I stood in the alleyway between Dax’s Pizza Parlor and a dry cleaner shop, dressed for the occasion.

I had thrown on a plain black hoodie over my gear to keep out the cold. My armored suit was surprisingly comfortable as was my helmet. Its sphere of protection covered everything till just below my chin. I had been concerned that there would be a weak spot around my neck but my costume and helmet overlapped, covering me completely.

I considered integrating the suit with the helmet to create a single-piece suit but I decided against it. I felt I could get more out of my upgrades by keeping them separate for the time being. I wanted to see if I could install a computer into the helmet and I suspected that it would be a costly integration that would only get worse if it was a part of the armor. That, and I also needed to improve its [Materials] to ensure my head had the best protection possible.

Projects for later.

It was dangerous to be out alone at nighttime so I kept my new laser pistol on hand. I had implemented a function to switch between lethality, so if things got dicey, I’d be able to defend myself without the risk of killing. It helped that the non-lethal setting used much less power so I’d be able to take on bigger groups.

After a few more minutes I spotted a black Sedan creep up and park at the curb right next to the alleyway. I couldn’t see who was driving it because of the tinted windows but with my brightened visor, I could easily identify the scratches and dents on the side of the vehicle.

It was my car.

I picked up my shoulder bag and carried it to the back seat. Opening the back door, I gently placed down before moving around to the passenger seat. As I slipped in, I bumped my head causing Sam to cackle.

“I dig the costume. Practical and intimidating.”

“Intimidating?”

“It’s always a little scarier when you can’t see someone’s face. If you don’t have Mentalist powers, you never really know what they might be thinking.”

Once I was comfortably in my seat, I looked over to Sam and saw her dressed in her costume, domino mask and all. I was actually glad I was wearing the helmet because I couldn’t hide my grin. She looked absolutely ridiculous.

“Laugh all you want,” Sam said. “I look awesome.”

My smile vanished.

“What?”

“Don’t bother. I knew you were smiling,” Sam tilted her head a little and gave me a grin of her own. “If you think a helmet is enough to hide from Gold, you’re in for a rude awakening.”

“So you really are psychic?”

“You’ve been wondering how I managed to bypass your biometric security to start the car. You’re suspecting my power might have pointed me toward the flaws in the design. Now you’re wondering what kind of flaws biometric security can have and while there weaknesses, they’re not ones I’m able to take advantage of. I don’t have the right tools.”

I shifted in my seat. “That’s really creepy.”

“She’s worse when she’s in control. All she can do right now is do some very light cold reading.”

“Right… so if she didn’t help you with my car, who did?” I asked. I tried to think which of her powers would have helped her, other than her super intellect. “Orange?”

“Yep.”

I was going to need to defend against that. I couldn’t have my beloved car getting hijacked by some random thief with all the upgrades I had invested into it.

“Alright. So, Sam—”

“Alice,” she corrected immediately. “Stick to codenames when we’re out like this. Okay, Upgrade?”

“Right. Alice. What’re we doing? You said you’d show me how all this works.”

Alice laughed.

“It’s not as complicated as you think. We drive around and look for anything that seems a little suspect, take a closer look and go from there. Also,” she gestured to the back seat. “What’s in the bag? You didn’t tell me you were bringing any toys.”

“Oh, so you can figure out what I'm thinking but not what’s in the bag?”

She leveled a glare at me.

“I don’t use my powers for everything.”

After she held my gaze for a few moments longer I let out a sigh.

“You said we’re doing some scouting, so I went to the electronics store today and bought some stuff to make a drone,” I spared a quick glance at the bag. “Since I’ve done it before, it was easier then usual. But don’t get your hopes up, it’s nothing special. I wouldn’t say it’s advanced enough to be considered Mechatech. That said, it should still be enough to help us get info in a more covert manner.”

“You work fast!” She beamed. “Awesome. That’ll make all of this way easier.”

“So, where are we going?”

Alice leaned over and reached down into her right boot. She pulled a piece of paper out and unfolded it before handing it to me. It was a map of Bayside with highlights and scribbles all over it. I could barely read the handwriting.

“We’re here,” she pointed to the street we were on. “We’re going all the way up here, following this route, and passing as many places as we can in a reasonable time. The red circles are safehouses I’m certain exist. Yellow are the potentials I don’t have much evidence for and blue’s are predictions made by Gold by ‘filling in the gaps’ so to speak.”

I followed the finger carefully, analyzing the carefully mapped-out route she was going to drive us through. As I observed each circle, my eyes landed on one particular blue circle that caught me off-guard.

“You highlighted my school,” I stared at her. “How can it be a safe house?”

“It’s not necessarily a safehouse per se, more like they have members in the staff. Yours isn’t special, all the schools in this city have skeletons in their closets. See, look here,” she pointed to the other side of the city where Eastworth Girls was. I saw a big red circle with about a half dozen notes scribbled around it. “About three quarters of the staff are part of Queen’s Court, it’s basically a glorified recruitment camp. Luckily for me I’ve already dug up dirt on some of my teachers. You know Haze?”

I thought for a moment. “Uhhh…he’s the guy in white spandex, right? Misty eye in the circle thing on his stomach. Fucks with your senses. Wait, he’s with Queen’s Court now?”

“Yup. He’s also my Chemistry teacher.”

“You’re kidding,” I stared at her. She stared back without a shred of humor on her face. “Okay, not kidding. Shit…”

I had to wonder if any of my teachers were secretly villains leading a double life. I couldn’t think of any of Minerva’s staff who might have powers. They all seemed like boring people but maybe they were just that good at staying hidden.

“He’s not the only one either. There’s one more, though I don’t have her as a teacher. Ricochet. She teaches general science to the juniors.”

“Why?” I asked, perplexed. I saw every other school circled in either blue or yellow. “Why would gangs be involved with the schools? Recruitment?”

“That amongst other things. Mostly it’s just staff on the lookout for supers and kids are stupid enough to slip up all the time. The ECU is usually able to get to them in time, but there are instances where some can slip through the cracks,” Alice explained. “But Minerva sits in contested territory. I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone has their sticky little fingers in that pie.”

My thoughts drifted to Pete and the rest of his crew.

Gang colors were banned, but it didn’t stop people from joining. All it really did was appease the parents. Even then, stuff like neck tattoos still slipped through and now that I knew what was going on, it was obvious how. Pete and others like him had people in their corner smoothing things over.

That only begged the question of who was in on it.

Mr. Reid?

The Dean?

Could they have powers? Shit, I don’t like suspecting everyone of foul play. That’s a fucked up way to live, but it makes too much sense what if—

“Don’t psych yourself out. A little paranoia is healthy but too much can screw you over,” Alice said. “I highlighted Minerva blue for a reason. It’s a guess. If there is gang influence there, it’s probably not just the Cains and none of the gangs can afford to be too overt. ECU presence is strong at every school. Even Eastworth Girls.”

“Sorry,” I shook my daze away. “It’s just a little stunning to have confirmation.”

“World’s not perfect,” she shrugged. “That’s why we gotta stick together.”

Alice put the car into drive and slowly, we started off into the night.

While we were trucking along, I kept my eyes peeled for the notable locations Alice had marked. The first place we passed was a bar. There were customers inside all watching the TV and hollering at the rugby. She had marked this place down as yellow so we just casually drove by.

There wasn’t much to see. The people inside just looked like regular blue-collar workers spending a night with their friends. There was no need to stop and bother them now, plus, I doubted we’d even be allowed into the place anyway.

Something told me that wouldn’t stop Alice.

The next two places were marked as blue. There was a game shop and a fairly standard-looking row of townhouses. Nothing suspicious there according to Alice, so we kept on moving. The clock passed midnight halfway into our journey when Alice pulled over close to a department store. This place was marked down as yellow.

“You stopped. See something interesting?” I asked, looking out Alice’s window. The lights inside were off so I couldn’t tell if she had seen anything. “Doesn’t look like anyone’s inside.”

“No, but here’s something interesting. That van,” she pointed to the black van. “Does your helmet have a zoom function?”

“No, but I’ll add it to the list. Here,” I unlocked my phone and handed it to her. “The camera should be good enough.”

She took it and zoomed in, before snapping a picture of the license plate. Then, she reached into her other boot and retrieved a little black notebook about the size of her palm. She opened it and flipped through the pages, shining my phone’s torch on the page. She placed a finger on a particular string of letters and numbers, cross-referencing what she had written down with the photo.

“Gotcha,” her lips formed a grin. She slapped the book shut and stuffed it back into her boot. “There’s definitely something here. Think you can crack their security and take a peek inside?”

I pulled out my phone and opened the app. Unlike the mall, there weren’t many connection points in the area. I did, however, see a clump of green dots inside the department store, along with a single red one. There were a few orange dots as well, all scattered throughout the building.

“Got a bunch of vulnerable ports all clumped together. They could be office computers.”

Alice stared at the screen for a couple of moments before shaking her head. “No, those are definitely Cain guys. Can you connect to them?”

I pressed one of the green dots and connected instantly. I was greeted by a list of options; contacts, emails, text messages, music, installed apps, everything. Looks like I had broken into someone’s phone. Honestly, the whole thing looked pretty mundane; there were family photos, text messages from a spouse, grocery lists, and a bunch of spam emails about subscriptions to different streaming services.

I tried another connection and got the same results.

“Nothing here looks particularly interesting,” I looked over and handed her the phone. “Can your power make anything of this? It all looks pretty innocent. Nothing indicates these guys are part of The Cains.”

Alice took the phone and scrolled through all the available options, her brow furrowing in frustration.

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“These guys are careful. Not even a single hint at being associated.”

“Could we have the wrong place?”

Alice stared harder.

“No, Gold’s certain these guys are part of the gang but I’m confused at how they communicate. How do they coordinate, move around, and know what places to guard if they don’t talk through their phones? They could do it by word of mouth but… no that’s so inefficient. They must be deleting conversations,” she turned to me. “Can you restore deleted threads?”

“Not as it is now,” she handed the phone back to me and I searched for the option. I even consulted my power to see if there was any way to do it. Naturally, there was, but with what I could upgrade to now, restoration would take too long to be worthwhile. “I’ll have to do some software upgrades in the future. Too costly right now.”

“What about the red dot,” Alice asked, leaning over and pointing to the single spot of red amongst the cluster of green. “Can you get into that one?”

“Not without improving the software. Red connections have some serious security behind them. I could upgrade the software on my phone to try and brute force my way through but there’s no telling just how tight the security is,” I explained. “I could be wasting my charges for nothing.”

“Right,” Alice nodded before reaching over into the backseat to grab the bag I brought with me. “Plan B then. How good is the drone?”

“Decent – careful, my laptop is in there as well,” she unzipped the top of the bag and retrieved my laptop before handing it to me. I booted it up while Alice grabbed and examined the drone. She wasn’t a Mechakinetic but Gold probably had a thing or two to say about the design – a simple quadcopter with wheels.

“It’s a rushed job but it should do the trick.”

“You call this rushed?” Alice gave me an incredulous look. “Give it a gun and this is basically military grade hardware. I thought you said this stuff takes time to make?”

“I’ve made one before,” I explained, booting up some software and connecting to the drone. “The night The Cains got me, I was selling one of them to some suits.”

“Suits?”

“They were corporate looking guys. They sort of looked like gangsters but…” I trailed off, not really knowing how to explain who or what they represented. “They didn’t give a name so I have no idea who they are.”

“How much did they pay you?”

“Quarter of a million.”

“Fuck! For this?” She held up the drone, seemingly unconvinced. “No way, you were ripping them off for that much.”

“The drone I sold them was better than this one. It had spider legs as well and could imitate materials it landed on, sorta like a chameleon. There were some other things as well but I fulfilled the request,” I replied with a huff. “I didn’t get my money either. Unless they’ve spent it, The Cains still have it. It’s on a payload chip so there’s a chance it might still be in one piece – but this is a big city. It’s probably long gone by now.”

Alice gave a soft whistle. “No wonder you’re so keen to get back at them. If they cheated me out of two hundred and fifty grand, I’d be pissed too.”

I powered on the drone through my laptop. The machine in Alice’s lap started whirling as I applied about a dozen software updates all at once before finishing a minute later. I lifted it in the air a small amount and it barely made a sound. Perfect.

“Camera’s up and so is the audio feed. What now?”

Alice turned and stared at the building for a few moments. “We need a proper entry for this little guy, preferably somewhere that isn’t alarmed… there’s no skylights so that won’t work. Back door is alarmed. Can you do something about the alarm?”

I used a command to search for any references relating to alarms. The port was defended but my software could crack it. Unfortunately, the door wasn’t connected to any systems and from where we were sitting in the car, it appeared to be opened by a lock and key.

Absolutely archaic.

“I can but those doors aren’t electric so I won’t be able to open them.”

“That’s not an issue. I can use Purple to teleport through a window. I was just worried about the alarm,” Alice said with a grimace. “Purple Isn't exactly efficient.”

“Not efficient?”

“Yup, you’ll see,” she picked up the drone and tucked it neatly under her arm. “Ready?”

“Yeah, good to go.”

Alice quietly got out of the car.

She stood still for a moment like she was checking to see if it was safe to cross the road – which was ridiculous because it was after midnight and she had superpowers. Then she took her first step and quite literally blurred across the street. She was at the front door of the building in half a second.

Through the audio on my laptop, I heard giggling as the camera feed was suddenly taken up by Alice’s face.

“Hiya Uppies!” She whispered.

Uppies? This must be Pink.

“I dunno if you can hear me in there but I think I hear some voices inside,” she placed a finger to her lips and shushed into the camera. It was so painfully absurd I thought we were going to get busted before this operation even began.

“Going stealth mode!”

I watched, bewildered, as she crept along the side of the building in plain sight of the street before pausing at the windows. She peered through by shoving her whole head in front of the glass before pausing again. It was like watching a Saturday morning cartoon villain try to be sneaky. Her head tilted quite abruptly and then her posture slouched.

Okay, this must be Purple.

In a blink of an eye, she teleported through the window and was inside the store.

“Hmm… where should I put this?” I heard her mutter. Her voice was a bit slurred and it sounded like she had just woken up from a six-hour nap.

You have got to be kidding me.

“Eh… this’ll do,” she placed the drone down at her feet. “There, all done.”

One second she was inside and in the middle of the road the next. She stood there for a moment before her eyes switched back to their normal blue. She walked the rest of the way to the car. When she climbed back into the driver's seat, I couldn’t help but stare at her.

She glared back.

Then she sighed.

“Yeah, I know. They’re fucking useless.”

“I thought you were exaggerating but… damn,” I turned back to my laptop screen and whistled. “They must be a pain to deal with.”

“I don’t bring out Purple too often and she likes it that way. Pink though… She's what I usually default to if I’m going out to fight. People find it hard to deal with speedsters and I can be very creative when I’m Pink. It also gives the impression that I’m a ditzy idiot which just makes Gold’s job much easier.”

“Well, you got the drone inside. That’s all that matters,” I said, turning my attention back to the laptop. “Now, let's see if we can get closer to get a better look at those offices.”

I kept it on the ground so the rotors wouldn't alert anyone and the camera feed was slightly grainy, but that was mostly because of how dark it was. The audio installed on this thing was decent, but it wasn’t picking up anything notable yet. That was both good and bad. Good, because the drone wasn’t producing noise loud enough for the microphone to pick up, and bad because I wasn’t certain what direction I should be searching.

“What would the Cains use a place like this for anyway?” I asked. I kept my focus solely on the drone’s camera feed as I guided it around hoping to pick up anything notable, the silence was starting to unnerve me. “I thought they’d… I dunno, rob the place or something. Aren’t they gangsters?”

“Robbing stores is petty criminal work. Gangs like the Cains have to be at least somewhat organized to last more than a week. They’ve only been around for seven months but typically gangs that start up, fall apart when the ECU and other criminals rip them to shreds,” Alice explained. “Most gangs don’t have proper leadership, or there’s lots of infighting so they don’t make it past the first month.”

“So this place is a front for something?”

“They’re probably laundering money or using it as a safehouse,” Alice paused for a moment, pursing her lips in thought. “By Gold’s estimation they probably have somewhere between forty to sixty locations they run their operations out of. The more valuable places will be guarded by supers.”

“Wait, wait,” I stopped moving the drone. “Could there be a super here?”

She shrugged. “Could be. You can never be completely sure. Even Gold needs something to go off of, but if I had to hazard a guess…” she turned and looked out the window, gazing back at the store. “I’m going to say no.”

“Are you sure?”

She turned back and rolled her eyes at me. “Do you want a percentage?”

“That would be nice.”

“Five— no, wait,” she looked back at the store. “Err… eight percent.”

“That’s eight too many.”

Alice gave me a playful nudge. “What’s life without a bit of danger to spice things up?”

“Safe.”

She snorted. “Remind me not to take you anywhere fun.”

I alternated between looking at the camera feed and my phone. I was able to guide the drone around the store to various points by following the orange dot which represented my drone. The closer the drone got to the clump of green dots, the more walls I was hitting and had to detour. There was unfortunately no blueprint included in this app, so I couldn’t tell what level of the building they were on or if they were behind any walls.

“Starting to wish I had incorporated some kind of x-ray feature.”

“Can you use your power remotely?”

[Charges: 2/25]

I only had two of my twenty-five charges left today after upgrading my gun to a laser pistol, improving the durability of my helmet, and creating the drone.

I shook my head. “I have to be touching whatever I’m trying to upgrade. Plus, I don’t have much juice left in the tank today.”

Alice gave me a long, curious stare. “I’ve been wondering – and Gold has made her own guesses – but just so we’re clear, you can only use your power a certain amount per day?”

It was scary how she could just know that.

“Yeah, my power gives me twenty five charges to use per day and they don’t roll over,” I explained, maneuvering the drone into another part of the store. “The more complex something is, the more it costs so I have to be careful what I work on. Though, retreading ground I’ve already covered before is less costly.”

“You said that before. Your power learns, previous upgrades get easier,” Alice noted, staring off into the distance looking distracted. For a moment, I could have sworn I saw her eyes flash Gold as she looked at my laser pistol. “You can also sacrifice efficiency for time to make things cost less. That’s how your gun has improved so much.”

“I…yeah, I was about to say that,” I blinked, feeling a little cheated that I didn’t get to explain that part. “Did Gold figure that out?”

Alice gave me a sheepish smile. “Yeah, sorry. I— hey, do you hear that?”

There was a faint crackling from the speakers on my laptop. The microphone was picking up some very soft activity above the drone. There was a second floor and I quickly maneuvered the drone to the stairway. The only problem was getting the drone up there without alerting the people inside. The flight mode made a little bit of noise but in the silence of a department store at night, you could hear a pin drop.

“No wonder I was hitting so many walls trying to get to these guys. They’re upstairs,” I said, looking at a spectrogram on my laptop. “Should I risk trying to get up there?”

“Are you attached to the drone?”

“Not particularly. They’re not that hard to make.”

“Go for it then,” she grinned. “This is kinda cool doing it like this, I feel like I’m in a spy movie. Normally, I’d be the one sneaking around in there. It’s way less fun when your life is in danger, though Pink would beg to differ.”

I could see Pink loving life-or-death scenarios.

I switched to flight mode and flew it up the stairs, making sure to keep it as low as possible. The moment it cleared the top of the stairs, I returned it to the ground. The small buzzing the propellers gave off blocked out the small amount that we could hear before. Thankfully, the voices seemed unperturbed by our risky move and no one came out to investigate.

The audio was starting to come through clearer now. We were definitely in the right place.

Unfortunately, this was as far as we would be going. There was a wooden door blocking the drone's path and I suspected it led into the staff room and manager’s office. It was easy to tell there was activity coming from the inside from the light leaking out beneath the door.

“Blocked.”

“Crap,” Alice ran a hand through her fringe. “Can you get a little bit closer so we can hear what they’re saying?”

I guided the drone forward and parked it at the side of the door. If it spontaneously opened, it shouldn’t be crushed and hopefully would remain unnoticed. Even still, the audio was still garbled so I tried adjusting the frequency.

I was met with disappointment.

“Oh,” I wrinkled my nose. “It’s just a replay of the game. Maybe someone left the TV on?”

I checked my phone again. One of the open ports was probably the TV. Could there really be people here? So far, all I had to go off of was Alice’s insistence.

“No, someone’s watching it. More than one person,” Alice shushed me. “Three… four? How many vulnerable devices are you able to break into?”

“Nine,” I pressed one and was immediately assaulted by the sound of classic rock tunes. “That one is just a radio. This one…” I pressed the other and got a video of the rugby game aired earlier in the evening. “...Is just the TV. Alice are you sure—”

She shushed me before I could finish.

“People don’t just leave the TV and radio on overnight. There’s people in there,” her eyes narrowed. “Six.”

“Six?”

“Six guys,” Alice confirmed with a nod. “Two watching the game, the other four playing a game… Blackjack.”

There was a cascade of voices from inside as an argument suddenly broke out. It was impossible to tell just how many people were inside there but judging from the intensity and number of the voices, I was going to take Alice’s estimate of six as fact. We shared a glance and Alice suddenly mouthed seven when a final voice was heard.

“Ladies, ladies. Keep it down, yeah? We’re here to keep watch, not holler like it’s a Saturday night house party, capiche?”

I knew that voice.

It was the same voice that had taunted me. I could feel my blood boil beneath my skin and the gun resting on my knee felt heavier. I had never gotten his name but his face lived rent-free in my head. To me, that face, shirt, tattoo, and smug grin represented everything I despised about the Cains – and here he was.

He might even still have the money that he and Banshee had stolen from me. Now would be the most opportune time to get it back. I had a gun, armor, and backup. I could walk in there and clean them out before they even realized what was going on. My gun was a laser weapon too, a low-powered one but it was better than anything these schmucks could get their hands on.

“Ooh, I know that look,” Alice grimaced. I was wearing my helmet so she must have been reading my body language. “You know him. He’s the guy, ain’t he? The one that hustled you. He sounds like a pompous asshole.”

“He likes to hear himself talk,” I replied dryly. “Little fish. Big fish… I’d know his smug voice anywhere.”

“Well then,” Alice clapped. Her eyes flashed Pink. “Waddya say we go crack some heads?”

I moved the laptop to the side and picked up my gun. There was a small digital display on the side of the magazine. It read ‘12’. I flicked the setting to non-lethal.

Twelve shots.

“Took the words right out of my mouth.”