Since the Heroes League were stone-walling them about the dead hero, Justin had asked Naiad to get in touch with the League to see if they'd talk to her as a former member, and had Era investigating other missing persons and murder cases throughout the state.

Justin was going to be heading the patrols tonight with Oscen and Shift, so he did spend an hour installing a micro-grenade launcher into the Phantom. It wasn't much, but since they would be pretty much on their own, it would have to do, especially since most of the team had plans to be busy elsewhere.

Division had zeroed in on an old steel mill as Ku's current hideout, and was planning to stake it out until he knew more. Revenant, Shade and Wind were planning to break up the Jackal's downtown recruitment drive, which was apparently happening tonight in an old multi-storey car park. According to Era, this kind of thing happened all the time when gangs and villains were trying to expand their reach, but Justin couldn't quite picture it, he kept seeing something like his middle-school job fair, which was just ridiculous.

Justin made some good progress on his core throughout the day, but it would still be at least another day before he could field-test it. In the mean time, he'd spent a couple of hours working up the new combat drone so that he'd have something to put it in, before heading out on patrol.

Things had been going well. They'd stopped two muggings, a sexual assault, and chased off half a dozen dealers. Justin was happy with the night's progress, but a little disheartened with the state of the city if this was a normal night.

Around midnight, they were pulled from further patrolling by Division. Apparently the Furies had just turned up at the mill and disappeared inside.

Justin went over a number of scenarios on the way over, from the Furies working with Ku, to their spying on the Outsiders and trying to steal their collar. None of it seemed likely, or made a lot of sense. Most likely they'd been lured to the mill by Ku for some unknown purpose.

When they arrived, they discovered that Division knew as little as they did. The Furies had turned up, twitchy, but not obviously ready for battle. They'd headed in quietly, and things had been silent ever since.

"I definitely still smell the Furies," Oscen whispered, her eyes closed, her head tilting and turning "but no one else, not recently. There is also blood and... charcoal? Could be from the mill days, but it smells too fresh." She tilted her head again, apparently lost enough in her senses that she'd overcome her usual reticence for talking. "I don't hear any heartbeats inside either."

Division nodded, staring up at the building while behind him, his clones stripped off their disguises and donned body armour. "We need to know what happened in there, and I need to know how Ku slipped the net. I'm happy to just send the clones in with Artisan, but your help would be appreciated." He said, flicking a look between Shift and Oscen.

The two heroes shared a glance before nodding back.

Justin could appreciate why everyone was feeling so tense, and it wasn't just the spooky atmosphere of the mill at night, or the bodies they were likely to find inside. Something was very off about the whole situation.

Justin was tempted to suggest calling in the rest of the team, but he knew how important it was to break the Jackal's plans tonight. The Jackals were large enough on their own, the team really didn't need to be dealing with a bolstered army of transformed gang members.

Once Division had changed his clones out of their street clothes and into body armour, the clones led the way quietly through the abandoned site.

Justin was both relieved and frustrated that they found nothing except damp, empty rooms, dirt, rusty metal and the gentle whistle of wind through old pipes. The place was seriously creepy, even with his night vision, and Justin couldn't imagine anyone choosing to stay here if they had any other choice.

They were on the upper floor when Oscen indicated a doorway at the end of the corridor.

Justin ran a scan on the room, and was disheartened to see two cooling bodies inside. The third was still putting out heat, but it was a still heat unlike that of a living body. He'd been pretty sure they were going to find the Furies dead, and it wasn't like the players themselves had died, but it was still strangely unsettling.

During the more harrowing moments of his stay in Manticore's cave, Justin had given some thought to what he would do if his character was killed, or rather, destroyed. He knew Imagitech liked to run their games with full immersion, so no respawns, death was permanent, but with a definite asterix, it was a superhero game after all.

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Justin had heard that it was more than possible to buy your character's way back into the game,  by taking on more complications, or purchasing a power that could save you. It didn't need to make you immortal, it just needed to provide enough of an explanation for your character to have survived whatever happened to him.

Oh, you fell from that building? Guess who's waking up in hospital with amnesia. You bled to death in an alley? Guess who's latent Regeneration needed a good kick to get started.

In the end, you might end up loaded down with powers and complications you didn't want, but at least you wouldn't be starting over from scratch.

Justin was pulled from thoughts of digital mortality, as the team moved carefully into the room.

Inside were the three bodies Justin had detected. They were all lying on their faces, as if attacked from behind, their backs a bloody mess of slashes and punctures, as if a dozen people had swung at them, and then just kept going.

Justin didn't look too closely at the two still human looking bodies, he knew he'd need to in a minute, to get a better appreciation of what happened, but for now his gaze went to what must have been Red.

It reminded him of those pictures of Pompei, of people turned into ash and charcoal by intense heat. But there were no scorch marks around the body, no blood. Whatever happened to him must have been after death though, since Justin could make out wounds in his back, probably a side-effect of his power.

Division cleared his throat uncomfortably, most of his clones were spreading out to investigate the room, but one had laid his hand on Oscen's shoulder. "Sorry to put you through this, I know you worked with them, but if there's anything you can tell us about what happened here."

Oscen nodded back, a little pale, but resolute.

They were interrupted from further investigating the scene by a worried Shade. "Su puta madre," he muttered over the comm, "Division, turns out recruitment meant trial run. The dogs have passed out formula and are doping hoodrats by the dozen, any minute and we'll have actual rats running rampant through downtown."

"Damn," the Division by the door muttered, turning towards central Detroit as if he could see it from way out here. His hand flicked up to his com as he took a deep breath. "How many are turning?"

"At least a score are showing signs, some appear to be in some distress. I'm afraid we didn't realize their purpose until too late." Revenant replied heavily.

"Right," Division answered, seeming much calmer, as if the number had made the decision for him. "You're on your own for now, and there's no way you'll contain that many." He paused taking another breath, "I want you to put down anyone that transforms, if they get out into downtown it'll be a massacre. Try to incapacitate, but safeties are off. Full engagement, pull down the building if you need to."

There was a pause before Shade responded, "Full engagement," he confirmed, his voice serious.

"We'll be there as soon as we can, and good luck." Division signed off, turning back to the room. Shift was already bouncing on his toes, anticipating the order to head out.

"Right," Division said again, staring at the bodies on the floor before touching his comm once more. "Era, things have gone tits up at both ends, we've got League casualties at the mill and possible hybrids running rampant downtown. Get me in touch with the League and local services."

"Yes, Sir." Era replied, and Justin had the surreal thought that she'd never called him Sir.

Division glanced at the others. "Get ready to move out, I don't like the timing of this at all, we already figured there might be a connection..."

But before he could finish, he was interrupted by a metallic skittering sound as three mechanical spiders scuttled into the far side of the room.

Justin triggered his Over-clocking, noting the bloody, sharpened blades at the end of each leg. In that frozen moment he unleashed every scan the Phantom had, but everything came back negative. The spider mechs were giving off no heat, no radiation, no digital, no electro-magnetics.  There was only the very faintest trace of a signal reaching out like a thought to each of them.

A signal that felt strangely sticky as Justin inspected it more closely. He pulled back just in time as the strand twitched, and immediately cut off all active signals from the drone except the most basic audio-visual, and the single encrypted channel he was using himself.

He held back on firing off a grenade. He only had two, and neither seemed appropriate right now. He also realised that the spiders had halted just inside the room. He triggered his return to normal speed, wanting to preserve his focus in case it was needed later.

A holographic image flickered into being above the central spider, the figure male, tall, and wearing brown armour with a smooth faceless mask. Four mechanical spider legs were reaching forward from his back, clicking and moving around him as if scenting the air.

"Not cool dude," Shift said, and Justin realised the speedster had actually backed away from the arachnids. "Spiders are so not cool."

The figure ignored him, turning to Division as an electronically-disguised voice spoke out from below the light show. "I wanted to introduce myself before you left." The figure said, "My name is the Huntsman." He cocked his head and sighed at their lack of recognition. "A lack of notoriety is an unfortunate side-effect of being so good at my job. Despite that, let me assure you that I am a villain of some repute, and you would do well to join me."

Division stared at him for a moment, "You're delaying us." he muttered.

"Maybe," The Huntsman replied in amusement. "But can you take the chance of losing valuable information as I tell you all the details of my master-plan."

Division looked like he was about to respond, when all his clones suddenly flinched and dropped lifeless to the floor. Justin could just hear one of the clones breath the word 'Ackbar', the strange buggout command Division had chosen.

The team froze in shock, and Justin was about to repeat the command when in the middle of the room, Red's body cracked and heaved, letting out a burst of flame.

Across the room, Justin saw the spider bots backing away, and somehow, the electronically altered  voice managed to sound smug. "It looks like I now have the lynchpin to your leader, and our crispy friend is waking up right on time. Sorry to leave just as things are heating up, but I have a lot more to do tonight." His image waved as it flickered away, the spiders springing in three different directions, two of them taking the direct path out of a window.