Are You Afraid of the Dark? [Worm AU fanfic]

[woodzrox]

Oh! It's been a while, thanks.

 

[Avernus]

It's funny that not only does Coil have no intention of actually cutting his losses and staying away from Tattletale, but he's so predictable about it that everyone involved just knows he'll do that.

 

[Ack]

It's funny that not only does Coil have no intention of actually cutting his losses and staying away from Tattletale, but he's so predictable about it that everyone involved just knows he'll do that.

Click to shrink...

Pattern recognition is a survival skill.

Oddly enough, Coil seems to lack it.

 

[SlickRCBD]

One thing that strikes me as odd is that the PRT keep acknowledging that The Dark isn't a parahuman. Given his legendary capabilities, they should be suspecting some kind of combat Thinker along the lines of a discount Contessa. Not that anyone in the Brockton Bay PRT knows about Contessa specifically, only the Triumvirate and the Chief Director. However some kind of subtle Thinker power should probably be on their minds given the mindset of the PRT.

Calvert lowered the phone and let out a ragged breath. Tattletale was looking at him expectantly—she'd know what had happened, of course—and he handed the phone back to her. He had to force himself to open his mouth and utter the next words, but they had to be said.

"Stand down. Let them go. We're leaving." Every syllable tasted of ash on his tongue. He hated to admit defeat and simply walk away from her, even as that irritatingly smug look blossomed on her face. Worse still was the silent (and not so silent) disbelief from his men. Where they thought he couldn't hear them, they were exchanging low-voiced comments with their radios off. Taking a deep breath, he raised his voice. "I said, stand down."

Trading glances, taking their time as though waiting for him to rescind the order, the troopers released the Undersiders from their bonds. For their part, the teen villains did little more than rub their wrists. Their looks of disbelief were directed at Tattletale, most likely attempting to divine how she'd managed to pull that impossible rabbit out of a non-existent hat.

One by one, his men exited the loft; the chopper had moved away on receiving the stand-down order, so they would all have to leave via ground transport. He was the last out, if only to ensure that none of his men did anything to get him killed. At the doorway, he looked over at Tattletale. "You'll tell him?" That I did what he said, he didn't have to add.

She nodded, her smug expression infuriating him almost to the point that he did something regrettable. "Sure, I'll do that. Bye." It was as much a reminder that he should be leaving as it was a farewell.

As he descended the spiral staircase, his jaw was clenched so hard that his teeth were grinding against one another. He took small solace in the fact that the metal door's lock was ruined, and the door itself was hanging off one hinge; the Undersiders would have to find a new base now or undertake serious repairs to that and the window, occasioning no little inconvenience. Good.

"Sir." It was Sergeant Hardacre. A good, solid NCO, he knew his place and how to handle his men. While he was scrupulous to a fault when it came to everything that didn't involve Calvert's business, and had never actively participated in any illicit activity, he'd taken bribes more than once to look the other way. "May I ask what happened up there? The men will have questions, and I'd prefer to have something to tell them from you, rather than let them speculate."

This was one of the few instances, Calvert decided, that the unvarnished truth would serve better than any lie. "Tell them that we were warned off by the Dark." He saw the shock of understanding in Hardacre's eyes. "Dismissed."

Click to shrink...

I somehow missed the alert about the update for this fic.
One thing that stands out is that if these are NOT Coil's men, but more or less honest PRT troopers, they should be reacting by using containment foam on Calvert and calling master-stranger protocols. Also checking with higher ups.
Given that they suspect Regent is one of Heartbreaker's kids (they thought correctly he might be Hijack), and that they don't really know what Tattletale can do, the possibility that their commander had just been Mastered into ordering them to let the Undersiders go seems more probable than him suddenly taking a phone call and deciding to let wanted criminals go for no reason.
The fact that Brian unleashed his darkness meant they knew for sure that those were indeed the Undersiders they captured.

 

[Ack]

One thing that strikes me as odd is that the PRT keep acknowledging that The Dark isn't a parahuman. Given his legendary capabilities, they should be suspecting some kind of combat Thinker along the lines of a discount Contessa. Not that anyone in the Brockton Bay PRT knows about Contessa specifically, only the Triumvirate and the Chief Director. However some kind of subtle Thinker power should probably be on their minds given the mindset of the PRT.

I somehow missed the alert about the update for this fic.
One thing that stands out is that if these are NOT Coil's men, but more or less honest PRT troopers, they should be reacting by using containment foam on Calvert and calling master-stranger protocols. Also checking with higher ups.
Given that they suspect Regent is one of Heartbreaker's kids (they thought correctly he might be Hijack), and that they don't really know what Tattletale can do, the possibility that their commander had just been Mastered into ordering them to let the Undersiders go seems more probable than him suddenly taking a phone call and deciding to let wanted criminals go for no reason.
The fact that Brian unleashed his darkness meant they knew for sure that those were indeed the Undersiders they captured.

Click to shrink...

He's never done anything that could be pointed at as definitely being cape-worthy. He's just really, really good at killing.

It's Coil's men in the base with him. They've all done enough shady stuff on the side that walking away from the Undersiders (even if they don't know why) is something they can do.

 

[Ack]

Are You Afraid of the Dark?

Part Fourteen: Doubling Down

[A/N: This chapter commissioned by @GW_Yoda and beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]



PRT ENE Building Secure Parking Garage

Director Emily Piggot

As the trucks rolled into the garage and pulled into their parking bays, Emily waited alongside the elevator doors. She wasn't quite sure who the anonymous tip had come from, though she could make a few guesses. When it came down to it, the source was less important than the content. Calvert technically had the authority to take his strike squad out on a mission without seeking official clearance first, but he was supposed to give her a heads-up, including a general run-down on what he intended to achieve.

None of that had taken place.

Thus, when Emily got the message that Calvert had gone out to capture the Undersiders, working off information Emily wasn't privy to, that was bad enough. The additional information that he'd literally had them in custody, but then let them go again, was just icing on the cake. Which was why she was down in the parking garage, awaiting his return.

She wasn't sure exactly what his story would be, but she really wanted to hear what he came up with.

Even if he hadn't been uncovered when he climbed out of the nearest truck, she would've known him immediately from the way that he froze momentarily upon seeing her. She lifted her chin slightly, letting him know that she'd seen him too. As though it had been his intention all along, he started toward her.

"Director," he greeted her once he was in earshot. "What an unexpected surprise. Did something come up while I was offsite?"

Translation: What have you figured out, and how do I get out of it?

"I'm actually interested in what happened on your mission." She gave him a level stare. "Walk with me, Commander Calvert."

"My report will cover—" he began.

She cut him off with a raised hand. "I said, 'walk with me', Commander. Not 'go write your report'. Do I need to repeat myself a second time?" There was no way in hell she was going to let him sneak off and massage the facts until they fitted an appropriate narrative.

A muscle pulsed in his jaw, but when he answered, his voice was steady and calm. "No, ma'am, you do not. What do you wish to know?"

She tilted her head toward the elevators, and led the way into the first open one. His annoyance and overall disquiet were almost palpable as he followed her. She knew damn well that he didn't want to, but walking away now after she'd made her wishes clear would give her ample excuse to utterly screw his career, and they both knew it.

As the doors interleaved together, she pressed the button for the top floor. The elevator made its usual lightning-fast trip, the interval short enough that she was able to successfully ignore his non-verbal signals to begin the interview. Once they opened again, she led the way to her office, then seated herself behind the desk. He looked around for a guest chair, but she'd personally removed them.

"The Undersiders raid," she began. "Two truckloads of troopers, plus a chopper. Why so much force for such a low-priority target? Are they so very dangerous?"

The muscle pulsed again. "They've shown themselves capable of escape and evasion to an impressive degree. I wanted to make the cordon around their base impenetrable."

"Ah, yes, their base." She raised her eyebrows. "Where is their base, exactly? When did you find out about its location, and why isn't that information already on my desk?" She tapped the desk in question for emphasis.

"In a warehouse, half a mile from the northern ferry terminal." His voice was tight, the tone clipped. She noted the half-second pause, and decided that whatever came next was likely to be a lie. "I learned about it from a CI, who said they were prepping to move to a different location. Going through the usual channels would have taken too long. I had to get there fast."

It was a good lie, she had to admit. Just not good enough. "Did you get there in time? Are the Undersiders in custody?"

The muscles on both sides of his jaw could've been used to crack armour plate. "They are not, ma'am," he admitted reluctantly. "We had them, but Tattletale …" She watched him grit his teeth momentarily. "… made a phone call. To the Dark. He ordered me to stand my men down and let them go."

It was the truth, she knew instinctively. The Dark? Was he the one who tipped me off? She had the sudden feeling that the stakes were higher than she knew. However, she still had Calvert in front of her.

"Which you did." It wasn't even remotely a guess.

"Yes, ma'am." Again, the half-second pause. Emily's instincts flagged another incoming lie. "As you said, the Undersiders are a low-priority gang. I decided it was better not to lose any of my men to a dangerous psychopath like that." He almost managed to assume a virtuous expression as he said it.

Hah. Yeah. Right. You didn't want to put your own face in the crosshairs, did you?

"I see. Do you have any idea why the Undersiders might be able to call on the Dark for assistance at a moment's notice?" Emily spread her hands, inviting speculation. She very much doubted that he would respond with anything remotely resembling the truth, but whatever he said would betray the shape of his thoughts anyway.

The half-second hesitation came once more, confirming her suspicions. "Nothing concrete, ma'am. One of them might be related to him, or perhaps they've been working for him behind the scenes. I'm personally not familiar enough with them to be able to judge, one way or the other."

"Hmm. I see." She nodded slowly, as though considering the ideas he'd thrown up as a smokescreen. "Well, that's satisfied my curiosity. Make sure your report includes the relevant data regarding this CI, plus links to any other information that he's given you. Dismissed."

"Of course, ma'am. I'd be happy to." His tone was smooth and practiced, but she'd already caught the telltale pause. By now she was sure there was no confidential informant involved in this particular information chain, which raised disturbing ramifications.

She watched him leave the office and close the door behind him. The reason she'd pulled him into her office for this 'informal chat' was that she had an audio recorder in the desk, which she'd activated with her knee when she sat down. She was also aware that Armsmaster was working on a lie detector for his helmet. How far along it was, she wasn't sure; technobabble wasn't something she was familiar with.

What are you trying to hide, Calvert? What's the truth behind your lies?

And what's the Dark got to do with all this?

<><>​

Somers Rock

Death's Head

I looked around at the dingy bar. It hadn't looked like much from the outside, and the interior was equally unprepossessing. The cobwebbed bars on the windows had bled rust stains onto the paintwork, and the fluorescent lights were yellowing with age.

In other words, it was perfect for our needs.

Dad had explained to me that the waitress was deaf, so I wrote '1 Coke please' on her notepad. He simply raised two fingers instead of adding his own order. In time, she brought out two Coke bottles on a tray, along with glasses and paper-wrapped straws.

Nobody had objected when I brought Chewie in, but I didn't know what he might find down there on the floor, so I lifted him onto my lap. He didn't mind at all, turning around a few times and curling up for a nap. I'd walked him before we came in, so he'd be fine for a while.

Ignoring my glass, I popped the cap off the Coke and drank it from the bottle, while Dad poured his into the glass, the brown liquid fizzing over the ice cubes. It was ice-cold and deeply refreshing, but I never stopped moving my bugs around, as Dad had trained me. All the staff were under surveillance, whether they knew it or not.

"Well?" he asked quietly after sipping his drink.

"Nobody's making any surreptitious phone calls," I reported. "And I think I just spotted the Undersiders on the way here now. About thirty seconds out."

"Good." There was a slight smile on his face. "They're punctual. I can work with that."

I took another drink while idly stroking Chewie's ears, but that was for appearances' sake. My bugs were busy, patrolling every inch of my control radius for any hint of something out of the ordinary. In this sort of situation, it was easy to become distracted, which was why it was the best time to attack. I was determined not to let that happen.

Thirty-two seconds later by the clock on the wall (I had bugs on the hands, so I didn't have to look), the door was pushed open, and Grue walked in. Tattletale followed, her eyes flicking all around the interior of the bar. Regent was next, his sheer lack of fucks to give contrasting with her high-strung nerves, while Bitch was last, with three dogs following her in.

Dad stood up and I followed suit, still holding Chewie. "Greetings. You've met my daughter. She's now going by the name Death's Head. We know who you are. Be seated, and we can get down to business." With that, we sat down again.

Grue didn't hesitate; he came straight over and sat at our table, opposite Dad. "Thanks. And thanks for whatever you did to get Coil off our backs."

<><>​

The Dark

Danny nodded to acknowledge Grue's words. "I have potential uses for your team, and none at all for Coil. That's why I blew up his base, and it's also why I'll be shooting him in the head as soon as humanly possible. The man is incapable of not being treacherous."

Tattletale and Regent sat down next to Grue. While Regent seemed content with watching Ms Lindt's interactions with Taylor, Tattletale's twitchiness was ongoing. "Uh, sir, you know what I did, don't you?"

Danny raised an eyebrow. "Despite knowing that I was very real, you told Coil I was an urban legend, with the intent of causing his death at my hands."

Her face was so pale that she looked ill. "Yes," she whispered.

Folding his hands, Danny gave her a number three 'I am not impressed' stare. "On the one hand, young lady, you have caused me more than a little irritation. I spent years building a reputation worthy of my name, and it is not a plaything for you to toss around at a whim."

Tattletale seemed incapable of speech at that moment, so Grue carefully cleared his throat. "And on the other hand, sir?"

Danny allowed himself an austere smile, letting Tattletale partially off the hook. "On the other hand, Coil and I were always going to clash. You and your friends merely gave me the opening I needed."

<><>​

Death's Head

As the Undersiders entered, Chewie awoke and sat up on my lap, staring at the three larger dogs. His tail wagged, and he let out a tiny whine of eagerness. This caught Hellhound's eye (even in my head, I refused to call her 'Bitch'), and I gestured at the chair next to me. "Hi. Want to sit here?" I was aware of Regent watching us, but I didn't care. So long as he didn't pull any shit, I was fine with his presence.

Watching me warily, she sat down; at a hand signal, her dogs lay down beside her. She looked at Chewie as he stood up on my lap. "He looks well."

"He's only alive because of you, so thanks for that." She seemed to respond best to bluntness, so I didn't beat around the bush. "Do you want to hold him?"

Cautiously, she glanced at Dad, then back at me. "… yes?" The meek tone did not jibe with her habitually forbidding expression (I wasn't going to call it any kind of 'resting B face', even in jest) but given Dad's reputation, I wasn't surprised. Even the most powerful movers and shakers in Brockton Bay seemed to tiptoe around him.

"Here you go." I lifted Chewie carefully across, and she accepted him in her rough, blunt-fingered hands. He reached up to lick her face, and her expression softened. Nobody could long resist the urge to stroke those silky ears, and she was no different.

"What's his name?" she asked as he closed his eyes and leaned into her hand.

"Chewie." I paused for the inevitable Star Wars reference, but she just looked at me blankly. "When we first got him, he chewed on my pyjama sleeve. He still likes to gnaw on things, but we're working on it." I couldn't help the fond smile that the memories of first meeting him brought back to me.

"He means a lot to you." There was almost a note of wonder in her voice.

I nodded. "We've only had him for a week, but I can't imagine being without him. I was in a really bad place when Dad got him, and he pulled me out of it."

She looked somewhat enlightened. "When Kaiser's guys took him, your father killed a whole bunch of men to get him back, plus Cricket and Hookwolf. Meaning, I'll have a lot less trouble hitting the dogfights from now on, if they even keep going with them." Her expression was savagely satisfied.

"Oh, didn't you know? Kaiser stopped the dogfights." I gestured at Chewie. "He figured it was the best thing to do, now that Dad's got a dog. Just in case, you know?"

She blinked as she absorbed the information. "I didn't know that. Makes sense, though. Kaiser's an asshole, but he's not a stupid asshole."

"I'm just glad they're over with." I meant it. Making dogs fight to the death was a horrible thing to do, and if Dad had needed to kill a bunch of people to save Chewie from being sacrificed in that way, I had no problem with it. Anyone who would murder a puppy like that was totally a horrible person, anyway. "What are your dogs' names?"

Her eyes widened as she realised I was being serious. "Uh, this one is Angelica, that's Brutus, and that's Judas." Each dog raised its head when she said its name, but made no other movement.

Looking them over, I could see scars and at least one missing ear. "Did you save them from other dogfights? That's pretty cool."

She ducked her head. "They don't deserve to die like that."

I put my hand on her arm. "I totally agree." A worrying thought occurred to me. "But what are the owners of those dogs going to do with them, if they can't fight them?" However, before she could answer, something Grue said caught my attention. "Excuse me."

<><>​

Grue

"Opening?" That sounded hopeful, in a 'Tattletale isn't getting shot in the head today' sort of way. As much as Brian enjoyed seeing her knocked off her perch of pure know-it-all smugness every now and again, he still valued her as a friend and teammate.

The Dark nodded once. "As I said, you have the potential to be useful to me. I understand that you used to work for Coil, albeit unwittingly for the most part. What were you getting out of it, apart from money?"

Brian took a deep breath. "I've got a younger sister, with attention and authority issues. Dad's ex-Navy, and he doesn't work well as a father for her. Too authoritarian. Mom's a druggie, and the reason Aisha's got those issues. Also …" He winced, recalling his mother's less savoury aspects. "There's a lot of reasons she's a bad fit. Anyway, I've got a place of my own, and with steady work I can convince CPS that I can care for her long-term."

"Understood." The Dark turned his attention to Tattletale. "From your attitude toward him, I'm assuming your relationship with Coil was less transactional and more threat-based?"

"Well, yeah." She seemed to be edging down from the peak of her fear. "The bastard literally had a gun to my head as a way of forcing me to work for him. Like I said in the files I sent you, I'm pretty sure he tortured me on a regular basis to find out my latest plots against him, just so he could laugh in my face while he dismantled them. If you kill him, I will happily dance on his grave."

"I see. To put your fears at ease, I don't work that way. If any of you decide to assist me in my goals, it will be of your own accord, not through threat of force." The Dark turned to Regent. "And you?"

"Can I ask a question first?" Without waiting for an answer, Regent kept talking. "Say I made killing one particular person a condition for working for you. Would you do it?"

The Dark raised an eyebrow. "That would depend on who the person was, and what they'd done."

Oh, for fuck's sake. "No!" Brian hissed. "We talked about this!" He turned back to the Dark. "Sorry, sorry. He heard about how my mother abused Aisha, and now he wants you to kill her. I thought I'd talked him out of it."

"Excuse me," Death's Head interjected, breaking off from her conversation with Bitch. "Your mom abused your sister?" She turned to the Dark. "Dad, can I kill her?"

"See?" Regent gestured around the table. "We all want her dead. Some of us just haven't admitted it yet."

"Kill contracts come later." The Dark's tone was firm. "Right now, we're negotiating terms of employment. Regent, is that your requirement? The death of Grue's mother?"

"Well, no, actually, but it'd be great if we could do that too." Regent took a deep breath. "Heartbreaker. If you can gank him, I'm all in. Team 'The Dark' forever."

Brian knew who Heartbreaker was, of course. The French Canadian cape was firmly entrenched in the list of malevolent Masters across the world. But what his connection to Regent was … wait a minute.

"Your father, I presume." The Dark forestalled Brian's epiphany by a matter of seconds. He looked thoughtful for a second. "Hijack, yes?"

"I'd say 'damn, you're good' … but you already knew that." Regent nodded. "I joined the Undersiders for protection against him. There's a good chance he'll be sending one or more of the others after me. He might even come himself. I'm not going back."

From the look on Tattletale's face, she'd either known or suspected this already. Bitch wasn't really paying attention, being more absorbed with Death's Head's puppy. Brian was actually kind of impressed that they'd found common ground so easily.

"If Heartbreaker comes to Brockton Bay, I'll kill him." The Dark left no room for speculation. "This isn't for you. He poses a threat to the city, and people I care for. Is that good enough?"

"What if I actually paid you?" Regent wasn't giving this up. "I've got a fair amount saved up."

"Regent …" Brian growled the name. "Not. The. Time." Regent was seated on the other side of Tattletale, so Brian couldn't kick him in the shin.

"No, seriously." Regent put his hands flat on the table and stared directly at the Dark. "I can see him sending his other kids after me. They'll cause a ton of problems in Brockton Bay. Nicholas can make anyone feel fear just by wanting it to happen. Guillaume can see through the eyes of anyone he touches. Cherie can read emotions city-wide, and make anyone near her feel whatever emotions she wants them to. Love, hate, suicidal depression, whatever. Flor can force you to take on compulsive behaviours that you have to carry out before you can do things like eat or drink or talk. Under his orders, they'll do anything they have to, to get hold of me and bring me back to him. You want to cut all that off at the pass and get my loyalty forever? One bullet, in the back of Heartbreaker's head. Or between the eyes, I don't care."

The Dark didn't shut him down immediately, which worried Brian. Once the spiel was over, he nodded slowly. "I'll take that under advisement. Ms Lindt, what was Coil offering you to work for him?"

Bitch's head came up. "I had a place I could put dogs to keep them safe. Medical treatment and food and stuff. But like Regent said, if you help me save the dogs, I'll work for you."

"Save the dogs …?" The Dark sounded slightly puzzled. "Which dogs are we referring to, exactly?"

Death's Head cleared her throat. "The dogs that were competing in the dog fights. Their owners probably hung onto them in the short term, but keeping them fed and stuff is going to start looking pretty expensive, especially if they can't win money back with them. Is that what you meant?" She addressed the question to Bitch.

"Uh, yeah." Bitch looked over at the Dark. "Those dogs. If they can't fight 'em, they'll probably just kill 'em."

"I see." The Dark drummed his fingers on the table briefly, then indicated Brian and the others, one at a time. "So, your terms are: help Grue gain custody of his sister, kill Coil for Tattletale, kill Heartbreaker for Regent, and save the dogs for Ms Lindt. Am I missing anything important?"

<><>​

The Dark

One by one, the Undersiders shook their heads. Danny took a moment to ponder the evils of the world—not one of the Undersiders was in the game out of simple greed or the love of violence—then got back to business. "As you know, I've already marked Coil for death, mainly because he will keep coming back at me until one of us is dead, and I'm disinclined to give him the opportunity to do so. Heartbreaker is a taller order, but not impossible." He gave Regent a steady look. "Anything you can give me about his habits and living situation would be invaluable in that regard."

"Ah, yeah," agreed Regent with as much excitement Danny had seen him exhibit to that point. "I'll totally give you as much as I can remember about where he was living and stuff."

"Good." Danny was not in the least bit surprised. "I'm sure it will all be useful. Grue, do you have a problem with doing manual labour?"

"No, sir." The lad sounded surprised, but willing. "It's just that people were more willing to hire me as a supervillain than as a worker."

Danny nodded; it made sense to him. "And the Empire has its hooks in most of the construction companies in Brockton Bay." He steepled his fingers before him. "However, I have connections in the Dockworkers' Association. If you show up there tomorrow morning, they should be able to sign you on with minimal fuss. The Empire's never been able to get a foothold there."

"Not that they've got much of a foothold anywhere right now." Taylor smirked. "It seems that when the PRT raided them yesterday morning, some mysterious stranger let slip their identities. Every one of their capes from Kaiser on down is either out of town, in a cell, or decorating a slab."

"Now, imagine that." Tattletale seemed to have at least partially regained her composure. "I wonder how that could've happened?" The sarcasm in the rhetorical question could've been used to resurface I-95, all the way from Houlton to Miami.

"Information was exchanged." Danny looked over the Undersiders. "And that leads me back around to the question none of you have asked yet: why I might put so much time and effort into keeping you around."

They paused and glanced at each other, then Regent shrugged. "I guess we assumed we make great minion material?"

"Speak for yourself," Tattletale retorted. "I just didn't want to jinx it."

Grue took a deep breath. "Okay, I'll bite. Why?"

"You're aware of the man Coil had impersonating me." Danny raised one eyebrow slightly, and Tattletale hunched her shoulders accordingly. "Last night, Oni Lee killed him, then I killed Oni Lee. Lung will be quite angry with me as a result. He's not about to stand down, so I'm going to have to kill him. And while I can pull it off with Death's Head's assistance, it'll be a lot easier with competent help."

Regent rubbed the back of his neck. "Is it just me, or are you killing a lot of villains all of a sudden, for someone who used to make a point of never taking contracts on capes?"

Danny sighed. "Back in the day, the villains would've simply stepped aside. But the latest crop mostly weren't around when I made my name. So, I'm going to have to make it all over again." He placed his hands flat on the table. "But that's not why I arranged to meet you here. Your base was already compromised before Coil's raid, which means you're going to need some secure location to move into. Also, to keep your dogs."

Ms Lindt spoke up at that. "I've already got a place … don't I?"

"Sorry." Taylor said what they were all thinking. "He could easily wait for you to visit them, then follow you back to your new base after."

And that was the best case; Danny could think of far worse.

Grue broke the silence that followed. "So … do you have somewhere we can go?"

Danny had been thinking the matter over since the Coil raid, and he figured he had a solution in mind. It was unconventional, to say the least, but that didn't matter.

What mattered was keeping them out of Coil's hands, any way he could.

<><>​

Coil

Timeline A

Thomas Calvert wasn't sure how much Piggot suspected and how much she actually knew. The latter could not be too extensive because if it was, he would currently be sitting in a cell. That was the only bright spot in the entire day.

One of the worst aspects of it all—just barely edged out by the loss of Tattletale, his base, his mercenaries, and the fact that the Dark knew who he was—was that Piggot still held her position as Director. He wasn't entirely certain how she'd managed it, but her raid on the Empire Eighty-Eight had somehow gone off flawlessly, capturing all the Empire capes still operating within Brockton Bay. That level of success went a hell of a long way toward offsetting the cowboy nature of the operation itself and rendering her effectively bulletproof, at least for now; Chief Director Costa-Brown liked subordinates who Got Things Done, after all.

His only chance of climbing back on top of the heap therefore depended on locating Tattletale without alerting the Dark to his actions. Regarding the girl herself, his thoughts veered between murderous and acquisitive; her treachery demanded appropriate punishment, but he could still get a lot of use out of her Thinker power before her inevitable end at his hands. How dare she out me to him like that! The sheer level of betrayal was breathtaking.

Fortunately, it seemed that the Dark had opted not to pass on Thomas' criminal identity to Director Piggot; why the remorseless killer was exercising such restraint, he had no idea. If the roles were reversed, he certainly wouldn't have done the same. And if the Dark imagined the deed would convince Thomas to lower his guard, he was sadly mistaken. Thomas was already double-checking everything he did, certain that the other shoe would drop at any moment.

Without his main base as a refuge outside the PRT building (he'd have to leave sometime), he felt somewhat exposed. Then he reminded himself that the Dark had somehow gotten all the way into the base, killed most of his mercenaries, then set off the self-destruct. If he could do that in a situation where Thomas had personally set up the security, then there was nothing stopping him from doing it in the PRT building, or anywhere else for that matter.

Tattletale was almost certainly working for the Dark now. The treacherous little cow no doubt knew enough of his habits that she could give her new employer a good idea of where Thomas was likely to be at any given moment. Worse, she'd be almost certainly working to convince him to kill Thomas instead of letting him go, because she was vindictive like that.

I've got to assume that he's planning to kill me at any moment, and take precautions. Disposing of Tattletale would be a good start—she couldn't keep betraying him if she was dead—but putting an end to the Dark himself would be the perfect solution.

If the stories he'd heard were true (he was inclined to dismiss most of them), people had been trying to kill the Dark for twenty years; all those who'd tried were dead. But the stories were just as insistent that the Dark wasn't a cape, and thus heir to all the weaknesses of the human condition. He could be killed.

The trick would lie in pulling it off.

In this instance, Thomas believed he had a slight advantage. The Dark was apparently invested in the safety and well-being of the Undersiders, whereas Calvert didn't suffer from the disease of loyalty. Anyone who took his coin was basically one more meat-shield between him and incoming fire. But if the Dark was willing to put himself at risk for them, that could be where Thomas got his break.

Still, there was the other timeline, where he'd never made his move on the Undersiders at all. In that one, the phone call with the Dark had never happened, so he didn't have his deadline. His base was gone in both timelines, of course, which meant his options were still limited, but if he could kill or capture Tattletale before she had the chance to call upon the Dark for assistance …

Hmmm.

<><>​

Timeline B

The Undersiders' base looked calm and peaceful, and so it should. In this timeline, it had never been raided. Thomas sat in his car half a block away, observing it through binoculars; any closer and he'd risk tipping them off about his presence.

He was reasonably sure Tattletale didn't know about his fallback location, which meant the Dark was unaware of it too. Once he had her, he could take her there and extract all the information she had about the Dark at his leisure. Following that, he could even set a trap with her as bait. The Dark would die; she would die. He would be free to enact his plans for Brockton Bay.

He froze for a moment as the metal door opened, and the four teens exited. There were no dogs with them, and they were out of costume; from that, he deduced that they weren't going rooftop riding. This is getting easier and easier. Laborn paused to lock the door behind them, then they were strolling down the street toward him.

Sliding down in his seat wasn't easy for someone of his height, but he managed, joints protesting. With his eyes just above the windowsill, he watched them go past on the other side of the street. Lindt was stomping along with her hands in her jacket pockets, but the other three were chatting animatedly about what they intended to buy at the Market.

Thank you, he decided. I'll definitely take that.

If they were going to the Lord Street Market, he had several options to work with. The shops had Enforcers to deter theft and vandalism, and he could flash his PRT credentials to get them to work with him. Lindt actually being a wanted criminal would only work in his favour there.

Sinking farther down into the seat, he adjusted his rearview mirror to follow them as they proceeded down the street and around the corner. A fly settled on his hand and he waved it aside. None of the Undersiders looked back; even Tattletale had missed him as she walked by.

Once he gauged that they wouldn't hear it, he started the car and moved off; he knew where they were going, so all he had to do was get there first. The temptation was strong to break in (of course he had a key) and set explosives, but if Lindt had left her dogs on guard, there was no way he'd get past them without killing them. That would be a dead giveaway (pun intended) for the rest of the Undersiders.

He got over to Lord Street as soon as he could, then merged with the flow of traffic heading for the Market. Under normal circumstances, he would've followed their vehicle—he'd been trained in surveillance techniques like that—but again, the odds were too high that Tattletale would make him. So the plan was to get there first, pick them out of the crowd, and trail them discreetly until Tattletale put herself in a vulnerable position.

As he drove, he maintained a watch on his mirrors as a matter of course; not just for good driving, but also to make sure the Undersiders hadn't pulled a con on him and gotten on his tail. He knew the precise description and license plate of the car they were using, and there was nothing matching that behind him. Still, there was an itch between his shoulderblades that he couldn't shake, so he maintained his lookout.

He found a place to park relatively easily, two cars down from where a tall balding guy and his teenage daughter were getting out of their own vehicle. The girl was holding a puppy, which seemed inordinately interested in everything around it, including Thomas. However, she bore zero resemblance to either Lindt or Tattletale (or even Vasil in drag) and no amount of theatrical makeup could have made Laborn look like the father, so Thomas ignored them and headed into the Market.

His best chance of tailing the Undersiders once they were inside was to spot them before they saw him, so he went into a newsagency alongside the main doors and began browsing the magazine racks while keeping an eye on the main concourse. This was the kind of thing he was good at; people rarely paid attention to someone who was obviously distracted like that. The best part, of course, was that he had the height to see over the racks while leaning forward as though to get a better look at the magazine titles.

Perhaps a dozen people filtered in while he was thus occupied, and another dozen exited. He kept up his vigil, maintaining an awareness of his surroundings, and managed a credible act of pretending to choose between one magazine and another. If the Undersiders didn't show soon, he would have to change posts so as not to raise suspicions. Not of what he was actually doing, of course, but of shoplifting.

If that happened, if the Enforcers were called, he would have to do some fast talking before matters escalated. He didn't want to have to go there for two reasons: first, any kind of disturbance would be likely to draw attention; and second, he wasn't precisely certain how much respect they would show his PRT credentials. Getting tased or pepper-sprayed because they didn't like his looks or attitude would wreck his day in every way possible.

And then the Undersiders passed by. Tattletale was almost hidden by Laborn's bulk, but Laborn himself was impossible to miss. Thomas straightened from his faux perusal and sauntered from the newsagent in pursuit.

Using the tall young man as a beacon, with the blonde hair of Tattletale on one side and the auburn of Lindt on the other to make sure that they hadn't peeled off, Thomas began to tail them. The first place they went to was a food court, which could have been a problem, but Thomas was careful to take up station out of Tattletale's line of sight, never directly looking at them. He acquired some overpriced fried chicken, and even managed to finish it and wipe his fingers with a napkin before the Undersiders got up from their table.

Lindt was the first to break away from the pack, entering an army surplus store to examine their boots and jackets. Almost at the same time, Vasil vanished into a shop exhibiting the latest console games. Finally, Laborn went into an exercise equipment store, leaving Tattletale wandering without anyone to protect her.

Thomas carefully closed the distance, always keeping several people between himself and her, looking for the perfect time to strike. If he just grabbed her in the main concourse, there was always an Enforcer nearby, and she could escape in the resultant chaos. But if he could get to her with no witnesses around, he could capture or kill her with minimal fuss then exfiltrate immediately afterward.

Up until now, she'd been wandering almost aimlessly, but now her head came up and she ducked into a doorway. Thomas closed the distance, and realised that it was a ladies' restroom. Not perfect, but definitely workable.

Making up his mind, he closed the last of the distance, opened the door, and entered. As usual, there was a short corridor before he emerged into the outer area, with the handbasins. Just a few yards away, there stood Tattletale. Leaning back against the counter, grinning smugly at him.

"Hi." She had to know what he was here for, but her grin widened, and she gave him the finger with both hands at once.

Something was wrong. He began to pull his pistol from its shoulder holster, then froze. The ceramic tiling in the room gave it excellent acoustics, emphasising the sound of the pistol hammer clicking back … right behind him. Tattletale then moved to the side, and he saw his reflection in the mirror … and the man standing behind him with a gun to his head.

Well, fuck.

"Tell me, Coil." For all that it came from a tall balding man with glasses, the voice projected menace more effectively than anyone Thomas had ever met. "Are you afraid of the Dark?"

Before Thomas could muster a reply, that timeline ended abruptly.

<><>​

Timeline A

Motherfucker.

Thomas Calvert finished up the paperwork he'd been handling while his other self went and got himself killed in the alternate timeline. As he shut down his computer and prepared to leave for the day, he mulled over what he'd learned from the incident.

He set up that trap with the cooperation of the Undersiders, because he was always intending to kill me.

This means him giving me a week to leave town was a ploy to make sure I don't leave right now. He fully intends to kill me, no matter what.

He knew I was going to target Tattletale. Still knows I intend to.

He might have a teenage daughter, who owns a puppy. That actually fit the story he'd heard about Cricket and Hookwolf being killed over a stolen dog.

Of course, the father in the parking lot may well be a totally different person from the man in the women's restroom, but he suspected not.

He concentrated for a few moments, attempting to recall any pertinent details of either the daughter, the car, or the puppy, but got nothing. They'd been too peripheral to his intentions at the time.

He's already working with Tattletale. She's telling him my most likely moves.

Okay, what I need to do is go somewhere she has no knowledge of. She can't pull information out of thin air. This was something he had carefully tested. Her gift demonstrated insane levels of intuition, certainly, but she wasn't actually clairvoyant.

Thomas owned two houses in the suburbs, only one of which was on the public record as belonging to him. Likewise, he'd acquired a warehouse in the industrial part of Brockton Bay via a series of cut-outs; his name was in no way connected to it. Both of them contained a cache of weapons and spare costumes, stored away on the remote off-chance that he might need them someday.

And now he did.

Splitting time once more, he got up from his desk. In one of his timelines, he would go to the warehouse and bunker down, while in the other he would go to his house, make his way via the underground passage to the other house, and settle down to wait. If the Dark was looking to kill him (which he couldn't afford not to assume), then Thomas would have a perfect line of sight on the decoy house, and a finger on the button to detonate the explosives that were built into its interior walls.

Tattletale would've told the Dark about Thomas' powers, of course. It was probably the first thing she'd blabbed about. This made the Dark better informed than anyone Thomas had faced before. However, this didn't mean he was capable of winning if Thomas knew what was going on.

In fact, given the lack of a corresponding attack when his alter ego was killed in the other timeline, it was entirely possible that the Dark had no idea of how to negate the advantage bestowed by Thomas' power. And if this blind-man's-bluff came down to Thomas and the Dark circling each other, both waiting for a slip from their opponent, the numbers favoured Thomas.

Yes, Thomas decided. The Dark was formidable in a head-to-head contest, but Thomas didn't play that way.

Once I know the score, I can't help but win. It's simple as that.

<><>​

Hebert Household Basement

Death's Head

Taylor watched from the steps as her father selected a sledgehammer from the basement tool rack and stood there for a moment, weighing it in his hands. Chewie wriggled in her arms, but in an I-want-to-lick-your-ear way as opposed to an I-want-to-get-down way. His tongue was warm and wet on her ear, but she resisted the urge to giggle, her attention fixed on her father.

Up came the hammer then down again, directed at a particular slab that looked newer than the rest. Grey-white chunks cracked and then shattered as the hammer rose and fell; Chewie had stiffened at the first impact, but relaxed in her arms as she soothed him. Finally, the hammer smashed the last piece of the slab, and Taylor watched her father sweep away the rubble from the lid of a metal box.

"What's in there?" she asked, her ears ringing slightly from the echoes of shattering concrete.

He opened the box and hefted out a rifle, its gleaming metallic exterior fairly exuding lethal purpose. There was more in the box than that, but Danny seemed only interested in the rifle for the moment. Holding it with the ease of long usage, he sighted down the barrel then pulled back a lever and dry-fired it. The sharp clack echoed through the basement.

When he turned to look up at her, his face held a slight smile.

"The rest of your education."



End of Part Fourteen

 

[woodzrox]

Hey, long time no see, thanks Ack!

 

[JohnWolfie34]

Always a pleasure to see this updated

 

[Avernus]

One thing that strikes me as odd is that the PRT keep acknowledging that The Dark isn't a parahuman. Given his legendary capabilities, they should be suspecting some kind of combat Thinker along the lines of a discount Contessa. Not that anyone in the Brockton Bay PRT knows about Contessa specifically, only the Triumvirate and the Chief Director. However some kind of subtle Thinker power should probably be on their minds given the mindset of the PRT.

Click to shrink...

As already mentioned in the story, they have Thinkers who can find out whether somebody is a cape or not.

"So who are you going to be calling?" Krieg frowned. "And why hasn't the PRT gotten involved years ago, if he's so dangerous?"

"The PRT haven't gotten involved for three reasons," Kaiser said, carefully turning the pages of the notebook. "One: the Dark doesn't normally kill capes. Two: the Dark isn't a cape. Three: they know what's good for them."

"Not a cape?" Krieg shook his head. "I find that extremely hard to believe."

"Apparently the PRT believes it." Kaiser shrugged. "They have Thinkers who can ferret out the truth about that sort of thing. The fact of the matter is that they've never gone after the Dark." He stopped turning the pages and prodded a number. Beside it was written just one word: DARK.

Click to shrink...

 

[quasit17]

The sheer level of betrayal was breathtaking.

Click to shrink...

Calvert didn't suffer from the disease of loyalty.

Click to shrink...

Coil I know it's hard for you to understand but the latter causes the former.

 

[Avernus]

Coil is one of those hypocrites who gets really, really mad when other people do to him what he constantly does to them. And lacks the self criticism to even realize it.

 

[Ack]

Are You Afraid of the Dark?

Part Fifteen: Long Shot

[A/N: This chapter commissioned by @GW_Yoda and beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]



Thursday Morning, 13 January 2011

Death's Head

I lay on the rooftop of one of the warehouses that had once serviced Lord's Port. Now it was more or less derelict, only used by a multitude of rats and a few homeless people. A perfect location to teach me how to use a sniper rifle.

We'd spent a thoroughly fascinating hour the previous night where Dad taught me how to disassemble and reassemble it, how the scope (which had more controls than I would've expected) worked, and covering the rudiments of how to fire a rifle more than a mile and still hit the target.

Not that he was expecting me to do that any time soon. He was good with it, but not as good as Mom, back in the day. The rifle, I'd learned, had been hers.

"First target." Dad was seated in a folding chair beside me. He had a walkie-talkie in one hand and a pair of binoculars in the other. Holding the radio up to his mouth, he spoke clearly. "Shoreline, ready?"

"Shoreline, ready." Lisa's voice emanated from the radio. "Target placed. I'm in cover."

"Copy." He peered through the binoculars. "Taylor. White cardboard box with red square on it."

"Okay." I fitted the stock to my shoulder and looked through the scope. Dad and I had already discussed where the target was going to be; I found it fairly easily, sitting just short of the water's edge. "Got it. Distance … five hundred sixteen feet. Down forty-six feet." Putting a bug on the box gave me exact range in an instant.

"Well done. Take your time." He shifted the ear protectors from around his neck to over his ears. "Weapons are free," he said over the radio. "I say again, weapons are free."

That was the signal for Lisa to keep her head down, because a teenage girl was about to fire a high-powered rifle for the first time. It was probably a wise precaution.

A long skinny swarm drifted into place between the muzzle of the rifle and the box. I took note of the different wind strengths over the five hundred feet, turned the appropriate knobs on the scope, and put the crosshairs right on the red square. My heartbeat felt like it was going to knock the rifle all the way off target, but I breathed deeply to calm myself.

It wasn't really working.

Then I held my breath, kept the sights on target as best I could, and squeezed the trigger. I'd dry-fired the rifle before, so I knew how much pressure it was going to take to fire, but the sharp crack and the solid punch to my shoulder still took me by surprise. The bullet crossed the intervening distance in what felt like a split second, passing by thousands of bugs (and obliterating some of them on the way through).

It took me a second to get my eye to the scope again; once I found the target box, my shoulders slumped with disappointment when I found it to be pristine. "Damn it, I missed."

"Only by a few feet," Dad informed me. "You're firing high and a little to the right. Try again."

Okay, then. I panned the scope over and found the divot punched out by the bullet in the damp sand. Carefully, I worked the bolt, then checked the breeze again and made a couple of minor adjustments to the scope settings. I was still learning exactly how much effect the wind had on a high-powered bullet, but maybe I'd hit the target this time. "Going again."

"Weapons free," Dad reported over the radio.

I ignored him, focusing on the target, and the information my bugs were relaying to me. Now that I'd fired once, I wasn't as tense, and my heart rate seemed to be easing down. Again, I held my breath, then fired. The shot came as much less of a surprise than last time. In the scope, I saw the cardboard box kick sideways. "Hah! Got it!"

"You did," Dad agreed. "A touch low this time, and you only hit the corner, but you definitely hit it. Weapon safe."

I snapped over the safety catch and took my finger off the trigger. "Weapon safe."

"Good." He put the radio to his mouth. "Shoreline, clear to reset target."

"Copy that. Resetting target."

Through the scope, I watched Lisa stand up from behind the wall she'd been using for cover and stroll over to where the box lay. She picked it up and set it with the target facing me, waved in our general direction, then headed back to her cover.

Cheating massively with the assistance of the bugs, I was starting to get an idea of how to do this; the next shot hit the box again, and the fourth one went right through the middle of the red square. As did the next three.

While I was reloading, Dad got on the radio and told Lisa to go to 'stage two', whatever that was. I got my eye back to the scope to see that a sheet of paper had been stapled over the growing hole in the side of the box. It had a smiley face drawn on it with Sharpie, though the eyes were X's and there was a red dot for a nose. Grinning, I lined up on the dot; however, just as my finger tightened on the trigger, the box shuffled sideways and the shot missed by a foot.

"Oh, ha ha. Very funny." At the same time as I said it, I had my bugs form the same words on the wall next to where Lisa was waiting. I lined up again, anticipating the movement; this time, I got the smiley's left eye. With the third shot, I put a bug on Lisa's hand so that when she tugged the string, I was ready. Or at least I thought I was. Feeling quite clever, I adjusted aim as she tugged, and squeezed the trigger.

Turns out, she was anticipating my anticipation, and let the string run through her hand so the box didn't move at all. I missed the red dot again, and didn't feel quite so clever.

Dad must have sensed my irritation. "If there's one thing I've learned over the course of my career," he observed mildly, "it's that the opposition rarely cooperates with any given plan of action."

"They always seem to cooperate with your plans," I muttered.

Predictably, he heard me anyway. "That's because I'm always careful to ensure that whatever they're most likely to do is factored into my plan. That, and I let them think it's their plan to begin with." Laying down binoculars and walkie-talkie, he pulled out a notepad and jotted something down.

"Right." I established line of sight on the box. Lisa had set it upright once more and was just heading behind cover. As I was waiting for Dad to give clearance to fire, I put bugs on the string; when they moved, I adjusted aim.

The red dot never stood a chance, after that.

<><>​

A Little Later

The expended brass tinkled gently in my pocket as we climbed down the stairs from the roof. I had the rifle slung over my shoulder, and Dad was carrying the folding chair. "Police just hit the outer perimeter," I reported, as my bugs detected speeding cars coming in toward the warehouse.

"What?" Brian, down below, had evidently heard me. "Should we be leaving? We should be leaving. The last thing you want is to for the cops to connect you to us."

"Wait here." Dad pointed at the floor. "We'll have this dealt with in a minute."

"What's he gonna do?" asked Aisha in a whisper that carried all the way across the warehouse. "Shoot 'em?"

I shook my head as I followed Dad down. "Probably not; but either way, he knows what he's doing."

Rachel came over to me, Chewie trotting proudly alongside the much larger dogs. Handing over the rifle to Dad, I bent down and picked him up; or rather, he jumped into my arms and licked my face. I gave Rachel a nod and a smile of thanks for watching him.

She nodded in reply, then went to join the others.

I expected Dad to put the rifle in its case, but he strolled unhurriedly to the front door of the warehouse. As the police cars screeched to a halt outside and the officers piled out of them, he opened the door and stepped out. I followed, half a step behind, Chewie in my arms.

Their reactions to seeing us were both interesting and educational. Eyes widened and gazes flicked from side to side. The guy I figured to be the most senior of the four officers slid his pistol back into its holster, and waved for the others to do the same. Moving like someone who expected to hear an ominous click underfoot at any second, he took a few steps toward us. "Mornin', Danny."

Dad nodded. I wasn't surprised that the cop knew him; he had an impressively wide range of acquaintances. "Morning, James. Noise complaint?"

Jimmy nodded cautiously. "Noise complaint. Someone firin' off a gun, they said." From the tone in his voice and the way his eyes were drifting to Dad's shoulder, he'd seen Mom's rifle.

I wondered if Dad was going to just deny its existence, and what the cops would do then, but Dad nodded. "Yeah. Getting in some target practice." I could feel his gaze challenging the officers to try to make something of it.

"Ah." James swallowed. "You, uh … workin' again, then?"

Dad tilted his head slightly. "Maybe, maybe not. Time will tell. Right now, I'm just showing my daughter how to handle a rifle."

"Ah. Good. Well ... I'll leave you be, then. Have a good day, Danny." A polite nod toward me. "Miss."

"You have a good one too, James." Dad stood and watched as the cops got back into the cars. Two of them didn't quite seem to understand the situation, but they followed the cardinal rule of policing anywhere: if you don't know what's going on, follow your sergeant's lead.

Once the cars were out of sight, Dad turned and headed back into the building. I had to ask the question: "Do you know all the cops in town? As the Dark, I mean?"

He chuckled and shook his head. "No. But enough of them know me, and not one of them's going to say a word about this. The report won't even mention us. And in future, they'll be slow-walking any responses to noise complaints in this area." A cold smile crossed his face. "Seems not everyone has forgotten about me."

Out of all the Undersiders (and Brian's sister Aisha), Alec seemed to be the only one willing to say anything. "So … that's it? You walk outside, talk to them, and they go away without trying to arrest you or even search the area?"

I wasn't quite sure if he was disbelieving or just jealous at that point.

"The only police I've ever gone after were the ones so dirty that everyone knew it." Dad's tone was matter-of-fact. "And I've removed more than a few cop-killers from consideration. Someone figures it out, they keep it under their hat, because they secretly approve or they don't want to draw my attention. They pass it on to the ones they know they can trust. It stays on the down-low. Last time I ran into James on the job, it was about five years ago. He walked away then, too." He dusted his hands off, effectively killing the topic. "But enough about me. How does the warehouse look to you?"

The warehouse Dad was alluding to, a little farther away from the water, had an entire second floor that the Undersiders could move their stuff into. With a few phone calls, he'd had the power switched on to that building as well as the next one over, which had a solid fence around it. The other was going to be used to house Rachel's dogs for the time being.

"Looks good to me," Lisa said at once. "Really good, in fact. Rach?"

"Yeah." Rachel was clearly uncomfortable with talking so much, but she was making the effort. "Plenty of storage space, and they've got room to move around outside. And we're nowhere near the Empire."

"Not that the Empire's any kind of threat, these days." Lisa grinned evilly. "Kaiser even shut down the dogfights before the PRT took him down, so they've got other things to worry about than messing with us."

"Just by the way," I offered, "I can ride along while you're moving your stuff here, and the dogs as well. Between Lisa and me, we'll know if anyone's trying to follow you."

"Hot damn!" Aisha seemed to be adapting to the new reality faster than her brother, or any of the other Undersiders for that matter. "This is what I call primo boss material. Why'd you guys take so long to start minioning for the Dark? I coulda done with getting away from that hellbitch drug ho years ago."

"Oh, God." Brian facepalmed with one hand, and grabbed Aisha by the arm with the other. "Please ignore her. She has a severe filter problem. As in, it doesn't exist."

Dad's expression didn't change, but I knew he was amused anyway. From the way Lisa's gaze flicked sideways to him, she'd figured it out too. "I'm raising a teenager. This is hardly a deal breaker. Is Death's Head's offer acceptable to you?"

Brian nodded. "Uh … sure. I really appreciate it. We appreciate it." He hesitated. "So … uh, when do you think I'll be able to go back to my apartment?"

"Not until Coil's been taken off the board, plus a few days afterward to make sure he didn't leave any contingencies in place." Dad spoke with all the assurance of someone who knows exactly of which he speaks. "After that, you may live where you desire."

"Actually, to be honest?" Alec raised his chin slightly. "I'm not hating the extra room we've got in this place. If the internet connection's any good, I might just vote we stay where we are once this is over."

Lisa pursed her lips. "Depends. Not a fan of having all Rachel's dogs just next door."

"Hey, what's wrong with my dogs?" Visibly deferring to Dad, Rachel still managed to turn a medium-intensity glare of death on Lisa.

"Nothing's wrong with having a dog, or even three." Brian stepped in between the two. "And the three you bring inside are just fine. But you're starting to build up a real collection, and not everyone's a fan of listening to them barking—"

"—or howling," Lisa added.

"Or howling, at all hours of the night and day." Brian spread his hands. "We can handle it for the short term. We will handle it for the short term. But once the threat is dealt with, going or staying will involve a team discussion. Okay?"

"Whatever." Rachel shrugged, the topic clearly over and done with for her. "When are we going after Lung?"

Dad paused, thinking. "Maybe tonight. I'll let you know. In the meantime, Death's Head will be travelling with you to provide security. I'm sure Chewie will enjoy the outing."

I was pretty sure of it, too.

<><>​

Mid-Morning

Pelham Household

Lady Photon

Sarah looked up from doing the vacuuming when she heard the knock on the door. Frowning, she turned the cleaner off and headed into the front room. She wasn't aware that anyone had been coming over, and her family all had keys.

Well, not all, she amended when she saw whose face it was in the door security camera. A smile breaking out across her face, she unlocked the door and opened it wide. "Mike! Wow, what a surprise! It's so good to see you!"

Her brother stepped forward and gave her a hug, which she readily returned. "You too, sis. But you mean to say you weren't expecting me?"

She blinked as his meaning dawned on her. "Oh. The, uh, thing I called you about?" She'd honestly thought he was basically going to wait until she begged him on bended knee to come look at it.

He rolled his eyes. "Yes, the thing you called me about. When the others had no idea what you were talking about—"

"What?" She took a step back, eyes widening. "You called them and asked them?" Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Digging out her phone, she activated it for the first time that day. The number of missed calls and text messages made her cringe.

"What the hell was I supposed to do? You weren't giving me any clues!" He looked around and shut the door behind him. "Anyway, I took the first flight in this morning and I'm here now. So, what's the big fuss about? What's going on?"

She bit her lip. "… okay, I've been wanting to tell someone, and you deserve to hear it more than anyone else." Ushering him through to the living room, she pointed at the sofa. "Sit. I'll be back down in a minute."

As he sat, she broke her own rule of not flying in the house; zipping up the stairs, she darted along the corridor to the bedroom she shared with Neil. The back of her underwear drawer wasn't the most secure hiding place in the world, but she was pretty sure her husband wouldn't go searching through there without a really good reason.

Which, she reflected, Mike had possibly given him with that ill-considered phone call.

The burner phone was still there, so she grabbed it and retraced her path down to where Mike was waiting on the sofa with poorly-concealed impatience. He looked at her as she reappeared. "All I can say is, this better be real good."

She took a deep breath to overcome the sudden fit of nerves, then handed the phone over. "It's not going to be nothing, that's for sure."

"Okay …" Accepting the phone, he woke it up—the Dark had left no PIN on it—and accessed the video file. From the way his expression changed to utter shock, he had to have recognised Peterson immediately. The shock didn't go away; instead, it intensified when the Dark gave his little speech as Sarah had requested. The sound of the suppressed shot was clearly audible, but Mike watched until Peterson fell over before looking up at Sarah. "This can't be real." His tone of voice said otherwise; he knew it was.

She sat down beside him. "It's real. He's dead. Justice has finally been done."

"Justice?" He held up the phone in his hand. "You call this justice? That was cold-blooded murder!"

"And what that piece of shit did to Jess wasn't?" She spread her hands, willing him to understand. "He got away with it! Slap on the wrist, less than three years in juvey where he was no doubt a minor celebrity, and then he gets a free ride straight into the Empire Eighty-Eight! We couldn't do anything about it, not legally! But when the Dark showed up again, I grabbed the opportunity!"

"And so you paid a hitman to kill him." Mike shook his head. "Sarah, we're supposed to be superheroes. Held to a higher standard than everyone else."

"Don't you dare use Carol's lines! You left the fucking team over what he did!" She could hear her voice rising, but she didn't care anymore. "We both know you wanted to kill him! Now it's done, he's paid for what he did, and Jess can rest easier!"

"Yes, I wanted to kill him." He grimaced and looked down at his clenched fists. "I wanted it so bad I could taste it. But everyone knew who we were, and we couldn't take a step out in public without someone pointing a camera at us. If I'd gone after Peterson—if any of us had gone after Peterson—the whole country would've known within hours. The PRT would've definitely known."

"I've spoken to some people who were high up in the PRT when it happened," she said softly. "They're not about to come out and say straight-up that they'd look the other way for something like that, but there's a possibility that Piggot would've cut us a break and soft-pedalled it."

Mike shook his head sceptically. "Or she might not. The woman was a real hardass even back then, so I hear. But whichever way it went, the narrative would've been out there. New Wave, the uncontrolled vigilante team. The loose cannons. All our big talk about public accountability and transparency, and we don't even let the justice system do its work. There's not a law-enforcement body in the country that would've trusted us to stick to the rules if we'd gone after Peterson and executed him."

"You're the one who's talking, but I'm still hearing Carol's voice." She looked him dead in the eye. "She sat on you, didn't she?"

"… yeah," he admitted after a long moment. "I wanted to go after him so bad, but she kept on reminding me that if I did, New Wave would be dead in the water and the bad guys would win. Even insinuated that it might've been a targeted hit, to incite us to fuck ourselves over. By the time I finally told her I'd take the chance, the cops had him in custody. Anything we did then, we wouldn't have walked away from."

Sarah's understanding of the events was starting to rearrange itself into a whole new picture. It was a surreal experience. "And that's why you left. Not because of Jess. Because of Carol."

He grimaced. "I mean, I kinda get what she was doing. The New Wave initiative was her baby, even more than Vicky ever was. She didn't want some no-account murdering shithead asshole to cause the plug to be pulled on it, not when we still had a chance of salvaging it. She cared for Jess, but …" He trailed off; Sarah suspected that he didn't want to badmouth their sister, but couldn't think of anything good to say about the situation.

"But yeah," she agreed. "And she was wrong anyway. We had no chance at all of salvaging it, no matter how hard we tried. As soon as Jess was murdered, every team that had signed up for the initiative either started walking it back or went radio silent. And when Peterson got charged as a minor, the ones who'd already unmasked rebranded with different cape names; the ones who hadn't got that far just backed right out. If unmasking leads to all downsides and no upsides, why take that chance?"

"Preaching to the choir, here," he reminded her grimly. "It was Carol's bullshit about accountability and transparency that got Jess killed, and stopped me from doing what needed to be done to that bastard years ago."

She frowned, trying to figure out where his head was at. "Wait a minute. When I showed you that footage, you were parroting her party line like a true believer. Now you're saying we should've killed him? Make up your goddamn mind, Mike."

He let out an aggravated sigh. "Seeing him die like that surprised the hell out of me. It scared me, but I couldn't figure out why. So I went with what sounded right. But that wasn't it at all. I've figured it out now." He fell silent, looking unhappy.

"So why are you pissed at me for doing it?" she prompted.

"Because you got a fucking hitman to do it!" he shouted. "And he knows it's you who paid for the hit! And now there's footage out there of him saying that New Wave sends its regards! And there was someone else there, so he's even got a witness who knows about it too!" He paused for breath, his chest heaving as he glared at her. "I always thought you were the smart one in the family."

Knowing it was a weak excuse, she still tried. "The Dark isn't just any hitman. He's never done blackmail before."

Mike snorted in derision. "He also never went after capes before. How many is it now? Three? Four?"

"We're not sure about Oni Lee yet." She knew she was hedging, but saw no other way out of the verbal trap. "With Cricket and Hookwolf, the word on the street is that the Empire took his dog, so he went and got it back. They just refused to get out of the way."

"A dog? He killed a couple dozen people and two dangerous capes over a dog?" Mike shook his head. "Who even does that?"

"The Dark, apparently." Sarah knew she was being snarky, but there was no other way to say it. "It seems he was really attached to it." She'd never owned one herself, but she knew dog owners could be very protective of their pets. "Also, keep in mind these were neo-Nazi gangster assholes attending an illegal dog-fighting match."

"Still, killing them?" He seemed to be having trouble with the idea. "Isn't that a little over the top?"

"What would you have him do?" She raised her eyebrows. "Walk in the door and say please? What part of Neo-Nazi gangster assholes did you not get the first time around?"

He put up his hands. "Yeah, I get that they're gangster assholes. You've already made that point. But surely there was some other way to get his dog back that didn't involve mowing down a couple dozen of them in cold blood."

"A lot of the deaths were them shooting back and missing," she pointed out. "Which means they were illegally armed, at the time they were attending an illegal event, in the company of at least one cape member of the Empire. I don't condone the deaths either, but I'm not going to clutch my pearls and claim there's a way he could've done it non-violently. And I'm absolutely not going to try to tell him he should've just let his dog die."

"So instead, you hired him to kill Larry Peterson." The sarcasm was heavy in his tone. "Thus giving a multiple murderer more money to do what he does."

She met his gaze fearlessly. "If you even try to tell me that Peterson didn't deserve to die for what he did to Jess, I will slap your face. Twice. Once for me and once for her."

He grimaced. "I'm not saying that. I'm saying you've opened yourself up to a whole shit-ton of trouble by doing it this way."

"Well, how the hell else was he supposed to die?" She shook her head. "We had no way of finding him without the Empire figuring out that we were looking for him. If we'd done that, by the time we caught up with him there would've been a dozen cameras recording the whole thing, it would've been online within the hour, and the team would be bogged down in legal red tape until the heat death of the goddamn universe. It was my last, best chance to make it happen. And it worked. Watch that footage again. Watch his face. He understands that it's not just a random thing. That we finally got him for it." She gestured at the phone. "Go ahead. Watch it."

With a show of reluctance, he started the clip playing again, but Sarah could see his eyes devouring every last detail. After the tinny poc of the shot, he shut the phone down again. "Yeah. I see what you mean. There's 'oh, shit, they actually hired a hitman to get me' written all over his face."

"Exactly." She sat forward. "He'd thought he was free and clear, that he'd gotten away with that shit. And then, four years after he walked out of juvey, he found himself literally looking down the barrel of … retribution, I guess. The only thing that would've made it better would be if I'd been there to see. Or to do it myself."

"Not opening New Wave up to the possibility of blackmail and criminal charges would've certainly made it less problematic." Mike didn't sound like he was letting that go any time soon.

"Well, it's not like we're ever going up against the Dark." She did her best to make it sound like a joke, but it really wasn't. Nobody had seriously tried to capture the guy as far back as she could recall. It just wasn't going to happen. For all that popular wisdom insisted on him not being a cape, nobody wanted to put it to the test. "So he's got no reason to need leverage over us."

"People like him don't need a reason. Except that money's a great reason in and of itself. If he really wanted to, he could string this out for years, extorting you of every dollar you had with the threat of making that video public."

She huffed in annoyance. "Technically speaking, I wasn't even there when the video was made. Anyone could say anything they like on a video. And I don't think he would've gotten my specific banking details when I paid him. So, the most he could do is give the time and date that he got paid, along with the amount, and someone would have to get access to my account to prove that the same amount of money went out at that time. Hardly a smoking gun."

"Hmm. True." He seemed to have calmed down a little. "Still think you took a chance, but you definitely got your money's worth … wait. How much did it cost, anyway?"

"Why?" She felt relaxed enough to make a joke about it. "Considering making some changes to the underworld scene in Chicago?"

He rolled his eyes. "Oh, hardy har har. Be that way, then."

"No, I'm just kidding." She gestured to the phone. "There's a text file."

"Shit, okay." He hesitated before opening it, then jabbed his finger at the screen. She figured the reality of 'this much money bought a person's death' was finally coming home to him. When he read the figure, he whistled softly. "Okay, then. A little more than I expected. Was this because you got him to say what he said?"

She shrugged. "You know, I never asked for a price breakdown. But you're right. It was totally worth it. Once I paid, I knew Peterson was going to die. It's amazing how much of a weight that removes from your shoulders."

"I guess so." He tilted his head, frowning slightly. "How'd you contact him, anyway? It's not like he's in the Yellow Pages."

For a moment she considered keeping that one to herself, but then she shrugged. "Remember back when we first formed the Brigade, and that meeting we attended at Somers Rock, about the Nine being in town?"

"Jeez, now you're pushing things." He frowned. "I … think so? This was before you married Neil, right? And Mark hadn't joined the team yet. I hadn't even met Jess then."

"Uh huh. Well, I was trying really hard to pretend I wasn't totally out of my depth, so I introduced myself to everyone there." She pushed her chin out and deepened her voice. "Like, hey, I'm Lady Photon of the Brockton Bay Brigade, how you doing? I mean, shit, I was twenty, and I knew nothing. Carol was nineteen. You were seventeen."

"I remember the meeting, but mainly how I was keeping my head down and not stepping on anyone's toes." Mike rubbed his chin, then blinked. "What, you met him there?"

"Yeah." She chuckled briefly. "Them, rather. Him and a woman. They were collectively 'the Dark', but he tended to be the face of it. Thinking back, they saw through me in a heartbeat. He scared the shit out of me without even saying a word, but she gave me their number and told me if I ever needed someone taken out of the picture, or just to vent about cape bullshit, to give her a call. I nearly threw that number away, so many damn times. When we were briefed about the raid on the Empire, I dug it out and called it up."

"Well, shit." He handed the phone back to her. "Thanks for showing me this, but you should really destroy it. Like, yesterday."

"But what about the others?" She flipped the phone from one hand to the other like an ungainly fidget toy. "I think they should see it too."

"I think you're crazy for even thinking that." He jabbed his finger at the phone. "Carol sees that, she'll be all up in your face over how you've jeopardised the team. Neil will probably secretly approve, but he won't want to go against Carol. And Mark won't want to engage at all. And for God's sake, don't let Crystal or Eric get even a whiff of what's on it. They'll be horrified. Or worse … they won't."

She nodded slowly. "And of course, Vicky and Amy will be the next ones to find out, because heaven forbid a teenager keep any secrets." And Carol's horror at her daughters being 'corrupted' by that sort of thing would be nigh-apocalyptic.

Activating the footage one more time, she ran it through, watching Larry Peterson's expression change to horror as he heard the name of New Wave; the expression lingered even as the bullet took his life. Then she formed a force field around the phone and crushed it to powder. Finally, she slashed a laser through the remains until nothing more than a fraction of an inch across remained.

She got up from the sofa and went into the kitchen to dispose of the fragments in the trash can. On the way back, she took a couple of sodas from the fridge; when she returned to the living room, she handed one to Mike.

"Thanks," he said, popping it open. "One last problem, though."

"And what's that?" She opened her own and took a drink.

He raised his eyebrows. "What are you going to say when they ask you what you were calling me so urgently, and so secretively, about?"

She considered the question. It was not an easy one to answer. "I think … I'll say it's a private matter between you and me, and just let them speculate."

Slowly, he nodded. "And I'll look mysterious and not say a damn word."

Holding out her soda bottle, she clinked it against his. "Works for me."

A companionable silence fell as they both drank, then he spoke meditatively. "And by the way … thanks."

She didn't have to ask what it was for. "You're welcome."

<><>​

Late Afternoon

Coil

Without slowing the rented car, Thomas rolled down the street, eyeballing the exterior of the Undersiders' lair as he passed it by. The window was still shattered; that didn't surprise him in the slightest. More concerning was the fact that the metal door was wide open. This would not have been the case if the building was still being used.

Still, it might be a double-bluff.

A quick glance up and down the street told him that there was nobody in sight. Pulling up around the corner, he double-checked the pistol in its shoulder holster, and the backup in the ankle rig. His backup timeline had him sitting at home watching TV, but if he encountered the Undersiders—especially Tattletale—he intended to shoot them in the face as many times as necessary. And that timeline, he was going to keep.

Climbing out of the car, he waved aside a couple of flies that seemed intent on making his acquaintance—street hygiene in these areas of town was a positive joke—and strolled back down the street toward the seemingly abandoned factory building. Nobody had come into sight by the time he reached the open door, so he stepped inside and pushed it almost shut; no sense leaving it as an invitation for all and sundry to wander in while he was performing his investigations. In the dim light, he drew his pistol and held it left-handed while he climbed the spiral staircase as quietly as he could.

There were no voices or sounds of movement from above, so he wasn't overly surprised when he reached the top to find the main living area deserted. Still, he swapped the pistol to his right hand and proceeded to check every room in the way he'd been trained, all those years ago. The last thing he wanted was to blindly spring an ambush through inattention.

All he found from one end of the loft to the other were more flies, buzzing aimlessly about in a fruitless search for food. The furniture, the appliances and even the shower curtain; all gone. Whatever hole the Undersiders had crawled into, they'd taken everything with them. Only one thing of note remained: an artistic rendition in Sharpie of a hand with a raised middle finger on the kitchenette wall, with the words 'FUCK YOU COIL' underneath.

He allowed himself a curl of the lip at this sentiment. About to leave the kitchenette again, he paused and checked the cupboards. Too small for anyone to hide in without being an extreme contortionist, they might yet contain a clue as to where the little shits had fled to. And it was well that he had, because on the back of each cupboard door someone had scrawled in a different hand, COIL IS THOMAS CALVERT.

Well, that changed matters up considerably. Searching the loft for any more incriminating scribbles would take too long, especially as this was definitely going to be the timeline he kept. The cupboard doors were relatively flimsy, allowing him to wrench them off their hinges then break them into fragments. Piling the bits in one corner, he took out his pocket-knife and shaved off bits, then salvaged a lonely-looking matchbook that had been kicked half under the bench and lit up the tinder.

It caught and began to burn with more and more enthusiasm, the crackling flames starting to trail up the wall. The wood was dry; as he retreated down the corridor, he could see the volume of smoke beginning to grow. He clattered down the staircase and exited the building, then crossed the street to where he could see smoke now issuing from the broken window. Faintly, he could hear the crackling and popping as the flames took proper hold.

Satisfied, he strolled back up to his car and got in. He may not have found the Undersiders this time, but their plans for outing him had been thwarted; no doubt Piggot would've sent investigators to look the place over sooner or later. They could comb through the ashes all they liked, now.

He would keep looking. After all, he only had to find them once.

Starting the car, he checked his mirrors. No cars were in sight, so he drove sedately away.

<><>​

At the Same Time

Grue

"Okay, he's on the move." Death's Head traced her finger over the map she was holding to show his progress. Brian obediently put the car in gear and moved off, glancing every now and again at the map to make sure he was staying close enough. It was an odd feeling; they were following Coil's every twist and turn through the city, and he had not the faintest idea they were there.

"So why don't we just go where he is and capture him for the PRT?" piped up Alec from the back seat. "Or, you know, kill him."

"Yeah," agreed Aisha, sitting beside him. "Fucker wants to fuck with you. Deserves what he gets."

"That's not the plan." Death's Head didn't raise her voice or look around from the map. "If we come up on him and he spots us, things could go wrong. Our job is surveillance and information-gathering, and that's what we're going to do."

"Bor-ing," groused Aisha.

"You didn't have to come," Death's Head observed.

"Aisha," Brian growled warningly. "These people are helping us. Don't give them a reason not to."

"Still boring." Brian was pretty sure she'd just poked her tongue out at him.

"She's right." Alec wasn't backing down. "We're good at this shit, remember? Nobody ever caught us."

"Because all this time, Coil's been stacking the deck in your favour." Death's Head may as well have been reading the news headlines for all the emotion she showed. "You literally couldn't fail. Now he's stacking the deck in his favour, and we have to take that into account. We stick to the plan."

Her finger continued to move on the map, and Brian drove on.

<><>​

Pelham Household

Manpower

"Mike! How've you been?" Wrapping his brother-in-law up in a hug, Neil lifted him clear off the floor.

"I've been okay, thanks," Mike replied after he got his breath back. "Family's healthy, got a good job. It's really good to see you all." He seemed to have reservations when he looked at Carol, but he didn't voice them.

"I'm glad to see you too." Carol gave him a much more sedate hug, then let him go. "So … what's this all about, anyway?"

"What's what all about?" But he answered a little too quickly and his eyes flickered to Sarah and back to Carol, almost too fast to spot. However, Neil caught it and so did Carol. Mark didn't; having already greeted Mike, he'd sat down on the sofa.

Neil cleared his throat. "Whatever Sarah called you about, that you called us about. The reason you came back to Brockton Bay, after swearing you'd never set foot here again."

Mike traded another glance with Sarah. "That's between me and her. We've settled it; I'm flying back to Chicago tonight."

"Yes, but what was it?" Carol was in full 'discovery' mode now. "Whatever it is had to be pretty damn important for you to come here in the first place. Why the hell are you blowing us off about it?"

Sarah sighed. "Look, I'm sorry you got pulled into this. There was something I wanted to talk to Mike about, in person. We've talked, and like he said, it's settled. It doesn't involve you guys. Can we just drop it? Please?"

"Okay," Neil said reluctantly. He didn't want to let it go; when he met Carol's eyes, he could see she didn't want to either. But he didn't want this to blow up into a whole thing between him and Sarah, so he made a cut-off gesture with his hand. "So long as it's not going to affect New Wave as a whole."

There was a fractional hesitation, then Sarah nodded firmly. "It's not going to impact the team." Mike echoed her, sounding not quite so certain but saying the words anyway.

"Right, okay, then we'll drop it." Neil raised his eyebrows and gave Carol a meaningful glance.

She grimaced, no doubt unhappy about being the sole holdout. "Fine," she gritted. "But if whatever this is comes back to bite us, I am going to land on you two with both feet for not giving us a heads-up."

The look in her eye, however, promised that she wasn't going to forget it any time soon.

Neil just hoped that it would be enough.



End of Part Fifteen

 

[Avernus]

That's clever. Writing "COIL IS THOMAS CALVERT" all over meant that they could be sure he'd keep the timeline where he investigated and burned the old lair. Which gave them to opportunity to track him like they are (I admit, I half expected Taylor to snipe him as he left the building).

Also a self inflicted weakness, since if he hadn't built that silly self destruct into his base he'd likely still have some mercenaries and not be stuck doing everything personally.

 

[steamrick]

That's clever. Writing "COIL IS THOMAS CALVERT" all over meant that they could be sure he'd keep the timeline where he investigated and burned the old lair. Which gave them to opportunity to track him like they are (I admit, I half expected Taylor to snipe him as he left the building).

Click to shrink...

I half expected him to drop the timeline and send in a team of mercs to torch the place.

I guess he didn't want to risk any of his mercs getting curious enough to disobey whatever orders he'd have explicitly given them and open some cabinets.

 

[Avernus]

I half expected him to drop the timeline and send in a team of mercs to torch the place.

I guess he didn't want to risk any of his mercs getting curious enough to disobey whatever orders he'd have explicitly given them and open some cabinets.

Click to shrink...

He doesn't have mercs anymore; the few who survived abandoned him after the base explosion, and killed him in the timeline he tried to keep them.

 

[steamrick]

Right, I forgot. It's been a while...

 

[Avernus]

Right, I forgot. It's been a while...

Click to shrink...

I happened to have just finished re-reading the story yesterday before the update, so it was fresh in my mind.

 

[Ack]

Are You Afraid of the Dark?

Part Sixteen: Nowhere to Turn

[A/N: This chapter commissioned by @GW_Yoda and beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]

Grue

Since triggering with powers and joining the Undersiders, Brian had had a few odd experiences, some of them downright weird. This definitely topped the list. Driving a car through Brockton Bay traffic should've been a perfectly ordinary activity. The bizarre aspect, of course, was the fact that the person doing the navigating was doing so by tracing her finger apparently at random on a map of the city.

Although she wore neither costume nor mask, the only name he had for her was Death's Head, which was a totally fine name for the daughter of the Dark. Fortunately for Brian's state of mind, she didn't seem to be particularly arrogant about her status, and in fact had entirely won Rachel over by way of a highly engaging puppy.

In fact, she got along better with Rachel than just about anyone Brian knew, which was kind of impressive.

"We're going to need to turn off this street now," Death's Head reported; glancing down, Brian saw that Coil's car had reversed course and was heading almost directly for them, though it still wasn't in sight. "I'll let you know when it's clear."

"Y'know," mused Alec, "we could just let him go past, pull up alongside him, and pop him through the window. You got a gun, right?"

"I have a pistol, yes." Death's Head may as well have been discussing the weather. "It stays in the holster. We stick to the plan."

"Why'd he turn around, though?" Brian was already doing what he was told, but he wanted to know the answer. "Did he make us somehow?"

"No." Lisa sounded reasonably certain. "He's checking his backtrail."

Death's Head nodded. "Crazy Ivan."

"What?" Aisha frowned. "But his name's not Ivan … is it? I thought you said his name was Culvert or Drainpipe or something."

Brian held in a snort of amusement. Aisha could be an utter goblin if she thought he was laughing at her.

"Calvert, but you were close," Death's Head explained. "Anyway, it's a counter-surveillance technique. I got the term from a book I once read. Back during the Cold War, US and Russian subs used to try to shadow each other. One of the ways Russian subs used to make sure they weren't being followed was to do a quick one-eighty—well, as quick as submarines can turn around—and go back along their previous course. If anything dived for cover, it meant that it had been following them."

"Right." Now that it had been explained, Brian could understand it perfectly. "So if he thinks he's being followed, he gets to eyeball all the cars he passes by and see who avoids his eye, and he can take note of license plates and stuff like that."

"What I don't get is why we're following him at all, if we're not looking for a chance to kill him." Alec seemed intent on raising the whole earlier argument again.

"Oh, we're absolutely going to kill him." Death's Head said it so calmly that Brian got goosebumps all over his forearms. "But we're going to do it following the plan. Any other way will fail."

"He's alone, he doesn't know we're here, and you've got a pistol." Aisha took up the refrain. "How much more plan do we need?"

Death's Head turned to look back at her. "Enough of one that he stays dead afterward." She glanced down at the map. "Okay, take the next left, but keep it slow. He's just pulled into a parking garage. Either this is another means to lose a tail, or … ah. Car swap. Now he's driving something totally different."

"He's feeling the pinch." Lisa sounded thoroughly satisfied. "No way he'd be using this much tradecraft, and burning backup vehicles like this, if he wasn't certain someone had him under surveillance. Most likely your dad."

Death's Head nodded. "Coil almost certainly tried to pull a fast one on us. It must've come off badly, because he dropped the timeline. You must have been involved, because he torched your old base. Which means he'd be super paranoid about everything by now."

Sure enough, three minutes later, the moving trace left the parking garage and started across the city again. After a few moments, Lisa frowned. "Well, that's interesting."

The effect of her words on the others was illuminating. Alec and Aisha immediately started looking in all directions out the windows, while Rachel glanced at Death's Head. The assassin's daughter showed no particular alarm, so she kept petting Chewie, who was asleep in her lap. Brian decided to split the difference. "What's interesting, and how is it interesting?"

"Coil isn't heading home." Lisa gestured to the map. "That's the industrial area he's making for. The way he's moving and stopping, he's still keeping an eye out for a tail, but he's not changing course much anymore."

"So what's that mean?" Brian thought he knew, but he wasn't taking anything for granted.

"He's going for an alternate base." Death's Head spoke with confidence. "It's what Dad said he'd do. Right now, he's on a long straight road, watching to see if any cars are acting oddly around him. He's probably got a warehouse out there somewhere, under a false name."

Sure enough, her finger drifted to a stop on a cul-de-sac that was ringed around with warehouses. Brian pulled over at her direction about a block back, out of sight of the building proper. "What now?"

"We wait. Give him half an hour or so. If he doesn't move in that time, he's there for the duration. Then we go and start moving your furniture to the new place."

"Thank you." Alec almost showed emotion that time. "The dust in that storage unit has gotta be messing with my console."

"Better than whatever Coil had planned for us," Lisa reminded him.

Death's Head lifted her finger off the map; a small black beetle crawled over the paper to that spot. "Exactly. So, I hope everyone's comfortable. We're going to be here a little while."

Aisha shrugged. "Works for me. So, boss-lady. What's it like being the Dark's kid?"

Brian facepalmed. "Aisha! Don't ask things like that." He gave Death's Head a worried look. "Please don't hurt her. She has problems with her brain-mouth filter. And by that, I mean she doesn't have one." The inevitable jab in the ribs came seconds later, but he managed not to react.

Death's Head smiled. "Don't worry about it." Turning her head, she addressed Aisha. "You know how Winslow burned down the other day?"

"Yeah …" In the rearview mirror, he watched Aisha frown, then her expression cleared. "Wait, was that him? Did he do that? Why'd he do that?"

"Because it was a case of either burning the school down or shooting the principal and half the teachers in the face, and the school was easier." Death's Head shrugged. "I didn't care either way. Whatever got me out of that hellhole, I was just fine with. But to answer your question: my dad is someone who has already burned down a school for me."

"And he still hasn't said no to shooting your mom too, so there's that," Alec added helpfully. "Neither has Death's Head."

Brian felt it necessary to weigh in at that point. "We're not paying anyone to kill our mom." No matter how toxic Celia was, she didn't deserve death.

He wished he felt more strongly about that.

"You might not be," Alec snarked. "I've got my own bank account, remember?"

Brian silently groaned. This was going to be a very long half hour.

<><>​

Coil

Thomas Calvert didn't put much stock in the idea of a 'sixth sense' or non-powers-related extrasensory perception, and he knew damn well his powers didn't include any sort of ESP, but he was on edge all the same. Ever since the encounter with the Dark in the mall, he'd had an itch between his shoulder-blades that steadfastly refused to go away. Even travelling across the city in two different directions, using all the tradecraft at his disposal to ensure nobody was dogging his backtrail, he felt as though he was being watched.

In one timeline, he made his way to a warehouse in the industrial area, owned by him via an intricate series of cutouts and shell companies that would take a competent accountant days to unravel. The property was kept up, and the electricity and other payments were made on time, so there'd be no indication of anything amiss. As he drove up to it, he pulled out the remote he'd retrieved for the purpose and pressed the button that caused the front doors to rumble aside.

He drove into the warehouse then closed the doors behind him, leaving him in semi-darkness. Stacked around the perimeter, leaving an open bay containing several anonymous vehicles (registered to names that shared no details with his own, save that they were all alternate identities belonging to him), were crates containing supplies of various types. At least one of them was a shipment of MREs, so at least he would eat reasonably well.

In the other timeline, he went home, or at least appeared to do so.

He parked his car in the garage then went inside, ensured all the blinds were closed, and entered his study. Going to one of the corners of the room, he slid his fingers into a barely visible gap in the carpet. A concealed metal grip met his touch, and he lifted a lightweight hatch over a heavy metal trapdoor set flush into the concrete flooring.

Opening the trapdoor involved entering an eight-digit PIN; he did this, then heaved it up to expose the narrow shaft below. He knew that once he closed it again, the hatch would drop over the top, concealing it from all but the most stringent search. The trapdoor lowered into place, and he locked it solid. Then he climbed down into the darkness.

It had cost him quite a bit to seal off a section of sewage line and arrange the paperwork so that city maintenance left it that way. Bent almost double, he proceeded along the tunnel and climbed the ladder at the far end. The house he emerged into was owned by an entirely fictitious person whose photo ID would have borne a remarkable resemblance to Calvert himself, if it had ever been examined in that light. Locking the trapdoor behind himself and arming the explosives built into the tunnel walls, he settled down for the evening.

The PRT had no idea of his dual identity, he told himself. And although the Undersiders certainly knew, even Tattletale needed some information to go on. As good as she was, she couldn't just point at a spot on the map and locate him that way.

Finally, while the Dark was very good at what he did—if anything, his official record of kills undercut reality by a considerable margin—even the best assassin had their limits. Exactly nobody knew of his bolt-holes; he'd made certain of that by ensuring sudden and unexpected deaths for everyone who'd been involved in their creation. That had also cost him a substantial amount. He considered it money well spent.

After he'd washed off the traces of his underground transit, he took a pre-made meal from the stock in the refrigerator and heated it up in the microwave. It wasn't as good as a home-cooked meal, but he'd never been skilled at that. When he sat down in front of the TV, it wasn't to watch a movie or show; a click of the remote woke it up to display the readouts for the concealed cameras in and around the decoy house. If anyone broke in looking for him, he wanted to know about it.

As the afternoon wore into evening and the lights automatically came on in the other house, nothing of the sort happened. Neither was his counterpart in the other timeline disturbed by anyone attempting to gain entry to the warehouse.

It seemed that once again, his security precautions had worked out.

I'm just that good.

<><>​

The Dark

The sun was just setting when the moving truck pulled up in front of the warehouse that Danny had arranged for the Undersiders to use as their temporary residence. Ms Lindt's dogs barked, of course, but that was hardly a problem. He was more pleased with the fact that no other people—police or otherwise—had come sniffing around the area.

If he was going to be using the Undersiders as minions, or if Taylor was going to be befriending them, then he preferred that their living arrangements be as safe as he could arrange.

"—still say we could've got someone to help with the furniture." As Regent climbed out of the cab of the truck, he seemed to be continuing with an ongoing argument. Aisha got out after him, looking amused.

"We managed." Grue nodded to Danny. "Hello, sir. There were no problems. We followed Coil to a warehouse location, and he remained there for the half-hour we were keeping an eye on him. Death's Head is about a minute behind us, in the car."

Danny had already heard the car engine as it approached. "Thank you. Is everything you need in that truck, or will you need to go back for another load?"

Regent rolled his eyes. "See? We could've only loaded half, then gone back for the rest."

"Sorry, sir." Grue sighed. "Alec, we both know you would've conveniently vanished when it was time to go back for the second load. Don't even try to argue."

Aisha smirked. "Yeah, he totally would've."

"Hey, why are you on their side?" Regent looked irritated.

"Guys. Quit it." Grue returned his attention to Danny as he opened the rear doors of the truck. "It's all here, sir. The TV is coming in the car. Alec insisted on the console riding on the front seat with us, the whole way. I'm pretty sure he would've come in the car with the TV, but Rachel needed the room for her dogs, and she would've punched him."

"Good to hear." Danny didn't bother elaborating that he was speaking about the lack of need for a second trip. Grue would figure it out. "Did Coil try very hard to avoid being followed?"

Grue nodded. "Yes, sir. He doubled back once, and switched cars as well. Then he checked for tails on the way out to his warehouse. It's quite a ways from here, so I'm fairly certain we don't have to worry about him hearing the dogs."

"Excellent. He feels secure. That means we won't need to go looking for him."

The car pulled up alongside the truck. Taylor opened the passenger side door and got out, holding Chewie. He wriggled to be put down, so she obliged; he went and peed on the car wheel, then trotted over to Danny.

"Hey, Dad." Taylor looked cheerful. "I guess Brian's filled you in?"

"He has." Danny leaned down and scooped Chewie up, holding the pup close while discouraging him from administering facial licks. "I'm presuming Coil didn't get close enough to make you?"

"Not nearly." She looked and sounded pleased with herself. "He didn't get within a block of us. And we've got a solid location."

Tattletale and Ms Lindt had emerged from the car by now, along with the three dogs. Ms Lindt, still showing the deference toward him that she had from the beginning, went and stood by Grue. Her dogs took up station behind her, seated but alert.

"Yeah, that was amazing." Tattletale was regaining what Danny suspected was her ground state of smugness. "We knew exactly where he was all the time, and he had no idea we were even there." She rolled her eyes. "As opposed to the usual, where he knew everything about what I was doing, and I had no idea what was going on with him."

Danny raised an eyebrow. "I presume you're not going to be taking issue with how I also play my cards close to my chest?"

"Haha, nope." She made vigorous scissoring motions with her hands. "Your business is your business. You saved our asses when you could've just left us in the wind, so I'm not about to question how you do stuff."

"Good. Keep that attitude, and we'll get along fine." Danny looked at the furniture stacked in the truck; passing Chewie across to Regent, he unbuttoned his cuffs and began to roll up his sleeves. "Mr Vasil, you may take care of Chewie. Mr Laborn, Ms Lindt; would you like a hand carrying the heavier items inside?"

He didn't miss the startled look Grue shared with Tattletale, but neither one spoke. Aisha stepped in instead. "Hell yeah! Didn't I say we got some primo boss material right here? C'mon, Tats, Death's Head. Let's deal with the smaller stuff, so they can get the bigger stuff."

Jolted into action, Grue cleared his throat and nodded. "Uh, thank you, sir. You don't have to, but it would be really appreciated."

Tattletale rolled her eyes, even as she climbed up into the truck. "At least this place doesn't have a spiral staircase. Looks pretty, hell to carry stuff up and down."

Waiting to accept the first chair, Taylor snorted. "Trust me, I hear you."

It wasn't what Danny would've picked as a team-building exercise for his new minions, but he figured it would work as well as anything else.

<><>​

Tattletale

Death's Head slid the last chair under the table and gave Aisha a high-five. In the other room, Lisa could hear the Dark coordinating with Brian and Rachel exactly where to put the sofa.

"Nice," she said, looking around approvingly. "You and your dad helping out really sped things up."

"Hey, I helped too," Alec interjected defensively. He still held Chewie in his arms, but he was also carrying a shopping bag full of tinned food. "Someone's gotta make sure this little guy doesn't get underfoot."

"And I appreciate it." Death's Head went over and reclaimed the pup. "Are you all good from here?"

"Yeah, pretty well." Alec looked around, then frowned. "Actually, can we run through the whole Coil trap thing again? There's something I'm still not quite sure about."

"Jeez, again?" groaned Lisa. "She only explained it about three times."

"Yeah, but here's the thing." Alec closed his hand, then extended two fingers in a V formation. "Here's where we are, right?" He tapped one finger. "We know where our Coil is. Where's the other one?" A tap on the other finger. "How are you going to deal with him, if we don't know where he is?"

"That's not our problem," the Dark said, emerging from the corridor behind Alec. "We don't need to know where he is, because the version of us in that timeline knows. The important part is that he doesn't know that we're aware of his current location in either timeline. He needs to feel safe and secure."

"… oh." Alec blinked. "Oh, that makes sense."

"Well, duh," jeered Aisha. "I had that figured out the first time she explained it."

Death's Head grinned, but put her hand on Aisha's arm. "Be nice," she reproved mildly. "Not everyone can get everything straight away."

"So, when are you gonna pop him?" Alec mimed a finger-gun.

"At the right time." The Dark looked around at the Undersiders. "Stay put. Don't draw attention. We'll be in contact when we need you."

Brian nodded. "We'll be here. And thank you, for giving us a chance."

"I'm trusting you not to make me regret it." The Dark turned and led the way from the hideout; Death's Head followed behind. At the top of the stairs, she turned and gave them a brief wave. Then they were gone.

Lisa waited until she heard the car engine start, then relaxed and allowed herself to sink onto the sofa. Keeping a tight rein on her power so she wouldn't start analysing either one of them had been a strain, but the last thing she wanted was the Dark thinking she was prying into his affairs. "Well," she remarked to the room at large. "That happened."

"Death's Head is kinda cool," Aisha said, flopping down next to her. "She coulda gone all growly like the Dark, but she was nice."

Brian shook his head. "Aisha, just because they were polite and helpful doesn't mean they're nice. The Dark would kill any of us in a heartbeat if he had a reason."

Aisha spread her hands. "Who wouldn't, if they had a reason? I mean, Coil wants to kill you guys just because he's a massive dick."

"Exactly. Which means we aren't going to give them a reason, are we?" Lisa spoke firmly. "And we'll give them reasons not to. We're gonna be useful to them. Courteous. Respectful. Okay?"

"You talking to me?" Aisha gave her an incredulous look. "I was totally respectful!"

"I was talking to you and Alec both." Lisa leaned back and put her arm over her eyes. "We don't question them, and we don't act too familiar with them. Professional is the vibe we're going for. Even if Death's Head gives you a high-five, you don't start expecting it. And we never make comments about them where they can possibly hear it. Do you understand?"

"Hey, what about Rachel?" objected Alec. "She's a lot more likely to be rude to people than us!"

"Not to them." Rachel didn't look up from where she was grooming her dogs. "The Dark killed Cricket and Hookwolf to save my life. Death's Head treats her dog well. They're in charge."

"Exactly." Lisa didn't move her arm. "Brian?"

"Listen to Lisa," Brian ordered. "Both of you. It might just save your life."

"Okay, fine," Alec conceded. "So, when do you think he's gonna do the deed?"

Brian shrugged. "No idea. But I know this for a fact. When he takes his shot, he's not going to miss."

Nobody argued with that.

<><>​

Director Piggot, PRT ENE

Emily leaned back in her chair and steepled her fingers in front of her. "Talk to me."

Armsmaster cleared his throat. "I ran the recording through my software several times, ma'am. It's still not as good as I'd like it to be, but I got consistent warning flags of dishonesty at three different points. Specifically: when Calvert mentions the CI, when he calls the Undersiders a low-priority gang, and when he says he doesn't know them well enough to make a judgement call."

"Well, now." She frowned. "That's very interesting indeed. So if I'm to take those results at face value: there was no CI, he considers the Undersiders to be important for some reason, and he has more experience with them than he wants us to know about."

"That was my conclusion as well, ma'am." Armsmaster looked troubled. "I don't know where this is going, but I don't like it."

She gave the armoured hero a dry look. "I would be thoroughly disappointed in you if you did. Reading between the lines, I can only come to the conclusion that Calvert had some kind of prior understanding with the Undersiders, and they've recently tried to break with him and sign up with the Dark instead. The mission was intended to either dispose of them or intimidate them into returning to his patronage, but the Dark intervened on their behalf. Does that make sense to you?"

Reluctantly, he nodded. "It does. I'm just not at all sure about how it all fits together."

"There's a great deal I'm not sure about," she agreed. "Which is why I'm not going to jump straight to arresting a man on the strength of uncertain software. We're going to investigate this, in detail. I'll leave you to follow up his report on the CI and determine its veracity. I've got an interview to schedule with a sergeant."

<><>​

Sergeant Philip Hardacre, PRT ENE

Phil wasn't quite sure what was going on, but the only person waiting for him in Interview Room C was a desk weenie with a clipboard in front of him. He stopped anyway and braced to attention, because the weenie was wearing lieutenant's bars and the last thing he wanted to do was draw attention by pissing off an officer. "Sir, Sergeant Hardacre reporting, sir!"

"Ah, Hardacre. Good, good, you're here. I'm Lieutenant Grant. Have a seat." The lieutenant waved vaguely at the chair opposite him.

"Thank you, sir." Phil pulled out the chair and sat down. "May I ask a question, sir?"

"Hmm?" Grant looked up from the clipboard. "Question? Ah, of course. Ask away."

Phil had been expecting a rebuff, so the invitation threw him a little, but he recovered swiftly. "What's this about, sir? All I know is that I got orders to report to this room."

"Oh, it's nothing to be worried about, Sergeant." Lieutenant Grant tapped the clipboard. "We just had some follow-up questions regarding the after-action report that was submitted for the raid on the Undersiders yesterday. Commander Calvert isn't immediately available, so we were hoping you might be able to help us out."

By the time he finished talking, the hair on the back of Phil's neck was standing on end. Everyone knew that 'follow-up questions regarding the after-action report' was code for 'we found something hinky and we want to know who to hang it on'. Worse, Calvert was either in custody and being questioned himself or he was in the wind. And finally, the phrase 'nothing to be worried about' was a sign that events were FUBAR. Whenever it came out, there was absolutely something to be worried about.

But he couldn't react, or official attention would be focused on him instead of Calvert. So instead, he pasted his most earnest 'helpful NCO' expression on his face. "Ask away, sir. I'll help you however I can."

"Good, good." Grant picked up his pen and clicked it. "Okay, to start with … hmm. In the pre-mission briefing, what exactly were you told about the Undersiders? Rules of engagement, appropriate levels of force, that sort of thing?"

Phil blinked. "Sir," he said carefully, "not to tell you your business, but shouldn't all that be in the briefing document?"

"You are correct, sergeant." Grant's tone was serious. "It should be. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to source that document and Commander Calvert's temporarily out of contact. So, if you could fill me in on the highlights, that would be vastly appreciated."

Phil thought fast. He still couldn't figure out who was supposed to be in the frame that was clearly being constructed, but the first thing any good NCO learned was how to sidestep incoming shitstorms. 'Unable to source that document' and 'fill me in on the highlights' sounded very much like 'tell me your version, and we'll see how well it matches the document, which we absolutely do have access to'.

While he had history with Commander Calvert, it wasn't going to stretch as far as lying for the man, especially with Calvert not answering communications. "From my recollection, sir, the ROE involved a shock-and-awe fast entry, subdual as necessary with nonlethal munitions. We were only to go lethal if the situation required it. Fortunately, we were able to gain entry before they were prepped for us, and they surrendered without resistance."

"Mmm, yes." Lieutenant Grant scribbled something on the clipboard, then tapped it meditatively with the pen. "Shock and awe … shock and awe … could you please expand on that for me? How exactly did you carry out this particular fast entry?"

Phil took a deep breath. "Sir, we had a chopper overhead with half a dozen troopers fast-roping onto the roof. They then affixed climbing lines to the roof and swung in through the large window on the side of the building. At the same time, I led a dozen troopers in through the ground floor. We were momentarily held up by a locked steel door, but a forcible entry device overcame that. Once we were inside, we were further hampered by Grue creating his clouds of darkness. However, the fast-rope team put a stop to that, and we were able to secure the location with zero casualties on either side."

Lieutenant Grant nodded approvingly and made a definitive tick on the clipboard. "That's always a good thing to hear. Once you had them secured, what was to be your follow-up action?"

This was the danger point, so he tried to imply what he'd been told without actually saying so. "SOP is to transport prisoners to the PRT building to be in-processed and arraigned. We would've commenced this ASAP, except that the Commander had to take a phone call."

"Let's put a pin in that for a moment." Lieutenant Grant peered at his clipboard. "Getting back to the shock-and-awe entry. Eighteen troopers, including a helicopter for a two-pronged attack. Has the threat profile for the Undersiders changed recently? My most recent information is that they're considered low priority, only to be focused on if they come up in conjunction with a larger operation."

"Uh …" Phil felt as though he'd skated past one gaping pitfall, only to teeter on the brink of another. "Sir, that sort of thing isn't my call. Commander Calvert did the mission planning for this op. You'd have to ask him why he brought so many bodies along for it."

He knew damn well that he was throwing Calvert under the bus, given that Calvert had come to him for input on how best to ensure a total lack of resistance from the four little shits. However, loyalty only went so far, and he hadn't had his pay-packet enhanced any time recently. Technically speaking, it hadn't been his call; while he'd made the suggestions, Calvert had been under no obligation to follow them.

"Hmm. Ask … Commander … Calvert." Grant scribbled a note as he muttered the words, then raised his eyes again. "I will definitely follow that up. In the meantime, sergeant, let's get back to the matter of the phone call. What happened with that, exactly?"

"The phone call. Right. Uh, I wasn't privy to the other side of it, you understand, sir. But when we came in, Tattletale was holding out the phone and saying that she needed to speak to our CO. That is, Commander Calvert. When he entered the scene, she addressed him by name and handed the phone over. The call didn't take long, then he handed the phone back, told us to stand down and that we were pulling out."

Grant tilted his head slightly. "You said you weren't privy to the other side of it. This meant you could hear what Commander Calvert said?"

Phil cursed himself for walking into that one with his eyes wide open. "Ah, yes, sir. From what I recall, he said …" He frowned, trying to reconstruct what he'd heard. "First, he said something about having the wrong person. Then he said something about how 'she's the one'. After that he asked how long he had, because he had obligations. And then he stood everyone down."

Lieutenant Grant had been busily writing as Phil spoke; even if he'd missed anything, Phil was gloomily certain that the recording equipment behind the one-way glass had captured every syllable. "An intriguing conversation," he remarked. "Do you think you can shed any light on what Commander Calvert may have meant by some of his more obscure comments?"

"Sir, no, sir." Phil shook his head firmly. Even if he had his suspicions—and he did—there was no way he was going to air any of them, ever. The difference between throwing his CO under the bus and being the guy in the driver's seat was a fine line, but it was there. "I did query him after the orders were given, and he informed me that it had been the Dark on the other end of the call, and that he'd been warned off the Undersiders. I can only presume that he had their low priority in mind when he made the decision to comply."

"Ah, yes. The Dark." Grant made another note. "His name did come up, so thank you for verifying that." He tapped the pen down the clipboard. "Alright, we've covered that … and that … and that … hmm." The pen stopped. "And you really have no idea why Commander Calvert was so eager to get them into custody that he carried out a mission without waiting for official sanction?"

"Sir, I can't help you on that one." Phil had half an idea, but to speak of it would open a bigger can of worms than he was willing to let loose. "Perhaps he needed them for information regarding another case?"

"Perhaps." Grant tapped the clipboard again. "Actually, here's another discrepancy I'm trying to clear up. He clearly knew of their location and how many there were, but no communication was made with prisoner intake to make ready for them, even after you had the site secured. Would you happen to know why that is?"

"The Undersiders have a rep for escape and evasion, sir." Phil was pretty sure the sheen of sweat on his forehead could be used to reflect lasers. "Once we had them in hand, it would've been easy to make the call on the way back to base."

"But not until then, in case they got away. Right, I understand." Lieutenant Grant nodded agreeably. "No sense in wasting everyone's time." He looked the clipboard over, then nodded. "Well, sergeant, it seems that the queries have been addressed, the boxes have been ticked, and so forth. You may go. I've got what I need."

"Thank you, sir." Phil stood and came to attention, then turned and marched from the interview room.

All the way back to his quarters, he went over the interview in every direction he could think of, but it looked like he was in the clear this time. Calvert, on the other hand, might not be.

Where the hell are you, you twisty bastard? he asked silently. And what the fuck do you think you're up to?

But when he thought seriously about it, he decided that he really didn't want to know.

<><>​

Armsmaster

Colin knocked on the door of the Director's office; a moment later, her voice sounded from within. "Enter!"

When he opened the door, there was a PRT officer standing alongside the desk; wearing glasses, on the skinny side, he looked like nothing much until he straightened up and squared his shoulders. "I can come back later …" Colin offered.

"No, it's fine." The Director gestured to the officer. "I've borrowed Captain Grant from the Boston department for the day. Grant, this is Armsmaster."

Her statement about borrowing Grant puzzled Colin until he got close enough for a good look at the officer's shoulder flashes, alongside his rank insignia. "Intelligence division?"

Grant smiled thinly, his expression going from gormless to incisive in a heartbeat. "Correct. And it's good to meet you, Armsmaster. You have something for us?"

The Director must have noted his hesitation, because she gestured impatiently. "Grant's been read in on the situation. What do you have?"

Colin took a deep breath, using the time to order his thoughts. "I looked at the details he gave for the CI. Superficially, it looked to be on the up-and-up, but then I got Dragon to do a deep-dive. They'd been in place for all of two days, but the timestamps had been backdated by a month."

The Director didn't comment, but her eyebrows rose significantly. "Well, that's a thing," murmured Grant. "All leading back to Calvert's computer?"

"All leading back to it, yes." Colin nodded toward Director Piggot's computer. "How did it go with the interview?"

Grant smiled again. "It's amazing how much people relax if they think the person asking the hard questions is just a bumbling time-server. Sergeant Hardacre definitely knows more about Calvert's extracurricular activities than he lets on."

"Really." Colin wished he could feel more surprised at that, but this Calvert business was starting to look like a bottomless pit; the more light they shone on it, the darker and deeper it got. "Would you mind playing it back for me?"

"Happily." Director Piggot clicked the mouse, and the sound file started playing. Colin activated his specialised software and listened.

At the end of it, he let it digest while he thought over what he'd heard. "I'm thinking the significant part was the phone call. Specifically, what Calvert said."

Captain Grant nodded. "I agree. It's a little strange that his name was spoken out loud, he accepted the phone, then immediately denied that they had the right person."

"That the Dark had the right person." The Director suddenly sat up straight. "The Dark … had … the right person …" she repeated, a little more slowly. "Sonovabitch."

"Director?" Colin was a little concerned. While Director Piggot wasn't a puritan about swearing, she rarely did so in front of outsiders. "What's the matter?"

"One second." She held up her finger as she grabbed her phone.

<><>​

Assault

Ethan's phone rang just as the movie got to the good bit. He groaned as he muted the TV and dug the annoying electronic instrument out of his pocket. The only reason he wasn't ignoring it altogether was that no call coming in via that specific phone was to be ignored.

When he saw the name in the caller ID, his annoyance abated somewhat, giving way to curiosity. The Director rarely called him directly, if ever. "You've got Assault," he said, holding the phone to his ear. "What catastrophic emergency has you calling me at home, Director?"

"Listen carefully." Her tone brooked no further levity. "I have a single question, and I want a yes or no answer. No hedging, no 'I need to protect my sources'. Just the truth. When you emailed that list to me, did you get it from the Dark?"

He froze, eyes no longer on the silent action playing out on the TV. Extreme respect for the Dark warred with his loyalty toward the Director, and he hesitated for a long moment. Fuck it, I already said it was a 'friend from the old days'. There's damn-all of those left around. "Yes. Yes, I did."

"Thank you. That will be all." There was a beep as the call ended.

He was still staring at the phone when Battery entered the room. "What's going on, hon?"

"You know," he said, "I have no idea."

<><>​

Director Emily Piggot, PRT ENE

Emily felt the thrill of vindication as she placed the phone back on the desk. "Calvert is a cape," she said, having trouble believing it herself but unable to make the pieces fit in any other pattern. "A villain. And, if I'm reading the clues right, the Undersiders used to work for him. That raid was him making use of PRT resources to either eliminate them or coerce them into returning to his employ."

"A cape." Armsmaster didn't quite make it a question.

Grant frowned. "How do you figure that, Director? Because I'm missing a few steps in your logic."

"Wait." Armsmaster seemed to be catching up already. "When you got that list of Empire identities, it came from the Dark?"

She nodded. "It makes sense. If anyone knows who everyone is, it's the Dark. And when he spoke to Calvert on the phone, what's the first thing Calvert said?"

"Something about how he had the wrong person." Grant spoke in tones of realisation. "But Tattletale had already identified him. So, the Dark called him something else. Like a cape name, which he tried to deny. It does fit together, yes."

"And the next thing Calvert said?" Armsmaster was leaning forward now, excited. "She's the one?"

Emily figured it out first, and snapped her fingers. "The Dark was putting his foot down about the Undersiders. Calvert tried to wangle some kind of concession regarding one of the female members of the team. I'd say Tattletale, because she'd be more useful to him than Hellhound. But the Dark wasn't having it."

"The last thing he said." Grant checked the screen. "He asked how long he had, because he had obligations."

"Not duties." Emily nodded darkly. "That shows where his priorities lie. The Dark told him to get out of town or gave him a job to do that's extremely resource-intensive. He was negotiating for wiggle room." She looked at Armsmaster and Grant. "If either of you can figure out a coherent alternate explanation for all that, I'm listening."

Silence fell across the office. Emily read and re-read the transcript, trying to delve beneath the writing for the true meaning. But no hypothesis she could devise that involved Calvert not being a supervillain hung together. It was the only explanation that made everything else make sense.

"So …" mused Armsmaster. "If he's a villain, there can't be many that he fits the profile for."

They both looked at Captain Grant, who held up his hands. "Sorry, I can't help there. I'm not as familiar with your local capes as you are."

"None of the Empire capes, by definition, even if there were any still on the loose." Emily was fairly sure she knew who it would be, but she didn't want to leave any stone unturned. "Likewise the Merchants; he'd never have passed a drug test otherwise. And he doesn't fit the body type of Lung or Oni Lee. Or Uber or Leet, for that matter."

Armsmaster nodded. "None of Faultline's Crew is that tall, and the men are all physically striking." He looked toward Emily, and she nodded.

They spoke at the same time. "Coil."

<><>​

2354 Hours

Atop a Warehouse, the Industrial District

Death's Head

The surroundings were familiar; the roof of a warehouse. I lay on a thick blanket with the sniper rifle snuggled up to my cheek. In contrast with the first time I'd used it, there wasn't a lot of light around. Streetlights dotted the nearby cul-de-sac, and the overcast sky reflected back a little of the overall light pollution. Nowhere near enough to see properly by, but I wasn't depending on my eyes.

Dad knelt beside me, surveying Coil's bolt-hole with binoculars. I wasn't exactly sure what he'd be able to see, but I was sure he'd get more detail than I would. However, thanks to my bugs, I knew exactly where the asshole was within the building.

"We can't get much closer." Dad spoke softly, but not in a whisper; according to him, the sibilants carried farther. "He's got security cameras all around, some visible and some hidden. How's the shooting angle look?"

"Changing." I roved the scope over the outside wall of the warehouse, following the unseen aimpoint inside. "He's awake and moving around."

"That's not good." I could hear the frown in his voice. "We need to make this shot exactly at midnight."

"I think he had a nap earlier." I tried to settle my aimpoint onto his centre mass, but he only stayed seated at what I figured to be a desk for a few moments. "He's definitely awake now. Checking on vehicles, doing a count of his weapons and foodstuffs. Won't sit still for more than thirty seconds."

He seemed to come to a conclusion. "I'm going to try to do something about that. Stay on him."

"Okay." I kept following Coil with the rifle, tracking him with the bugs on him. Other bugs rode with Dad as he climbed down the ladder alongside the warehouse. Time ticked down.

I had less than thirty seconds to go, and Coil was still moving erratically. If I was going to get a kill shot, I needed him to hold still for long enough for me to get bugs in place. Then I saw Dad step into place under a security light. He raised his pistol.

<><>​

Coil

Timeline A

Following the nap, Thomas felt energised. The warehouse was a safe refuge, he knew. But the Dark was still out there and still wanted to kill him. He wouldn't be truly out of danger unless he killed the Dark first.

Lacking his previous minions to do the prep work, he found himself moving from one task to another, alternating online searches with checking on exactly what he had available in the way of vehicles and weaponry. Once he'd narrowed down exactly who the Dark was and where he laid his head at night, it would be a simple matter of setting up a no-lose confrontation, one that Calvert could iterate as many times as necessary until he was successful.

And then there was a shot from outside, followed by another. The glow coming in the window from one of the security lights went out.

What the fuck? How did he find me so fast?

Dashing up the stairs to where the security footage fed to screens, he stared at the evidence. One of the camera feeds was blank, unresponsive. Not even a timestamp in the corner.

Seating himself in the chair, he began turning other cameras to cover that spot. If it was truly the Dark, he had an assault rifle that would shred the assassin clear through the sheet-metal wall. And even if it wasn't, he might shoot them on general principles anyway.

Timeline B

Safe within the secondary house, he slept the sleep of those entirely unconcerned with matters of conscience. He was assured of his safety from this direction as well, though there had been bad news as well; the PRT had kicked in the door of the decoy house and searched it thoroughly, earlier in the evening. This told him that they knew of his other identity, but they hadn't uncovered the trapdoor into the tunnel.

This discovery was almost inevitable, given the horde of PRT investigators that would descend on the dwelling come the morning, but by the time they got anywhere, he would be long gone. And if they figured it out faster than expected, he could always drop that timeline.

He rolled over in his sleep and settled down again, playing out the lucid dream where he settled back with a glass of wine and enjoyed the reality of his untouchable nature.

Fired from the open rear window of a car idling quietly some way down the street, the .308 bullet traversed a hundred yards of air, punched through drywall, passed through three more yards of air, more drywall, two feet of air, then through Thomas' skull and brain.

He knew nothing of any of this; the closure of the timeline was the first he was aware of the danger.

Timeline A

Shit!

Instinctively, as was his go-to whenever he unexpectedly lost a timeline, he split time and went in two different directions. The first one had him diving for cover behind the desk, while in the second one he lunged for the assault rifle leaning against the wall. In both timelines, a bullet came in through the wall, perhaps a fifth of a second after he started moving.

Timeline A1

As he dropped behind the desk, the bullet came in high. It punched through a security monitor, sending the screen dark and spraying plastic shards over him. A dull punch to the shoulder nearly sent him off balance and gave notice that he'd been shot. As he crouched low, he evaluated the wound; it had only gone through the outer muscle. Using the arm would hurt, but he could deal with that.

Timeline A2

He almost had his hand on the assault rifle when the bullet took him in the lower abdomen, knocking him sideways with the shock of contact. He sprawled on the timber flooring, aware of the spreading warmth on his front and back and aware that it was going to hurt like fuck in just a moment. It was also a wound that he wouldn't survive without competent and comprehensive medical assistance.

As the pain began to dig its claws in, he dropped that timeline and split the other one.

Timeline A1

It didn't help; even as he crouched under cover in both new timelines, three more shots came through the desk itself, fired in quick succession. The first completed the job of ruining his shoulder, the second caught him in the chest, and the third went straight through his throat. Either of the last two shots would've proved fatal; he slumped to the floor, dying.

Even as his sight ebbed, he tried to figure out exactly how the Dark had managed to shoot so accurately through cover.

He died with the mystery still unsolved.



End of Part Sixteen