Somewhere along the line, t had become something of a habit, as we ended our sessions. I gave her a little smile as we parted.
I made my way back to the common area, and seated myself at the computer. The others were still following what was happening on the larger monitors. The defending heroes had frozen the plane’s half-submerged wreckage and they were preparing quarantine measures.
Whatever the reason for this particular attack, I doubted it would be clear anytime soon.
Instead, I seated myself at the computer, and logged myself in. The timers ticked away.
Once I’d updated the timer for the recent attack, it read:
C/D: Endbringer
149:22:59:59
C/D: End of World
579:07:14:53
Inching down steadily.
Mrs. Yamada had been right, I mused, as I found the files on the local kingpins and warlords. I was doing myself a disservice by waiting for opportunity to come to me. If I was going to do as Glenn had suggested, and make a calculated play, I needed to act, rather than hope for another chance like we’d had in New Delhi.
Looking at the others, I wondered if it was best to manipulate them or get them on board. Manipulation was almost kinder, because it absolved them of guilt. Simply making sure we were in the right place at the right time, luring a local power into a fight, with a plan already in mind…
No.
Chevalier’s Protectorate, ups and downs aside, was more about honesty. I wanted to tap into Skitter’s strengths, her ruthlessness, but I also wanted to be a hero. That was at the core of what I had achieved in New Delhi.
“Tecton,” I called out, as my eyes fell on a portrait of a supervillain with a mask of an upside-down face. An established power, located at the city’s edge for nearly ten years.
Too established? I didn’t want to set another ABB fiasco in motion. There were advantages to being open. The ability to ask questions, get feedback.
“What is it?” he asked.
“There’s something I want to talk to you about.”
25.03
Wind stirred the snow that had piled up at the rooftop’s edge. As it entered the space over the Chicago street, city lights caught the flurry and made it almost luminescent, whirling clouds in intense, intricate patterns.
I was, in other words, bored beyond comprehension.
Stakeouts? Not nearly as interesting as they were in the movies. Not even as interesting as they were in the TV shows where nothing happened and the cops complained about how dull things were.
No, this was a special kind of boring, where I was told to limit how much I moved, because of the half-a-percent chance that the targets in the building on the other side of the street might look out a window, and the ensuing one-in-a-thousand chance that they might actually be able to see me perched on the rooftop, surrounded by snow in my dark gray and white costume.
A boring, even, where I wasn’t allowed to read or listen to music.
“Weaver,” the voice came through my earbud.
“Talk to me. Please.”
Grace complied. ”Police chief and the Mayor are talking to Revel and the Director. Thought you’d want an update.”
“You could give me minute by minute updates on golf and I’d love you forever.”
“Hyperbole. That’s not like you.“
“It’s been a while,” I muttered. I shifted position to bring my feet up onto my ‘bug box’. The case was insulated, but there was some heat loss, so it included a heater that turned on periodically to maintain a consistent internal temperature. At the same time, I was wearing a PRT issue winter-weather costume beneath a doublethick silk ‘Weaver’ costume, complete with a hood, shawl and something of a skirt. It took time for my fingers and toes to get cold, so things more or less evened out with the heater.
“Well, this is your five minute check-in. Again.” I could hear the noise of a show or something on in the background.
“Thank you, Grace. Situation unchanged. Target’s grabbing a late dinner. There’s seven others working under him. Nothing special in their chatter. There’s plainclothes capes in there, but they’re not using names.”
“You’re sure they’re capes?”
“He warned them when they stepped inside that he’d act the second they used powers, so… yeah.”
“Gotcha. I’ll be in touch in another five min.”
“These five minute check-ins make it so much worse,” I groused. ”It’s like, if it weren’t for those, I could let time slip by, but no. I get measured reminders of how long I’ve been here.”
“This was your idea.”
“Dumb idea,” I commented.
“You were the one who wanted to do the stakeout, even,” she reminded me.
“Kind of thought I’d get to read,” I said.
That, and it had been a way to finally get some time to myself. We had run it by the Director, and I’d known right off the bat that he was itching to shut me down. Orders from above, no doubt. A way to get credit with the guys upstairs.
Still, I’d explained how my bugs would let me track the target’s movements. Our boss had okayed the job, with certain restrictions. The surveillance had to be airtight, with the check-ins, a mandate that any breaks had to fall between check-ins, and the restrictions on entertaining myself or drawing attention. At the same time, he’d said with a smile, the PRT rulebook said a Ward couldn’t be forced to undertake or carry out a mission. If I wanted to walk away, I could. If I got too cold I had to.
He wanted me to quit. To exercise a measure of control over me, so he’d have something to leverage against me at a later date.
Six hours in, I’d left for three bathroom breaks, each between four and a half and five minutes in duration, and had relocated three times, as our target went out to lunch and then returned to check on the business. Wanton and Annex had both come to keep me company, until the Director had found something else for them to do.
Then Revel had come on shift, and I had an ally who wasn’t just ready to go to bat for me, but able to. She was working reduced hours after her head injury, deferring more tasks to Shuffle, but she was still the boss. She’d read the logs from the check-ins, called me to verify facts on the drugs and guns I’d noted moving through the apartment, and then reached out to the Director.
That had been two hours ago. Somewhere in the midst of her battle with the Director, she’d reached out to the police chief and mayor. She would be trying to sell them on our plan.
Or, it was easily possible, they were sold and they were trying to get the ducks in a row and favors pulled to make our plan a reality.
And with all the excitement that was no doubt happening over there, I was sitting here, a little cold, wishing I’d saved a little something from the lunch I’d packed into my plastic Alexandria lunchbox.
The lunchbox was a memento, really, an impulse I’d justified in the moment by telling me it fit with my general camouflage, that it was ironic. I hadn’t counted on how long I’d be left to stare at it, while my bugs tracked the target going about his day. It made for a long time spent ruminating on past events, debating just how the bureaucrats could sabotage me, intentionally or otherwise.
For several dangerous minutes, I’d seriously considered going back to the Undersiders if this mission got derailed. I’d stopped myself before I got too far into that line of thinking, knowing it was a trap that would lead to me compromising, giving up in a way. Playing into the Directors’ hands.
No, I wouldn’t go back. I missed them; scarcely an hour went by where I didn’t wonder how they were getting by, but I wasn’t allowed to contact them. I wanted to know how Imp had changed in response to Regent’s passing, if Grue was getting enough support, or if Rachel was managing in the cold on the other side of the Brockton Bay portal. Was Tattletale using her power too much, still? How was Sierra managing as a corporate magnate and front-man for a villainous organization?
Hell, how was the Boardwalk getting on?
T
hey were questions I couldn’t ask or answer without raising red flags with the people who were watching me for the slightest excuse. I’d cheated and sent letters, written by my bugs, delivered to a mail box while I was hundreds of feet away, and I’d received ‘fan letters’ with coded messages from Tattletale. It wasn’t enough, didn’t have the details I craved.
“Five minute check-in,” Grace said, interrupting my train of thought.
“Situation unchanged,” I replied.
“Stuff’s happening over here. Revel is right beside me. She’ll fill you in.“
I perked up a little at that.
“Weaver. Revel here. I’ve talked it over with everyone that matters and too many people that don’t, and they’re saying it’s okay. Tecton and the rest of the Wards, minus Grace and Wanton, will be mobilizing shortly.”
“We’re good to go?”
“Shortly. PRT trucks are already en route and will be standing by, when they’re not actively transporting your teammates. Campanile, Brazier, Shuffle and Gauss will be a short distance away, but they won’t engage unless this goes belly-up. This is your show. You and the Wards. Quite a few people hoping you guys can pull this off. A handful hoping you fail.”
Like the Directors. ”Got it. Do me a favor and fill me in on everyone else’s status and locations until they’re within a twelve-hundred feet of me. Coordination is going to be key here.”
“Grace will handle it.“
Not a hundred percent necessary, but it would keep me sane. I suspected the remaining minutes of waiting would be as bad as the first three hours had been.
“We’re controlling traffic,” Grace said. I could hear others speaking in the background. ”Flow through the area should slow and eventually stop.“
“Good to know,” I said. My eyes roved over the face of the building opposite me, while my bugs tracked our quarry.
“Where do you want your team?” Revel asked.
My team?
“Keep them in the vehicles,” I answered. ”I’ll let them know where to set up when things are underway.”
I stood up from my perch, making sure that our target and his employees weren’t watching out the windows before I stretched. I was alternately cool and toasty warm, where different body parts had been closer to the vent, and my costume layers thicker. Not cold, though. Not so much that I’d be affected.
Snow slid off the top of my hood as I bent down, lifting the insulated box with my bugs inside and setting it on the roof’s edge. It was essentially a thermos, but as lightweight as the materials were in the case and the heating system, the bugs I’d packed inside made it heavy.
I worried it would be an issue in my plan. With roughly eight hours by myself to think, I’d considered various ways this could go. Tactics our enemies could employ, things that could trip us up, ways our supervisors could derail the plan, but this forty pound box was something that rested entirely on my shoulders.
“We’re close to the perimeter,” Tecton reported, his voice buzzing in my ear.
I pressed a finger to my earbud, “I’m going to get us started. Sound off from all corners, please.”
“Roger from HQ,” Grace said.
“Roger-roger from the field team,” Tecton said. ”Just reached perimeter. Sending Annex and Cuff your way. Golem and I will be working.”
I stepped over to the rooftop’s edge. The streets had gone quiet. The unsteady evening traffic that had a way of continuing in the dead of night had stopped, leaving the area more or less isolated. I’d spent the better part of the day organizing bugs in the surrounding buildings, and I now moved them into position. Swarms formed into large ‘x’ marks on major exits, elevators and stairwells. In higher traffic spots where people were more likely to move, I drew out words with the swarm.
‘Cape fight in progress.’
I suspected this was a not-insignificant part of how Revel had managed to get the police chief and mayor on board with the plan, despite any protests or manipulations from the Director. The chance of bystanders getting caught up in this was minimal. As minimal as it was possible to get in the midst of a larger city, anyways.
I activated my flight pack and crossed the street, simultaneously making my way down to the ground. Not so hard, with the extra weight that made up my burden.
The doorway that led into the lobby of the apartment building required a keycard or a number punched into a resident’s phone upstairs. Not so difficult, after a day’s surveillance. My bugs were already prepared to knock a phone off the hook in an older woman’s apartment, a moment after I’d found her name on the board and dialed the number. Much as I’d done in Tagg’s office, I had my bugs punch the buttons.
The door buzzed. I walked backwards into it, carrying the insulated box, then dropped the box in the base of the lobby, opening the little door.
The bugs flowed out of the box and disappeared into the air vents. Slowly, they made their way up to the apartment of a local supervillain. A black market storehouse first, an apartment second, really. The only reason it seemed he slept here was convenience. The old adage of not shitting where one ate fell apart when ninety percent of the day was spent eating.
I knew how easy it was to fall into that trap. I thought of the Boardwalk and felt a trace of nostalgia.
The apartment was one of many detours in an extended distribution chain that saw guns and drugs making their way to the Folk, one of the rare criminal organizations that predated capes and still functioned in more or less the same fashion today. Topsy and his underlings were guarantors, middlemen who made it possible for diehard enemies to do business. If a fight erupted, he and his minions would deal with the situation quickly, promptly and efficiently.
It was a simple job, and it was one he’d done for nearly a decade. In the process, he’d apparently grown exceedingly rich, and he had recently started to become more ambitious. Campanile and Shuffle had interfered with a deal, and Topsy had hired some mercenaries to seek out retaliation. If the escalation of the situation wasn’t bad enough, the mercenaries had crossed lines, and Topsy had been relocated to the heroes’ shit list as a consequence. He was an acceptable target.
The only thing that would make Campanile and Shuffle happier than us fucking up and giving them an excuse to step in would be a perfectly executed operation and a humiliating loss for Topsy. I’d do my best to oblige on that front.
Finding the way through the building’s ventilation system was a question of mapping the system. Once I knew the way, the bugs abandoned the map and made their way into the apartment.
I could have gone on the offensive right away, but this wasn’t a conventional attack. Every step of this had to be considered, measured, and plotted.
Minutes passed as I followed Topsy’s movements through the apartment. One by one, I collected his underling’s phones, as they put them down. A girl in the group said she needed to make a call, couldn’t find her phone, and borrowed one from someone else. The second she put it down and turned her back, cockroaches swept it into the space between the table and the wall, and then proceeded to nudge it well out of reach, beneath furniture.
Topsy’s phone was the only one left, and he wouldn’t put it down long enough for me to claim it. I focused on the front hall instead, bugs collecting around jackets, boots and the winterized costume pieces, complete with warm coverings.
I could sense Annex and Cuff through the bugs that were warm and safe in the folds of their costumes. They trudged through the two inches of snow that had accumulated on the plowed sidewalks. Cuff seemed oddly more comfortable compared to Annex, who clutched his cloak around his shoulders.
“Annex, Cuff, I’m half a block up and to your right,” I said, one finger on my earpiece. ”Look for me in the lobby.”
“Got it,” Annex reported.
Back to the preparations. The goal here wasn’t to defeat Topsy, but to break him. Part of the goal, anyways.
Silk lines tangled zippers and bound laces. Gloves, both the ones
for costumes and the ones for regular winter wear, were knotted with more silk, or they became home to wasps, cockroaches and millipedes.
Bugs too large or too small to be crushed found their way into boots. Cockroaches bit and chewed at the finer straps that held the inner lining of jackets against the exterior. The bugs I’d laced with capsaicin were relatively few in number due to the fact that it would kill the bugs next to them in the box, but I didn’t need a lot of the stuff. I transferred some to scarves and balaclavas by rubbing their bodies against the fabrics.
Annex knocked on the glass door, then melded into it and passed through before I could approach to open the door. He rubbed at his upper arms as he opened the door for Cuff.
“You okay?” I asked.
Annex only nodded.
There. I snapped my head up to look in the direction of the upstairs apartment, as though I could see through the walls. Topsy had put his phone down on the kitchen counter to grab a beer, setting the thing to speaker mode while he looked for a bottle opener.
Bugs from the front hallway of the apartment flowed into the kitchen and swept the phone into the half-full sink. Topsy didn’t notice right away.
“Creepy when you do that,” Cuff said.
“Hm?”
“Zoning out.”
“I’ve disabled their communications,” I said. ”Let’s go.”
I moved the empty box to a corner of the lobby, hidden in plain sight, then led the way out of the building, with Cuff and Tecton following me into the adjacent alleyway.
Topsy was swearing as he nearly dropped his beer in his haste to rush to the sink and push his sleeves up to dig for the smartphone in the mess of dishes and scummy water. I could taste how much old food was in the water. It wasn’t a sense that translated well, but I could detect a thin, strong scent permeating the kitchen, one a select few of my bugs were attracted to.
“Tecton, Grace,” I said, “Annex and Cuff are here, we’re standing aside while I engage. I’m not forcing this. Longer it takes them to catch on, the better the psychological effect.”
“Roger you,” Grace answered.
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