A peal of thunder wakes Bedevil up from probably the worst sleep of her life. Immediately, her stomach twists. She rolls over, barely making it off the bed before her lunch makes good on its threat to return and ends up all over the prison floor. Chunks of pasta and meat are still recognizable in the slurry of stomach acid. She coughs, tries to breathe, feels it sticking in her esophagus.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” she groans, climbing up the metal bench her bed rests on. Her clammy hands slip, but she manages to keep herself from falling.

The bed tempts her back, but another grumble of thunder wakes her fully, and she decides to ignore the bed in favor of trying to clean up her vomit. She uses the cell’s one, crappy towel, wipes up the bile, and throws it into the shower stall. Someone will come get it later, or she’ll just wash it with the shower, doesn’t matter right now.

Chills take her as she stands in the middle of the cell. She presses the back of her hand against her forehead. Fever’s already setting in.

“Fine!” she shouts, although no one can hear her. “If this is how you want it, mom, I’ll beat it! I’m strong enough, I’m capable enough. I’ve survived far worse than this!”

In the moment after the outburst, she feels a little silly. Who was that for?

“Hey! You!” The whisper comes through a vent on the right wall. The voice belongs to a young man with a slight Hispanic accent. “What are you screaming about?”

Bedevil groans as she limps over to the wall, reaches up for the vent and finds that even on her tip toes the vent is just out of reach. She looks around for something to stand on, sees only the bed. At least she can move it. The metal legs squeal on the floor as she drags it over and then looks into the vent.

Mateo, Gabe’s little buddy, looks back at her through the vent. As soon as he sees her, his eyes go wide. He scowls and says, “Bedevil?! What the hell, man? I thought you’d be someone who could help me.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” she grumbles, ducking away from the vent. “I’ll leave you to it.”

“Wait! What are you doing in there? Why are you shouting? You woke me up, y’know. I was napping. It’s tough work being a prisoner of the fascist imperial state.”

Bedevil peeks back into the vent again. “Oh, you know. Also being a prisoner of the fascist imperial state.”

“You?” Mateo laughs. “No way. Aren’t you basically like the ruler of the Vanguard?”

“Not even close.”

“Like, the princess, at least,” he says.

Bedevil glares at him. “Obviously not, kid, otherwise I wouldn’t be in here.”

“Why are you here?” he asks.

She yells wordlessly in exasperation. “I don’t even know! I made horrible choices! I tried to help Gabe-”

“Gabe?” Mateo asks. “You’ve seen him? Is he okay?”

“He’s not, no. But he’s not here. He’s still out there,” she says.

“If you know our real names…”

“I know who you are, who he is… yeah. I’m sorry, Mateo. I’m so sorry.”

Mateo tsks her. “You shoulda led with that. Any friend of Gabe’s is a friend of mine.”

Bedevil certainly wouldn’t call herself a friend of Gabe, not after everything she’s done to him just this last week alone. But… she cares. She can’t help that she cares. Not even in the sense that he looks like Julian and it makes her heart ache. It’s just that helping him is the right thing to do. Even if Oracle disentangles her from Gabe, from Julian, from all of it, Bedevil knows in her heart that not even disentanglement can take away her sense of justice.

“Yeah,” she says. “I’m his friend.”

“Okay, cool. Since you are, we should work on getting out of here.”

Bedevil snorts. “I wish that were possible, kid.”

“It’s gotta be. Nowhere’s inescapable. Plus, I can show you something cool.” Mateo climbs up into the vent, squeezing his much smaller body into the space Bedevil could never hope to fit in. He barely fits himself, but manages it, and as he gets halfway up into it, he reaches a hand out to the midpoint of where the vent meets between their rooms. “There’s a gap.”

A ball of light blooms out of nothing in front of his fingers.

Bedevil almost cries. There’s a gap. She remembers how sharp the ball was when it hit her shield as they fought. “Does it survive the field?”

“Not on my side,” Mateo says, demonstrating by rolling it back toward him. As it travels back to his face, it shrinks until it vanishes. “But when I roll it toward you…” he conjures another, a little red ball, and sends it toward her. This time, the ball makes the journey. Bedevil worries for a second that it’ll chew into her, but when it touches her hand, it’s fine.

It’s a mistake in Houston’s cell design, and it’s a miracle for them. They must be relying on older tech that could only target a specific person in a room. Which is how Oracle could have appeared to her like she did, right in the cell.

“How is it safe to touch?” she asks. “Why did it seem to damage my shield?”

“Because I was spinning it really, really fast, duh.” Mateo makes a funny face at her. “Thought you’d be smart enough to know that.”

Spinning it…

“Wait, so these things are solid enough to endure anything? Could you make a disc and roll it over to me?” Bedevil asks.

Mateo nods, conjuring a thin, flat circle into existence. He rolls it over to her.

“It won’t break?” she asks.

“Nope!”

Bedevil takes her salvation and hops down from the vent, hoping that all this activity hasn’t caught the attention of any capes yet. She’s definitely being watched, but not actively right this second, it seems, because no one’s busting down the door.

A plan forms in her head. She steps down from her bed, brings Mateo’s conjured disc over to the door. She slides it into the seam between the door and the wall, searching for the lock. She finds it.

“This better work!” she says, before lining up the heel of her boot with the disc.

She kicks.

The door pops open.

Her powers and emotions hit her as she dashes through the door and into the hallway. Her body fights her on each step, her stomach kicks and whines as she reaches out, sensing where the electric wiring runs to cameras and lights. She creates tendrils of air that cut through the wiring, cutting the power to the whole hallway and its surveillance. Once that’s done, she changes her clothes into a security uniform, and ties her hair up in a blue cap materialized out of thin air. She conjures a pair of glasses, and hopes the disguise buys her enough time to get out.

She opens Mateo’s cell. The kid comes sprinting out, still in half the outfit he had on when they brought him in, minus the mask. Bedevil conjures an outfit for him that matches hers. Hopefully no one will look too closely at his height. “Come on,” she says, grabbing his arm and pulling him down the hallway.

The alarm starts. Red lights strobe at one-second intervals above her head, along with a low repetitive wail signaling a breakout.

“Fuckity fucking fuck!” Bedevil whispers, picking up her pace. But going faster than a power walk rips her guts out and jams them up her throat again. She falls against the wall, struggles to keep herself upright, and then dry heaves. Mateo moves to help, but shrinks back against the wall when a large masculine cape runs up to them, puts a hand on Bedevil’s shoulder, and asks if they’re okay in a tone that means he wants her to get up and do her job.

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Bedevil wipes her mouth, resorts to a lie. “It’s awful. It’s horrendous!” She points down the hallway, keeping her head turned away from the cape. “It killed Adrian!”

The cape starts at her lie, falling for it, and then runs down the hall.

“Sucker,” Bedevil says, sticking her tongue out. Mateo laughs when he sees her plan’s worked, and then they keep running. She leads him all the way down the hall, takes a left, finds stairs leading up to the Shrine proper, and, steeling herself for the tremendous effort, climbs them as fast as she can without vomiting. Mateo runs up after her, keeping pace. On the way up the stairs, she melts the security uniform and conjures street clothes, a simple gray t-shirt and jeans, and sneakers for running, but keeps the hat and glasses. Something that looks civilian. She does the same for Mateo.

“Stay close to me. If anybody asks, you’re my cousin.” Bedevil puts an arm around his shoulder and guides him into the Shrine.

The Shrine is exploding with activity. As they slip out of the stairwell on the ground floor, a security team passes them. They’re dressed in navy ceramic body armor and carrying rifles, with PK cuffs dangling from their belts. Capes herd visiting adorants out through the main Shrine entrance. Bedevil and Mateo slip in among them. They don’t complain or draw attention to themselves in any way, just allow themselves to be swept along with the crowd.

Before the capes realize what’s happened, they’re out in the streets.

Bedevil walks slowly away from the Houston Shrine, leading Mateo like he really is her little cousin. But as they duck into an alcove to catch their breath, a familiar drone swoops in with its sapphire gaze. Dotty, her mother’s only connection to Houston.

“Ruby!” Oracle hisses directly into her mind. “You-”

Bedevil has to move quickly. She reaches out with her power, creates a blade of air. She whispers, “Sorry, Dotty,” and flings the blade right through the drone’s camera eye. The machine sputters, dies, and with it, her mother’s voice. They’ll have to send another drone directly connected to her monitors. Likely that will come with Phoenix and Meltdown, but at the very least, Bedevil is safe from her mother’s gaze for tonight.

#

Flashfire snaps his fingers and watches the white sparks become tongues of fire. He’s relieved to have his power again.

He’d barely escaped with his life. Even after Home Run left to fight Krater, those women were insanely strong. He’d never expected such a fight from masks, never expected to feel so helpless. Truly vicious women. Actually managed to sprain his left arm, although now it was better, if a bit stiff. In the end, though, he managed to get away, and as soon as he had, his power had returned. He’d flown home. They had an empath. Of course they had an empath.

“Cocksuckers,” he whispers to himself, and looks over at the special medical unit housing Krater. He rests in an actual tank filled with yellow moisture gas, an amniotic healing dew developed by one of the medical guilds Flashfire can’t remember the name of. “Ain’t that right, buddy?”

No normal hospital bed could house Krater, both because of his enormous stature and the extent of his injuries. There’s a giant, stone-covered hole just below his chest, slowly healing. Flashfire walks over to the unit and presses his forehead against the glass surrounding Krater. The monitor beeps to his steady, if weak, heartbeat.

Flashfire feels so worthless after everything. If he hadn’t been captured, Krater would be joking with him right now.

A loud trill comes from his personal handheld. Flashfire jumps and fumbles the device out of his pocket. Who would be calling him at this hour? The caller ID is unknown, which is usually only reserved for higher-ups on the Templar network. Or it means the person has some kind of power or tech that can scramble the Affect powering the network. Which is possible, just super rare. Flashfire’s only seen it done once.

Overwhelmingly curious, he answers.

A buzzing, electronic voice asks, “This Flashfire?”

“Who’s this?”

“A friend of a friend.”

“That friend of a friend have a name?” Flashfire asks, already pissed off. He doesn’t have the patience for these kinds of games. “Who the fuck is this?”

“You want to get Home Run, right?”

Flashfire’s heart rate rockets. “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m an old friend of Danger Close. Worked with PK, too. I’m a friend to the heroes, have been for a long time.”

“If you don’t give me a name, I’m gonna hang up and report your number.” Flashfire leans back from the receiver, ready to end the call. He waits to hear what the person has to say.

“I’m Pandahead.”

Flashfire slams the phone back to his ear. “What the fuck did you say?”

“I said I’m Pandahead.”

“Bullshit. You ain’t no friend of the heroes.” Flashfire snorts in disdain. He’d heard of Houston’s bogeyman, and Bedevil’s reports had mentioned his name in connection with Home Run. But that he’d call Flashfire, claiming to be on his side? The very idea… insane.

“Nah. I worked with your boy Danger Close for a long ass time.”

Now Flashfire can’t even think straight. “You’re lying. The hell you did. He-”

“He, PK, and I whipped up something special together. If you want to see his work done, I need your help. I need Home Run dealt with.”

Flashfire is about to bite his own tongue in half. His arms are tense with rage, he wants to chew through his phone and find the person on the other end, whether or not they’re pranking him. “You need my fucking help.”

“Yeah. I need someone to pick up where DC left off. You were his best friend. He talked about you all the time.”

If the person on the other end of the phone is lying, there’s no way to tell. Flashfire can’t get a read on the electronic voice, can’t even tell if it’s a man or a woman.

“But I need someone who can be my guy in the capes, like DC was. He was so dependable, and he thought the world of you.”

“You’re saying you’re Pandahead, a wanted slave trader, and you worked with my team leader. Is that right? You’re saying my team leader willingly worked with a slaver? Willingly worked with a slaver terrorizing this city and sending the local masks into a frenzy? You’re saying, my DC let you run free? Fucking liar.” Flashfire shakes his head in disbelief. “This is some fucking crank call, man. I’m reporting your number, and then I’m finding you, and I’m gonna melt you down to your asshole.”

“If you don’t believe me, check your boy’s office for a hidden compartment. It probably got missed when you cleaned it out. Passcode A-D-Seven-Six-Slash-T-M-Two.”

The chill that runs down Flashfire’s spine kills his rage.

“You let me know what you think of that.”

But that rage doesn’t stay dead long. Trembling, Flashfire holds the handheld up to his mouth and says, “If you’re thinking that I would ever work with you, you’re delusional. I’m a cape, damn it, and I’ll kill every fucking slaver I see.”

He hangs up, throws the handheld at the wall. It shatters into pieces.

A nurse enters, looking alarmed, and sees Flashfire standing there, biting the back of his fist. “Is… is everything okay, Mr. DeClaire?”

Fighting the idea that there might have been a side of Danger Close he never knew, Flashfire says, “Yeah. He’s fine. Sorry. Didn’t mean to freak you out.”

The nurse nods and, instead of leaving, walks into the room. She glances at the broken handheld on the floor, but says nothing. She focuses on checking Krater’s vitals. “He’s improving,” she says. “Not as fast as we hoped, but he’s improving.”

Flashfire manages a smile for a half second. But before he can internalize that good turn, the Shrine alarm goes off. The single red light in the room begins to strobe on a one-second interval. The nurse looks up, then at Flashfire, clearly afraid, so Flashfire reassures her with a silent pat on the back and rushes out to the hallway. All the medical staff stand around, apprehensive, and as Flashfire jogs by the nurse station, they look to him as if he’ll have some kind of answer.

He breaks into a full run when the alarm doesn’t stop, finding the elevator that’ll take him off the medical floors and down to command. He broke his handheld, so now he has to find someone to tell him what’s happening. The elevator descends, his panic rising as the alarm doesn’t relent.

Then the code arrives over the elevator speaker with a burly operator’s voice: “All capes and security, code 74.”

Breakout.

Bedevil.

Flashfire screams in the elevator. “No, you fucking bitch!”

The elevator doors open in the Shrine command rooms, where the breakout code has kicked the capes like a hornet’s nest. He doesn’t waste time, just holds down the “close door” button and slams the basement level for the cells. Then the thought strikes him - she’s had a head start. She’s probably already out of the basement levels. If she has her power back, no telling where she’s gone or what she’s done with it.

He jumps out of the elevator at the last minute, dashing through the mass of heroes and security officers. He pushes through the command rooms to the stairs overlooking the Shrine, slides down the banister railing into the main hall. The adorants are almost done being pushed out of the building.

Flashfire sprints across the hall, desperate to catch her. She can’t fucking leave, not without answering for everything she’s done.

“Hey, no-” one of the security officers says as he makes it to the back of the line of people being escorted out. “Oh, Flashfire.”

“Shut the fuck up. Have you seen a tall blonde woman?” Flashfire shouts.

“Maybe?” another agent says. “We didn’t do facial scans; orders were to get civies out of the building.”

“No!” Fucked over by basic incompetence! Flashfire shoves people out of his way and fights through the doors. A man grunts at him as he pushes by, a woman yelps, “Hey!”

He’s single-minded now. He charges out to the street, searching for a glimpse of golden hair on a woman even taller than him.

Nothing.

“Search the building! A woman, 5’10”, blond hair!” Flashfire shouts at the security officers.

But he knows in his heart - she’s made it out. She’s clever, knows Vanguard security like the back of her hand, and has the ability to warp reality. She could have waltzed up through the building, reshaping it as she passed through floors, without leaving a trace behind.

“Fuck! Damn it!” Flashfire smacks a trash can next to the doors, startling the people around him. He runs back into the Shrine.

“That’s it,” he hisses to himself, and starts up his sprint again. He bounds down the stairs to the prison cells, taking them three or four at a time. Some capes freak out as he barrels past them, and a security squad in all their stupid armor point their guns at him as he turns down the hallway where they were keeping Bedevil. They lower their weapons when they see who he is.

“Dickheads! She’s already gone!” Flashfire says. “And you, give me that gun or you’re gonna see yourself stationed in Conroe by the end of the night.”

The officer says, “What?” while handing over the gun anyway.

“Go make yourselves useful somewhere else.” Then, with as much sincerity as he can manage, he adds, “Keep up the good work.”

The old man is on the floor below where they were keeping Bedevil, in a special containment room meant to keep empaths chained up. No Affect tech within fifty feet the floor, nothing they can manipulate. The gun in Flashfire’s hands is perfect for this.

Flashfire yells in relief when he sees Paul laying on the bench, staring at the ceiling of his cell. He practically rips the door off its hinges, scaring the shit out of the old man and as he says, “Get the fuck up and tell me everything you know about Home Run.”

Paul sneers at Flashfire. “I’m not telling you shit about him.”

“You’re dead if you don’t.” Flashfire marches into the room and aims the rifle at Paul’s chest. “Now get up. Be a good dog and take me to that cocksucker.”