Peyton Favors was afraid. To be honest, she was afraid a lot these days, no matter how much she tried to pretend otherwise. The red-haired teen did her best to seem totally cool and at ease with everything that was going on. But, to be honest, thinking about it too much left her petrified. The idea that there was some grand criminal conspiracy where the richest family in the state was essentially controlling, or at least manipulating, the majority of both the heroes and villains? It was a lot to take in. And now she, simple, ordinary little Peyton, a girl who had been so stupid she got taken in by a gross pervert catfishing her on the Internet and was kidnapped, was one of the only people who knew the whole truth about that and wasn't part of that group. And if this Ministry found out about the full extent of what she knew, they'd either try to force her to work for them or just kill her. And they probably wouldn’t even feel that bad about it.
That in and of itself would've been a lot. But it wasn't the whole story, not by a long shot. There was also this whole Pittman thing. Paige and Sierra’s father had engineered some super plague or whatever that put half the city's Star-Touched and other important law-enforcement people out of commission. Worse, he’d done so while the city's gangs were already in a violent war with each other. Which didn't exactly help that whole situation.
So now the whole gang war was even worse. The people who could actually do anything to stop the violence and help people were spread incredibly thin. The leadership of those groups, both Touched and Prev, was largely down for the count. And, to make matters even more of a problem, the two people in charge of the Ministry, who could probably have clamped down on the war most effectively, were also down.
The only real saving grace was that a lot of the Fell-Touched weren't being too active just yet. Whether that was because people who were still running the Ministry were keeping them in line, because they were gearing up for something much bigger, or some combination, Peyton wasn't sure. But either way, she didn't expect it to last very long. And even without Fells, all the plain old ordinary bad guys out there were more than picking up the slack. It turned out you didn't need to have super powers to commit terrible acts of violence.
Oh yeah, and because all of that still wasn't enough, Cassidy and Paige weren't even here right now. They’d had to leave the city completely to go track down that transportation machine so they could actually deal with the Pittman bastard and save all the people who had been affected by his stupid plague.
So yeah, there was a very good reason for them not to be here right now, but that didn't make it any easier to deal with. The city was completely falling apart, with gangs gradually taking over more and more territory and acting more brazenly with every passing hour, and those two were gone.
Not that they were exactly having a nice relaxing vacation, of course. From the information that Sierra was passing along, those two had plenty of their own problems. Seriously, running into a whole army of Breakwater troops trying to take the machine for themselves? And they had that guy from the Ministry, the one who used to be Cassidy's bodyguard or whatever. He was helping them, as was some sort of special hybrid TONI that everyone here wanted to meet. He sounded pretty great from what Paige had apparently said. Wren really wanted to get him a welcoming cake. Fred had suggested pecan pie.
All of that would've been enough to keep those two busy. But now they were sitting in some sort of secret hospital place while doctors tried to save that bodyguard guy after he had been shot. Apparently he was going to pull through, but still, it was another problem for them to be stuck with, another thing to keep Cassidy and Paige away from the city for a little bit longer.
The point was, it all added up. Peyton had been struggling a lot with the pressure of everything even before the plague bit happened. Now? Now she felt like she was going to be crushed under the responsibility. She and the rest of the team who were left in the city were running themselves ragged. They went on as many patrols as they could physically handle, listened to police scanners and intervened where they could, chased down muggers, helped rescue people from fires, pulled victims out of car accidents, even stopped the occasional full-on robbery. It seemed like there was a new call for help whenever they finished with the last one. Even when they split up and went out in pairs, it barely seemed to make a dent in everything that needed to be done. And they didn't dare split up any more than that. For the very simple things, two of them were enough. But if it was a fight, or anything that might become more complicated, the four of them went out together. The whole team was already undermanned, and with everything going on out there, things could get really bad really quickly.
Hell, things were already bad. And they seemed to be getting worse. Every time she sat down for a minute, every time she crawled into her bed, pulled the covers over her face, and slept, every time she sat at the table and had a nice meal with her mother, every time she did anything other than throw herself out there to fight the bad guys, the girl felt as though she was abandoning her responsibilities. Whenever she picked up her phone and looked at the reports of people who had been hurt or killed out there on the street while she was busy with other things, she asked herself if she could've saved them. If she had just slept for a half hour less, could she have been out on that particular street, and that neighborhood, at the right time to have stopped it from happening?
It was an absurd guilt, of course. She couldn’t be everywhere all the time. Peyton knew that, consciously. But it didn't really help. She still felt like she had failed them. She felt like she had failed Cassidy. And as that guilt piled up, she felt more tired, which made her need to sleep more, which led to even more guilt. It was a vicious cycle.
Oh, and speaking of cycles, hers had decided to sneak up during all this. So she had to deal with stupid cramps and blood that had nothing to do with all the fighting. Which just made everything so much better.
The past few days while those two had been gone were essentially a blur of violence, fear, guilt, and lies. Peyton had told so many lies to her mother lately that it seemed like she never told the woman anything real. Which made her feel guilty for a whole new reason. But it wasn't as though she could tell her mom the truth. If Peyton's mother knew she was Alloy, let alone all that other stuff, she'd never let her out of the apartment again.
So, she continued to lie. At least she had a good excuse for being out of the apartment. After all, she was a gainfully-employed part of the workforce at Wren’s shop. Of course, her mother had tried to tell her she shouldn't go to work with all this going on, but Peyton had convinced her that being at the shop was basically as safe as being at home. Their apartment wasn't exactly in the very best part of town. Plus, her mother still had to work. So she could either stay home in the apartment by herself every moment she wasn't in school, or be at the shop with other people and security measures. Not that her mother knew anything about what type of security measures there were, let alone that her own daughter was one of them. But still, it was enough to convince her that Peyton should keep going to work.
All of which was why she was here at the shop with her head resting on one of the tables, not quite asleep, but not fully awake either. She was just catching her breath, or so she told herself. It was fine, she was just letting her mind wander a bit for a few moments. Any minute now, she would pick herself up and get out there again. There were people who needed help.
A hand touching her shoulder made the girl jump halfway out of her seat. Her marbles flew out defensively, shaping themselves into a variety of melee weapons.
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“Sorry!” It was just Roald. The blonde boy jumped back with his hands up, flushing guiltily. “I'm really sorry, I didn't know you were asleep. I mean I wasn't sure if you were, and… sorry.”
It was Peyton's turn to look guilty. Quickly, she made her marbles shift back to their normal state, and tried to ignore the very obvious point that could've been made about losing her marbles. “No, it's okay. It's alright, I wasn't asleep. I mean I wasn't trying to. I mean-- what’s up?” Something had to be wrong. Something was always wrong these days.
Roald sighed softly. “We heard something on the scanner. A lady said there was a guy creeping around her house a few blocks away, and they don't have anyone in the area who can check it out. Murphy and me were going to go see what's going on, but Fred said we should take you and Sierra just in case it's something worse than a prowler.”
Fred was right, of course. Sure, it sounded like some creep just stalking that poor lady, but they couldn't really take chances. Not with everything that was going on. Besides, Peyton had a special bone to pick with creepy stalkers. Namely, the giant club-shaped bone she made one of her marbles turn into so she could beat them senseless with it.
So, before long, Peyton, Sierra, Murphy, and Roald were leaving the shop through the back door. The four of them were already in costume. Which, in Peyton’s case, was pretty simple to do.
Some might have wondered why she didn't use a normal costume instead of using up two of her marbles for it. But having her marbles create armor for her had its own benefits. They helped her punch harder, lift heavier things, could pick her up in the air and move her in a way that simulated flight to a certain extent, and they were tough enough to take some pretty strong hits. Oh, and using her marbles for armor meant that poor Wren didn't have to work even harder to make her something. The kid was busy with enough stuff as it was. So, Peyton assured her that she was just fine with what she had.
“Oh, right, Paintball and Poise are on the road again,” Sierra informed them as they moved through the alley. “It's still gonna take a long time for them to get here, but at least they're coming. So let's try not to let the whole city fall apart before they show up, okay? I really don't want to see Paige’s judging look if she gets here and the whole place is on fire.”
She was kidding, sort of. Peyton knew that, and yet she couldn't help the shudder that ran through her. Not really at the idea of Paige judging them for failing, but at the reminder of just how bad things could potentially get. From what they'd heard on the scanner, a few of the Fell-Touched had started to make a move or two, testing the waters. Testing how much the Star-Touched could respond. When they started making hard pushes… Yeah, things were going to get bad.
They couldn't worry about that right now. At the moment, they had a creepy stalker to chase off. Please, please let it be nothing more than a creepy stalker. Between the four of them, they could definitely handle that. And Peyton could use an easy win after the past few days of running all over the city practically every waking moment.
Honestly, she was pretty sure that was one of the big reasons Fred had insisted they go out together. Yes, it was probably safer this way just in case. With everything that was going on, you never knew. But she felt like he also wanted them to get a quick, easy win in dealing with some guy poking around a garage and peeking in windows.
The house in question was only a few blocks away, so Peyton created a flying glider out of three of her remaining four marbles, and carried everyone that way. She kept them high enough that it would be hard to spot them coming, especially if whoever was down there was focused on scaring the woman in the house.
Unfortunately, they didn't see anybody on the first pass. They had to double check that it was the right place, because it was all dark down there. The lights were off. Honestly, it felt a little creepy, but maybe that was just a product of the general situation. The house was a large Victorian-style place with an enormous yard and fences meant to maintain privacy from the neighbors. It was set at the edge of a dead-end street, with the backyard overlooking a steep concrete drop into a water canal.
Yeah, no wonder the woman who lived there felt creeped out by the idea of someone sneaking around outside. The place was pretty isolated from the other houses between the distance of the yard and the tall fences. Or between that and the fact that the police were all tied up with other things going on throughout the city, it wouldn't be hard for some random bad guy with evil intentions to turn the place into hell on Earth for that poor woman.
But still, something seemed weird about it. If Peyton was in that situation, she would've turned every light in the house on, and the porch lights. She would've been holding a bat, or any other weapon she could get her hands on, and doing everything she could to let the man outside know that she sure as hell wasn't going to be an easy target. The last thing she would do was turn off all the lights and sit in the dark waiting for him to sneak in.
“Shit,” Murphy murmured as the four of them perched on the edge of the glider. “Are we too late? Did…. did he already--”
“Let's get down there,” Peyton quickly put in. No, Alloy, she reminded herself. She had to be Alloy right now. Peyton was a silly little mommy’s girl who got herself kidnapped by dumb perverts and turned her mother into a paranoid wreck. Alloy was a superhero.
So, they glided down. To be on the safe side, Style and Hobbes jumped down into the backyard and turned on the flashlights from their phones to take a look around. Not that Style actually needed to, from what Alloy and the others understood. But she said she liked to keep people guessing about her capabilities. If some bad guy out there thought she couldn't see without her flashlight, they might make a mistake.
Meanwhile, Alloy and Calvin flew around the front and went up to check the door. That creepy feeling she had was getting worse. The hair on the back of her neck was standing up under her armor. Some part of the girl wanted to take off and get out of this place right now. But if she did that and then found out that the woman who lived here had been hurt or killed, she’d never forgive herself. No matter how scary this was, no matter how many chills it sent down her spine, she was going to deal with it.
With that thought firmly in mind, the girl exchanged a glance with Calvin, both of them using their own cell phone lights to illuminate one another. With a pair of firm nods, they walked up over the steps and the front door. Only then did the two of them see that it was open. Not much, only a crack, but still. The fact that the door was sitting open made that bad feeling even worse.
All four were in a group call, connected through Bluetooth earpieces so they could talk with each other. While Calvin reported the bit about the door being open, Alloy took the lead. One of her marbles turned into a sword and hovered in front of her, while the other three turned into a variety of shields. She gave the door a little push with two fingers to open it the rest of the way, holding up her cell phone light to see what was inside. After a brief thought, she called out using the name they'd heard over the scanner. “Rebecca Lanning?! Are you okay? We're here to help!”
Very slowly, she stepped into the large, pitch black front room. Calvin was right behind her, and she could hear Style and Hobbes saying something about going in the back door.
A sudden rush of movement from the side made her spin that way, catching a quick glimpse of a dark kitchen before a shape loomed in front of her. She reflexively yelped and fell backwards against the nearby table, knocking a framed photograph onto the floor.
“Oh thank you!” Suddenly, the living room light came on, and Alloy saw a tall, bespectacled woman with large frizzy hair and panicked eyes. She wore a fuzzy bathrobe over her pajamas and was holding a baseball bat in one hand and a phone in the other. “You're really here, you really came. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I didn't think anyone would come. It's my ex-boyfriend. He won't leave me alone. He keeps sneaking around banging on the windows and trying to make me take him back. I think he's really lost at this time.”
Alloy started to say something else, but her phone rang on a separate call. She looked down to see that it was her mother, and blanched. It might be bad timing, but if she didn't answer, her mother would send out the cavalry.
Quickly promising that they were going to help this poor lady, she stepped aside and lowered her voice while answering. “Hey Mom, kind of busy right now, but I'll be home soon.”
“No, no don't,” her mother's voice came back in a whisper. She sounded more terrified than Peyton had ever heard her. “Don't come home. I love you baby. Just know that. I love you so much.
“The Scions are here, and I'm pretty sure they're going to kill everyone in the building.”