the woman, "I don't mean to be condescending, but I grow weary of people who think they're being deceptive. I can practically taste the fear radiating from that woman, even as we walk away."

"Then I should be happy you didn't voice your concerns," Zeke muttered.

His control with Androm was slipping. The Nictus was learning he didn't need vocal chords to speak and was starting to push out "audible psychic projections" in order to converse. What was worse, their minds were no longer synced up, meaning they each had individual thoughts. That second part had been developing for a while, possibly from the time Androm was "comatose." Zeke still had doubts the energy being had been dormant all that time.

What hadn't changed, however, was Zeke's control over the Nictus energies dwelling within him. Androm sometimes sounded bitter when he said he had no control over what the human did. After conversations with other Kheldians, what few were willing to talk to the gray-haired man once they realized who he'd bonded with, Durj was starting to suspect his control over the power had o do with how Kheldians were supposed to merge.

Usually, the two beings became one. It explained Charlene's behavior as of late, as she took strongly to heroism, but simultaneously struggled to juggle her heroic life with the passions of her family and her career. It never occurred to her that she could let the Kheldian, Sol'ra T'Cha, merge with someone else because for all intents and purposes, Sol'Ra was as much Charlene as Charlene was Sol'Ra.

But it wasn't the same for Zeke and Androm. They thought differently from each other. They believed differently from each other. There had been numerous times where Geizzer had demanded that Zeke simply execute the thugs they ran across instead of arrest them.

"Set an example for the others..." had been his rationale. Zeke had countered that he wasn't Vlad Tepes.

"Hey!" he heard somebody shout, "Are you one of the strange warriors Imperious brought to our land? You dress so strange, but not in the thin, tight clothing..."

He turned and saw one of the local merchants. He was waving excitedly to him.

"Ah! I knew it! You have that dark energy about you!"

"Get ready for screaming..."

The man ran up to Ezekiel and clapped him on the shoulder.

"Come with me, sir! One from your land has a great offer for those with your capabilities!"

The merchant led Zeke down to the beach where a canvas tent had been erected. A man in dark armor wearing a long-horned skull for a helmet was walking away. He seemed to be poking at a burlap bag that clinked with the sounds of coins and other objects.

"Out of my way, Hero," the big man growled as he walked past, "You're lucky I'm in a good mood. Fusion now has materials to further its goals... So I'm willing to allow you time to prepare for your doom!"

Zeke shook his head and walked past the villain. He didn't understand the mindset of many of the Rogue Isles' super-powered denizens. What was stranger, it seemed that whenever they were just close enough to achieving their goals of world domination, something seemed to stop them, whether it was heroic or environmental intervention or internal strife. Sometimes, Arachnos itself would stop the self-styled villains, which made the whole operation of the Isles dubious.

"Zeke!" he heard as he rounded the tent, "Hey man!"

He didn't recognize the big brute and was a little disconcerted that he was recognized. The pale-skinned man was massive, overly-muscled and had large spire-like protrusions poking out of his torso and shoulders. Dark purple circuits coursed through his form, and every so often he saw a glow of energy as it coursed through the channel.

"Power Breaker?" he asked.

"Yeah!" the big man stood, smiled, and reached out to shake Zeke's hand.

He looked better than what Randall had described. After waking in St. Martial, the big man had sent just one message to Randall, detailing his survival and the damage his body had sustained after fighting Dagoeth. Randy had relayed it to him and Kip, and Zeke expected to never see anymore support from the big man.

However, here the brute was, hale and healthy. Despite the pale skin (surprisingly pale, despite the sunlight), Breaker moved easily and seemed comfortable in his own skin. His body was still severely scarred, but the newer ones were fading quickly. The older ones remained as they had been in place before Breaker had gained his powers.

"Thank you," he said as he placed a few coins in the merchant's hand, "An added bonus for bringing a friend to me. Run along, now."

The merchant who'd guided Zeke smiled and walked away happily. The Warshade wondered idly if Power Breaker had even considered the impact such activity might have on history. He shrugged the thought aside, however. It certainly couldn't be the first time such advertising had been employed.

"What the Hell are you?" Androm suddenly shouted at the brute.

"Don't mind that," Zeke said calmly as he took the seat Breaker eventually offered him.

"Don't mind me? Zeke, don't you recognize the energy radiating from his form!?"

"Yes... Power... Uh..."

"Call me 'Ray,'" Breaker replied as he started fishing through the bags next to him, "Heroes call me Ray, Villains call me Power Breaker. Either way, I'm in business."

"What have you been doing?"

Laughing, Power Breaker described the past few months as a drunken haze. Sometimes he was intoxicated, other times he was in so much pain as to be deliriously sick. It was an ongoing stupor as his nanites struggled to repair the damage done to him by the "Godmode" code he'd had them activate to fight Dagoeth.

"Of course, if it hadn't been for the code, I'd have never survived! Dagoeth would have ripped me apart and used my pieces as boxing gloves to fight Statesman and Recluse... I don't think anybody knows how that would have turned out. Well, once my body was restored, I woke up..."

He grunted harshly and grimaced as if he were struggling with a bad memory.

"You've seen Arachnos Spider Mistresses, right?"

"Yes," Zeke replied, unsure if he liked where this was going.

"Well, there's one that has some infamy in the Isles... Her name's Becky, and she... She's a little strange. Well, I woke up tangled up in her legs..."

Zeke blinked at him.

"She seemed happy," Breaker shrugged, "Apparently, as part of my convalescence, I was throwing some wild parties in my apartment. I had Marcones, Frosts, Freaks, some Arachnos troops... I've been going through the pictures. I also have some offers to help set up a new club in St. Martial."

"But now you're here, running a shop," Durj muttered, "Seems counterproductive."

"I don't want to run a night club," Harris sighed, "Besides, I need to replenish my nanites. I can usually find the materials they need in my everyday activities, but there's a crucial element I need that I can't get in regular supply anywhere else..."

He pulled an object from the sack next to him and showed it to Zeke. It was a crystal that was not just black, it drew light into itself, making objects around it seem black and white. It also emitted a faint energy field, one Zeke was intimately familiar with.

"I get it now!" Androm shouted, "You use Shadow Cyst Crystals to energize the nanites that give you powers! Oh... Oh this is delicious!"

"Uh..." Breaker put the crystal shard back into the sack, "I'd expected you to be more upset..."

"Upset? Me? Hell no."

"Why?" Zeke asked, drawing a worried look from Raymond.

"Because it's the ultimate insult. I can picture Requiem and Arakhn running across your friend here, staring in horror as they watch their energies used to power him. Oh, my fellows were certainly remiss in turning a blind eye to the activities of the Crey Corporation. Nictus turn humans into "Night Wolves" and Vamypri, and Crey turns Nictus into weapons. It's a delicious cycle."

"Oh... Kay..." Breaker sat back and smiled, "Well... What I do here is scrabble around for mystical bits and trinkets. I then sell the items to capes and capers for fragments of Cyst crystals... Which I then eat."

"Really?"

To demonstrate, the brute pulled a small gem out of the bag next to his chair and swallowed it whole.

"They're actually kind of tasty. I think my nanites altered my tastebuds."

Androm started laughing, the chuckles trailing off and fading into the background noise as Zeke leaned back and smirked. The Nictus should have been horrified at what they'd just learned. If Crey made Power Breaker once, they could repeat the process. They could use the Nictus as a power source for any number of insidious machines.

However, for now, the information didn't seem to be leaked. What's more, Crey seemed to have forgotten they'd even made Power Breaker. So... For now, they could revel in the moment of providence.

"That's interesting, Raymond," Durj said with a strange sense of calm, " So... What do you have in stock?"

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

--Atlas Park--

Roland lurched into his apartment and crashed on the sofa there. The magic in the fabric massaged and relaxed his sore muscles. He was exhausted from a day of helping renovate his father's base after Ms. Liberty had left. He probably shouldn't have, but the Ryats were doing all of the heavy lifting, and it helped him exercise his muscles again to regain mobility. Whatever it had been that "Lilian Rose" had done to him, it made him feel incredibly sluggish and unresponsive. Slowly, he was regaining control of his body and returning to normal, and it seemed to go faster if he got involved with some kind of labor.

"Dammit, Snuffy," he grumbled into his forearms, "I know..."

His work with his father was suffering because of her pestering. Normally, she would have left him alone. Lately, however, she'd been poking into his mind, asking if he was sure he was feeling okay. When he growled for what had to be the fiftieth time that he was fine, she countered that people who'd been sexually assaulted were never fine. She was already asking psychics who worked as psychologists and psychiatrists (which was apparently a lot of them) what disorders they knew were associated with such an attack when he let out a low growl to get her attention. Slowly, calmly, he informed her of how he had just convinced the woman not to go through with the attack that would surely kill him before his sister and Ms. Liberty for cavalry arrived to save him.

Ms. Liberty...

All of this... His staying in the city, the suffering, torment and assaults he'd suffered... Even the attempt to **** the life out of him... It was all because of his association with her. They wanted to hurt him to hurt her. It was what the Menders had warned him about, it was ludicrously psychotic, and it was working.

He still remembered the shocked look on her face. She'd gone pale at seeing how just being his friend had almost killed him. She probably didn't like that kind of responsibility.

He wasn't like most heroes. He couldn't lift and throw big rocks into the distance, he couldn't shoot energy blasts from his hands, and he couldn't do a lot of the things his compatriots and counterparts throughout the city and across the world could do with ease. There were few heroes as "underpowered" as he was, and they usually found something to supplement their lack of power.

He did, too. Sheldon's gadgets to affix to his arrows, and a few others to protect himself. The inventor made some fantastic devices, and he implemented them with a professional air that almost made Roland forget how absurd the work was. A few of the items were strange, like the inertial dampening leggings that helped him leap long distances (something he still hated to do, as it reminded him too many times what it was like to fall off his roof as a kid), others were simple, like the canister of slippery ooze that ignited about as fast as jet fuel (which had saved his life on a number of occasions, like when he'd been attacked by Dominatrix).

In the end, though, he couldn't count on those things to keep him safe. The interested criminals and terrorists operating out of the Rogue Isles would find a way to take his life if he stayed here.

So...

Why did he really stay?

"That's the ten-million dollar question, right there," he sighed as he rolled to his back and stared at the ceiling, "Why am I putting myself through this?"

He didn't think about it before. He had a chance to do it right now. Or, he would have if there weren't a knock at the door.

"Hang on!" he grunted, "I'll be right there..."

He reluctantly pulled himself from the sofa and felt the magic slowly slide off his body. It was a strange enchantment, one that made it more comfortable than any piece of furniture had a right to be. It was the only bit of magic he really liked, too. Why couldn't more of it be simple things like that?

Opening the door, he was greeted by the warm, smiling face of Jessica Duncan. She was in a simple outfit of a black rain jacket, a light blue shirt with a cartoonish cat face on it and a pair of blue denim pants. She held a large box under her arm that Roland recognized as a garment box.

"Hi," he said, a hint of confusion tingeing his voice, "What's up?"

"I thought of a way to make things up to you!" she chirped, "Let me in!"

"Alright, alright," he stepped back and gestured for her to enter, "I was just thinking about... This... Situation..."

Ms. Liberty looked at him with a wry glance.

"You sounded confused there..."

"I was just searching for the right words," he growled, "I didn't... I didn't mean..."

"It's okay, you big goof!" she jabbed him lightly in the arm with her free hand, "You been sleeping?"

"I was resting before you got here. I was working all day."

"You shouldn't be doing that," Jessica set the box on the couch and started opening it, "I thought the doctors said you needed rest. Wait until you see what I got from Icon for-!"

"I don't need rest, I need to get back in working condition. I just... I don't know why, I just-..."

Jessica held up a strange-looking outfit. It was a suit, to be sure, and it was one sized for him. It was like a tuxedo, though it still retained the simple capabilities of a business blazer. The white dress shirt was a pleated thing, which was obviously designed to make the wearer appear slimmer than he really was. The real draw for the eyes, however, was the strange hem on the object in her other hand.

"Um..." he intoned, his mind drawing a blank at what looked like a blanket, "A cloak?"

"Yeah!" she squeaked happily, "It's that new style that's been cropping up here and there, the high collar one! I thought you might like this tribal design... It's fancy and subdued at the same time!"

He noticed the cloak's interior was white as a contrast to the rest of the outfit's black. At least it wasn't colored bright sky blue or orange sherbet.

"Well... Is this for me?"

"Of course!" she started laughing as she set the clothes back in the box, "I can't wear something this big and be taken seriously at the banquet this Friday..."

"What?"

"The banquet... It's a big event to celebrate five years since the end of the first Rikti War and the influx of heroes into the city. Apex is going to be getting a medal for his efforts in helping bring down Requiem early in his career."

"Oh. So he's your date?"

Jessica turned and fixed Roland with a look that chilled him.

"No..." she said quietly, "Try again..."

"I'd rather not," he replied and scratched the back of his head, "My mind goes to dark places lately..."

"I'll give you a hint," she smirked, pulled a wide-brimmed hat out from under the cloak and folded her arms over her chest, "He's the only guy in this room, right now..."

Roland blinked and shrugged.

"Why?"

"Because," Jessica walked up to him and playfully placed the hat on top of his head, "I think it will be good for you."

----------

--Brickstown--

Most of the patrol went uneventfully. Eisen had merged his SUV seamlessly behind the armored truck after it passed the alley. Kip looked through the sunroof to see a black and blue uniformed hero fly over a building and disappear. It was likely he wasn't going to lend support if they ran into trouble as he'd just reached the end of his leg of the patrol.

"It keeps us rested and alert," Eisen explained as he pulled the SUV behind a red sports sedan, "We don't strain ourselves to cover each inch of the situation, but we overlap our legs so that the objective is always covered."

"Good tactic," Kip replied, "Prudent."

"A chief virtue of the organization," the tall man agreed.

The truck was making stops at each of the Family Jewels stores throughout the city. Despite traversing dangerous territory where the Council liked to strike their poses and the Freaks liked to show off the latest gadgets they'd grafted to their bodies, they saw little in the way of resistance. Eisenherz never let the truck get too far away from him, and when the vehicle stopped at a store, he pulled around the corner and took a few laps around the block.

At one point, he parked the car and he and Kip got lunch. While sitting and eating while the tanker watched the store across the street, they continued to discuss the company.

"We try to be sensible and avoid reaching beyond our grasp," Gordon began, "In the first year of the organization, shortly before the first Rikti War, the boss, former Army Colonel Emanuel Horrigan, had thought meta humans could do almost anything. While they can, his thinking was seriously flawed. Our capabilities come from numerous sources, sources we don't fully understand when we first start leaping tall buildings or throwing fire. Quite a few lower-power heroes lost their lives engaging things that... That... They simply were too overwhelming. Bank robberies, criminal plots... The meta humans he'd hired before were all low-ranked, uncontrolled malcontents who wanted so desperately to prove themselves and they just got manhandled by the Fifth Column and the Tsoo... That's why we don't run our own investigations, Kip. Horrigan's scared of another year of blood."

"He must have seen some success," the scrapper retorted, "I mean, it's not like his company's floundering. You've got snazzy uniforms, a base of operations in Talos Island, and if I'm not mistaken, this is an armored SUV... With a Hemi V-8!"

"Heh," Eisen smiled briefly and took a bite of his burger, "Yeah. While many died, a few survived. We call them the Black Talons. If a Black Talon gets called into a situation, be prepared to see some fireworks. Those guys don't mess around."

"You're not a Black Talon?" Kip arched an eyebrow and regarded the grim tanker, "You know a lot about the company..."

"It's in the handbook," Eisen shook his head again, "I'm trying to explain the mentality of the company, Kip. I know you. You're a hothead. You'll pursue the criminals we run across. I see you when you glare at the Freaks. I hear you curse under your breath as we pass the Council soldiers. I'd like to run their groups over, too, but I can't."

"You really hate the Council... Why?"

"That's a personal question. I won't answer that. Now... In order to avoid reprisals, or excessive reprisals, we just deflect attacks on our charges or we help the overtaxed police department in evacuating civilians from danger areas. We rarely, if ever, engage major super-powered criminals. Most of our ranks are just rifle or shotgun-toting guards, and the meta humans are often spread too thin to provide a decent fight. The only reason you're here with me is so I can instruct you."

"But you patrol with Genevieve," Kip pointed at Eisen, "What's your story there?"

"Genny... Her powers are... Erratic..."

"You're not telling me something..." Kip blinked, "Is something wrong with her?"

"Another personal question... One I don't feel I should answer, even if I wanted to. You want to know more, you talk to her about it when our patrol is done."

Kip nodded and sipped from his soda. Eisenherz finished his burger and crumpled the paper he'd received it in into a tight little ball. When he finished his soda in one long slurp, he opened the lid on the top and tossed the paper ball inside the cup. Kip arched an eyebrow at that, but continued to eat at a leisurely pace.

"Hurry up," Gordon growled, "We need to be ready to move when they roll out."

"When does our shift end?" Kip asked before stuffing the last bits of the burger into his mouth and standing to put his tray away, "Ah mihn, ish nod lige woor in-con-spishoush..."

"What?" the tanker asked as they made their way back to the vehicle.

"Somebody has to have noticed use driving around with the truck by now," Kip explained after swallowing the last of his food, "I mean, it's a pretty normal-looking SUV, but after a while, the bad guys will realize it's always around when they want to pull the heist."

"I think you give our enemies too much credit. We're talking about people who still take potshots at heroes that have just days prior beaten them into bloody pulp. Hell, even Dreck still shouts in this city through loudspeakers that he can beat up Statesman. They're boastful, loud, and lacking a lot of cognitive capabilities."

"Makes you wonder about the effectiveness of our work," Kip shook his head sadly as he entered the vehicle, "They may be dumb as rocks, but they seem more than capable of bumping their way back out of the Zig."

"It's not the Zig they escape from," Eisen strapped on his seatbelt before he even shut his door, "It's the precincts."

They rejoined the armored truck and Gordon explained their last stop would be next to the Green Line. There was one more store to stop at and then they would meet the next patroller. The overlap was extended to the Green Line because the truck would be laden with diamonds, precious gems and other jewels. Eisen also explained that a few meta human law enforcers and even a P.P.D. unit of Powered Armor Cops were on standby.

Unfortunately, the Freakshow had anticipated something like that. There was a flash and an explosion burst from the side of the armored truck. Eisen didn't speed up, instead bringing his SUV to a screeching halt like the other civilian vehicles. Kip glared at him, but Eisen paid no heed as he made sure his shield was properly secured.

"Brace yourself," Eisen grunted as cybernetic Freaks ran for the immobilized truck, "But not too hard. You need some give for the impact..."

"I thought seatbelts were supposed to take care of that..."

"They help immensely, but you don't want to just let your body snap around..."

"You sound like you're expecting to crash," Kip made sure his seatbelt was securely fastened.

"Expect, no..." Eisen glared at the five Freakshow Tanks that were trundling to the fight as the smaller ones raked their claws into the armored truck's plating, "Plan on it."

With that, he revved the engine and threw the vehicle into gear. Tires squealing, he tore the Security SUV down the street and aimed for the center of the massive armored cyborgs.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

The Freaks turned at the sound of squealing tires and a loud, roaring, high-octane engine. A few fired shotgun blasts and threw saw blades at the approaching machine. They were dumbstruck when the windshield merely spiderwebbed and the blades spanged off the sides. The Tanks launched another grenade volley, causing the vehicle to hop in the air slightly before colliding with them.

Before the Freaks could recover, the driver and passenger doors opened and the two meta human enforcers leaped out. Eisen moved first to the nearest Tank and kicked it in the face. He then went back to the SUV to get his heavy riot shield from the back seat.

Kip, in the meantime, was actually drawing the larger crowd. He didn't focus on just one enemy, but instead threw himself at each and every Freak he could. A punch here, a kick there, and a leg sweep to cut down five that got too close. They hacked and slashed at him, but an energy field around his body would absorb the impact. All they were doing was making the young scrapper angry.

Some of the freaks weren't concentrating on the fight. Instead, they were yanking on the doors of the armored truck, trying to pry it open and get at the jewels inside. They were succeeding, for their robotic limbs never tired, and their bodies were amped up on Excelsior.

Eisen smashed one of the Freaks aside with a backhanded smash of his shield and kicked the Tank he'd attacked earlier in the head again. He then pulled a shotgun from his shoulder and blasted a small cluster. When they turned to him, he charged with his shield, crashing into the group and toppling them over.

As they Freaks struggled to stand, Eisen slid the shotgun back onto its shoulder harness. He then reached to his belt and drew his nightstick. When the first got near, he swung hard and smashed the maniac's jaw. The next raked its massive scythe blade claw against his shield and Gordon spun about to catch him with a backhand strike to the temple.

One Freak hurtled through the air and collided with two that were next to blonde man. Eisen glanced and saw Kip bringing his leg back down from the hard side kick that must have sent the Freak flying. He then hopped up, spun around, and K.O.'d a Slammer with a dropkick.

Kip turned his attention to the Freaks on the truck after that. Hopping in the air, he crashed his knees into the back of one yanking on the driver's side door. The lightly-cybered man dropped with a scream and collapsed to the pavement, whining about his back. The driver of the truck looked to the scrapper in shock, but the young man merely nodded and moved to delivering a back elbow to another Freak that got too close.

At this point, the Tanks were pushing the SUV off of themselves. One looked up in time to see the edge of Eisen's shield come crashing into his face. The other two were able to get up, and lob a pair of grenades at the tanker, but the projectiles bounced back at them as he knelt into the shield and drew the shotgun again.

He placed the pump of the weapon against the edge of the shield and pushed hard, racking a new round into the chamber. A sawblade struck the shield and Eisen peered around the edge to ensure he would be firing on the tankers as he squeezed the trigger.

The blast sprayed buckshot across the Freaks and they stumbled. One tanker spat some of the shot out of his damaged mouth and started muttering curses about how he'd be tasting that for a week. They didn't notice Kip running up behind them.

In another three minutes, the fight was over. The two meta humans relaxed on the wreckage of Eisen's SUV as police drones moved in to sweep up the unconscious bodies. Shortly, the members of the truck's crew would be explaining to the police what had happened before the police came to talk with the "heroes."

"Nicely done, Kip," Eisen breathed, "This... This is what we do."

"[Butt]-kicking as a profession," Kip chuckled, "I should've gotten in on this a long time ago."

"You going to ask any of these goons what they intended to do with the jewelry?"

"Gold for conductive materials, gems for... Whatever. I guess they could be trying to make a ray gun, but... Hell, there are more legitimate means of getting one. They're probably just hoarding the damn things until they can find somebody interested in them."

"Well, they've been at this for a while. Maybe it's just the flavor of the month in terms of capers."

A group of Blue Talon officers approached and greeted Eisen. One in a cape looked over to Kip and nodded his head at him.

"Kipland Durj," Eisen explained, "Meet Captain Grindstone."

"Stone Tanker?" Kip asked.

"Yes," the helmeted man replied, "So, you're the new guy who wanted to just jump into the action..."

"Didn't want to. Had to. Unlike in the comic books, I'm not a millionaire playboy or provided for by a space dad. I have to work for money, and I don't have time to have a job that's 'inconspicuous.' I need to keep my skills sharp."

"Then you'll probably fit in well with us. Hell of a first day for him, Eisen."

"Kip's an established vigilante," the tanker replied calmly, "He's not some tike off the street who found out a week ago he could lift rocks with his mind. He knows how to fight and he's even faced the likes of Nosferatu and Nemesis personally."

"Is that so?" Grindstone turned to Kip with marked interest at that, "Oh wait... I remember now, you were in the tabloids because you were dating Mynx..."

"I never dated Mynx," Kip narrowed his eyes at the man, "It was a plot from some idiots in Crey to seed a clone into the Vindicators... I happened to be available material for them to use at the time."

"How do we know you're not a clone?"

"Because they killed every clone they made of me during their 'stress tests.' I can take a bullet to the forehead. They couldn't. They ran their plot with me because I really wasn't that important to the equation... I was just supposed to be there to explain why Mynx had been missing for a little over a week."

"Alright, alright," the blue-and-black armored man raised his hand in an amused apologetic gesture, "I didn't mean to sir up bad memories..."

"I don't like my stories with the big players. So many 'heroes' and meta humans want to work with them, thinking it'll be some big, epic adventure, but we're usually left sitting on the sidelines, watching them beat the snot out of everything else and shine in the spotlight that's blinding us. Everybody thinks their time with those heroes was special, but do you think they remember us? I wonder if Statesman even hangs out with whoever it was that pulled him back from Praetorian Earth..."

"Okay, okay, you made your point. You're experienced and you've got a chip on your shoulder..."

"Everybody's got a chip on their shoulder. I just happen to have a lot of chips."

Kip smirked, and Grindstone started chuckling as he realized this wasn't about to be a big ordeal.

"Okay... Well, here come the police. Was this a standard smash-and-grab attempt?"

"Looks like," Eisenherz replied, "Standard loadout for the Freaks, they brought in a few more Tanks this time, but I think that's because they've been getting tired trying to pry these trucks open."

"Well, I guess once the field reports are taken care of, you two can call it a day and head back to H.Q. Continue the training there."

"Yes, sir," Eisen gave a casual salute and Grindstone grunted a little, "That's all you're getting out of me."

As the blue-on-black uniformed troops walked away, Kip turned to Eisenherz. He was smirking at the man.

"You got some bad blood with him?"

"Grindstone's the kind of guy who gets promotions through being a buttkisser. He's normally a good guy, but he's in charge of a squad long before he has any right to be. He needs more field experience, more understanding of the tactics involved... He's a decent enough Tanker, but he's used to being on his own. He doesn't know how to tell people what to do and at the same time demands everybody shows him 'due and proper respect owed him.'"

"Heh. Cedric says guys like that didn't last long in the field in the Marines... That's why they stayed in the rear."

Eisen nodded. A few minutes later, the two of them reported to the police what had happened. Once the reports were filed, they acquired insurance information from the police so Eisen could give proper codes to his company to pay for a replacement vehicle. They then made their way toward the Green Line to continue their journey to Founders' Falls.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

"Relax, Roland, you look fine," his mother said softly as she straightened his collar, "In fact, you look downright handsome."

"Thanks, mom," the large young man replied in a low rumble, "I know I look alright, that's not what's bothering me. I just... I don't know how to behave at a function like this."

"Well, I've been to my share of banquets, and so long as you don't make a drunken buffoon of yourself, you should do fine. Tell a joke or two..."

Charlene's eyes widened for a moment, then she gave a narrow glare to her son.

"...Not your father's jokes!"

"Aw, ma, but he just got done hammering that 'Magician in the Bar' one in my head. Plus there's the 'Three Tough Mice' joke that James keeps repeating..."

"Don't tell them. Just don't."

Charlene pinched her son's cheek and smirked. She wasn't about to tell him how she was hoping the night would go.

"Perhaps your son will establish a relationship with the young lady," Sol'Ra whispered in the back of her mind, "He's a nice man. He deserves a nice young lady."

"While I agree, Sol," the young-bodied woman sighed, "I'm afraid he either feels he's not good enough for her or she's way out of his league. But, who knows? Strange things happen in this city."

Roland quirked an eyebrow at his mother. He'd figured it out a while ago that when her pupils got that white glow in them, she was discussing things with her Kheldian half. Sol'Ra usually let Charlene run her own life, but since Angel had been born, she'd gotten more "chatty."

"You two talking about me?" he asked.

"Of course," his mother chuckled, then abruptly changed the subject, "Oh! You need a tie!"

She rushed into the room she and her husband had been sharing since her rescue. Roland could hear the sound of drawers opening and closing as his mother frantically searched for something he could wear around his neck.

"There's a black bow tie in the bag there," he murmured as he motioned to the plastic the suit had come in.

"No, no, that won't suit you at all... AH! Here it is!"

Charlene returned with a bolo tie and held it up for her son to see in the light. On the golden face of it was a smiling skull. Despite the object's peculiar appearance, Roland could already tell it wasn't enchanted.

"You and your skulls, ma," he chuckled, "What is it with you and bones?"

"I just like them," she chirped and went to loop the tie over her son's head, "Okay, bend down a little... There! Now we tighten this here and... Done!"

"Well, that's a lot easier than having to tie it," Roland said as he looked down at it, "Let's see me in the mirror..."

It was certainly an odd appearance for a dress suit. Broad-brimmed hat, a thick cloak that hung over his shoulders and hugged him inside a cream-colored liner, and the suit was crisp despite his size.

"This had to have been very expensive," he said quietly, "And probably came from Carson. Sarah says he likes to make more... Exuberant outfits..."

"Well, I think it looks nice."

Charlene held her son by the shoulders and turned him so she could get a look at him. When she looked into his eyes, he saw tears that were barely being held back.

"I'm so proud of the young man you've become."

"Thank you," he gave her a hug, "Love ya, Mom."

"I love you, too, honey."

----------

No matter how many times it happened, he still wasn't comfortable in a limousine. It was such an unnecessary-seeming vehicle, like its only purpose was to show off how rich the occupant was. Or at least produce an illusion of wealth. Jessica patted his wrist and laughed lightly when he mentioned his concern.

"I still think I'd have preferred meeting you there," he said softly, "There are going to be cameras. The whole paparazzi thing is going to start up again."

"Oh, so what? You're a quiet guy. They'll get tired of you soon enough."

She gave his arm a hug and rested her head on his shoulder. He looked to her and felt a strange twinge in his chest. She sighed and for a moment, he was wishing the ride wouldn't end.

The camera flashes got him right in the eye as he exited the vehicle. Grumbling curses to himself under his breath, he helped Jessica out the door while she gave him a wry grin that was both admonishing and amused at the same time. Looping their arms together, they strode purposefully to the doors behind Back Alley Brawler and his wife.

Inside, the Sinclair Mansion was entirely different from how he remembered it. Before, the building's interior seemed to have just been filled with expensive stuff to show off Manticore's vast wealth. Now, it was filled with expensive stuff to cater to the guests. Men and women clad in tuxedos and dresses wandered about and looked in awe at the various doodads and goo-gaws, but Roland gave a cursory glance to the long silk scarves and tapestries placed about and hummed in appreciation.

"It looks nice," was all he said when Jessica looked to him.

"Justin can be a good man," she said, "He doesn't do anything without a purpose behind it."

"I guess he's trying to avoid a combative atmosphere this time," Grey pointed to the ornate staircase that curved to the upper balcony, "There used to be two suits of armor flanking those steps. Now it's a pair of 'oriental' vases filled with orchids."

"That's an interesting observation," a voice said warmly behind them, "You think there was some kind of intent behind the decor?"

They turned and regarded Manticore. No matter how many times he saw it, Roland still thought that seeing the man in a tuxedo or official suit while still wearing the red "maned" mask looked ridiculous. He couldn't just wear a red domino mask or something? Why did it matter if nobody recognized him when he was supposed to be a civilian?

"When you have the money for it, there's always intent behind the decor, Mister Sinclair," he said as he extended his hand to shake while Jessica, oddly, curtsied.

After a bit of a double take from the gentlemen, she laughed warmly. She straightened and folded her arms over her chest as she gave them an amused grin.

"I guess sometimes you need to prove those charm lessons your mother got you haven't gone to waste," Justin remarked, "I suppose the question is who you're trying to charm. You do remember I'm married, right?"

"Oh, God, Justin... I wouldn't dream of it."

"Then I suppose it was for your friend here..."

Roland growled in the back of his throat. This caused the other two to laugh uproariously. Well, it was uproarious for the setting.

"Easy there," Grey grunted, "You don't want to blow a gasket."

Manticore finished off his laughter lightly and clapped the young man on the shoulder. He took the two on a short tour of the banquet hall and the dance floor. Each room was illuminated by massive crystal chandeliers and everything was wrapped in white and gold silk. The plates were silver-rimmed, bright white ceramic and the silverware itself was actual silver. The tables were huge, stretching from one end of the fifty-foot-long dining room almost to the other, and made from finely polished mahogany.

The dance hall was surprisingly spartan. A large grand piano sat in the corner, and as Manticore showed it to them, Roland noted it had a plate on it that indicated it was made in 1890. He regarded the strange coloration of the keys and realized they were probably ivory. The wood was polished black walnut.

"After dinner, the band will set up in here and we'll be able to cut loose," Manticore continued as he guided them along, "They'll set up over there and I'll be at the piano."

"I didn't know you could play," Jessica almost gasped.

"You'd be surprised how relaxing it can be."

----------

The rest of the evening was like a blur. A slow blur. Roland followed Jessica quietly from group to group as she chatted with various heroes and heroines who had distinguished themselves in various ways throughout the city. Many stared at him. Some, mostly men but also some women, scowled. They tried to hide their contempt for this "nobody" at the side of the object of their desires, but their facial ticks, lowered tones and stuttered phrases easily betrayed their discontent.

"I don't like this," he murmured to Ms. Duncan as they approached a young man whose only trait revealing his capabilities as a hero was a metal right hand instead of a flesh one, "I can feel them burning holes into the back of my neck."

"If you would talk more, they could get to know you better. Hi Blue!"

"Jess-er..." the young man stopped himself but she gave him a sideways look and he smiled before grasping her hand with his flesh one and giving the back of it a light kiss and continuing, "Jessica."

"I see you and Bluette are enjoying yourselves."

"Well, she certainly appreciates how fancy everything is. She never thought for once she would get to see the inside of Manticore's mansion."

"Blue, this is Roland. Roland... Blue Battler and his... Friend, Blue Battlette."

"Hello," Roland reached out to shake his hand and the other hero reached to him with the metal one, "Pleased to meet you."

"The feeling's mutual," the hero replied with a strange note in his voice.

Sadness Roland thought. Not contempt, not regret. He's another who has feelings for Jessica, but he doesn't seem to be angry with me about her decision for tonight.

"Roland has been something of a confidant for a couple years now," she explained, "Somebody outside my normal purview who could help me get a new perspective on things. He had some trouble recently and I wanted to show him I'm here for him, too."

Something seemed off about how she said it. Roland nodded, but he looked slightly askance at her.

Is she lying? Why?

"What's your heroic identity?" the young woman next to Blue, "Blue Battlette" Ms. Liberty had called her, chirped at Roland suddenly, "Are you a tanker?"

"No. I don't have any powers. A buddy of mine makes arrows that do stuff and I basically bow hunt. No weird names, either. It's Roland. Just Roland."

"Really? Aren't you afraid of somebody coming after you?"

"It's my understanding that they find us even if we're wearing masks," Grey replied with a sigh, "I hate to think of how many people I've seen shot out of the sky with a Sapper."

"Oh my Lord, I hate those weapons..." Blue agrees, "And the Group that uses them..."

"I've heard of them," Jessica rubs her belly unconsciously, "I heard... I heard they made the weapon that those villains used to... To..."

Blue's fist glowed suddenly and a low growl escaped his throat. They all knew what she was talking about. They also knew how she'd spent weeks in a coma in the aftermath. Fortunately, the defeat of the Phalanx by the group of villains who perpetrated the crime didn't crush the heroic populace like Recluse had expected. It bolstered them, and a small army of caped crusaders were all too eager to help Statesman raid the Rogue Isles shortly afterward.

But she'd still been hurt. Roland had only seen her briefly during her recuperation, offering a gentle hug and a few heartfelt words. He wondered if she'd spoken with Blue Battler, too. He felt that twinge in his chest again and wondered why his skin suddenly felt like it was on fire.

"Come on," Blue almost shouted to break the sudden gloom permeating the conversation, "People are checking out the mansion. Bluette and I were about to see the garden. I hear Sister Psyche had it filled with fireflies."

----------

After a couple hours of general conversing and exploring the different aspects of the decorated mansion, Citadel announced that they would be holding the awards ceremony in the dining hall. The heroes filed in and started taking the seats they'd reserved before arriving.

With a start, Roland realized he didn't know where he would be sitting. Jessica seemed sure of herself, however, and led him to the far end of the room from the dance hall.

The head of the dining room was dominated by a large oak table. There were a large number of seats behind it, and Roland realized it was where the Phalanx and their guests would sit. What he failed to realize was that Jessica was leading him to it, too.

"Uh..." he whispered, "Are you sure I should be here? I think I'm supposed to sit somewhere else..."

Grinning, Jessica pointed to a card resting on a plate. One word was written on it in cursive: "Grey."

"That could be for Lady Grey..."

"Just sit down, you big goof," Ms. Liberty chuckled as she went to take her seat.

Remembering just in time, Roland pulled her seat out for her and helped her get situated before taking his own seat. A hand clapped his shoulder and he turned to look into the blue eyes of Marcus Cole who gave him an approving nod.

"And here I thought good manners were going extinct," the powerful man said quietly, "Have you been enjoying yourself tonight?"

"I feel quite a bit out of my element, sir," Grey replied evenly, "But, yes. It has been a pleasant night."

"Good, good..." Statesman leaned in close to his granddaughter and whispered something in her ear before taking his place at the center of the table.

Roland settled into his chair at the end of the table and tried not to look at the rest of the seated heroes and heroines. He could feel their stares and he didn't like it. They were trying to place him, figure out who he was and what he did to get a seat at the head table. His name wasn't in the paper, his face wasn't on the television.

It was a relief when the ceremony finally began. The floorboards creaked as a large man approached the center of the table where a podium had been erected and a trophy had been placed.

The speech about Apex and his accomplishments was recounted by the Back Alley Brawler. He talked about his time meeting the man who just seemed to naturally defy the standards and pushed through to excel, despite being a dimwit. That bit about being a dimwit was actually in the speech. It got a chuckle.

However, Apex's heart was always in the right place, and no matter what happened, he was there for his friends, the city, and justice. He had accomplished much since helping defeat Requiem and losing two of his earliest friends in his career. According to the Brawler, it was a shame he was being recognized so long afterward.

When the hero accepted the award, Roland didn't see a braggart or a buffoon like the audience had laughed about. Apex seemed slightly haunted. His eyes were misted with tears as the memory of what had happened to War Witch and Horus was recounted as a passing occurrence. He shook the Brawler's hand and the big man drew him in for a quick hug before handing him the award, which was a gold-framed crystal with a plaque declaring Hernando "Apex" Barrera a True Hero.

The man gave a simple speech afterward in which he thanked the Brawler for all of his help and the various heroes he'd worked with throughout his career. He thanked his fallen friends as well and explained that his memory of them and the wisdom they'd imparted was a further driving force behind his continuing adventures. He thanked the Phalanx for their support and he thanked the rest of the heroes who'd been invited to the prestigious event for their work at helping protect the city. In a rare stroke, he also thanked the heroes who weren't at the event, for whatever reason, and explained that his award was as much for them as it was him.

"We're all true heroes," he explained, "Our moments to shine just might not be as apparent as others. Thank you all, and I hope to meet you in the streets, protecting this city and its citizens from the horrors that foolishly think they can afflict them while we're around."

Roland applauded along with the rest of the heroes and heroines and he did it with enthusiasm. Apex was exactly the sort of hero Kipland had been talking about. He'd helped defend the city from the criminals plaguing it at the edge of public perception. He'd battled the worst the city could throw at a hero and almost nobody had known he was there.

If it weren't for the Brawler, he probably never would have received this award. He probably would have faded into complete and utter obscurity. Who would have known his story? Who would have cared?

"Who gives a damn about those of us on the frontier?" he asked aloud and Jessica turned back to him.

"What was that?" she asked before taking a sip of wine.

"Nothing, just musing about something Kip told me," he replied, "It's nice that one of the virtually unknowns is getting recognized. I'm glad he was so gracious about it."

"Apex has a good heart, a strong soul," Ms. Liberty sighed, "If he weren't so obsessed with his quest about that sword he has... I probably would have been his date tonight."

"You told me Mister White introduced you two."

"We had a good time, but he's still troubled by what happened to War Witch. I told him he could talk to her in Croatoa and Pocket D, but... He said it wasn't the same."

"I suppose it wouldn't be. So... What's being served?"

"A few different things. Roast beef, turkey, ham... I think there's a wonderful clam bisque and a Caesar's salad... You know, standard fare."

"I don't know what's standard fare for a banquet like this," Grey sighed then took a sip of his wine, "Hm."

Jessica patted his shoulder and gave him a warm smile. He smiled back and gave her hand a gentle squeeze. His chest twinged again. He knew what it was and he turned back to his empty plate to stop looking at her.

He had a bad feeling he was going to hate this night despite how in love he felt.

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

The rest of the banquet went by like a blur for Roland. He remembered enjoying the light meal he consumed, and dancing with Jessica. He remembered getting lost in her eyes.

Why did he suddenly feel like this? He'd been able to keep his thoughts of her so neutral for so long... No he hadn't. He'd made so many decisions in his life in recent years that put one reason ahead of all others, including ones that made more sense: her. He wanted to be close to her.

Why was he only realizing this now?

He noticed Malaise looking at him with a peculiar grin on his face. Roland narrowed his eyes at the strange psychic and the questionable hero shrugged dismissively.

If the self-styled artist thought something would come of this night, he was sorely mistaken. While Roland may have just opened his eyes to how he really felt about the girl he'd considered a friend, despite all odds to the contrary, he held no illusions or delusions that anything would come of it. Jessica had an active social and professional life outside his purview. Sometimes, especially on nights like this, he felt like the reason she tried to involve him in her life was more of a courtesy to make up for all the times his life had been in danger just for being her friend.

"I think it's time we go," she murmured suddenly when they finished a dance in the ball room, "I feel... I feel a little tipsy."

"You think you might make a scene?" he asked as he cleared his attention and looked to see how her own eyes were starting to droop, "Or pass out?"

"Yeah... I... I can go... You can stay if you-"

"I don't know anybody here," Roland interrupted, "I think I would rather just go home, too."

Jessica nodded and guided him to say her goodbyes to her family and friends. Her mother gazed at Roland for a few moments before finally reciprocating. Statesman, however, pulled Roland aside after the farewell.

"I trust you'll remain a gentleman with my granddaughter," he murmured, "She deserves the very best."

"I know my place in all of this, sir," Grey replied quietly, "I'll be sure she arrives home safely, then take my leave."

Marcus looked at the young man with an appreciative nod. Ms. Liberty pulled Roland away with an admonishing glance to her grandfather but didn't say anything.

They left the banquet and Jessica asked Roland if he'd had a good time. He had, and he was glad to have been there. He mentioned that it helped him put some things in perspective, though he didn't mention what. She replied that something similar had happened to her, but didn't elaborate.

Roland assumed she chose to find someone else to be with. It made sense to him, he was just some hanyak she'd met at random... Perhaps the whole point of this banquet was to say goodbye.

"I'll handle it with class," he thought to himself, "No point in getting upset... I knew it would be this way. I knew it would end, and she would try her best to spare my feelings. God... If only it had been yesterday or something... If only I didn't... If only I didn't feel this way..."

The limousine glided through the streets of Atlas Park, taking a more scenic path through the city than Roland would have taken. They could have dropped him off at his apartment, but he told Jessica... Megan... He started thinking of her by her more public civilian name... Better to start distancing himself now. In any case, he told her it would be best if he made sure she made it home safely.

"You're such a gentleman," she whispered dreamily as she rested her head on his shoulder.

She was half asleep when the limousine pulled up to her home. Roland gently nudged her and she asked if he was going to walk her to the door. It sounded like she was joking, but he agreed to and she smiled.

"I'll miss seeing that smile."

He got out of the limousine and walked around to her side to help her out. Jessica spoke to the driver for a few moments before finally exiting.

"I wanted to thank him for doing such a good job driving us through the city and letting us have our peace," she explained, "It was nice... It was nice being able to talk to you, Roland."

"We've talked often," he replied as he extended his arm for her to grasp.

Giggling, she did and leaned against him as they paced up the paved walkway to her house. She seemed to be breathing heavier as they reached the door. The light clicked on as they stepped onto the porch and she loosed her arm from around his. Turning him around, she gazed into his eyes and sighed.

"You look so handsome," Jessica's voice cracked and he noticed she had some tears in her eyes, "God, Roland, I'm so sorry about what's happened to you..."

"It's not your fault," he replied, hoping his voice sounded even, "You don't... You don't have to feel like you need to make anything up to me."

"Oh... When I saw you... On the floor of your apartment... And she was... She was... All I could think was 'Oh my God, I almost lost him!'"

"It's okay... It's okay."

He rested his hands on her shoulders to calm her. He didn't expect her to reach up and pull his face to hers. Their lips met and he felt his heart explode.

He didn't know how long they stayed in that position. It felt like forever, but could have been just a few seconds. What drew his attention away, however, was the limousine doors closing.

Breaking the embrace, and somewhat lightheaded by a flood of emotions, Roland looked to the car and saw the driver getting in the driver's seat. A moment later, he was driving away.

"...What?" he whispered, "Where... Where is he going? What's... What's going... What's going on?"

"Roland," Jessica said as she caressed his face and turned him back to her, "I told him to leave after I kissed you."

((Yes, yes, I know. I'm not going to explain anything here, though... Just know... It doesn't end like this.))

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

The next thing Grey knew, he was cuddling Jessica on her couch. They'd been talking, but he couldn't remember a word that was said. When he said so, she giggled and gave him another kiss, which again sent his mind into a tailspin.

"I don't get it," he whispered when his head finally cleared, "I mean... Why?"

"I'm tired of being alone," Jessica said just as quietly, "I'm tired of being afraid to open myself up... I'm tired of watching those who could get close to me being torn away before... Before I know how I feel... Roland. I knew... I knew when I saw you on the floor, unable to move... I didn't want to lose you."

She held him a little longer and they sat in silence. He ran his fingers through her hair, he couldn't believe how soft it felt. Was it really this simple? Could he be this fortunate?

Roland had told his friends and family that he didn't feel like getting involved with relationships until he was twenty eight. He had figured that a perfectly rational, logical age to start looking for somebody who would take their relationship as seriously as he would.

What he didn't tell them was the massive doubt he had about finding anybody even then. He was so certain that his demeanor would put off anybody who met him. He always figured that his stoicism and quiet nature would keep him from ever even getting the chance to talk to somebody.

How did a chance meeting turn into this? How were they able to turn a momentary squabble into... Into...

"I'm having trouble believing this is real," he finally said, "I mean... You said... You said you were feeling... Tipsy... Are you sure you're thinking clearly?"

"I've been struggling with this for the past week... I didn't know how I could have ignored you for so long... I didn't know how to tell you how I felt..."

"So you decided to dress me up really fancy and see how I dealt with your world?"

"It's not my world," she replied with a light smile, "But it's a part of it. I want you to be a part of it, too."

Roland nodded at that and gave her a hug, which she reciprocated. When they eased the embrace, they gazed into each others' eyes and kissed again.

"Let's... Let's go to bed..." Jessica sighed as they broke the embrace.

"I... To sleep, right?" Roland asked, "I don't know if... I don't think I'm ready for..."

She pressed her finger against his lips and leaned in close to kiss him on the forehead. He hugged her and they stood to go to her room.

"You remember the way, right?"

"Just close my eyes and wait for Manticore to hijack me in my boxers so I wake up lying under you..."

She giggled as they walked up the stairs. When they reached the door, she turned and leaned against the frame to look at him more seriously.

"I won't do anything if you're not ready," she said quietly, "It's been a long time for me, Roland, but... I can understand if you're not ready. I just... I hope you don't mind cuddling."

"I don't mind that," Grey replied and they entered the bedchamber.

Curled up on the mattress together, Roland listened to her breathing turn even as she drifted off to sleep. He was so happy, he couldn't believe how good he felt. He had expected to have to resolve himself against a crippling depression before he turned to sleep. He hadn't expected her to draw him in.

Which made his next thought seem so strange. Something felt off. Something seemed... Wrong. He felt a chill grip his heart.

What if this was all an illusion?

Like he figured Kipland would, he started rifling through his head all the different people who would try to pull something like this off. The Carnival, the Mu Mystics, even the Circle of Thorns... Perhaps the Malta Group would try something like this, and Arachnos certainly would.

But it wasn't an illusion. Dreams and illusions didn't last long. They broke down as the subconscious started to overreact. The day had gone by so... So realistically... For the most part. The past hour had been the stuff dreams were made of.

He admonished himself for being paranoid. He had what he wanted. He had what he needed. He was happy and he was certain he could make Jessica happy, too.

As his eyes closed and he started to drift off to sleep, one nagging question continued to hammer against the back of his eyes: If everything was so good, why did it seem so wrong?

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.

--Kings Row: Grey's Army Base--

The base entry portal seemed to crackle as it spat Kipland out. His eyes were blazing and he looked around, his face contorted into a scowl of rage.

"Where is he? Where the [Hell] is Roland!?"

"He ain't here," James muttered as he flipped through channels on the lounge television, "What are you so ticked about?"

"None of your business, Jimbo-"

"Hey! Don't you call me Jimbo, you midget mother-!"

"What is everybody yelling about!?" Nester's voice hollered from down the hall, "Kip! Get in here!"

The short young man glared into the taller Baker brother's eyes as he walked away. James snarled at him and turned back to the television. Since the day Kip said Grey's Army was going to be training him and the rest of the Brutal Warriors, the agitation between them had been building. It wasn't that James didn't like or respect Kip, because he did, but the attitude the little man kept giving him was starting to get on his nerves.

Kip stomped his way to the medical bay and encountered his brother and Sheldon Wallace. The two young men were looking at him critically.

"I know you're upset about Roland," Nester said sternly, "But that doesn't give you the right to take it out on James."

"Whatever, Nester. Do you know where he is? I need to have some words with him."

"He's out doing errands," Sheldon replied, "And you don't give him enough credit..."

"Of course I don't give him credit! Doesn't he know what kind of trouble he's in? How could he possibly think this is real!?"

Kip was, of course, referring to the recent upsurge in tabloid activity questioning the identity of "Ms. Liberty's new squeeze." It was all he could do to keep from incinerating the newstand with his eyebeams when he saw the blurry paparazzi photograph showing a large man entering her house with a bag of groceries.

"Look, man, Round knows what he's doing," Nester placed his hands on his brother's shoulders to calm him down, "He's seen enough craziness happen to enough people to know enough to doubt what's going on. But... Jeez, man... He's not going to rage against it just because he has his doubts!"

"That's the only way to deal with it, though!" Kip shouted as he batted his brother's hands away, "When you know something ain't right, you cut that [stuff] out of your life!"

"Kip, please," Sheldon sighed, "There are more ways to dealing with life than just your combative philosophy. Roland doesn't have an energy field protecting him from all brands of assault, not like you. He has to research and learn about the situation he's in, which is why he came to see us..."

"What did he see you about?"

"He's got us reading a sample of his blood," Nester replied as he handed his brother a chart, "He wanted us to make sure he wasn't being affected by some kind of chemical agent. His cholesterol level is a little high, but not nearly dangerous, and he's otherwise fine."

"His oxytocin levels are a little high," Sheldon commented, "Studies indicate that it may have something to do with the emotion of love, as well as a other relationship elements... I still need to do some research and see if there's anything abnormal about the numbers."

"Fantastic," Kip smirked angrily at them, "You boys have discovered he's in love. Whoop-dee-[poop]! Well, I'm sure glad Roland's on top of things! It never occurred to him that maybe, oh, I don't know, Ms. Liberty might not be Ms. Liberty!? That sure as [Hell] happened to me with Mynx!"

"I think there are other people who would notice if Ms. Liberty weren't the real Ms. Liberty," Nester retorted, "I'm sure they would have handled it themselves..."

----------

--Galaxy City: Freedom Corps, Freedom Phalanx Headquarters--

Statesman rubbed his temple and turned to Sister Psyche.

"You're sure?"

"Yes!" the psychic heroine shouted in exasperation, "It really is Jessica, and the young man is still the same young man you've spoken to repeatedly."

"I just..." Cole narrowed his eyes and sighed, "It's not like I don't like the kid, but something just seems wrong about this..."

"Is this about that bet with Manticore?" Citadel asked.

"Maybe... I say we give it another week before I start talking to the Icon people about making my uniform pink for a week..."

"I still can't believe you made that wager with him," Psyche gasped, "What would he have done?"

"He said he'd let Carson go wild on his outfit," Statesman chuckled.

----------

--Grey's Army Base--

"I guess you're right, Nester," Kip said darkly, "Still... I'm concerned. When it involves the big names, it can't end well."

"Sure it can," Nester grinned and shrugged, "I mean, come on, Kip! Isn't the point of being a hero that we're paving the way to make it safe for our optimism? Why wouldn't we expect something good to happen once or twice? Why can't we?"

"Because it doesn't happen! Every single time this happens, something comes along to ruin it! Lord Recluse even showed up to ruin Manticore and Sister Psyche's wedding, what do you think will happen if Roland and Ms. Liberty get that far along?"

"With how pessimistic you're being," Sheldon's mouth quirked into the briefest smirk, "I would expect the very gate to Hell to open right underneath them as they enjoy a simple picnic."

"Bite me, Sheldon."

----------

--Atlas Park: Roland's Residence--

It was getting dark when two figures entered the apartment. The larger one flicked the light switch, revealing Roland Grey and his friend, Cortland Simmons, as they walked into the living room. Roland looked worried and Cory shook his head without concern.

"My friend, I'm telling you, there is nothing to worry about..."

"I'm telling you, Cory, I just... I have a really bad feeling about this."

Cory rested his hands on the sofa in the middle of the room and sighed. His large friend had contacted him earlier when he was finishing up some business with "Ye Olde Magic Shoppe" in Talos Island. He was gathering trinkets and artifacts he wanted to bring to the new workshop so he and Matt could tweak the magic motorcycle, Christine. While that could wait, the fact that he was being interrupted over a simple lack of faith was a little irritating.

"Just... Just do that scanning thing you wizards do!" the portly man sighed, "See of there's anything on me or in me or whatever! I want to be sure things are... Things are right!"

"Okay, okay, calm down," Simmons clapped his hand on his friend's shoulder and had him take a seat on the couch, "Here, relax. Why are you so concerned?"

"Because... Because I want this to be real, Cory. I want to make sure that there's nothing messing with this. I don't want this to be some plot, I don't want it to be some kind of crazy mind control or spell... I want to be sure that if I'm in love, I'm in love, and not just inebriated on phlebotinum."

"Fle-what?" Cory asked, his eyebrow arching as he laughed.

"Just... Just scan me, man."

The dark-skinned sorcerer nodded and set to work. If he were to allay his friend's fears he was going to have to perform the ritual. He wished Michael White were around, this would have been an excellent learning experience for the artifact-laden magician, but he would have to remember this moment for a future lesson.

He set up some candles and turned off the electric lights. He explained that while the electric lights didn't need to be shut off, sometimes scrying spells caused feedback that caused bulbs to blow when lit. Turning them off didn't make them one hundred percent safe, but it helped.

"If there is something crazy at work trying to use you as a pawn," he said with a smile that faltered a little as he thought just how bad that could get, "You might get to see the lights flicker on!"

"Sometimes wizardry is a lot like science, huh?" Roland asked as he noted his friend's enthusiasm.

"Well, Chemistry, maybe. The rest of science is just so boring... Quantifying what we already know works, just to ignore it all when it comes to trying to quantify things we don't. Sometimes, I see little difference between Science and Religion, you know? Both can just be so dogmatic and contradictory to themselves..."

"I've run into plenty of magicians who have the same problem," Grey muttered, "I'm sure you've run into Gregor Richardson."

"Insufferable man... Even Matt knows you can't be certain what magic will do when applied to a situation, even through artifacts. Sometimes certain energies, elements and origins react chaotically, and that's what makes magic stand apart from science. You mix two chemicals of particular amounts together, it doesn't matter how many different places you get the chemicals from, they will always blend the exact same way. Magics, however, they keep something from their homelands and their wielders, and it makes different combinations react in strange ways, ways you can't always predict."

"Well, that's not the why I was expecting... I always figured magic did what it wanted for the given moment."

"Oh, it's not the only reason why. Chaos is just a major element of magic. It makes things... Interesting. So, yes, it does what it wants is a good description of the situation. I mean, it's not really magic fire I throw, just enchanted fire. The fire is still fire, but the production of it and the enchantment on it that makes sure it only hurts my foes and not my friends are both the end result of coursing the magic through my body carefully and skillfully to articulate them. If the magic weren't there for me to work with, well... I would slightly be at a loss. Alright... Now hold still..."

Cory started muttering and closed his eyes. Roland sat still and kept his breathing even as the ritual commenced. After a few minutes of waiting, Cory opened his eyes and his eyes were glowing blue.

"Let's... see..." he said softly as he looked the portly man over.

Without the magic sight of a scry, Roland looked like anybody else. Through the enchantment, however, he (much like every other hero in the city, regardless of origin) lit up like a Christmas Tree.

Throughout his few years of working as a hero in the city, Roland had a lot of residual magic built up in his body. Most of the threads of enchantment were degraded and useless for anybody who would want to bother with manipulating him. Others appeared to be severed in half, as if a spell used on the man was interrupted before it could be completed. Considering the fact that most of them looked like the holding spells the Circle was fond of, this was probably a good thing.

For the most part, everything seemed fine. Roland was just like most every other hero in the city. He regularly used the devices and items that regenerated his flesh and reinvigorated him, just as he accepted enchantments that protected or empowered him.

Just as Cory was about to shut down the scry, he saw it. It was a strange enchantment, a loose thread that dangled, yet it permeated the glow that surrounded his friend. The wizard stood and traced it with his finger. It was a pink and light blue ribbon of energy, and it was thin and flimsy. It was surprising that an enchantment like this had even lasted a few minutes, much less stuck around in a kaleidoscope of energy like this.

Yet here it was, and it wasn't just a stray thread. The thread was just something he noticed as it wafted toward the couch and tried to merge with the comforting enchantment in the fabric. The rest had wrapped about Roland, stitched itself to him, and clustered around the heart of his soul like...

"Cupid's Arrow!" Cory shouted in shock as he stumbled and his eyes returned to normal.

Roland chewed the inside of his lower lip as he frowned and blinked before responding "So... I guess that's bad?"

---

My Stories

Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.