"It wasn't too long after she came to terms with her new powers that Whitney decided she had to be a 'good' Exhuman like the P-Force. That's why she built the exosuit and took my place. That's why she put down the rules about minimal contact, and why 'Chariot' has been fighting so differently recently." I shook my head, almost laughing. "She's so shit at combat, though. She's so methodical and plodding, even if her powers are way stronger than mine were."

Moon just sat in silence on the couch with me, her ghostly effigy of my own body hunched over in thought. At first, she had asked questions and clarified points, but as my story continued she became more and more reserved and thoughtful.

I could hardly blame her. I'd almost forgotten just how much I'd been paralyzed and lost and confused I'd been when I woke up that morning and discovered my powers gone. They had never returned, and sitting next to her now, I was as powerless as I was as a baby.

Abruptly, she stood up and cast forward her hands. Nothing happened, of course, eliciting a further stunned statue.

"It's true," she said, disbelieving.

"Why would I change everything in my life and then lie about it?"

"I don't know. But I also didn't know that powers could ever abandon their owner."

She seemed bothered by this more than I thought proportionate, and I might have missed it if I weren't in the habit of examining language to excess around her. "You call it being abandoned? That's the second time you've used that word. The first is when I left the P-Force."

She glared icily at me, and I was smart enough to stop questioning that line.

Eventually she sat back down, though I could sense her mind racing like crazy. "At the very least, this explains much," she said at last.

"Yeah."

"And how is Whitney coping with her new life?"

"Really, really poorly," I sighed. "She spends almost her every moment locked up in VR existing in avatars that aren't anything like her. Her apartment is a mess, she doesn't eat enough or get out unless she has to, and when I do visit, sometimes she doesn't even talk to me. She does the P-Force thing to keep from hating herself for what she's become...but I don't think it's working."

"Troubling. Poor girl."

"Do you mind if I ask...you've never seemed much perturbed by being Exhuman, that I can tell. Like, hugely messed up in a ton of ways--"

"Please, spare me the flattery. No, I insist."

"--but none of it seems central to your...Exhumanity. Did you find some way to accept or cope with it?"

"Is there a reason for your query? Or do you just find enjoyment in nosing in my personal affairs?"

"It's because Whitney is having such a hard time of it. Any peace I might be able to offer her...I think I would like to. So whatever you found, I don't know if it will help her or not until I try."

"Oh," she said, seeming to deflate slightly. "How dare you be a decent person. You have subverted my expectations yet again."

"Yeah, sorry, I'll try not to."

She didn't take too long to pause and think this time before responding with a mild shake of her head. "Unlike many, my powers are quite tame. Or, I should say, as tame as my host's capability permits, they are. I have never been at risk like most of you of causing an accident. The worst I can do is imperil myself by accidentally vacating my body...typically."

"Typically?"

"Are you unfamiliar with that word? It means, with the greatest statistical likelihood--"

"I know the word. I meant, there are situations where your powers would endanger more than just you? I can't think of a case."

She glared icily at me and then deliberately ignored me and resumed the original topic. "So my situation is incompatible with most Exhumans' experience, and alas, unlikely to give her any peace of mind."

"Yeah. Seems so. I try to remember what it was like for me when I first turned, and all I come up with is like...well...The XPCA tried to kill me. Karu tried to kill me. AEGIS tried to kill me. Saga did that one time…and the bear..." I shrugged. "I was so busy staying alive I didn't really have to face my Exhumanity. So my experiences weren't really applicable to her either."

"We could always drop her in the canadian wilderness," she mused.

"I think she'd die. Even if we gave her food and shelter and everything, the lack of 'net would do her in."

"I don't think one could die from lack of 'net."

"I was kidding. Joudan. Jesus."

She gave me a little smile anyway, which surprised me given...well...her face, and the current mood of the room. I blinked at her for a moment and then gave in to asking the question in the middle of our minds.

"You seem happier," I said. "And more emotional in general, I mean. You were also crazier and stuff in coming here. But since I told you the story, you seem happier."

"Hmph," she said.

My face split into a grin. "You like me."

"I detest you, and my loathing grows with every second spent dwelling on this topic."

"You were worried about me! That's why you came all the way out here, why the first thing you did when you were being honest with yourself was to come back and force an answer outta me. And now you're happy because you know the reason why 'I' was treating you so differently."

"If you could go die now, I would be amenable."

In truth, I was being a huge ass. Moon didn't want me in her head, and that's absolutely where I'd gotten my info. There was no way I was relationship-savvy enough to figure this out on my own. She didn't want to be friends with anyone or care about anyone, and I was rubbing it in her face that she did.

But I wasn't being an ass randomly. Her feelings towards our friendship weren't the only thing I found in her mind. Right now, despite her strength, she was dead inside, scarred and burning from fear and pain of her capture and torment. And if I could give her even a shred of normalcy back by being her punching bag for a minute, I'd do it.

I think I tipped my hand a little too much though, and something in my thoughts got through to her. She seemed hesitant with what to do with the knowledge and just sat there blinking at me for long moments before speaking.

"Thank you," she said at last.

"For what? Mocking you? Never any need to thank me for that, I do it free of charge."

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"You know of what I speak," she said, with a delicate, reserved smile. "It has been a long week."

"Well it's over now. You're safe here. You told your dad to fuck off, you can stay as long as you need. Everything will be fine."

Lia stumbled into the room wearing her slipskin, her plain white mask hanging off the side of her head and her face a cloud of trouble.

"Everything is not fine," she said, collapsing into the other couch opposite us.

"Where have you been? I haven't seen you in days," I said.

She just gestured at her slipskin like I was blind. "That info bomb we dropped mucked up the whole black market economy. Lots of people are getting snatched, and a load more are laying low until it blows over. But information goes bad, and intel is the currency to get more intel. If I don't stay in it, I may as well quit."

"You could quit," I mused. "We'll both be normal again."

She shook her head, her frizzy brown hair threatening to engulf her mask in the process. "And that brings us back to my dramatic room-entering statement. Things are not fine, and information is critical for us, even if you're not Exhuman." She looked at me poignantly. Well, as poignantly as possible from being upside-down on a couch. "Dragon's coming back, I'm almost certain."

"What? How?" I found myself on my feet. "I thought we had a decoy...thing. He fell for it. He went to New York."

"All true. The problem was, the buyer in New York almost immediately realized his product was a fake and unloaded it as quick as he could. I guess he didn't want to sully his reputation so he went through a third party on a much more public site, which is why I didn't find it until now. But some dumb schmuck bought it up despite all the red flags."

She pulled at her hair distractedly in frustration. "If I'd have known some moron would just buy it up at any price without a care, I could have unloaded it anywhere, anytime. Pisses me off that some idiot is just ruining my plans by bumbling around."

"Perhaps if your plan is so easily ruined, it was not a very good plan?" Moon asked.

"Or maybe I only account for people of average intelligence and above in my plans," Lia huffed. "I am getting greater appreciation for the term 'foolproof' every day."

"Hey, focus for a sec. Where'd the device go? Where's Dragon?"

"We lost track of Dragon, as usual. But the device is...here somewhere. I traced the buyer's point of access to...here, charitably. Somewhere right around the university."

She fished in her pockets, the slipskin doing its job of retaining everything even with her upside down, and then flipped through her mobile for a minute, before holding it up for us to see. I leaned forward, unable to see much, so she tossed it, bouncing it off the couch next to me effortlessly.

It had the relevant information. A wide blue circle on a map, centered on the university, presumably the area where our buyer could be, but covering half the city almost. Not much to go on, but I got the feeling that would hardly matter. If Dragon knew I was here and knew the device he sought was here, I didn't think there was much of a conclusion to draw but that I was in trouble again.

I flipped through the other information on the screen. Copies of posts listing, selling, and buying the item, and really, a frankly irresponsible amount of money getting thrown around.

"Wait, go back," Moon said, and I did, to a picture of the decoy AEGIS had built.

"Same size, weight, shape and basic materials as the real one," Lia said, still pulling at strands of her hair. "I dunno how he determined it fake so fast. I guess I'm better at buying and selling than appraisal? I dunno."

"I've seen this before," Moon said. "What is it?"

Lia and I looked at each other. "Uh, there's two of them now. There's a real one in the hands of the XPCA somewhere which is an Exhuman device which was made by Mini of the Defiant, and does fuck-if-I-know," I said. "And there's a decoy, which is pictured and was sold by us to draw Dragon off our trail. If used, it blows up and kills you. Against my wishes," I added, glaring at my sis.

"Hmm," she said. "It is unmistakable. The collection where I was being held had several artifacts. He said this was new, and something unlike anything else in the world."

"Wait, he had it? Diallo?"

"Who, what now?" Lia asked. "Kaori's a collectable now?"

"Don't ask," I said. "Seriously. Don't."

"Why not--"

"Don't."

She stuck out her tongue at me but dropped it. "Okay, well then...isn't Diallo that guy who was trying to go to lunch with us and wound up punching Sebastian?"

"Yeah."

"Well then we're in luck. He's a fan of yours. Just tell him to get rid of it somewhere remote, and hopefully Dragon goes there instead."

I tried not to but found myself looking at Kaori.

"He's dead," she said simply.

"What?"

"I killed him."

The confusion on Lia's face grew but she started studying ours and realized quickly that this was a serious situation, and that I hadn't been joking earlier. "Okay," she said taking a deep breath, and with that breath all misgiving seemed to vanish. "Then...we might be in trouble. If he's not around to pitch the decoy, we're stuck sitting on it."

"Could you go back and...get rid of it?" I asked Moon, and she shook her head.

"I do not want to ever go back...and it is now likely a crime scene."

"I wonder if it'll be in police custody then," I said, hoping that weren't the case. How many good, dutiful men might Dragon kill this time to get his hands on it? Then I reminded myself he'd probably come for me first, and the death of some cops seemed, well, still bad.

"I doubt we can hide," I said. "I don't know what to do. I've been training, but without my powers, I'm just a mildly competent dude. I'm no paragon of martial prowess like he is."

"Yeah," Lia said, her face troubled.

We sat in silence, the three of us thinking for several long minutes, interrupted only by Lia occasionally getting up and pacing or bouncing or falling back into the couch in an entirely new and still improper orientation.

Eventually, Moon's mobile went off. Despite being a newer model and with a nice case, it was a default ringtone. She glanced at it, and then with a tap, muted the ringing.

"My father," she said. "He will undoubtedly wish to have words over my message."

"It was a pretty strongly-worded message."

She waited for a minute and then listened to the voice message he left, finally closing her mobile with a snap that reminded me of the irritated way she closed her books at me.

"Well, I also appear to be a source of trouble," she said. "And for that I apologize, and will vacate your hair as soon as possible."

"No, stay as long as you want," Lia said.

"You say that now. What if my father's agents are beating down your door?"

"Wait, that's gonna happen?" I asked.

"It is likely. He has let me know that I am his property and if I will not follow his wishes, he will enforce them."

"You're his daughter. You're not property," Lia said.

Moon just shrugged. "Neither of us see it that way."

And I mean, how do you respond to that? Other than just telling her that's messed up. Moon just seemed like a pile of canned worms, opening up one after another.

"Okay. So we've got two potential threats coming at us now. What can we do about it?"

"One of them is Dragon," Lia sighed. "And you've gone over what to do about him a thousand, thousand times. There's nothing to do, except be prepared and make sure we're all accessible to each other.

"Which is a pretty bad plan," I frowned. "Not like Dragon really needs that long to kill someone."

"Well, we're doing our best to make sure Athan can buy himself time. AEGIS said she'd stay with him every minute of the day but apparently that's obnoxious, though I can't see how that's a fate worse than death. But given that, what we've prepared so far, and your bit of martial training will have to do."

"Rito's been to the school. She can bring in anyone and everyone. All I need to do is waste Dragon's time until the cavalry arrives."

"And not die," Lia emphasized.

"As for Moon's dad?"

"Kaori," she said flatly.

"There is one significant advantage we hold over him and his," she said.

We all waited for a moment while Moon said absolutely nothing. "Which is?" I goaded.

"What about witches? Please be more specific," she asked.

"Okay, the plan is officially to just tie her up and hang a sign on her neck telling her dad that she's all his."

Again, Moon graced us with a small smile. "Joudan, I hope."

"Yes. But finish your damn thoughts without prodding sometimes?"

"Very well. Though my father is powerful and influential beyond compare, easily one of the hundred most successful men on the planet, his grasp is not all-encompassing, and his knowledge is not infinite. There are things he does not know which could be used against him to great effect."

"Things like?"

"Like the fact that his daughter is an Exhuman," Moon said with the same small smile. "Or that, despite her efforts, she has friends, and they are Exhuman as well."