It was neither the time nor the place to inform Chariot of his ineptitude, but the desire to do so lingered in my mind anyway like a foul smell.

He had failed us again and again, I knew he could be quicker than this, better than this, but he was not and as a result we had almost died.

I was frustrated, as I ever was. As I ever had been. As I had been since the day he had turned his back on the XPCA, and on us, and on his vow to protect people. And on me.

That he thought he could simply vanish and come back and be welcomed, the arrogance of it was a slap across my face. Saving lives was not a job one could walk away from. This was not some trivial duty to shirk. While he was gone, good and innocent people had died, been maimed, or traumatized, and as I saw it, their suffering was on his back.

But it was never the time nor the place to inform Chariot of this. Instead, I seethed inwardly, saying nothing, doing nothing, being as I should be, doing my job and protecting who and what I could. As he should have done, as he refused to do.

To say I held bitterness for the man was an understatement. But I also recognized that my feelings were without value, and that just made them even more painful to feel. I had practiced this, a lifetime of knowing what I was worth and what my feelings were worth and still...still they swelled within me every time I saw him.

Betrayal. Rage. Jealousy. I wanted him to suffer as those he had let down. But I also wanted it all to go away and for things to be as they once had been.

I had mastered the art of being still and being nothing, so why could I not still myself when I saw him?

The frustration at that failure simply compounded the lot. But it was not the time for that either.

Despite my issues with him, Chariot was keeping us alive for the moment. The slowness of his actions was offset by the sheer destructive power of them, as he prepared and detonated a single blade at a time, vaporizing five hundred liters of assailing water with each blast. With frustrating slowness, he prepared the next blade and the next blast as though unaware of the danger.

Had it been drugs? What could have altered him so? Was there a chance that whatever it was, it had also been responsible for his flight from us? Was there any amount of trauma or brain chemistry that I would accept as an excuse, or was he simply lost to me forever?

I shook my head and focused just as another jet of water slammed into me, catching it in time with Tower's power to avoid being impaled by the pressurized stream.

"Focus, damn it girl!" Tower yelled.

"I am attempting to." And so saying, I pushed Chariot from my mind before he was responsible for yet another death.

Tower and I had spoken about this at length. He had approached me tactfully, stating that he knew my thoughts, and while that was a violation, they worried him regardless. He was concerned for my well-being, which was meaningless, but also my readiness, which was everything.

The last time we saw Athan, not Chariot, was at his sister's place in Las Vegas, almost two months ago. He was at the time, obsessed with defeating Dragon, and offered no apologies or excuses for his absence, stating only that he was still working in the interest of the XPCA. That he could say that with a straight face while still being a wanted fugitive, I found appalling.

We came to discover he was conspiring with the Defiant Unchained, the very faction which had threatened not just the XPCA, but the world at large, with a mass event. I knew Athan had a soft spot within him for Exhuman lives, but for him to throw in with those would-be murderers, who would throw the world off-balance for their own selfish comfort...instead of executing them on the spot…

Tower reached up and blocked another jet of water before it impacted my head. "FOCUS, damn it, girl!"

"The situation is fraught with distraction," I hissed at him. Through our shared mind, I could feel him rolling his eyes, finding my 'hiss' still utterly monotone. It annoyed me more than it should.

"You're gonna get yourself killed, if you keep distracting yourself."

"It is exceedingly unlikely I die in here. I will come back when you reintegrate my consciousness with my body."

"So you're saying you can die, and will just come back? Sounds a lot like getting yourself killed to me."

I had lost at verbalizing myself properly to Tower of all damn people. I truly was lost. My distracted nature was more dangerous than I thought. Again, I pushed thoughts from my mind and feeling from my heart.

The wave containing the Exhuman was nearly on us, and I had no greater plan but to be slapped full in the face with it and hold my breath. I had wasted precious seconds, and regretted it.

"We'll float," Tower said. "Into the sky. Invert gravity's pull, now."

As much as I did not enjoy having him respond to my thoughts, his plan was better than mine. Doing as he said, I felt out the insistent tug of the Earth on me, and flipped it around, feeling my feet off the ground and my organs floating unnervingly within me.

"Chariot!" Tower yelled. "Get higher up before the wave hits!"

"I will remain and engage. The exosuit is capable of submerged combat."

I let gravity take me a bit further up and then negated it, drifting skywards, several stories up by now. From here, the damage looked even more severe, black rubble littering the streets, poking out of the rising water like a beach of crushed gravel. Fires in the distance smoked heavily as the rain poured into them.

Chariot, even in his black exosuit, looked like a mere toy, and I felt my heart throb uncomfortably as I remembered my last look at Japan and thought the same thing of it. It had disappeared from the plane window, chased away by the Pacific, just as the wall of dark water a mere block away threatened Chariot now.

"Chariot, move up," Jack yelled painfully in my ear. "The hydromorphs can squeeze into the suit and make it burst, your suit's capabilities will be compromised."

Chariot said and did nothing but rooted his feet and crackled with power.

The wave approached, the front of it white with turbulence as it swallowed the street beneath us. It closed on him, surging faster and wilder as though it sensed prey. Deep in its center, I saw a dark shape, the Exhuman we were here to defeat.

It meant little, but I pulled Tower's firearm from his side and unloaded into the shadow. With luck, the extra power from gravity might help the bullet find its mark, even through feet of water.

He shook his head and changed the magazine as he confiscated and reholstered it. "Not even with a rifle," he said. "Which is lucky, because his window's open, you stupidass."

I swore inwardly, the strongest profanity I knew in several languages. I could not let my urge to see justice prevail get in the way of it prevailing. I was being an active detriment to this mission and knew it.

"Focus. I understand," I said.

"'Atta girl. Come on, Moon, you're better than this," Tower murmured to me. He was kind in not holding me to my failings. Kinder than I would be.

The roaring of the water echoed up the buildings until it seemed all around us, and the smell of sewage and rot reached us at nearly the same moment. Chariot leaned forward as the water finally reached him.

One moment, the waves lapped at his ankles, and then the next, with a crash, he was gone, and the surging wall of water continued as though nothing had stood in its way.

"Chariot, c'mon," Tower whispered. I found the same thought in my own heart despite myself.

"Chariot. Reply. This is Papa-Foxtrot Actual, do you copy?" Jack barked. "PF One, do you copy? Chariot? I can't see beneath the water, Chariot. So, do you copy?"

There was nothing but silence in the moments he waited for a reply.

"PF One, confirm reception. Chariot, this is Papa-Foxtrot Actual. Respond."

The black tide continued onwards, seeming to slow as it passed. It had hit its mark, there was no need for the Exhuman to continue pressing it forward. I blinked as rain fell from my eyelashes, my eyes darting everywhere for a sign of a submerged shadow...friend or foe. I had to see one of them.

"Chariot, respond, damn it!" Jack yelled. "Athan, you son of a bitch, where the hell are you? Athan! Respond!"

"He's tougher than that," Tower said. "No little splash in the pond is gonna be the end of Chariot."

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"It was dozens of tons of water," I told him. "He stood and...faced it like a moron. Like a lunatic."

"Athan you bastard, be alive!"

Tower suddenly pointed downstream, and I followed his finger. "There!" he shouted.

I did not see Chariot. But I did see signs of his struggle.

There, beneath the water's surface, flashes of light, flaring and decaying like fireflies. But when they strobed, the surface of the water boiled and sparked, and tendrils of lightning jumped across the surface.

In the flashing lights, I saw a shadow slipping through the water, faster than any sea creature, fleeing from the light. As he went, the electricity chased him, jumping off the edges of the buildings into the water near him and dissolving into seething, glowing vortexes.

"Chariot you damn bastard," Jack sighed, sounding at the verge of tears.

"What happened to 'language'? Tower asked with a smile as he began our descent towards a street lamp.

"Oh shut up," Jack said.

Tower kicked off the lamp, sending us both flying above the water in the same direction the shadow was fleeing. We bounced off buildings erratically, moving ever faster and ever forward. "He's gonna get away," Tower said. "Unless we do something."

"I understand," I said, and focused on doubling Tower's efforts.

Borrowing another's powers was always a bit of an experience. Not the least of which, being in their mind and body, but also the sheer lack of knowing their capabilities. Tower, presumably, had spent much of his life rocketing himself about, shrugging off forces, redirecting blows, and punching through things. I had not.

So I had to lean deeply into his mind to draw on his confidence in his powers as we hurtled at impossible speeds towards the face of the leaning building. To me, the walls looked like glass and concrete, neither of which was something I would willingly press my flesh into, much less at these speeds. But he was smiling as we flew, as certain of this as of anything.

And that was a real comfort. Because we really were flying face-first into a skyscraper.

All of our accumulated speed and force erupted like a shot, doubled as it poured out of us and into the building. Tower was no engineer or physicist, he did not target weak points or structural supports. He went for the very middle, and hit it as hard as he could.

Where we struck, concrete detonated into the air in a plume taller than the standing skyscrapers. The crack was so loud I heard it echo back to us three times. The building shuddered where we struck, it cracked, it groaned.

And then all at once, it rained down like concrete hail. The two of us hovered there, pushing the plume of concrete away from us and floating up and out, as the whole building seemed to fracture and fall, as though the blow had transformed it to a suspended jigsaw puzzle.

The dark shadow in the water kept advancing as the first of the building dropped into the water, but as the mass of it broke and fell, the shadow stopped, and then was pushed backwards by yet another wave, but this one not of its own making. The path before it was blocked.

It swam in small circles for a moment, like a lost fish, before darting back the way it came. Yet, within seconds, it reached the outermost tendrils of lightning and drew away, trapped now in its own watery prison, between the rock and the exosuit.

It seemed to waver there for long moments. Was he afraid? Did he regret what he had done? I hoped so. This man was evil, and evil existed only to be destroyed.

Chariot's advance was slow, but inexorable. The reaches of his lightning grasped ever further towards the dark cul-de-sac, where our prey waited, trapped.

I wanted nothing more but to help, to dive in there and gut the coward with my own two hands if I had to, but he had to die to directly controlled powers. Even if I accelerated into him at top speed, would the window see it as my powers bearing his end? Or my body? I couldn't be sure, and so the task fell to Chariot.

From time to time, something seemed to attack Chariot under the water, but whatever was happening, he would just suddenly surge with power and blast a hole around himself, the exosuit steaming for a moment as the water immediately around him vaporized. And then the waves crashed back in with a scalding hiss that sounded as though they screamed to touch him.

And still he walked forward. One plodding underwater step after another. I could not think of a more dreadful way for the Exhuman to face his end, and I found my heart racing with anticipation as we watched to ensure no escape.

Just as it seemed time was out, the water suddenly surged again. Through the wreckage, through the buildings, from under the street, everywhere, water flowed, and an enormous wave appeared from everywhere and from nowhere.

"Does he think that will work? He already slapped Chariot with a wave once," Tower said.

"Look again," Jack muttered. "He's not just relying on the water to sweep Chariot away this time."

In the water I saw debris seething and swarming in a vortex around the shadow.

"What is that? Clothes? A shopping cart?" Tower asked.

"It doesn't matter, as long as he can get it to bind to Chariot and increase his profile. The Exosuit might be able to withstand a hit of water with its streamlined profile, but not if it's got so much junk wrapped around it that the whole street of water is pushing him."

"Cowardly," I spat. "And pointless. If he pushes Chariot back, he faces only another advance from him after."

"Man, you bitter," Tower said. I glared at him.

"He only needs to push Chariot back a block, and can escape down a side-street."

"And we're out of buildings to drop," Tower mused.

"There are buildings all around us. Let us block both side streets," I said.

"I dunno if you noticed, but it kind of took all we had to knock down one that was already fallen over. We do not have the punch to topple a whole skyscraper. And I don't think Jack does either."

"No," Jack said frustrated. "We can go in if Chariot is knocked back, but...I do believe this will all be up to him."

"No," Cosette suddenly said, "Jack, can you dart into the water and pull out what debris you can? Tower, Moon, you may not be able to punch down a building, but you can still barricade some. Any amount you slow the target down is time for Chariot to strike. We must do what we can."

"Yes, good plan," Jack said. "Remember not to affect the Exhuman directly."

As the water surged and grew in height, it pulled away from Chariot, leaving him only half-submerged, and still blasting away encroaching hydromorphs as he advanced.

"Chariot...here," we heard him say faintly, through heavy breaths. "Trouble with...-omms after...hit."

We had no time to watch as we scrambled to beached cars and overturned street signs, crashing them together to make as sturdy a barricade as possible to anything human-sized. Jack appeared infrequently with random debris he fished out, jamming it into our makeshift wall as best he could.

"This one's good enough, Tower said, giving it a few brutal punches that warped the roofs of two cars together. "We need one more."

"There is no time." Jack shouted suddenly. "Evade!"

I had one moment to look up and see the swelling wall of water bearing down. Tower kicked us up, and before my feet left the ground, I did as well, sending us spiraling uncontrollably skyward.

In the glimpses I could see, Chariot stood facing the wave, not braced as before, but hands before him as though he were going to exorcise the water away. A sea of garbage boiled at the front of the wave, rubber tires and hoods of cars, bouncing around like inner tubes and surfboards as they bore down on him. The dark shadow seemed to grin malevolently through the surf for a moment before disappearing beneath brimming foam.

"We didn't get the barrier up," I said. "If the wave pushes him, we'll...we'll lose the target."

"He'll hold," Tower said. "Chariot always holds on."

"He's not...holding on," Jack said with alarm.

Lightning crackled all around Chariot as currents ran up and over the harsh angles of the exosuit. Was he planning to electrocute the entire wave? There was too much water, and the Exhuman had fled to the back. It would not work.

And then the wave shuddered as, instead of the debris crashing into Chariot with the wave, it was blown away. Forks, fire hydrants, traffic signs, fences, car parts, all sent flying into the air with unbelievable force.

And also Exosuits. Something unseen and impossibly powerful lifted Chariot's exosuit into the air and kept him there, hovering, crackling, floating just above the surface as the tide of water crashed down the street under him.

"He's flying," Jack said simply. "He can fly."

"What the fuck," Cosette added.

"That was my one damn trick!" Tower yelled, but sounded much more ecstatic than annoyed. "God damn, Chariot!"

I looked down the street at the garbage still running away and realized, it was all metal. The Exosuit was all metal. For so long, Chariot had worked so hard to keep anything magnetic off of him for fear of dragging himself around under his own powers...but now he was dragging himself along on purpose.

"It's...simple magnetic levitation," I said, surprised to hear how stunned my own voice sounded.

Chariot wasn't done. As the water cleared out under him, he still had an Exhuman to contend with who might escape at any moment, and there was too much water to electrify. He pointed a finger skyward and I saw a shining strand of lightning flickering towards the heavens.

And then the strand widened and exploded as it reached a cloud, and honest-to-god bolt of lightning coursing down the channel he'd ripped in the air and into the water where his other hand pointed.

The shadow did not remain shadowy as the thousands of watts of electricity coursed through it. The entire body of water flashed and boomed as much as the lightning did, and Chariot's exosuit glowed white-hot, even though I could see the course of the electricity bending far around him.

It did not bend far around the Exhuman. It went straight for him, honed and refined by Chariot's will into the most focused, lethal bolt of lightning ever made. God's power, directed by man's hand. The blast of thunder made my hair stand on end and my ears ring.

After what felt far too long to be a single bolt of lightning, darkness filled all our eyes and Chariot and his exosuit fell into the retreating water in a pillar of steam. He stirred only enough to give the Exhuman a glance, and then fell back into a stupor.

The Exhuman was utterly fried. Shriveled and blackened, and without a doubt, completely and utterly dead. Barely even recognizable as a human body, which was fitting, considering.

The rain continued down but the surge of water in the street abated, its sinister master gone. Punched right through his window, Chariot had.

As we approached, the exosuit sat up and the comms crackled.

"Reporting…-ission success. Return… to prior location."

"Thanks, Chariot," Cosette said. "We'll see you next time, okay?"

He said nothing, just waited for us all to turn away.

I sighed heavily, knowing that when I did, he would vanish again, from my sight if not my mind. No amount of looking away could banish him from there.

But I did as I was told and showed him my back, as yet another crisis ended, and yet again, we had Chariot to thank for it.

As ever, he left me wondering. What had changed him? Why had he come back? And when, and whee, would be the right time to confront him over it?

I sighed again. It was not important for me to know. My feelings were of no consequence to anyone, and I knew that. So long as I could accomplish our missions, knowing was a mere luxury I did not require.

But looking back and seeing Chariot utterly gone, the burnt corpse still smoking, the water under it steaming yet, I felt like I had to know, even if it wasn't important. Even if it was only me.

I had to know, because if he could change, then maybe, just maybe, so could I. And that terrified me thoroughly.