Leah was late as she dashed out of her gate and right outside the prep room where the rest of her team was waiting. She pushed the door open to see Sphinx was pacing in her blue uniform as the other three chatted together. Her great Pharaonic head piece gave her a glaring, almost mummy-like countenance as she walked.

"You're late," Sphinx said when she entered. Leah could tell the woman was trying to control her voice, so she tried not to let it affect her.

"Yeah," she said dully. "It's our party." Leah felt this response was a model of self control.

Sphinx's unmoving mask stared at her in a way that Leah found creepy. She hated that unblinking stare. Was she rolling her eyes? Scoffing?

"I'll go tell Olympia we're ready," Sphinx said in a fully audible voice and left the backstage area of the audience hall.

Leah walked over to Boy Titan, who Nereid was currently trying to get pumped up. "Come on! Think of all the cool people you'll get to meet!" Nereid commanded with all the enthusiasm that she brought to everything in life.

"It's not all that," Leah said, doing her best to pop Nereid's bubble of energy. It might have worked for her but it didn't work for other people. "Important people are just regular people with power. They're not some special kind of thing."

"Spoilsport," Neried said, sticking out her tongue in good humor. She smiled at Boy Titan and patted him on the back, "Leah's been doing this stuff for way longer than a lowly Elevated like myself."

Leah sighed, "I'm not… It's not about that Nereid." She had only been trying to help Boy Titan relax. This politicking stuff was not going to stop the heir of Titan from having a long and comfortable life. It might be quite stressful if he didn't relax about it, though.

"I know," Nereid said with a smile. Nereid enjoyed yanking people's chains too much in Leah's opinion.

"Elevated?" Boy Titan asked. Leah had to admit that they had sheltered this guy maybe a bit too much.

"If you don't come from a pre-war Legacy, that's all," Leah said, doing her best to be helpful. They were all legacies except Nereid. Her power was far too strong to neglect and she was friends with Sphinx.

"They're about to signal us on," Sphinx said, re-entering the conversation.

Zera's voice came over the speakers and gave the usual set of platitudes about guaranteeing justice without delay. Soon enough, she was announcing names. Sphinx went up first as Team Lead, obviously, and then Wands, probably because his master's prominence. Leah ushered Boy Titan on when he was announced right in the middle of the pack, a humble gesture on Zera's part, and then "Heir to a long and honorable legacy, Gate!" and Leah went out into the audience room.

Stepping out onto the stage, Leah looked out at the crowd. Surrounding the tables like many colored Christmas decorations were dozens of Order members in their uniforms. Leah saw her mom frowning among them as Leah came out and she knew she was in for it later. Flitting between the tables were the service staff of the Ziggurat and behind the tables, there was a collection of authorized press personnel taking photos.

"And finally, Nereid, one of our finest recruits!" Zera announced and the room gave a polite round of applause as Nereid walked onto the stage. They were all in full-regalia, of course, but Leah had to wonder if Nereid was self-conscious about always wearing a swimsuit.

Zera gave them a few lines of thanks, knighted them all with a ceremonial sword, and then commanded the room, "Please congratulate our fine young heroes, but not all at once."

Leah immediately did her best to be next to Boy Titan. Boy Titan let out a little "Wuh" of shock.

"Just stick with me and you'll be fine," Leah said. No way she was letting someone this green do the meet-and-greet by himself.

"Okay," Boy Titan said.

The greetings got off to a start with a bang. A thin man in a pre-war three piece suit approached, settling into late middle age with thinning red hair, approached them first. He extended a hand to Boy Titan, "Diomedes Donne," he said, smiling with the practice of a professional.

Boy Titan seized up immediately. Leah steeled herself and shook Donne's hand, "A pleasure to see you again," she said, keeping her voice pleasant and even.

Donne shook her hand gamely, "It's been quite sometime Gate. You have my condolences on your father. I did not know him so well as Titan, but nonetheless he was a great servant of the Order."

Donne had been one of Titan's chief enemies before the war and clearly Boy Titan hadn't lost track of that fact. "It's been a great loss but justice prevails and we survive," Leah said, keeping her head. "This is Boy Titan, he's still quite new to all this, so I imagine he's a little awestruck."

Boy Titan made a sputtering noise but Donne smiled conspiratorially to him, "Of course, of course," he agreed. "I've grown close to Olympia but I sometimes forget that I am more remembered by many for my… wasted youth."

Donne had tried to take over the world multiple times before the war. "We're all so glad that your talents have found their proper place," Leah said and ribbed Boy Titan.

"Yeah," Boy Titan said, after a moment, with a very half-hearted tone. He extended his hand and Donne shook it.

"It's a pleasure," Donne said, "but I'm afraid I must go congratulate young Sphinx. Thank you both for your time."

After he had walked something that might have been called out of earshot, Boy Titan leaned over and whispered, "That's Doctor Donne."

"The world's leading scientific mind," Leah said, trying to muffle her contempt. "He's a huge boon to the Order's project."

"He's a costumed villain," Boy Titan said as a pair of heroes approached. The pair of them made niceties with the two of them but Leah found a way to quickly peel off.

"Lots of people were robbers during the cops and robber years," Leah said, keeping her tone under control. It wasn't so much that he was wrong as that things had changed. "Extraordinary individuals frequently found themselves sidelined for their abilities."

Boy Titan looked at her aghast, "He tried to take over the world. Multiple times!"

Leah put her finger over her mouth, "Shhhh!" she said, "You say things like that you'll start a political fracas for Olympia. Even the old government didn't execute him and he hasn't even tried to overthrow us," Leah said. "He's too valuable to humanity. You get used to it."

Boy Titan frowned at that. "It doesn't feel like you should get away with something because you're too useful."

Leah shrugged. "Justice prevails," she said sarcastically as another hero approached.

"Boy Titan," the woman said, her golden hair laying her white adapative fiber. Leah tried to remember what exactly her power was. Photokinesis? There weren't an infinite number of powered heroes, but there were a lot. "Your father was an inspiration. I'm so grateful for everything you family has done."

Boy Titan locked up at that. Leah needed to bail him out, "We can only hope to live up to the high standards he set. We're so glad that so many treasure his memory."

Boy Titan nodded his head in agreement, "Yeah. Thank you."

The woman smiled at them both before looking Boy Titan square in the eye, "If you ever need anything, let me know."

Boy Titan gave a tight smile and assent before Leah managed to pilot them to safety. Leah patted him on the shoulder, "Sorry about that. You probably don't have much experience talking about your father."

"It's not-" Boy Titan fumbled over his words. "I didn't know my father. I mean I've seen pictures as a baby but mostly it was my mom and me. I just don't know how to deal with people- with being treated like a substitute for him."

Leah felt bad for Boy Titan. She had lost her father, true, but she had known him and admired him. For all the compromises involved in being in the Order, her father had been a good man and worthy of the name of hero. "People like that just want to know that their care for Titan is received in some way, that's all."

As they drifted through the room, Leah's mom finally rounded on them and Leah sighed, "I gotta handle my mom," she whispered to Boy Titan. "Remember, smile, nod, gratitude, nothing distinct."

"That's your mom?" Boy Titan said, clearly surprised.

Leah's mom still dressed in her suit from her days as a robber in Crosspoint. Her dark skin contrasted with her bright red suit which, in addition to be skintight like most adaptive fiber, was quite low cut. Her mom would say that she dressed like that to attract Gate's attention but now that he was gone, it took on a different meaning.

"Boy Titan!" Leah's mom said, smiling as if she were meeting an in-law for the first time. "Such a pleasure to meet you."

"A pleasure to meet you, Bombshell," Boy Titan said, making strong and focused eye contact.

"Oh you flatterer," Bombshell said. Leah rolled her eyes. She made that joke every time. "You know we were so sad when they announced you dead. Gate was inconsolable, he was so close to your parents, but he would have understood, it was necessary for your safety. Leah, dear, why don't you come with me for a word?"

Leah wondered if her father had really been inconsolable for weeks as she followed her mother. They slipped out into the hallway of the Ziggurat and into one of the large closets where supplies were kept. "Ten minutes late!" her mother said, clearly having worked her into a state.

Leah didn't bother denying it, even if her mother was only guessing. "You're overreacting."

"You think I don't know that you were at the penthouse?" her mother said, her voice high pitched and whiny even under her Jersey accent. "You can teleport."

"Dad was always late," Leah said, adjusting the trademark golden armor nervously.

"Your father was a great man," her mother said, "and a founding member of the Olympian Order."

Now he was dead, so you could see all the good those appellations did him in the end. Leah bit it back. "Mom, nobody's gonna care, they practically expect Gate to be late," she said

"You got real lucky with this robot guy," her mother said, "and you oughtta be here making the most of that, making connections."

"Mom, I don't care," Leah said

"You should care," her mom said, "Your father cared."

Leah didn't say, 'That's because he fought for the Dissenters in the civil war.' That wouldn't have been polite. Her father had been reconciled and in good standing for years before he'd gone missing. "I'm not Dad."

"Don't I know it," her mom said, taking a deep breath. "Honey, your brother and I, we're depending on you. You know our powers aren't exactly, er, stable like yours is."

"It wouldn't kill you to learn to fucking budget Ma," Leah said acid on her tongue. Leah knew that her family had it harder than her but she hated the guilt trips. Pyrokinetics with imperfect control was a rotten power set. The Gate power set was, essentially, the lottery. Point to point spatial gates, perfect control, only limited to line of sight was a badass power.

"You think this is about money?" her mom said, waving her arms for emphasis. "You think that this is about money? Honey, this is about something more important than money, this is about legacy."

Her father had given up on legacy when he'd bent the knee to Olympia. There wasn't any shame in that. They'd lost. It didn't make a lick of sense to fight in a losing war, but it didn't make a lick of sense to pretend that this was somehow their project. "Mom, calm down," Leah said, "It isn't like these people don't already know me."

"You're honored to be put in with the best heroic lines and you're late your own freaking party. That's how you say thank you? You think all these big important people care that they knew you when you were little? They're not gonna care if you don't show respect."

Leah resisted the urge to yell at her mother. It was so frustrating, "Well, Mom, I guess you'll have to just get back out there and woo a few more people."

Leah's mom shook her head in annoyance but seemed to think better of a long argument. "Fine. Remember, your position is not as secure as you seem to think it is." She marched out the door.

Leah didn't care about her position, so she took a few moments of breathing before sallying forth to rescue Boy Titan from the friendly hordes. She stuck her head out to see a huge array of the heroes marching out. It was at that point that she heard a bang thud from inside the room she was in. "Who's there?" Leah asked, her hackles up and summoning two gates on either side of her to act as shields.

"Um…" a small voice said. A woman's voice. Leah could tell it was from behind one of her gate-shields, "Um… Just service staff, sorry, sorry, I was just in here getting stuff…"

Leah dropped her shields and turned to see the voice. A service member in the formal, almost black purple of the service staff stood next to a rack of chairs. She was a pretty young woman but no so pretty to be distracting, the classic mold that the Zigguarat tended to hire. "Hi," Leah said, confused. "What are you doing in here?"

"Uh, well," the woman said, clearly thinking of an excuse.

Leah looked her over quickly, "Turn out your pockets, now," Leah ordered, keying up her armor's sensory array. If she were a spy for another Order member, there wasn't anything outright incriminating about what they'd said but it would be leverage.

The woman hesitated and then did so. However bad following orders was for her, not following them would have been worse. A vape pen fell on the floor.

Leah picked it up, "You're too young for this to be legal for you." Tobacco and marijuana were prohibited by the Order for people who had become adults during their reign who were not part of the service. She looked at it through her helmet's data screen and pulled apart the pen.

"Necessity," the girl cursed. Interesting that the staff had picked that up from Zera. "I know. I know but we've been on our feet all day already and it hurts so much. It's hard to be calm around someone whose killed hundreds of innocents, even if it was before the war."

Leah sighed. That was a fair point but, "Isn't that your job?"

"Yeah," the woman said dejected. "It's just – you know, the pressure is sky high since it's Boy Titan's debut."

Leah looked at the woman and gave her a quick one over with her head cam. "Phone," she demanded, pointing toward her back pocket. The woman handed her phone over without protest and Leah waved it in front of her badge. She flipped through messages. There wasn't anything there, the most recent message was to that she was taking a quick break and nothing looked like it might even be code in her two dozen or so texts for the day. Leah felt a surge of relief. She didn't want to arrest somebody over possession.

"This is a big security risk," Leah said, holding up the vape pen. If she'd decided to do it even though she knew she could lose her job doing it inside the Ziggurat, she was not in control of herself. "I get it, you're stressed, but this is leverage. The rehab program is free for employees who sign up and it'll clear you from blackmailing charges."

"You can't get promoted on the rehab program," the woman said defensively.

Leah didn't know why the Order insisted on making this her business, but it WAS a security threat if the woman didn't sign on for the rehab program. She may not have been close with much of the Order, but she and her team worked here and the security of the Zigguarat was important. "I'm not going to let you off for this if you don't sign up, Miss," she checked the phone's id, "Carleigh."

Carleigh's eyes widened, "You'll let me off if I do?"

"Man, I don't care at all if it's not a security problem for us," Leah said.

Carleigh hesitated for a moment and then nodded her head, "Give me the phone," she said. She took the phone and put in the number for the rehab line, "Hey, this is Carleigh with service team three, I think I might have a problem."

Feeling like both a tyrant and a voyeur, Leah left the room and headed back into the ballroom, gating to get there faster. She jumped past a set of heroes leaving the party early. Right as she crossed the threshold, she spotted Carleigh pushing a cart stacked with center piece flowers. She walked over to Boy Titan, who was smiling and nodding like a champ to a small man in orange. "Hey, you two see that woman come in?" Leah asked. How had she gotten past her? Leah was an all-time fast hero.

"I didn't notice anything, there's been a lot of hubbub since Olympia left." Boy Titan said. The man in orange shook his head.

"Wait, Olympia left?" Leah asked, remembering the group of heroes walking away. She glanced over the room – Not many people were left and most of them were old-school robbers. "Okay, never mind, did you see when she got here?"

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"I bet Sphinx did," Boy Titan said and pointed to where their fearless leader was perched on top of a statue of Titan.

Sphinx wasn't much for politics, clearly. "Come on, let's go check on her," Leah said. The man in orange grinned and waved them goodbye. Sphinx was scanning the room from atop the statue's shoulder. "I think Olympia should just add some perches for you guys. The friendly hordes get you down?"

Sphinx looked down at her, "Something's off," she said. "The heroes got called away to deal with a crisis at the edge of New Avalon."

"Did you notice that there are too many staff members?" Leah said, noticing herself that not only was erstwhile Carleigh somehow back, but that the ratio was far too high here.

"No."

"Tell Olympia," Leah said, looking at Sphinx with concern.

"This is a debut, it's a big deal but- yeah, you're right." Sphinx raised a hand to her ear, "Olympia, this is Sphinx. We've got suspicious conditions, staff's number off."

There was a moment after that when it seemed multiple members of the staff turned to look at Sphinx. Then it happened.

The potted plants erupted into long tentacle like vines, whipping around in attack. The smell of the room changed into something green and gross. "We're under attack!" Sphinx announced, pouncing from the statue.

There are many possibilities for an attack. But whatever else you could say about their characters, this room still had a large number of preternaturals and extremely talented individuals. It was a flurry of noise as powers erupted. "We've gotta get the service staff out of here," Leah said.

"They've been subverted!" Sphinx said as a large vine lashed toward her.

Leah blocked the vine and gated it back toward one of its own segments. "Sphinx, I don't think that's it!" Leah shouted back.

"This seems as subverted as it could be!" Sphinx said as one of the service members rushed at her.

She should have cultivated a better relationship with Sphinx. Her mother was right, not that Leah was going to say it. "I was in a different room with flower girl over there and then she got back before me?"

"Fine!" Sphinx said, assenting easily. She was a quick adapting commander, Leah would have to keep that in mind. She danced around the attacking service member and slapped a stunner on their neck. "We've got to move quickly if we're going to get them out of here." The stunner went off and the service member shook and shocked and collapsed. It seemed to shudder and lose definition, like it was packed together clay instead of a finished sculpture.

"How many in here?" Leah asked as she put up a block gate in front of one of the vines. Sphinx would know. The Hellhounds were thorough as anyone Leah had ever met.

"There were twenty four," Sphinx said. "Comms have cut, we gotta get the word out personally."

Leah felt her adrenaline surge. These plants weren't dangerous enough. They didn't have to be, she realized. If the Order killed a bunch of civilians in their loyal service by accident, the damage would be worse. Internal strife would balloon. Their whole reason for being was that they were protectors of the innocent. This room was, for better or worse, full of robbers from the old cops and robbers era of preternatural individuals. It was the perfect trap, nobody would've even noticed it was being sprung if she hadn't seen Carleigh.

"Come on!" Leah shouted. She looked around the room for fire and saw her mother, splitting the air with a gate to her mother. She stepped out on the other side where her mother was.

Another tentacle vine whipped out and Leah had to dodge physically. She needed Sphinx here. Sphinx burst through the gate and Leah nixed her portal. "It's a trap to get the order to kill service members," Leah said.

Bombshell nodded her head, focusing her fire down the vine that had lashed at Leah. "Good to know," she grunted after she crisped the vine. She was visibly shaking. It was hard for her to work her fire safely in an enclosed environment like this. "You've got to tell the others."

Leah looked around the room and tried to spot friends. She looked for old-school Order memebrs, but it was thin pickings. Most of them had jumped at the chance to go deal with the outside crisis.

"Careful of civilians!" Sphinx shouted, but it was hard to hear over the cacophony of powers in use in the room.

"Line by line," Leah muttered to calm herself, looking around the room for any threatened staff members. She split a new gate open and walked through it, "Donne!" she shouted as Diomedes Donne stood over an unconscious staff member, his fist bloodied.

"Gate," he said, a maniacal grin on his face, "I think I have this one well in hand."

Leah took a moment to breath and realized that no vine attacked her. Was there a conductor in the room? "This is a trap," she said, looking at the service member.

"I saw this one bringing in the flowers earlier," Donne said, his voice triumphant.

"If the flowers work for him, than why aren't they defending him?"

"Such naivete," Donne said. "Why, when I was a rogue it was every man for himself. That hasn't changed. He's no use to the attacker anymore."

Leah looked for Sphinx and discovered that she was still on the other side of the gate, dealing with an attack from a vine. "Donne, if you kill this person, you'll be undermining the Order's authority."

"Gate," Donne said, his voice testy. "Don't put me to the test."

"Make less threats. I'm not going to let someone with clemency break down our society." Leah said before she could think about it. It was a stupid sentiment and a dangerous statement. Her family, no less than any other, relied on the forgiving nature of the Order. But Leah wasn't going to let him kill some innocent schmuck to save her own skin. Her father would never have done that.

Donne looked at Leah and down at the service member. His face was a bloody mess. "I guess he is handled enough for the moment," Donne said. "I'll go find another one, shall I?" He walked away and left the crumbled body on the ground.

Leah felt a knot in her stomach come undone that she hadn't gotten the chance to notice. The room was getting quieter now and the crowd was thinner. Leah raised her hand and opened a gate toward the center of the room. "We've got to get these people under control," she said as she stepped through.

Boy Titan was hanging in the air, trying to tear his way out of a vine. "I'd help – aggh - if I could" he said, his face screwed up in pain. Leah produced a gate and dropped her side knife through it into the vine that was wrapping around Boy Titan.

He wrenched his hand and got hold of the knife, stabbing into the vine and slicing it open before falling onto the ground. He stood up uneasily as Nereid flowed across the floor toward them. "I've stopped a few of them," Nereid said, her voice nervous. "For a little bit, I guess. These plants are a bitch."

The two halves of the vine seemed to wriggle and begin growing, just as if they were supposed to be like this the whole time. Nereid cursed and Boy Titan muttered, "Necessity," under his breath as the vines grew back.

"Sphinx! Do you have a plan for this stuff?" Leah said into her communicator.

"Fire!" Sphinx said on the other end of the line.

Fire seemed doable, "Mom!" Leah said, ripping the air open next to her mother. "Fireball special?"

"You got it," her mom said, focusing up a fireball in her hand.

Even in the heat of battle, Leah thought of how her father and mother must have done this many times. Then she started queuing up the gates to wherever she could see the vines sprouting from.

The plan was going swimmingly when the vines lashed toward her and wrapped around her face, closing off her eyes. Leah's helmet held them off, but she could feel the squeeze around her skull. A tide of water flowed up her body and Leah felt a moment of confusion before the vines burst off her.

Nereid was standing next to her, breathing heavily as Leah regained her vision. "I'll be watchman," Nereid said, "You do what you need to do."

Leah nodded and tried to spot her mother. She found her surrounded by the plants, "How many of these damn things are there?"

"A lot!" Nereid said, a dancing pillar of water.

Walking with Nereid next to her, Leah managed to reach her mom and put the fireballs through the gates. It was an efficient method of working through the problem. "There are still vines!" she cursed as the smoke seemed to be filling the room.

"We've got to fall back," Nereid said from next to her. "Clearing the room should be easier than clearing out these damn plants."

"You think they're sessile?" Leah asked skeptically.

"Maybe!" Nereid said.

"Sphinx, we're not clearing these things fast enough," Leah said.

"I couldn't tell!" Sphinx said over the comm, her voice bitter.

Leah had to admit that was fair, "Call a retreat! Let's get the service staff out of here and seal the place up!"

Sphinx, to her credit, didn't resist a good idea when it came to her. "Sounds like a plan. Retreat! Quarantine! Get the civilians and let's go!" Sphinx shouted as loudly as she could. Leah could only sort of hear her over the din of battle but began to repeat her as loudly as she could.

Leah spotted a service member on the ground and gated over to them with Nereid, "Come on, let's go," she said, extending her hand to the service member.

The service member grabbed her hand for a moment and then vines burst from inside the service member's wrist and latched onto her. "Hello," a voice said from inside the service member. His eyes were rictus, false, "I'll get right on that," he said his voice perfectly ordinary.

Leah tried to wrest herself free but to no avail. The vines were cracking through her armor and soon they'd be cracking through her arm. She let out a curse as Nereid blasted through the arm vines. "This one's a dud!" she said, as if it needed clarification. "Come on!"

Leah felt a moment of disorientation and then realized she needed to get out of contact range. She opened a gate and Nereid dragged them both through without waiting for permission. "Over there!" Leah said, nursing her arm. There was another unconscious service member on the floor.

"Are you sure you can handle-"

"If they're a person, we can't leave them to die in here," Leah said, ignoring the pain in her arm. She ripped open another gate and they walked through it. "Can you pick her up?"

"Yeah," Nereid said, her voice shaky. Even though Leah could see the fear and trepidation in her movements, Nereid moved quickly. She picked up the unconscious service member and nothing happened. "Come on!"

Leah scanned the room. It was thinning out now, with relatively few Order members left. Wands was holding down the door with those grasping chains of his, Boy Titan was carrying out a couple of bodies. Where was Sphinx? Leah scanned and saw her, cornered by vines.

One of the big advantages of Leah's power was that she could open a door for her friends too. She opened a gate next to the exit and one next to Sphinx. Sphinx didn't even hesitate to look through the portal, she just jumped through. Leah followed suit herself with Nereid and their unconscious service member.

"Is that everyone?" Leah asked as the five of them stood next to the door, holding back an increasingly dense wall of angry vines.

"I pray it is," Sphinx said. "Come on, fall back."

They stepped through the portal.

"Boy Titan, I need you to command the Zigguarat to seal this room," Sphinx said. That made sense – The Ziggurat was made with the crystal technology of Titan's ship.

"How do I that?" Boy Titan asked, confused.

Sphinx recited a command phrase in a language Leah didn't know. Did she learn a whole series of commands in Zera's tongue?

Boy Titan repeated the command a couple times to the air before the doors of the room rippled like water and vanished. Terra had made a ton of technological progress across the past few years, but it still had a long way to go to catch up to Zera's homeworld.

"That should seal it off," Sphinx said, her body relaxing. Leah felt her breathing for the first time in the whole fight. She was breathing heavy and felt almost dizzy. Leah recognized that she was coming off the adrenaline high but she felt blurry even so.

She looked over to see Wands leaning up against a wall with both hands. Nereid and Boy Titan seemed to be genuinely jazzed. They looked like they could go another round without much trouble, but they were still breathing heavy.

The rest of the hall was cluttered with unconscious bodies. Not all of them were service members either – The guy in orange who had been talking with Boy Titan had apparently collapsed unconscious by this point. The 'robbers' were mostly fine, although even they looked a little haggard. Donne seemed to have a little coterie around him but when he spotted Leah looking at him, he glared at her.

Leah broke off eye contact first. She didn't care for a fight with the guy now that the service members were out. It was over, as far as she was concerned. "Have you gotten in touch with Hellhound?" she asked Sphinx. They must have had some weird key signal method because Sphinx hadn't broken off to call.

"Yeah," she said after a moment. "He just patched me into his feed. It looks like they've cleared the Kaiju's path but they haven't quite put it down yet."

"Who's got a kaiju and a plant kinetic?" Leah asked, trying to figure out why this whole thing had happened.

Sphinx shook her head. It only took half a glance back for Leah to figure out that she was holding out so that the other Order members wouldn't hear. It seemed the fight had shaken her, at least a little.

Security arrived to take away all the various unconscious to infirmerys as they needed and Sphinx seemed to relax. "Come on," she said to the team. They trodded up toward the room that had been designated as their "meeting" room.

The omnipresent glowing crystal of the Ziggurat providing something that felt like spring sunlight in the shade and the room had a loose configuration of chairs and couches to sink into. Wands practically collapsed on a couch, Nereid and Boy Titan were still pacing and jazzed. Leah watched Sphinx and thought even her breathing looked the same as before the night. Leah felt a little jealous but she knew Sphinx's background was as a theme criminal.

"Hellhound doesn't know who this is," Sphinx said, "but it looks like it's one of ours."

"One of yours?" Boy Titan asked.

"The Knights of St. Galahad have a lot of enemies, though less recently," Sphinx said and Leah did not think that she was exaggerating. "But this looks like Erato's work. She died more than a decade ago."

"Do we have a body?" Leah asked. It hadn't happened as much now that the Order was in charge, but there had been a time when villains 'died' more frequently than having birthday parties.

"She's dead." Sphinx said, her voice dark. "They did all they could to stop it and she still died."

"I'm not hearing a yes on the body," Leah said.

"Erato's power wasn't… she didn't get it clean," Wands said from where he was on the couch. "Her debt came due and she wouldn't pay it. That was all there was to it."

"May she rest in peace and rise to everlasting glory," Sphinx intoned in prayer.

Leah frowned. "Now you think it's someone who knew how to strike the bargain?"

"I hope not," Sphinx said, but her voice betrayed that she did think that. "The rituals should all be destroyed."

"Forging the kind of pact she did takes a certain mindset," Wands said. "Power that old knows its own. The last Erato changed, but a new one would be Erato at her worst, all over again."

"Killer robots one week, magical plants the next," Leah said exasperated. "I have been on this team for two weeks and we're already up to our necks in bullshit."

"Any sufficiently intelligent and powerful phytokinetic might have done it," Sphinx said, her voice sad. "But I don't know how they would've known how to do it."

Leah sighed. That was what it would be – She wasn't much of a detective. "I should probably warn you all about Donne," Leah said after a moment.

"Do you think he was involved?" Sphinx asked, confused.

"Probably not," Leah said, "but people like that can hold grudges. Quite nasty ones."

"Donne is a member of the Order in good standing," Sphinx replied, "Even if he's mad, he's not foolish enough to risk that by attacking you."

Leah resisted the urge to pinch her nose. It would've been good if she had more trust with Sphinx, but it seemed like Sphinx didn't understand the political dangers of the group. "I suppose not," Leah said.

Looked like Leah would be dealing with their political problems by herself.