The arma situation took a while to sort out.

Must have been because Lance was juggling several new abilities at once. Energy Cycling had finally clicked - he could direct the flow through his body with fluid control. Morphoplasm was coming along too, though "master" might be overselling it. He could make the black substance harden like steel across his skin, but only about half an arm's worth at a time. Not quite the full-body protection Impervious had given him.

Was it even as strong as Impervious had been? He wasn't eager to test that theory with bullets.

All typical superhero problems.

Then there was Dark Resonance. Just the name gave him chills - like some final boss ability in an RPG. Everything pointed to it being some kind of aura detection power, assuming his countless hours of gaming hadn't led him astray. But aside from saving him from a Freddy Krueger scenario, he couldn't get it to do anything besides occasionally ping him with cryptic warnings.

So that was Phase One complete: figure out his powers. Sort of.

Phase Two - catch the killer - was proving more challenging. He had no leads, no real plan, and absolutely no idea where to start. Which was why he'd invited Vicky and Diego to breakfast at Betty's.

Surprisingly, they'd both said yes. Though maybe it wasn't that surprising - Vicky never turned down food, and Diego... well, Diego was just that kind of friend.

The kind who showed up for you, even when you were clearly in over your head. The kind that made it worth it giving up the mask.

"How'd you even find this place, bro?" Diego asked before Lance could even say hello. "I love the noodle spot you showed me, but I've been dying for options. Gets boring eating the same thing every day."

Lance's hands went deeper into his pockets. "Just um… I noticed it during a run—"

“What?!” Vicky interrupted, saving Lance from having to say more. “Sacred Valley literally has a hundred items on the menu.”

“Same seasoning on everything, Vicky,” Diego said. “Same. Seasoning.”

She groaned, dropping her head into her hands. "I can't with you right now."

"So what's like the best thing here?" Diego asked.

"Hash browns."

Vicky leaned back slowly. "That's it? Just... hash browns?"

"They're fantastic hash browns," Lance said.

"Dude drove us across town for potatoes. Classic Lance," Diego chortled.

"Not just any potatoes. Crispy on the outside—"

"If you say 'soft on the inside' I'm leaving," Vicky said in a low tone.

"Actually, I was going to say 'burnt to hell on the outside.'"

"¡No mames! You're telling me you like them burnt?"

"Some of us have taste, Diego."

"Says the guy who eats burnt potatoes for breakfast."

"Better than your protein sludge," Lance retorted.

"Hey, that's premium grass-fed whey, bro. And at least I season my food."

Lance shrugged. "Salt is a seasoning."

"You two realize we're still standing outside, right?" Vicky said, pulling her jacket tighter around herself.

The bell over the door tinkled when they entered. Betty's was very much a local joint. Three retirees occupied separate booths, hunched over coffee cups and half-eaten breakfasts. More people than yesterday - seemed like the post-pandemic breakfast rush was finally picking up again.

They dodged a harried waitress, weaved between the checkered linoleum tables, and slid into a booth beneath a faded photo of downtown circa 2010.

"Ugh, why is the menu sticky?" Diego held the laminated page with his fingertips like it might bite him. "This better not mess with my macros."

Vicky hadn't made it past the first page. "Stop talking. I'm trying to decide if I can finish the lumberjack special." Her eyes darted back to the description for the fourth time.

Lance glanced at the ancient Samsung mounted in the corner - one of those clunky flat-screens from before flexible displays. The news crawled across its scratched display, the volume lost beneath the clink of cutlery, morning chatter, and Ms. Miller standing beside their booth with her order pad at the ready.

"Three days straight? My cooking must be growing on you."

Vicky's eyebrow arched as she glanced at Lance.

"Your cooking's worth the trip, Mrs. Miller. Though I think I'll try the huevos rancheros today. Need to mix it up."

This time Diego raised his eyebrow.

"Branching out from the lumberjack special? Bold choice." Mrs. Miller smiled.

As Vicky and Diego placed their orders, Lance stared at the news report showcasing the results of last night's temblors. The footage showed several streets with buckled asphalt alongside sidewalks bearing hairline cracks while scattered storefronts displayed fresh "Pardon Our Appearance" signs.

It had been worst during group therapy last night, but then it had continued as low-level tremors, and he could still feel them, and it was terrifying because even though he'd never felt an earthquake before, he was pretty damn sure they weren't supposed to feel like the entire city was a cruise ship at port. However, after everything he'd been through lately, the panic barely fazed him. In fact, Durham’s gentle rocking had lulled him right to sleep.

"Mister 'salt is a seasoning' wants huevos rancheros?" Diego asked the moment Ms. Miller moved away. Then he followed Lance's gaze to the TV. "That earthquake last night was weird as hell. We're not even supposed to get those here, right?"

"Hey Vicky, you're still at the Durview Hotel, aren't you? Any issues there?"

Vicky kept scribbling on her napkin, then looked up. "What? Oh, no, everything's fine. Come to think of it, the new manager's pretty decent. Pretty sure he’s an arma player, but decent. Said we can stay through January since the girls are helping clean."

"If you need a place... you know, when they kick you out... my couch is always open. Until you figure things out."

"Look who's getting soft on me."

"I'm just offering—"

"Don't flatter yourself. I was about to ask if you had room for my mini-fridge."

"I just thought—"

"Right,” Vicky said mischievously. “And I suppose you'll want me to do your laundry too?”

Clearly my social skills are diminishing, he thought. If Valentina had been a fencer with her wit—precise, controlled, elegant—Vicky was a street fighter, delivering blows meant to leave bruises.

While Lance shifted in his seat, suddenly very interested in his coffee, Diego pocketed his phone with a satisfied look.

“Just got my test results from Dr. Patel,” he said. "Something about a pinched nerve in my lumbar spine."

"Damn. Serious?"

"Can't make sense of half the medical jargon, but looks like it's nothing major. She sent over some physical therapy exercises too." Diego grinned. "That woman's amazing."

Lance cringed. “Well, keep me posted on how it goes."

"Will do." Diego leaned forward, eyes sparkling with excitement. "So… what's the plan? We doing stakeouts? Interrogations? I've been working on my intimidating flex."

Lance’s attention snapped away from the TV. "Not exactly. We need to figure out who's behind these killings first."

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"Oh, that's easy. It's gotta be Frank. That dude is weird as hell."

Vicky snorted. "Real detective work there, sheriff."

Lance stared out the window at the front, weighing the possibilities. Frank was volatile, even dangerous – the break-in at Lance's house proved that. But after getting his power back, Frank had just walked away. It was Mack, the other personality living inside Frank's head, who worried Lance. That guy was a genuine psychopath. But maybe…

"There's also Preston," Lance said.

"The rich kid?" Diego asked. "Why him?"

"Think about it,” Vicky said. “He was at the warehouse, and then again at that burning building. Seems suspicious, doesn't it?"

"You've got a point. It is pretty odd that he keeps showing up," noted Diego before stuffing a hash brown into his mouth and chewing thoughtfully.

"Yeah, but..." Lance trailed off, realizing the flaw in his logic. "We were at those places too."

He took a slow sip of coffee, buying time while the implications sank in. Were they also suspects? Or worse, was the killer among them?

The silence. Diego broke it. "Guess we're all suspects now. Cool. Cool cool cool."

"Relax," Lance said. "Your panic spiral is showing."

"Okay, so maybe we can't rule anyone out yet. But we need to start somewhere. What do we know for certain?" Vicky asked.

"We know the victims were all arma users. They all had abilities like us."

"So the killer is picking off enhanced individuals,” Diego said.

“That’s right.”

Vicky slumped against the vinyl booth, drummed her fingers on the table's edge, and traced the rim of her coffee mug with her thumb. "And how do you know all this?"

"Someone killed Rony.”

"The old guy? Holy shit, what? No way. No way no way no—" Diego pushed his plate away, breakfast forgotten. "But I just saw—he was at the community center last week!"

“Found out yesterday.”

"That explains why he missed the last three sessions." Vicky uncrossed her arms, exhaled through her nose, and stirred her coffee, her eyes distant. "You 'found him'? What do you mean by that?"

"A detective interviewed me. They're looking at everyone from the support group."

"Wait." Diego's voice cracked. "You're saying whoever did this... they could come after any of us next?"

"Exactly." Lance pointed his coffee cup at Diego.

“But why?"

"Fear? Jealousy? Maybe they see us as a threat," Vicky suggested.

It made sense, but something still nagged at him…

"But how do they know who has abilities? It's not like we're walking around with signs on our backs," he finally said.

"Hey, didn't you say BioNova called you about getting another dose?" Diego asked. "Like, right after all this started happening?"

As unlikely as Diego's theory seemed, he couldn't dismiss it – not after Dr. Reeves' suspicious behavior and Dr. Patel's silent warning.

"It's possible," Lance admitted. "But we can't just go accusing people without proof. But maybe…" Lance's train of thought derailed as he noticed Vicky’s pen dancing across her napkin, leaving behind precise shapes and crossed lines.

"Those look familiar."

"What?" Vicky glanced down. "Oh. Just looks like stage directions to me. You know, from drama class."

"More like crop circles," Diego grinned. "Maybe the aliens are sending you messages through your pancakes."

Vicky crumpled the napkin and hurled it at Diego.

"So what's our next move?" Vicky asked right before digging into her own lumberjack special.

Lance hesitated. He was out of his depth here. He was a software engineer, not a detective. But lives were at stake. And if someone was hunting arma users, self-preservation alone made this his problem. They had to do something.

He opened his mouth, changed his mind, swallowed, and then said, "We need more information. We should start by looking into the victims. See if there's any connection beyond the support group."

"I can do some social media digging," Diego said. "Between Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit, someone's bound to have posted something useful."

"Good thinking," Lance said. "Vicky?"

"I'll talk to Wren, see if she's noticed anything. That girl doesn't miss much, even if she barely speaks."

"What about you?" Diego asked as he wolfed down the rest of his lumberjack special.

"I'll keep my eyes open, ask around. If I find any leads, you'll be the first to know." Lance took a deep breath while tapping his finger on the table. "I'm going to talk to Dr. Patel. See what I can find out about BioNova - if they're even involved in this."

Vicky's sausage link hovered halfway to her mouth. "Are you sure that's safe?"

"No," Lance admitted. "But it's our best lead right now."

The conversation lulled as Lance broke off a piece of his huevos rancheros, watching salsa and yolk pool together. The bite sat heavy in his mouth. They had a plan. Not much of one, but it was better than waiting to see who disappeared next.

The last bites of breakfast sat untouched as Diego and Vicky headed their separate ways, leaving Lance alone with his cooling coffee and thoughts. He walked home—actually walked, for once—letting the crisp December air clear his head. The city's subtle swaying from last night's tremors had mostly subsided, though every few minutes a gentle roll would catch him off guard, like missing a step on stairs.

Back at his apartment, he wrestled with Jiro, who seemed determined to prove that even adult dogs could have growth spurts. Lance could have sworn his furry companion had grown an inch since the whole NARS mess started. He fired off a quick text to Marcus, canceling Krav Maga for the first time since he'd started. Ten days. Just ten days of training, and he'd absorbed more than some people learned in a year.

Thank god for that 6.5 in Memory Capacity, he thought, scratching Jiro behind the ears. Now if he could just redirect all that mental horsepower toward catching their killer.

Although... memory wouldn't help much there, would it? Sure, he could stockpile clues like a deranged squirrel hoarding nuts, but his Analytical Ability was stuck at 5.4. Probably because he hadn't been actively using it—unlike his physical abilities, which he'd been pushing to their limits with all the Krav Maga and superpower training. The body evolved what you exercised, after all.

Well, aren't you just the smartest little arma user who ever scienced, he thought with a self-satisfied smirk. Well…

Time to put that analytical ability to work!

But of course, because the universe had apparently developed a sick obsession with the number three—like his morning coffee rule (never less, never more), or his gym routine (three sets, three exercises, three days), or even his current juggling act of abilities (Energy Cycling, Morphoplasm, Dark Resonance)—he could only see three ways forward.

Option one: march back into BioNova, where they still treated him like a bomb that might go off at any moment. After the "unorthodox treatment administration" incident and his recent rejection of their latest wonder drug, he'd rather fight Frank blindfolded than deal with whatever fresh corporate hell they'd cook up.

Option two: reach out to Detective Yamada. But he'd watched enough gluetube compilations of police interviews gone wrong to know how that would play out. Shouldn't have met with them two days ago. What a dumbass.

Which left option three: confront Elena. The least terrible choice, if only by default.

So Lance spent the afternoon putting his apartment back together... *again*, though there wasn't much left to arrange. His bookshelf—the only piece of furniture he'd splurged on after landing his job at Qualtech—stood empty except for a few paperbacks that had survived the latest toss-up. The three trashings had stripped his place down to the basics, making it look eerily similar to when he'd first moved in fresh out of college.

With both his apartment and his thoughts slightly more ordered than they'd been that morning, he arrived at the community center—he checked his phone: [6:04 PM]—An hour early.

He'd never shown up more than fifteen minutes before their 7 PM sessions, but Elena was always there, no doubt working in her small office across from the gym. He had no idea when she arrived—for all he knew, she lived there. Still, it was worth a shot. Still, he hesitated outside Elena’s office door. Still, he had to try.

The community center's hallway stretched empty behind him, silent except for the—

Stop hesitating, damn it.

‘Knock’

"Come in," Elena's voice called from inside.

Lance pushed the door open, stepping into the small, cluttered space. Elena sat behind her desk, surrounded by stacks of papers and what looked like psychology textbooks. She stilled, pen hovering above her paperwork, as she registered his presence.

"Lance? You're very early. Is everything alright?"

He closed the door behind him, leaning against it. "We’ll see. We need to talk."

A crease appeared at the bridge of her nose, sharp as a paper cut. She gestured to the chair across from her desk. "Have a seat. What's on your mind?"

Lance dropped into the plastic chair while his hands found each other in his lap as he tried to sort through the mess in his head. "It's about the group. About the arma users."

"Go on," Elena prompted gently.

"Someone's targeting us. Killing us." The words streamed out in a rush. "Rony's dead. And I think there might be others."

Elena pushed back from her desk. "I didn't realize you knew about Rony."

"The police dragged me in for questioning yesterday. They're investigating his death, running background checks on everyone in the group."

"I've… I’ve been trying to make sense of it all week." She rubbed her temples. "Especially after they told me about Thad."

"Thad?"

"Thaddeus Walsh. He only came to one session—it was before you started coming. I thought—" Her voice cracked. "I thought he just didn't like the group. But the police say whoever killed him probably killed Rony too."

"Was he an arma user too?"

She made a soft, pained sound before nodding.

Another victim. Whatever doubts Lance had been clinging to vanished.

“I think whoever's doing this is specifically going after people with abilities. Like me."

"How can you be sure?"

"The victims all had abilities,” Lance said. “There have been others outside the support group - it's all connected."

Her legs seemed to shake, and she grabbed the edge of her mahogany desk to steady herself. "I keep telling myself there has to be another explanation."

"There isn't."

"The police have been asking so many questions. About everyone in the group." She pressed her hand to her mouth.

Two victims, two weeks.The group was a death trap now.

He stepped closer to the doctor. "You can't keep running these sessions."

"I know." She paused. "God, I know. But what am I supposed to do? These people need help. Everyone that shows up each night is strugg—"

She didn’t finish. She buried her face in her hands. "What should I do?" she asked.

Lance took another step towards her. Elena Rodriguez, always composed, always in control. Now breaking apart in front of him. The perfect moment.

“Cancel the group. Now.”

Dr. Rodriguez lifted her head, tears streaking her cheeks.

"You're right." A deep breath. "You're right."

He watched her pull herself together, then asked, "Who did you meet today at noon?"