“I appreciate your attendance today.”Piggot’s voice came out a grumble, the words low and clipped, the Director of the PRT managing to make all that ‘appreciation’ sound like it was being pulled tight through a pasta strainer.The phantom vibration of a cell phone buzzing against his thigh was a persistent hallucination, a distraction from the reminder of what it had led him into. Heavy white gauntlets rested flat and parallel on those same thighs as Gregory Lucas Veder sat rigid and upright in the basic government-metal chair. His thick blue hood shadowed his forehead, blue eyes peering through his domino mask as he fixed his attention squarely across the room.
The other side.
The Protectorate side.
Lady Bug sat barely three dozen feet away, dark curly hair tied up in bouncy twintails, in her bright red costume that perfectly matched her name; down to the oversized black buttons on her double-breasted red jacket. She even had a literal ladybug hairpiece clipped into the side of her hair, the whole highly-coordinated ensemble pulled together by a rounded red purse covered in big black polka-dots.All in all, the perfect primary-colored image of a bug-themed magical girl.
Also, someone he definitely, absolutely, and one-hundred-percent should probably not be answering text messages from.
A noble champion of the realm — true and honest — did not engage in clandestine digital correspondence with other maidens whilst — potentially — spoken for. It was not a good look and it was the exact kind of stupidity that got people killed.
Well, not killed.
Worse.
Yelled at.
Emma already wasn’t… doing the best right now and he really didn’t want to see how much worse she’d get after seeing a text from a famous Ward. That way lay tears and screaming and his mother asking questions he didn’t need her asking at all.
Questions about playing the same games his dad played and that way lied… problems.
He was a bastion of justice, a shining bulwark against the encroaching darkness of this struggling city and, currently, he was sweating bullets inside his armor over the simple terror of crossing the streams between his cape life and his civilian entanglements.
Still, the text had seemed important.Before Leviathan decided to turn a chunk of the bay into a saltwater swimming pool, the two of them had spent enough time hanging out that something that small wasn’t really strange by itself. Two colleagues like them, comrades-in-arms, and fellow travelers on the noble path of punching people in the face — nothing wrong with communication, right?
But Lady Bug hadn't reached out with a casual check-in. She had reached out to White Knight with a serious request.
An urgent one.
To meet her at a location.
This location.
And now Lady Bug was sitting near the cluster of Wards, gloved hands gripping the strap of her polka-dot satchel as she looked directly at him like she was well aware how awkward this was.
Just a few feet to her left, Glory Girl was also staring at him. The blonde powerhouse was more than staring, actually. In fact, she was beaming, a hand raised to offer an aggressively friendly wave across the room.
Right behind her, Gallant folded his arms over his silver armor, the other knightly cape in the Bay aiming a glare his way.
Greg gritted his teeth, jaw locked tight to prevent the escape of a long-suffering sigh. I’m a knight of the realm. The ‘right now’ didn’t need to be mentioned with the rest of the reminder as he squared his shoulders, armored plates shifting almost silently as he offered Glory Girl a crisp and perfectly formal nod of his hooded head. I am above the petty squabbles of squires.
Ignoring the silver-armored ex-boyfriend, Sir Prodigy stared forward back at the conference room of the PRT ENE Headquarters; eyes on the place where human hope clocked out and went to die. The whole of the place had clearly been renovated after the tidal waves gutted the lower floors, but the fresh sterile beige paint on the walls somehow made it all worse.
The new windows — undoubtedly reinforced to all hell — almost sparkled under the cold lights above as they looked out over a city still recovering from drowning.
A good month or so after said almost-drowning, the room had the ghost of industrial cleaning supplies still kicking around unseen but not unfelt. That chemical forever-tang was clear to him but even that wasn’t enough to bleach the memory of stagnant seawater rotting in the air vents above their heads. …someone should really get in there and fix that.
Last time he’d been in the building, the place had been far more packed and almost a quarter of the people gathered hadn't known they were breathing their last few minutes of air.
The meeting space may have been smaller now and the number of people might have been a whole lot less and a lot more familiar but there were still way too many capes in one room for anyone with a functioning Danger Sense to feel anything resembling safe.
Either way, every single person in this room had already survived the big obvious waterlogged apocalypse.
Now, they were just sitting around waiting for whatever smaller meaner one the PRT was about to announce. And if Greg was a betting man — which he wasn’t, but his dad was apparently, so it was in his blood somewhere — he was down to put his chips in on the fact that it had something to do with Heartbreaker’s kids.
"I will do my best to be brief throughout this meeting…" The Director spoke again, presiding over it all like a concrete fortress in a navy pantsuit as she stood at the podium in front of the long table at the head of the room. The whole of the Brockton Bay Protectorate, noticeably missing a familiar red speedster, occupied said table in full force. “As time is a luxury we have little to waste.”
Miss Militia sat ramrod straight, that patriotic scarf of hers pulled up over her nose, as she took her place right next to the true and blue form of Armsmaster, beard perfectly trimmed and bushy as usual. Assault slumped low in his chair on the other side of her, the man clearly trying to force a smile that didn’t want to sit tight on his face. Battery sat right beside him, the woman a coiled spring wound a good three twists closer to the breaking point than usual as she stared out at the quiet room.
"Brockton Bay is bleeding. Our emergency systems sustained critical damage.” Piggot laced her fingers together on the polished wood of the podium. “Local resources are severely strained. This headquarters is renovated and operational. That does not mean the city around it has stopped hemorrhaging."
Dauntless stared across the room as usual, on the opposite side of the table from assault, his glowing spear resting against his chair. Triumph sat nearest the wall beside Dauntless, the Roman-themed hero right next to the Greek, looking somehow taller and broader than Greg remembered from the Leviathan fight.
Guess he’s just not half-dead this time. Morbid as that thought was, Greg didn’t think twice as he let his attention slide to the right side of the room where all of the Protectorate- affiliated capes — not just the Wards — sat neat and tidy. New Wave was, as usual, all gleaming white in spandex with their bright rainbow colors and family solidarity in a shiny united front.
"More unregistered parahumans have entered the city limits in the last two months than the PRT can comfortably track.” Those flinty eyes swept the left side of the room. “And nearly as many have been suspected of triggering within the borders of the city.”
And then there were the independents, new and old, all of them sitting on the left.
On his side.
Greg recognized exactly one of the independents, a guy fully covered in flowing white desert-style robes, face hidden behind a mask that looked not too far from the one Theo wore as Magi, except clearly bought on a much tighter budget.
Sere.
The others were complete wildcards.
A tall Black guy sat straight-backed in a full-black costume that seemed dark enough to suck in the light around him, cheap welding visor over his face and a pair of large hands in black fingerless gloves gripping his own biceps. Another cape in the front row sat there in a bright orange and black flight suit, thick aviator goggles pushed up onto his forehead. Two girls in form-fitting bodysuits whispered to each other in the seats right next to that last cape, one in a stark white suit covered in overlapping blue dots, the other in an entirely black suit with sharp red accents.
Analyze.
The thought slipped free before he could even bother to stop it, Greg immediately doubling, tripling, and then quadrupling down. Honestly, what else was he supposed to do while the room marinated in silence?
Translucent blue boxes flared into existence right over his line of sight, just clear enough to see the capes on the other side of each one of the four rectangles.
[ Vanta ] [ Lvl 25 ] [ Darkflower ] [ Trait: Photonic Absorption Reversal ] [ HP: 320/320 ]
[ Vanta used to be a photography student, which explains the whole thing a little. He hid in a darkroom during a home invasion, wanting very badly to stop existing for a few minutes, and the universe took that personally. Cripplingly shy, and basically mute, his power absorbs light, fires it back without the light part, and accidentally gives people horror-movie jumpscares just by standing there. ]
Greg’s eye twitched behind his domino mask.
[ Backdraft ] [ Lvl 22 ][ Palm Pilot ][ Trait: Combustive Recoil Propulsion ][ HP: 220/220 ]
[ Backdraft has 100% yelled “watch this” before damaging public property. Talks fast, jumps into fights early, and apologizes afterward with the exhausted confidence of someone who fully intends to do it again. Spends too much time practicing over the bay because water forgives bad landings better than concrete. Brave, restless, bad at stopping. Keeps losing his eyebrows, for reasons that have nothing to do with the power he's immune to. ]
Okay, explosive idiot. He raised his eyebrows. Got it.
[ Eyelight ] [ Lvl 20 ][ Panic Lantern ][ Trait: Chromatic Photosphere Matrix ][ HP: 160/160 ]
[ Eyelight has been sleeping like garbage since Hardkour killed the PRT Vice-Director on live news, which is fair, because she’s terrified of the Ronin gang-pressing her. Tiny Asian girl who was apparently interesting enough for the ABB to start sniffing around before you kind of stole Lung’s whole flow. Makes little blue blasting light orbs and pretends that being able to see danger coming makes it less terrifying. Keeps checking behind herself when she thinks nobody notices. Nobody tell her everyone notices. ]
A heavy rock of guilt dropped right through Greg’s stomach, the teenager swallowing hard before he forced his eyes to track to the final blue box hovering in the air.
[ Arrear ] [ Lvl 29 ][ Late Fee ][ Trait: Kinetic Debt Accumulation ][ HP: 245/245 ]
[ A very... particular type of woman, Arrear owns a day planner and gets annoyed when people call it a diary. Keeps track of favors, debts, patrol times, missed appointments, and probably every person who has ever said “I’ll pay you back later.” Moves like she’s already late for something and blames everyone else for being in the way. Don’t ever owe her five dollars because she will be up your ass about it. ]
Greg dismissed all of them with a mental swipe, the blue light shattering into pixels. He had exactly enough time to regret knowing all the intimate psycho-neuroses of four different strangers before Director Piggot cleared her throat again.
"The old gang structure is broken.” Hard eyes flicked from side to side. “And the new structure has not yet stabilized.”
The blond looked up from where he sat wedged between his two best friends; Sparky to his right fully kitted out as Apex in black and yellow, arms tightly crossed as the soles of his matching high-tops tapped out a high-speed rhythm against the floor. Theo — Magi — took his left, the oversized silver reflective drop-shoulder hoodie swallowing his frame as the LED smiley face on his mask stayed static.
“Nature abhors a vacuum. Criminals abhor it more.” Piggot continued, flinty eyes sweeping the left side of the room. “Vacuums do not remain empty. They fill with whatever and whoever is cruel, ambitious, or stupid enough to move first."
As she spoke, Greg couldn’t help but notice something as the hair on the back of his neck, right where cowl met armor, stood straight up. Why is she…Those steel-gray eyes kept trailing back to him more and more often the longer the Director spoke. Not a constant glare, not an aggressive focus, nothing too obvious; but even still… it was enough.
Her gaze would sweep the Wards, sweep New Wave, sweep the Independents, and — just for a moment — stop right on him, all that attention landing directly on the blue fleur-de-lis on Greg's chest.
He didn't move his head, but his eyes tracked the attention too; Armsmaster’s heavy visor was angled just a fraction toward his direction and nowhere else.
Same as Assault.
And Battery.
Triumph and Militia, too.
Dauntless was the only one who didn’t seem to look his way much, but everyone else kept their faces blank, professional masks locked in place even as their eyes said everything.
Greg stared back, suddenly sure of something. They know.
They didn't guess. They didn't suspect.
They knew.
They knew who he was. They knew what he had done.
And if they know… The thoughts began to spread, logic and intuition branching out like cracks in safety glass. Then they probably know that I know they know.
Blue eyes flicked back to the PRT Director, jaw set tight. And if Piggot knows that I know they know, then Piggot probably knows that I know that she knows that I know.
It wasn’t paranoia but the thought looped, recursive and iterative, a tighter and tighter spiral that pressed in on him enough to suffocate through the armor.
So, Greg sat there in his pristine White Knight costume, wedged between a twitchy Fighter and a too-still Wizard, surrounded by an entire-roomful of registered government heroes.All of them gathered with him right there in the perfect spot to… to jump him.Blue eyes flicked over to Lady Bug, the girl in all red smiling back shyly. …or not?
Greg looked away, desperately pretending he was not currently engaged in a silent hostage negotiation with half the regional Protectorate through eye contact alone.
Then, Piggot stopped circling the point and Greg’s heart sped up in his chest for an entirely new reason. "The Slaughterhouse Nine are in Brockton Bay."