As a perceptive person, you have likely noticed that this memoir is comprised of chapters told primarily from the perspective of Dr. Tobias MacClain, in a chronological order. Though I may interject at moments, and occasionally spice things up with a few assuredly interesting notes on a few other interesting characters, the chapters thus far—and following—all revolved—and will continue to revolve—around Dr. MacClain.

Taking the aforementioned rules into consideration, I must declare outright that this portion of reading material is not a chapter. It takes place outside of the eyes our antihero, and turns back the clock to when he still thought fate was on his side; back in the volcano, after Team Defiance was locked in.

My client, Tobias MacClain, had no part in the information that I reveal in this chapter of his story.

I shall begin where it began.

One elevator shaft below his feet, a red-eyed teenager had her reading glasses pushed all the way up her nose and was typing furiously at a monitor. Her phone buzzed relentlessly on the desk beside the mouse, lighting up with each new message from her foster siblings, abusing the group chat.

Busy, Dizzy mostly ignored the unhelpful barrage.

Milk: Was Doc mad? _/10?

Hiccup: Where's your broadcast at, Ditz?

Milk: Did Doc find our note?

Hiccup: Hey, we're here. Open gate pls.

Dizzy hit a button on the remote in her pocket, then flipped the phone over. Eyes on the monitor, she pressed the EXECUTE key, then sat back in her chair and held the keyboard in her lap like a guitar. Her fingers hovered over the keys, dancing to an upbeat thinking jam from the classic rock band on her t-shirt.

The green process bar on the screen bounced in her eyeline as she bobbed her head. She lifted her boots to the desk and pushed herself off, flicking the keyboard back to the desk before she repelled to the monitors opposite the main computer.

Dull black and white screens filled her visions, music pumped through her headphones, and her finger tapped rhythmically over the corresponding keyboard and its right arrow key. Security feeds flashed past.

The kitchen feed was nothing but static. The bedroom was empty, she waved at herself in the control room. She turned these feeds off to save memory and compiled those remaining in a grid on the screen. The doctor was holding his head in the top corner, experiencing what looked like agony. Dizzy pursed her lips.

The hero lair feed, with two angles, took up two more squares of the grid, showing a meek-looking Mr. Might and Vine Voodoo from both their glorious backsides and pleasant fronts. The final screen, at the bottom right, displayed the secret entrance to the lair, where the old aluminum boat bobbed beside a skiff. Two girls clambered around the little dingy, one fussing with an unconscious person, the other holding on to the dock.

Dizzy pushed back her chair, took out her earphones, and traipsed to the door, poking her head out. Hand cupped around her mouth, she called, "Hey losers, did you bring my soda?"

Milk Chocolate stuck out her tongue and lifted a six-pack up to Hiccup, who grabbed it from the dock, then helped her sister up. Hiccup raised the soda over her head and the two younger sisters swaggered over to Dizzy, quite pleased with themselves after managing to commandeer a vessel all on their own.

At the time that Dr. MacClain was forcing the lawyer to drive him around Central Benediction, three clever young girls had been illegally driving the van that he had left with them and staying on his tail. Hiccup had stolen his powers during their early breakfast and stayed in range of him for as long as possible; long enough to get the girls to the dock and figure out a hasty plan. While Dr. MacClain reasoned with his hostage, coaxing her out of her sedan, Hiccup told Dizzy to jump on the boat. The chances of him looking over were high, so Hiccup and Milk Chocolate dove onto a nearby vessel to hide, and Hiccup made the next decision as quickly as she could... before Dr. MacClain could leave her range.

The younger siblings kept Dizzy calm with a message telling her to sit tight and wait for them. Milk Chocolate put an already-sleeping boat owner into a deeper sleep and the two girls hijacked the boat that brought them to the island.

Hiccup tossed Dizzy a Grape Fizz as she walked through the doorway, following the older girl into the control room. "Your broadcast hasn't played yet."

Dizzy flicked a thumb in the direction of the processing bar on the main computer and pulled back the tab on her can. "Working on it."

The girls sat down, Dizzy in her chair and the other two on the desks, and drank soda together. A few minutes later, the main computer flashed green, displaying a very good word: COMPLETE.

Dizzy smirked and turned on her phone. The broadcast was playing. Hiccup checked hers, too, and Milk Chocolate peered over her shoulder.

Tobias MacClain, in the guise of Tony MacGuire, sat at a formal desk with an envelope between his hands. He politely introduced himself to the camera, eyes quivering nervously, "Good morning, Benediction. You may recognize me by the name of Tony MacGuire. Roughly a week ago, I saved the people of East Benediction from evisceration by detecting the approach of a bomb. This bomb was sent by the villain Neville towards Higher Defense Headquarters and was redirected by the beloved hero, Mr. Might.

"Had I not been present and active and trained in the business of preventing Mr. Might's messes, thousands of civilians could have perished that day. It is all cleaned up now. Most of it has disappeared. They paid me to help make it disappear." The doctor held up the envelope and pulled from it his N.D.A check. He waved it, then held it still for the cameras to focus on. "Fifty grand to keep my mouth shut. A very large portion of your taxes goes into bribes like this—bribes designed to keep heroes in the limelight indubitably. But, I don't need the money. I don't mind the jail time that comes with breaking the non-disclosure agreement."

The doctor smiled and tore the check in half, then in half again. Then he tossed the pieces in the air. "My name is not MacGuire, anyways." He pulled the gloves off his hands and threw them off screen, exposing one and half missing fingers and pulpy black and red flesh. "As I said, I'm trained in the business of preventing Mr. Might's messes." The mask came off, exposing the gnarly burns of his face. He plucked free the hairnet, then unbuttoned his collar and rolled up his sleeves, exposing more and more damage. He turned away for long enough to privately remove his blue contact lenses, then turned back, perching his spectacles on his nose. "My name is Tobias MacClain, formerly of Team Defiance, and I am sickened by this business. If you give me a few moments of your time, I will show you why you should be sickened, too."

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The broadcast continued, but a movement on the security monitor drew Dizzy's attention away.

She jumped out of her chair and ogled the screen so closely that her nose picked up static. She pushed up her glasses to rub her eyes and looked again. A third boat! The open lair entrance exposed the Benediction bay to the camera.

Dizzy instinctively reached towards her hard drives—one uploading their team's broadcast, one downloading the feeds from all four running security cameras. Her fingers fell away empty. Grabbing the wrists of her siblings instead, she ploughed down the aisle of computers and plunged into a coffin-like closet, hurling her charges in first. Wires tickled her skin. Electricity hummed against her back and clammy palms. Hiccup and Milk squirmed and moaned, but Dizzy clamped her hands over their mouths.

"Someone's here," she hissed. "I think I know who."

Hiccup tugged off her glove and grabbed Dizzy's hand. She squinted through the closet door. It was almost second nature to her to use Dizzy's powers, for she had used them many times before. She gasped, hiccupping. "Spectre!"

"Shh!"

"What do we do?" Milk Chocolate whispered, biting her gloves. "Take her?"

"Let's see what she does," Dizzy answered. She knocked her head back against the wall and clenched her jaw. X-ray vision felt like a concentrated sugar hangover that happened all upon a sudden. Painted a red hue, she watched the control room through the closet doors. Two hands squeezing hers kept her steady.

Spectre entered, invisible. Hiccup and Dizzy both watched her skeleton cautiously prowl. She made herself visible after a brief look around and started to investigate the computer monitors.

"Oh, Tobias..." The woman shook her head sadly at the security monitor. Her eyes lowered to the hard drive plugged in beside the screen and she tilted her head. "Dizzy King..."

Dizzy smacked her forehead and cursed herself for labeling her drive. Her phone buzzed and she stiffened.

The hero looked straight at them. "You kids pulled one over on me once before. We're on the same side. Come out, please."

The girls hesitated.

Hiccup shrugged anxiously. "Can Milk get through her suit?"

Milk Chocolate shook her head. "Could try for her face?"

Dizzy smacked her own cheek and shook her head. She looked at her phone and saw the broadcast glitching. The blue Higher Defense Headquarters screen faded in and out. She grimaced and slipped the device away. "I need to get to the main computer."

The eldest kicked the doors open, hands in the air. Her sisters raised their hands, too, watching her.

"I need you to explain what is going on, here," Spectre requested patiently.

"Nothing!" Milk Chocolate declared. "We're just kids."

The woman smiled grimly. She raised her gaze to Dizzy, who was distracted by the runaway green codes on the main computer. Spectre approached the monitor and looked at Dizzy with suspicion. "It is my job to shut this down."

Dizzy bit her lip. The ground shook and all bodies crouched low.

Spectre recovered swiftly when it was over and took immediate interest in the small monitor with the volcano's Danger of Eruption meter, which had become a countdown. The meter itself was reading Imminent in an obnoxious firetruck red. "Tobias isn't focused. He would not cut things this close if he were."

"He doesn't want to hurt anyone! Just give a scare!" Hiccup whined.

"No, he doesn't know what he wants," Spectre murmured. She brushed hair behind her ears, biting her lip as her eyes drifted back to the man on the monitor. He prowled the control platform, gesturing dramatically, his eyes wider than human—even wider behind the magnification of his little round glasses. "This isn't like him. He leaves nothing to chance. He's cutting things close just by sticking around this long—and yet, he doesn't seem to be considering leaving... You don't understand how out of character this is. He always overthinks; but I'm not sure he's thinking at all. He's just acting. Is there a phone or speaker system?"

The girls shook their heads. Feet shuffled, eyes met other nervous eyes.

Spectre looked to the eruption timer once more, lips thinning. She pointed to the youths. "Get out of here, before the volcano bursts and you're trapped, or worse." Her finger moved to the security monitor. "It looks like the main doors out are inaccessible, which means I'll be coming back this way with my team. If you are still here and anyone sees you, then I will be forced to take you in. Do you understand? Get out, now."

She kicked off the ground and dashed out the door without waiting for an answer.

The three girls stared at one another.

"Start up the boat and wait for me," Dizzy ordered, thinking on her feet.

Her sisters nodded, faces screwed up with seriousness that didn't belong. Hiccup stuck out her fist, Milk Chocolate raised hers to meet it. Dizzy tapped both with her knuckles.

"Let's go, team," the eldest said.

They threw their fists to the ceiling and scattered. While the young'uns gapped for the boat and its sleeping owner, Dizzy leapt into her chair and slammed her fingers over the main computer's keyboard. Slender digits tapped a furious storm, lining the black screen with sharp green codes. Nonsense to me and most of you, but a language as clear as song to her. She looked at her phone, checking her progress.

Headquarters was still trying to beat her, but her broadcast was winning again, without interruption. Dr. MacClain's harlequin face remained on her screen, tinged purple and red as he spoke of Benjamin Jones's unpunished crimes against him in as calm and respectable a tone as he could manage.

She turned back and forth in her chair, looking feverishly between the security feeds and her coding battle versus HQ.

Dizzy kept up her fight until the last moment, when Tobias MacClain collapsed. Cutting it almost too close, she grabbed her hard-drives and bailed, skidding out the door and down the hall and leaping onto the boat. The lair was crumbling, dust catching in her lungs as she howled for Hiccup to speed the dinghy to its escape.

Meanwhile, many miles away in a safe location that I cannot disclose, yours truly, Mick Chadwick, was watching the television, and had been for so long that one might have said my eyes had gone square. Teaspoon against my tongue like a sweet lollipop—long emptied of breakfast tea—my hands were occupied with notebook and pen. I took many notes.

Unhelpful notes, such as my displeasure when my soap opera was interrupted by the face of one Tony MacGuire, ran along the margins. Other notes fought for space on the lines of the crammed pages.

I watched the broadcast and found myself quite intrigued by the end. I wanted more information to clarify my confusion, to tell me where to direct my doubts and my faiths. This Tobias MacClain I had known through the media, but had rarely witnessed him speaking before this. He had never been a person of interest until his death, and then in his revival through this nation-changing broadcast.

After I had been thoroughly convinced that Tobias MacClain was a damaged, unlucky, and rather rightfully angry man, and that Higher Defense Headquarters should not be trusted much—if at all—my broadcast was interrupted by an official HQ news broadcast.

This came at the exact moment that Dizzy ejected her hard drives from the lair computers. HQ took over the nation's television and reported the way they always do; one-sidedly. In this broadcast, well-known news anchors made apologies for the "anarchist" preceding broadcast. They depicted Tobias MacClain as a wanted man, and wasted no time in bringing up his faked death and his call for Benjamin Jones and Poppy Tris. They used the footage that he had sent to HQ at 9:00 am; unflattering. They proceeded to update the nation on how Tobias MacClain attempted to murder Team Defiance and failed, though his villainous mission resulted in the murder of a single mother who had been used as bait. There was no footage included on how Team Defiance defeated the apparent pom, simply the smiling statement of it. Heroes and justice had won out!

I was dubious.

I had hoped the rest of the nation would be dubious, too.