Standing on his stormcloud, Allen felt a bit of the heavy tension of tonight leave his body when Aiden finally got back to him. He’d been afraid someone younger, someone less experienced, would have to face that menace Viperia before he could get to them. Never before had he been so glad to be wrong.

Because Nar was there, holding her off while waiting for backup. His backup. Allen needed to get there, and fast. Not that he believed the junior captain couldn’t handle himself, he simply wanted this mission to be over. Committing to a large-scale raid like this with so many people had plenty of ways it could go wrong. When the board had first started pushing for it, he reacted with wariness.

Having an entire gang removed from the board, especially one as disruptive as the Venin were, was a tantalizing prospect, to be sure. But they had to move with caution. Guarantee that nobody got left behind and caught out unnecessarily. And with so many other heroes on the board, there were a lot of moving parts. It was good that the coordination team back at HQ was helping them direct the mission with some of the squad leaders to make things flow more easily.

Too many times throughout his life, Allen had seen entire groups of professionals fall apart due to tiny errors in communication, which taught him the importance of getting every member of an operation on the same page. Applying those same lessons here was a given; he let Zeta keep him apprised of all the different locations the others were hitting, he issued commands to course-correct where necessary, and he kept his eyes peeled on the flying transport he was providing for Warp and the rest.

Until now. Their highest priority target had shown herself, and it was time to capitalize on the opportunity. “Warp, I’m needed elsewhere,” he announced. “Drop them off, then await further instruction from Josiah.”

Despite the mask he was wearing, Allen knew Dolen well enough to tell when the boy was miffed. And this was one such instance, obvious from the way his shoulders set and his finger started tapping incessantly on his leg. Understandable, though. Soaring the skies to pick people up with portals when he usually had to walk must have been fun. Any other day, he would have allowed the teenager to stay on.

Today was not any other day.

In a swell of power, his cloud split itself off from the one carrying all the passengers, which he set to land on a nearby rooftop where Warp could send them away as needed. His own cloud accelerated, the billowing gray mass of vapor picking up speed each second he concentrated on it.

As Allen surged forward, he let his thoughts flow through the rhythm of his pulsing cloud, pushing him onward. His mind was constantly sifting through contingencies, a habit formed from years of seeing plans go awry at the worst moments. Viperia wasn’t just any enemy; she was cunning, ruthless, and, it seemed, willing to go to any extreme.

Now that they knew why Viperia—or Ms. Remy, he supposed—was doing all this, he was more on-guard than ever. He’d known better than to automatically assume her motivation was wealth or power, having brought in many criminals over the years and reading their files, but to know she was doing this for her family? It struck a chord with him. And it painted a lot of what she did in a different light.

Nothing that would justify the heinous acts she had ordered and carried out, of course. He was only acknowledging that the knowledge that all this resistance they faced was the desperation of a mother at work made this more visceral for him, more personal. God knew what he would do if Matilda was stuck with a condition like that and he thought he was the only one who could help.

Perhaps an attempt to get her to surrender peacefully was the right course of action here. They’d see what could be done from there. She wasn’t getting away with what she’d done, but her son was innocent, as far as they could tell.

Assuming he could win. He’d bested Viperia in all previous confrontations they had, but she had ensured she was never captured by being resourceful. On top of that, she was apparently boosting herself with some strange unidentified serum now.

Facing her directly required every skill and ounce of caution he had honed in the field. And though Nar would doubtless be confident enough to taunt her with that ever-smiling mask on his face, Allen knew better than to underestimate someone like her, even with the prodigy holding her at bay.

Beneath him, the megacity spanned far everywhere he could see. Focusing on one particular area, the target location was coming up in his view, and he lowered his cloud to surge toward that area. When he got closer, however, he began to hear tremors. Huge impacts, shaking the air and shaking dust free from the cracked buildings surrounding the epicenter of the battle he was now convinced he had found.

Upon cresting the final building, he was greeted with the sight of the infamous Venin leader bull rushing her golden adversary. Nar, transformed into a reptilian humanoid with a version of Viperia’s power, swerved out of the way just in time and landed a kick in her side. While it barely fazed her, it altered her trajectory slightly and sent her rocketing into a building next to them.

Except there was no delay between the moment she crashed into the massive wall and her rushing back out. Nar seemed caught by surprise as well, since he didn’t get away in time and had to block her charge with both arms. The force blew him back, but he didn’t break through any hardened surface, as Allen caught him.

The cushioning of his generated blanket of condensed moisture lifted his mentee upright, leaving them both staring down a crazed, panting Viperia. Verdant locks fell down her forehead, shrouding her face like a curtain. Her slitted eyes, abnormally wide and ringed with red, flitted back and forth between them. Darkened veins bulged across her pristine white scales, marring her usual macabre-yet-elegant appearance. The tips of her claws were dripping acidic green ichor by her feet like leaky taps, as if she couldn’t control her venom output anymore.

Steadying himself, the copied shifter dusted off his shoulders and called out, “Your makeover is daring, but now that we find ourselves in polite company, dare I suggest there is room for improvement? A bit of moisturizer? Or perhaps an exorcist?”

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The supervillain hissed at him, baring her fangs and shambling in their general direction the way one might expect from a zombie, every drop of that toxic venom sizzling as it hit the pavement.

But that look she had said it all. This woman was one hundred percent prepared to kill.

Allen turned to the young man on his right. “What powers are you using?” he asked.

“Viperia, Frameshot, Vanthelis.” Nar’s reply was immediate, with no quips or funny retorts this time.

After considering that for a moment, he nodded. “Coordinate with HQ and collect a combination of powers which can remove that drug from her system. Then come back here and wait for my signal.”

“Very well.” The next second, the costumed jester stood next to him in place of the reptile form from earlier. A gloved hand landed on his shoulder. To an outsider, it would look like a gesture of support, but in reality it was Nar copying Mistral’s power back into his rotation.

The faint constellation faded from his awareness as his junior flew away on a cloud much like his own, differing only in color. Nar was fast, but not to the same degree as Mistral. Fantastic though it would have been, the generational talent had not fully mastered his power. Beyond his inability to copy unbindings, people often overlooked how much training went into using an ability like power copying to its true potential. It sometimes meant he had to limit himself to one slot if the skill floor was particularly high.

This led him to use simpler powers or ones in which he already had a fair amount of practice for missions like this, where the stakes were so high. And Allen had to admit Nar’s control over storms was coming along nicely. Far better than his own, back in the day.

No longer worried about the boy, Allen turned back to the boss of the Venin. She watched the fading dot in the sky with hatred in her eyes before turning back to him. She raised her claws, as though getting ready to pounce.

“Genevieve,” he tried. “I know you’re not thinking clearly right now. Whatever you’re doing, it’s not going to save Yves.”

“Don’t you dare say his name!” she hissed, venom dripping from her fangs as she tightened her grip on her claws. “You don’t know anything about me! About what was taken from me!”

“Then tell me!” he pressed on. “We do want your son to be safe. If you’ll give me something to work with here, that can go a long way.”

“They’re going to let him live as long as he can be useful to them, and then when they’re done draining him for all he’s got, they’ll kill him! Don’t think you can lie to me!” she roared.

“You have to realize this can’t possibly end with you getting your way. Not like this. If you don’t surrender, you leave me no choice.”

Her laugh was a sharp, mirthless cackle. “You expect me to just abandon everything I’ve built? Everything I’ve sacrificed? Give my child a fate worse than a snowball in hellfire at the hands of those who don’t give a damn about him?”

“Not everybody is against him. Please understand that.”

But Viperia was done talking. She shot forward faster than a locomotive, and Allen barely had time to shield himself with a row of five ice walls. Four shattered, and the last was melting in the spots where the lizard woman dug her claws in.

Crackles resounded from the stormcloud as Allen waved his hand, causing it to envelop them both and emit bolts of lightning at his adversary. In their prior fights, this alone had been enough to drive her off, a decisive way to push her back and gain ground. Under the effects of the drug, though? She flinched for all of half a second before shouldering through the ice and jumping at his throat.

Restraints of ice flew with precision at her limbs, aiming to hamper her movement as much as possible. He jumped back in the instant she was locked down and created more distance. Rain flooded down on her and froze, leaving her vulnerable to a gust of air that blasted her skyward.

She surprised him by spitting on his crystalline manacles to give her arms the range of movement to power through the rest. After freeing herself, she twisted in the air and landed on the ledge of an old distribution center.

Then she was in his face.

Rising dust from the crumpled roof she left behind with the force of her jump blotted out the district skyline behind her; only the woman within breathing distance was visible as he leaned back, the light of his sparking clouds reflected in her mad eyes, glistening alongside the frost on her scales. Her teeth parted, ready to bite his head off.

A gargantuan spear of ice knocked the wind out of her lungs as it descended on her back and showed her the ground again. Allen let out a breath. That had been close, he had to be careful here. She might be unstable and fighting more recklessly, but blow for blow, she was stronger than him in this state. So when she got up, he was looking for an opening to counterattack.

What happened afterwards wasn’t what he expected.

Over the next few exchanges, the balance shifted in his favor. Allen could see the telltale signs—Her claw strikes were less precise, her hyperventilation was getting to be more out of need for air than intense emotion, punctuating her vicious growls with ragged breaths. It was as if the drug was taking a toll on her body, sapping her strength and clarity with each passing moment.

After landing a pillar of ice that sent her sprawling back against a shattered wall, Allen watched as she struggled to regain her footing. The ground shook with the impact, sending shards of concrete flying in all directions. Viperia’s claws dug into the pavement as she pushed herself upright, the strain evident in the way her shoulders heaved with each labored breath.

Seeing her like this, a twinge of sympathy ran through him; he understood the desperation that drove her. But there was no time for compassion now. He couldn’t afford to let her regain control.

With each passing moment, the air thickened with the mingling scents of rain and burnt toxins. Allen focused on his own breathing, steadying himself as he calculated his next move. Viperia’s wild swings were becoming predictable. She was relying too much on brute strength instead of strategy, which shouldn’t have surprised him in retrospect. She was tripping on untested power-enhancing substances. That it had negative side effects was a given.

The clearing stormcloud crackled ominously above them, mirroring his thoughts as he readied himself for the next assault. He had to act decisively before she could rally her wits. He had to press his advantage while it was still there.

“Zeta?” he said over his comms when Viperia was recovering from another round of flash freezing.

“Captain. I thought you were occupied?” came the response.

“I am. Tell any available fighters we have to surround my location in case Viperia tries to escape. She’s not getting out. I’m ending this here.”

He would end this.

He had it under control.