Tuesday, October 20
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Our appointment in the Council of Heroes archives started at 9:15, so Fursona and I blew off our classes to get there early. We’d watch the video lectures later, but I was excited to dive into the old newspapers and recordings of news shows for anything we could find out about 3V1L.
Between patrols and classes, we’d been busy over the last week, and today was our first real ‘day off.’ Sort of. The homework piled up any day we weren’t in classes, and the video lectures worked, but they didn’t feel the same, and the lack of schedule was rough. We’d also dropped the Triad on a pair of major league villains in the Parker and Evergreen districts, although why anyone wanted to fight over the acid-pocked, MIRACLE-clogged streets of Evergreen was beyond me.
We’d at least be able to disengage for three or four hours, hit up the archive, and see if we could start building an idea of how 3V1L operated. This felt different than Professor Panic, who was someone I’d been familiar with and underestimated, or Vigilant Vow, who’d descended into villainy while Fursona and I did other things.
This was an organization with a history, and Fursona and I needed to understand that history if we wanted to stop them.
So, as we rode the elevator to the COH Building’s fourth floor, got off, and signed in with the tired-looking old super at the desk, I reviewed the plan we’d made on the whiteboard.
Step One: Find out about the pre-Goosing 3V1L. How did they operate? What were their leaders like? How did they hold their own against major-league heroes? What strategies were used against them, and how could we copy them?
Step Two: Compare the pre-Goosing 3V1L with the current one. Figure out if anything had changed. If so, try to explain why it was changing.
Step Three: Build a plan to defeat 3V1L, test-run it in the Poudre districts, and go from there.
We walked through the shelves into the section labeled ‘Villain Records (Deceased and Retired).’ I figured we’d find information on the Three Vs there, if nothing else, and I wasn’t disappointed. Articles, Episode clips, and TV reports—the COH archive had everything we needed. I sat down with a newspaper article and began to read.
The organization known as 3V1L took over the South Poudre City Hall today, resulting in seven injuries as they held hostages and demanded the literal keys to the district. When informed that the keys were a metaphor, not a real thing, they began threatening to hurt hostages, at which point Liege Lord was forced to engage.
The hero was able to save all the hostages, although in his fight against the Three Vs, the city hall building was destroyed. MIRACLE crews are hard at work in the Poudre district, working on repairs and rebuilding. Of particular note was an interaction between Liege Lord’s ‘Imminent Domain’ power and the V known as Landcrawler’s ‘Ground Pound,’ which resulted in most of the destruction.
“Hey, did either of the Vs we’ve fought have names?” I asked Fursona quietly.
She shook her eagle head. “No. I’ve got Ghost Ronin here, a similar weapon choice to the V we fought in ‘The Root of All 3V1L,’ but the descriptions of her powers are totally different. Also, that V was a guy, right?”
“Yeah. That’s strange. See if we can track down any of the other letters. That’s a definite weird situation, no doubt about it.”
I kept reading, switching to a new article.
Yesterday, an incident between the Three Vs and Stella-Lunar resulted in all three being arrested. While Landcrawler and Ghost Ronin got out quickly, Crystal Cannon is still in custody as of this morning.
The fighting took place around Tokyexico General Hospital, which was both far outside of 3V1L’s territory and much different from their usual targets. Stella-Lunar responded first and quickly defeated the three villains while nearby lower-league heroes fought the lieutenants and henchmen who’d accompanied the Three Vs.
Gradually, article by article, a picture started to form of who 3V1L was. But at the same time, every article had a similar theme; the Three Vs moved together, usually along with a swarm of lieutenants and henches, and the 1L never showed their face. I didn’t even have info on who they were, and as far as either Fursona or I could find out, they’d never been identified, much less arrested.
“This is so weird,” Fursona said. I looked her way and nodded for her to continue. “Okay, their M.O. doesn’t match what we’re seeing in the field. We see a solo V with a few mooks. The old 3V1L never went anywhere alone—they always had henches. So, something changed in their leadership or strategy. They’re playing a wider game than they used to be.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“They are,” I said slowly. The whole thing made me a bit uncomfortable. No, not uncomfortable. Curious. “They had a big leadership shake-up when Golden Goose killed the Three Vs. Let’s watch that. Maybe we’ll see something there. We need a viewing room and the Golden Goose vs. 3V1L Episode. Maybe there’s a tell there.”
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“Due to unforeseen circumstances relating to her personal life, Magical Girl Stella-Lunar is canceled. Golden Goose has graciously agreed to shoot the Episode, excluding point-of-view filming and with a five-minute delay. Stella-Lunar thanks you for your understanding,” the TV said.
The last time we’d watched this Episode, Bee and I were drunk. We’d been plastered and cuddly by the time Golden Goose really went on the offensive, and I couldn’t even remember the ending.
This time would be different.
We sat in the small, dark room, staring at a TV less than half the size of mine, pens ready to take notes as Golden Goose hovered over the 3V1L base. She shouted out her typical time limit ultimatum, then started her attack by lasering open the roof. Then she peeled it open like a can of cat food, not quite ignoring the Three Vs and the swarm of lieutenants that came out to fight her. “I’m here for the One L!” She shouted, sparring with Landcrawler and Ghost Ronin with an expression between boredom and annoyance on her face.
“He’s not around! Die!” Landcrawler launched massive stone pillars from the ground, surrounding Golden Goose, and for the first time, I really paid attention to the Three Vs and how they fought.
It was like a dance. As Golden Goose broke through the stone barriers, Crystal Cannon opened up from three blocks away, spraying shards of glass so sharp they actually left scratches on the overpowered heroine’s perfect skin. Not cuts, but scratches. When the superhero tried to fly that way, Ghost Ronin slid into the space between, sword somehow managing to deflect a mid-powered eye beam.
Against anyone but the Top Ten, they’d have had a chance.
But Golden Goose was number one for a reason, and one by one, the Three Vs and their lieutenants fell to her punches, laser, and raw power. Then Golden Goose went inside, and the fighting got more close-quarters—and more intense. Hand-to-hand with unpowered henchmen and little league villains, a back and forth with a minor league Tank vil who lasted a shockingly long time, and then a burst of flames and fumes that left Golden Goose coughing.
Then she turned to the camera. “This is a warning to villains everywhere. If you get too big, too uppity, you will draw my eye. And if I have to fly halfway across North America to deal with you, I will be pissed—and you will regret it for the rest of your lives.” She pointed at a hench who’d wisely surrendered instantly. “Call an ambulance.”
Fursona lunged for the remote and paused it. Then she rewinded and pointed at the screen. “There! What’s that?”
I stared at the dark, grainy screen, trying to piece out what she was seeing. Then she ran her finger around it, and I saw the strange shape for what it was—a shadow. “There’s someone else in the room with her, and they’re not dead or beaten.”
“Exactly. But who?” Fursona said. She nodded her eagle head slowly. “Let’s take another look and see if we can figure it out.”
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We’d watched that clip a dozen more times, but the most we’d seen was a single arm and half a torso in the shadows. It just wasn’t enough to go on, and we couldn’t exactly ask Snowball or Golden Goose who’d been there. For starters, they wouldn’t tell us; the studios didn’t talk much about the behind-the-scenes, or at least not as much as you’d expect.
Golden Goose had also been in nearly seventy Episodes since then, so she probably didn’t even remember mopping up 3V1L. It wasn’t like a single Episode could stick in your head when you did five years’ worth of my career in eight months.
The point was that we couldn’t just fly to Yorkston or go upstairs to her temporary base and talk to her—not about a minor league problem.
“Should we keep digging?” I asked.
“Nah. We know enough to make a plan for 3V1L. That’ll have to do for now.” Fursona flicked on the lights. “Let’s get to work.”
As we compared our notes, though, it was clear that nothing we’d learned about the old 3V1L could help us handle the new one. Nothing flowed; the organization had no before-and-after continuity. “The One L wouldn’t change plans so completely. There’s no benefit to running wide right after taking a Goose-sized punch to their organization, and whoever they are, they’d try to rebuild a similar dynamic. Three main villains, a bunch of lieutenants, and as many henches as they could recruit. Remember the recruiting booth at the job fair last year?” I asked.
“Yeah. They’re really hurting on the lieutenant front,” Fursona said.
I thought for a minute. “Are they? They keep introducing themselves as ‘for the moment, the Second V’ or whatever. That doesn’t sound like a small organization. It sounds like one playing at being small and working toward being bigger. Temporary jobs while they find bigger villains to take those positions. Whoever we’re fighting this month as a V won’t be one in two or three. Ha, that rhymes.”
“Sure does. So, can we build a plan to handle Sword V and Punch V?”
“Yeah. We can. Of the two, Sword V is the tougher opponent. He’s aggressive, confident, and competent with his weapon. I think we can beat him with a good ranged game. That means Eagle-sona and Understudy for the flight, the distance, and the ranged damage. We can try the opposite with Punch V, but that’s risky. We can’t range her down, though—at least, not unless I save [Bit-Part Barrage], and I tend to use it as soon as I see an opportunity.”
I paused, then thought for a moment. “I think the bigger concern is fighting them with a group of henches, or fighting them each other, or fighting them with another villain. We need to be ready for anything.
But the plan wouldn’t come together—we knew a ton about 3V1L’s old operations but nothing about what they were up to now. They wanted Evergreen. They wanted Sister Sly gone. They wanted University. None of it made sense. After a frustrating hour and a ton of paper heading to the tower’s incinerator, I finally stood up. “I think we’re done here. There’s only so much we can learn from the past when we don’t know what the present looks like. Let’s go back to TU.”
“Agreed,” Fursona said. “We need a plan to push against 3V1L.”