“Thanks for your help today. Some of this wouldn’t have even occurred to me if I did this alone.”

Sam and I stared at the mountain of supplies stacked in the trunk of my car. Asking her to come along had been a last-minute change, one that had definitely paid off. I had spent most of Saturday making plans, spending my charges on an open-source Computer-Aided Design program I downloaded, and noting down what I wanted before Sunday rolled around. Once I was ready to set off, asking her to come along felt like the obvious choice.

“Hey, it’s no problem. The more stuff you have to work with, the more it benefits all of us. Good plan with the 3D printer though, all you need is something vaguely functional right? With all this, you shouldn’t need to scavenge for bits and bobs.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, rubbing my hands together with eager anticipation. “Just gotta upgrade all this stuff first.”

I had gone a bit wild and having Sam along only encouraged me. Not only did we buy several 3D printers, but I also invested in some powerful electronics to integrate into any future tech that might need it. The theory being that I could turn much of what I create ‘smart’ to open up more upgrade paths.

We bought plenty of cameras, motion detectors, and hunting traps —points to Sam for that last one— that we’d be placing around the apartment complex to improve our security. Added to all that, we had also bought a small generator, which I fully intended to upgrade into a personal power station.

Sam had said that once I had my workshop up and running at full capacity, the power being directed to the building would set off red flags. Sure the building had been condemned, but laziness on the city council’s part meant they hadn’t bothered to cut off the water mains or electricity. It was a huge hazard, but apparently, that was normal in Groves Den. As far as the local council was concerned, if these buildings burnt down then it’d save them on demolition costs, and if they took out a couple squatters? Then no one would miss them anyway.

In the end, we’d need something off the grid if we were going to get by undetected. While filling up a generator and buying fuel would be annoying in the short term, I could always upgrade away those issues. We briefly considered solar panels but with school, I’d mostly be using my workshop in the evenings or at night. We still picked some up though since there are plenty of other projects I could use them in.

Sam estimated that if we had three full weeks uninterrupted, we’d be able to turn the apartment complex into a fortress that would be able to run almost independently of the city, outside of the need for water.

The likelihood of that happening though was almost zero. I’d simply have to settle with doing as much as I could before the next crisis popped up. Sadly, given that we were expecting trouble soon, I had to prioritize my suit and personal offense and defense capabilities before I got this place up and running.

“We can sift through all this later,” Sam closed the trunk. “For now, let’s get lunch upstairs before it goes cold.”

She grabbed two boxes of pizza from the backseat and handed me a paper bag filled with curly fries and cheeseburgers.

Halfway up a flight of stairs, we heard muffled shouting coming from the floor of Sam’s apartment. There were very clearly two voices so either Mia had woken up or someone else had stumbled across our hideout. We increased our pace, making sure not to drop any food until we got to the door.

“Yikes,” Sam chuckled awkwardly. “Never thought I’d willingly walk into a domestic.”

She opened the door and the voices became distinguishable.

“—do you mean I was being experimented on!?”

“The Cains got you, don’t you remember?” Liam sounded desperate to be believed. “They got you and took you to some underground bunker—”

“No… no! You kidnapped me and did something—”

“No I didn’t!” Liam’s tone turned to frustration as Sam and I walked into the room. He turned and breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank God you’re back. Tell her what happened, she won’t believe anything I say!”

Mia was cowering in the corner of the room. She was clutching the railing of a curtain she had pulled off of one of Sam’s windows and brandished in our direction, ready to whack anyone that got close. Liam kept his distance, standing over by the kitchen. I knew he could easily disarm Mia with his powers but he clearly didn’t want to frighten her any further.

Sam grumbled and strolled over to Mia. The girl looked like she was about to hit Sam but lost her nerve at the last second. Sam reached in and snatched the curtain rail from her hands, leaving the girl a quivering mess.

“Seriously? These were nice curtains. Do you have any idea what I had to do to steal these? Ugh,” Sam turned and placed it neatly against the wall. “You need to chillax, girl. You’re safe here, and whatever Liam told you is pretty much the truth.”

“I want to go home.”

The sheer amount of fear in her voice tugged at my heartstrings. I couldn’t imagine the mess her head must be in right now. Evidently, a familiar face wasn’t enough to calm her down.

“Aww, come on,” Sam groaned, holding up one of the pizza boxes. “We’ve got pizza~” she even waved the box around but Mia didn’t move. Her eyes didn’t even move to the box. When she refused to take the bait, I caught a small pout form on Sam’s lips. “No?”

I calmly cleared my throat to get Sam’s attention. “I think food is the last thing on her mind.”

“Ah, well, I tried. Home then?” Sam pursed her lips and slowly nodded. “Alright. We can do that. Where do you live?”

The immediate 180 visibly caught Mia off-guard as her eyes widened.

“N-No, I’m not telling you my address. You can… you can drop me off somewhere. Northwind Point,” Mia refused to move, her hands planted firmly on the walls. “I-I’ll walk the rest of the way.”

“In the middle of QC’s territory? Ha, no,” Sam snorted. “Best we can do is New Market. I’m not driving us all the way over to Northwind Point. In a car like ours we’d get stopped by Gaea’s minions.”

“Well I’m not staying here,” Mia started edging herself toward the front door, doing her best to hug the walls. It was like she believed we’d lash out and attack her at any given moment. “Are you going to stop me?”

“Mia please—” Liam tried but Sam was quick to cut him off.

“Forget it, Liam. Just let her go,” she said, plopping herself down on the sofa and opening the pizza box. “If she wants to go out there and be recaptured then she’s more than welcome to, but I’m not going to stick my neck out to save her again,” she pulled out a slice of pizza and casually took a bite. “See ya. Good luck dodging Grim – oh, and please shut the door on the way out.”

Mia stopped and a look of dread overcame her features.

It was cold, but I had been around Sam long enough to know what she was doing. It was a mind game, meant to make Mia think twice about what she was doing – and from the looks of it, it was working.

“Hey,” I spoke up. Mia’s eyes drifted to me and I could have sworn I saw her flinch slightly. “I don’t know what Liam told you, but if you want a second account, here’s mine. He came to us because The Cains kidnapped you from a house party and we eventually found you in a high-tech bunker underground. I know it’s hard to hear but you were being experimented on,” I paused for a moment to let the information sink in. Mia’s gaze was locked onto mine. “You weren’t the only one, but we were only able to get you out. We’re not here to hurt you.”

I tried to keep my voice as level and calm as I possibly could. I’d like to think it was helping, considering she wasn’t yelling at me, but I couldn’t be certain what was going through her head.

Liam came up to my side. “We’re trying to help you, please just listen.”

Mia swallowed, trying to gather her bearings and courage to speak. She anxiously started picking at her fingernails as her gaze flickered between myself, Liam, and Sam on the couch.

Finally, she spoke, her voice low.

“What were they doing to me?”

“Now that is where it gets complicated,” Sam said. She gestured to the empty couch to her left. “Would you like to sit down? I can explain but it’s not going to be a short conversation,” her tone was a lot more compassionate than before. “And like I said, we’ve got pizza if you’re hungry. There’s burgers and fries as well if you prefer.”

Slowly, Mia walked back into the living room. She eyed Sam carefully before sitting down. Her eyes zeroed in on the pizza and she reached for a slice before stopping halfway. A pained look crossed her face and she retracted her hand.

Sam tilted her head. “Not hungry? I thought you would be.”

“I’m not—” Mia tried to say before shaking her head. “It’s not important. I want to know what happened to me.”

Sam nodded, taking another bite. “Of course, but I need to know something first. What’s the last thing you remember?”

Mia frowned, her face contorting as she tried to recall being captured. While the silence persisted, I handed the bag of burgers off to Liam and moved to apprehend the second pizza box.

“I… It’s all so foggy. I think I might’ve been drugged.”

Sam hummed in agreement. “While you were at the party?”

“I think so? It’s… I remember Sophie complaining that she was tired. Jazz said the same thing. It hit me too, but I thought it was just the alcohol,” Mia rubbed her forehead and cringed. “They wanted to leave so I went to find Vanessa and I just…” she shook her head. “I must’ve blacked out because that’s the last thing I remember before I woke up here.”

Sam and I shared a look but I beat her to the punch. “Someone on the inside spiking the drinks?”

“Sounds like it,” Sam agreed.

“Wait a sec,” Liam cut in. “I was drinking as well, but I was fine. I wasn’t the only one either, some of the Cains’ dudes were even herding people into a truck when I went back to apologize.”

“You came back to apologize?” Mia said.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Liam awkwardly shrugged. “Yeah. I felt like an asshole after I calmed down, so I decided to go back. Found those guys at the house and tried to stop them.”

Mia opened her mouth to say something but she stopped herself before any words could come out. From the looks of it, it seemed like she wanted to scold him.

“You have powers, don’t you?”

He replied with a slow nod.

“We all do,” Sam offered. “But let’s backtrack a little bit. Some of the partygoers weren’t affected while others were. What kind of alcohol was up for grabs? Bottled or shared source?”

“Both,” Liam answered. “There was some punch and other fruity drinks. Not really my thing – way too sweet. I preferred the beer. I was thinking of mixing some of the tequila with coke but—”

“Cool,” Sam cut him off before he could go any further. “Do you remember what you drank, Mia?”

Mia turned a shade paler.

“My friends and I don’t really like beer so we drank from the… punch,” she covered her mouth like she was going to be sick. “Oh my fucking God, I was drugged. We all were,” she suddenly shot up from her seat. “Shit! Those bastards have my friends. I have too—”

“Whoa there!” Sam raised her hands, stopping Mia in her tracks. “You are in no condition to be charging headfirst into danger. Besides, if my conclusion is accurate – which they usually are – the bunker is under ECU control which means your friends are in capable hands,” she waited for Mia to sit back down and it took a few moments of contemplative silence for her to sink back into her seat. “Grim might’ve crashed the party, but he can’t really stick around. The operation was busted wide open. He’ll grab anything he can and retreat.”

“Are you sure?” I asked. There was some seriously advanced tech down there and I had a hard time believing The Cains would just give it up without a fight. “Someone like Grim could probably hold that place down, even if the ECU brought their full power against him.”

Sam waved me off. “If I was a betting girl, I’d put money on him having other operations like that one. So if I was him, I wouldn’t have enough reason to stick around. I’d just cut my losses and go.”

I was reminded of what Alex said about contingency plans. If nothing else, we never encountered Splicer – if that’s who really was working with The Cains.

“Are you saying they’ve got more places like that?” Liam asked. When Sam nodded, he leaned back in his chair and scowled. “Man… fuck these guys. What the hell are they even trying to do?”

“Artificial Awakenings,” I reminded him, my gaze drifting back to Mia. When my words registered, her eyes widened. “That’s what they were trying to do to you, at least, according to Gold.”

Mia looked down at her hands and shook her head. “They were trying to give me powers?” She flexed her fingers and frowned. “Why? I wouldn’t have been grateful and I sure as hell wouldn’t work for them. I’ve heard the kind of shit they do. I wouldn’t have played any part in that.”

“Not willingly,” Sam admitted. “It’s difficult to say what they would’ve done. We busted their operation before they really got going, or even had a confirmed success. They could’ve messed with your head and made you loyal that way. There are supers out there capable of brainwashing, enslavement, mind control, reprogramming,” she listed them off very casually. “Have you ever heard of Replication? Her super name is a bit misleading. She doesn’t clone herself in the traditional sense. She grows pieces of herself and grafts them onto other people. Last I heard, she was kidnapping people and replacing their brains with her own, supers included.”

Yet another person I had never heard of.

“She’s not in Bayside, right?” Liam asked.

Sam just laughed. “Aha, no. Replication is somewhere in Alaska I think. The Furies are hunting her down.”

“Do you just sit online and research these things in your spare time?” I asked, curious. “I only know of the big names. I feel like I’ve heard more supers in the last two weeks than I have in sixteen years.”

Sam chuckled. “I have something of an obsession. Blame Gold,” she tapped her temple. “She’s always pestering me to go online and browse about supers. It pays to be informed.”

“I don’t know how this is supposed to work,” Mia admitted, bringing all of our attention back to her. “How do…” she stopped, her eyes narrowing at her hands. It looked as if she was trying to see something that didn’t exist. “How do you know if you have powers or not?”

“It’s very hard to say, no two powers are the same,” Sam started, pressing her hands together. There was a look of uncertainty on her face as she sat back down. She opened her mouth but quickly shut it and started twirling the ends of her hair around some of her fingers. “Ugh, how do I even put this? Nobody really has answers about how powers work. It’s innate, an instinct that gets you started and you learn from there.”

“Are you saying I might just activate my power randomly?” Mia asked. To her credit, it looked like she had relaxed and warmed up to us a bit. “I… I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

“Unless you turn out to be the next Gaea, I wouldn’t stress about it,” Sam brushed off her concerns. “There’s always the possibility that you actually don’t have any powers. Artificial Awakenings are rarely successful. The best we can do is just wait.”

“But what is an Awakening like? I’ve… I’ve read about it,” Mia’s head hesitantly turned to Liam. “How did you…?”

Mia and Liam stared at one another for a moment. I saw the hesitation flash in his eyes as he tried to figure out how to respond. He placed down his half-eaten cheeseburger and grumbled a little bit.

“I got detention for fighting. The staff made me clean up the boys locker room after school, but the guy I fought stuck around,” Liam idly scratched his cheek. “He fucked me up but… I don’t know, something just clicked and I transformed.”

“Transformed?” Mia questioned.

Liam shrugged and stood up.

Sam tried to shout her warning but her mouth was full of pizza. Liam shifted and Mia almost flipped the couch over in an attempt to back away. As quick as the transformation came, it was gone.

“Fuck,” Mia clutched her chest and breathed slowly. “A little warning would have been nice!”

“My bad. Sorry,” he cringed. “But yeah, I transformed and fought back. It was disorientating at the time so I didn’t really know what was happening. Took a few days to get the handle of things,” he then sighed. “Too bad I got expelled. They didn’t believe my side of the story because of how many bones I broke and the serious head injury he got. He never said anything about my powers, so I must have given him amnesia or something.”

Mia gave him a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

He just shrugged again. “It’s cool. I didn’t like that school anyway.”

It unnerved me a little about how casual he was about giving someone brain damage, bully or not.

“Well, can’t say my Awakening was as stressful as that,” Sam interjected. “For me it just… happened. One day I was a normal girl with teenage problems, the next, I’m a certified badass,” she finished off her slice of pizza and didn’t hesitate to pick up another one. “If you’re looking for something to go off of, don’t bother. Awakenings differ heavily depending on the person.”

I stared at the back of Sam’s head with narrowed eyes. Liam and Mia probably missed it but I knew with absolute certainty her Awakening went far beyond what she claimed.

“So I have no way of knowing if I have them or not,” Mia said, sounding depressed. “That… that sucks.”

“If you do, it’ll come to you soon. You’ve only just woken up. Give it time,” Sam moved the pizza box over to her. “I am no longer asking, by the way. Eat. You seriously need it after what you’ve been through and I’m not going to have you pass out on me just because you’re convinced you need to diet.”

“No, thanks. Really, I’m not hungry.”

Sam shook her head. “Don’t care. Eat.”

“But I’m not—”

Sam’s phone interrupted her.

“Hold that thought,” Sam reached into her pocket.

“Hiya mystery caller! I’m a little busy right now, call back and I’m sure I can cook ya up something special, tootles~” She went to hang up but stopped. Her face immediately brightened. “Springy! Ya callin’ from a different number. If ya wanted to go behind your hubby’s back, you coulda just sent me a text.”

Knowing Pink, I assumed ‘Springy’ was Springsong.

“Aww, don’t say that! You’re hurtin’ my feelings— ah, fuck. Sorry,” Pink disappeared and Sam was back in control. “Hi Springsong. What’s up?” She paused for a moment as Springsong started talking. Sam nodded to whatever she was saying and idly headed toward her room. “I can check that. One moment,” she turned to me. “I’ll be back in a second.”

Sam retreated to her room, leaving me and Liam sitting awkwardly with Mia.

After about a minute of silence, I saw the girl reach out and snag a slice of pizza before cautiously nibbling on it. I offered her a friendly smile, one that she didn’t return. Feeling the awkwardness skyrocket, I got up and followed Sam into her bedroom. I’d get more out of eavesdropping on her conversation with Springsong than sitting out there.

Unfortunately, the moment I walked in, Sam was already hanging up.

“That was a quick call.”

“There wasn’t much to talk about,” she replied. scribbling something inside a notebook. “Something’s come up,” she closed it and moved past me, poking her head out the door. “Hey, Liam. Come in here for a minute? Sorry, Mia. Just uh… just need these two for something. Sit tight.”

Liam joined us in Sam’s bedroom and she shut the door.

“Okay, so that was Springsong calling.”

“What does she want?” Liam asked, curious. “Did they find another bunker or something?”

“No. Gaea’s called a meeting.”

“A meeting?” I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. “Like, with us?”

“A meeting between Queen’s Court, Pandora, and various other independent super groups in Bayside,” Sam said through gritted teeth. “It’s under a truce and Gaea personally wants us there. Apparently, she’s made it clear that Madhouse has to attend. No exceptions.”

Liam’s reaction was instant. “Aha, fuck that. I ain’t going anywhere near her.”

“We don’t have a choice.”

“Oh yeah? What’s she going to do, hunt me down?”

Sam glared. “Yes, and believe me, you wouldn’t escape for more than a day.”

Liam crossed his arms, his fingers digging into his hoodie. “This is so fucking bullshit!”

“Look, we aren’t in any danger. It’s a truce meeting. These happen all the time when things get out of hand. It’s how supers across the world stop each other from doing something stupid. If people didn’t gang up on rampaging idiots there wouldn’t be an Earth left to live in by now,” Sam explained. “Now, I’m not telling you that you have to come along since you aren’t known to be a part of our group, but it would be nice to show a little support.”

I could hear the subtle warning in her tone and Liam understood it clearly. He sulked and rolled his shoulders.

“Ah… shit. Fine, I’ll go. If she kills us though, I’m haunting the fuck outta you.”

“Knock yourself out, Gaea won’t kill us.”

“This is about Grim, isn’t it?” I said. The look Sam gave me was all I needed for confirmation. “She wouldn’t call a meeting if she didn’t have some kind of plan to get rid of him.”

“Yeah. News has gotten back to her. From what Springsong said, she isn’t happy. She wants The Cain’s cleaned out of the city, every single one of them.”

I had to suppress the urge to smile. That meant Mirage as well. Even if he was out to play his own game, he was about to get caught up in the shitstorm that Grim’s caused.

“I can get behind that. When’s this meeting?”

“Tomorrow, midday at the Royal Flush.”

That felt like a trap. The Royal Flush was a casino right on the edge of Queen’s Court territory. Midday too… I’d have to call out of school to make sure I could go. Eh… not ideal, but much better than getting on Gaea’s bad side.

“So what, we’re just supposed to roll up to this place?” Liam asked, looking at us in disbelief. “I’ve seen that place and it has bouncers. Every exit has a guy posted there.”

“They’ll let us in if we arrive in our gear,” Sam said without hesitation. “They’ll be told to do so.”

“This is suicide,” Liam declared. “But… I guess we’re a team now.”

I opened my mouth to say something but was silenced by a scream that came from the kitchen, followed shortly by shattering glass.

We rushed out of Sam’s bedroom and into the living to find multiple copies of Mia – no, statues – all dotted around the room all made of different materials. The real Mia was on the kitchen floor with her back against a wall. In front of her, a bronze statue copy of her reached out to grab her.

Its expression desperate and frozen in time.