Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

It was dark when I woke up; a pitch blackness that made me frown. Old aches made themselves known, and I was certain something was different.

My eyes adjusted eventually, and I moved gingerly. My body felt heavy; the air thin. Water gurgled in the distance, and I could hear pumps engage and click off, the steady whir of fans and air moving in ductwork.

It wasn't the first time I'd been abducted, nor the first time my powers had failed me. The mission always remained the same; save the world. Or the day. Someone had to do it, and that someone was often me.

The sound of movement had me reflexively draw as the door opened. The form silhouetted against the dim light of the hall was small, their head not even reaching my chest.

"Go ahead and shoot me. It would be a relief after the time I've had." The voice was distraught and feminine. "Everything went wrong. It was just a complete madhouse. No one even remembers what we were supposed to do."

"Save the world." I quipped, my voice reassuring. "That's what we always do."

There was a beap, and the activation of more than just the dim LED status indicators of smoke alarms that I had been using to navigate. The light was still weak and red hued, dying everything the color of blood.

"At least you remember. Maybe because you didn't have one of those things connected to you. Fuckers didn't care the world was going to end, only wanted to fight with each other. So, everything is fucked up. And I mean really fucked up." She made a sweeping gesture at the state of the room I'd woken up in.

A variation of my armor, one lighter than I normally used, stood racked against a wall, a few guns leaned into a corner. Ceiling panels had fallen to the floor, some of them cracked. Chips of stone or concrete were scattered, and some of them explained some of the aches I'd woken up with.

"I figured you were dead. That something had gone wrong. I guess everyone else ignored you too. I was just coming to scoop that little dohickey, then bam! You're actually awake for once." She shrugged, as if she hadn't been discussing looting what she assumed was my final resting place. "Guess there might actually be a point to fixing up this dump, if it's not got bodies laying around stinking the place up."

I followed her from the room, grabbing a few tools before I left. I was starting to remember some of what had happened, at least in the vaguest of details. The others had wanted power to fulfil fantasies and dreams, things that could make them the next best thing to living gods. I'd cast away what had made me more than mortal, in exchange for what I needed to end the threat to all of the earths.

Thankfully, even without my old abilities, my skills at repairing the mundane elements of the base hadn't suffered too badly from their disuse. And while the manual labor only aggravated the injuries I'd suffered in my sleep, I badly needed to remember my new limitations when I'd been able to effortlessly manhandle cars before. The new scrapes and bruises would only add to the authenticity of my story.

Once things were well enough repaired that we didn't have to worry about the base failing outright, it was time for me to finally lay eyes on the world I had come to save.

It wasn't impressive, rather it was slowly sliding down the slope towards the end of civilization and the extinction of humanity. The Bay the base lay beneath was cut off from the oceans by the rusting hulks of what once were ships, iridescent films of sulfur smelling oil clung to the waters surface around them.

The city was barely better; the only buildings that didn't look old and tired I knew hid a cancer that would need to be cut out, and soon. Many warehouses and factories rotted away into weed choked plots, sickly looking trees and bushes poisoned by salt and chemicals peeking out from ruined roofs.

There was 'The Rig'; a shining beacon of hope and progress that housed the local Protectorate team. At least if you didn't look too closely at its structure, rather than the jewel-like energy field that protected the retired oil rig that had been set in place within the bay.

If it weren't more costly to remove the ships than replace the rig, then I suspect it would have been gone long before now. Similarly, it probably would have joined the ships rusting away if it hadn't been too embarrassing for them to just abandon the thing.

I at least looked the part as I walked through the streets. I looked like a laborer, broad shouldered and well-muscled. I had a tan that was edging from bronze to red, with well-worn clothes that had been sturdily built.

No one even blinked when I walked into the PRT building, though asking for an application to join had resulted in some amount of confusion.

They hustled me into a back room on the spot, not answering or asking any questions. I sat there for a bit, waiting until Director Piggot came into the room. Though she didn't match what my memory said she should, seeing as she was neither overweight nor dour.

"So, you want to join the Protectorate? We have a comprehensive" She started.

I cut her off. "I'm not a Cape. I want, and asked, to join the PRT. You can check if you like." She blinked, and her somewhat stiff smile turned into a frown.

"Damned receptionists. They just assumed that since you're not exactly the normal recruit that you were a Cape, and then called me out of a meeting. At least it means I don't have to deal with the Chief Director for the rest of the day." She sighed, leaning against a wall. "I'm not going to hold their mistake against you. But unless you want to be a trooper, we're not hiring. I'm not even supposed to hire troopers, but I've got slots, and I'll be damned if I'm waiting six months for new idiots that will transfer out in two."

"Perfect. I wanted to be a trooper. Lots of standing around guarding things, the occasional motor patrol or scuffle. A little bit of being shot at or punched to make sure it doesn't get boring, and some paperwork to make you glad of everything else." I replied flippantly.

She focused on me, staring me down. I doubt the amount of cleavage she flashed as she leaned across the table to study me was intentional, but it was a welcome distraction. When she realized where my eyes were she flushed.

"The mirrored face shields don't hurt either, do they?" She asked, sounding annoyed. "Fine. So long as you can pass the background checks and the fitness requirements, then you're hired. Fuck up, and I'll have your head. Get caught leering at one of the Capes, and they're liable to take your head off"

"And not in a fun way." I joked. "Besides, the PRT fitness requirements are the second lowest in the entire federal government. Just above the ATF. Anyone with a pulse and any amount of motivation can pass them."

"Yes, but most people aren't that well informed. And it gives us an excuse that isn't them failing a background check for not hiring people. Unfortunately, we're desperate. Fortunately, I have people to deal with you instead of dealing with you myself. I'll have someone bring you the paperwork."

She left, and I was wondering if her appearance was a recent change, or if the world was different from how I expected it to be. She seemed to not quite be used to it, which implied it was recent. Either that or she rarely interacted with people who would look at her that way.

It made an interesting diversion, while I waited for someone to bring me the paperwork. Well, that and watching the movements of people. With my new abilities of insight, it was easier to glean information. They were severely understaffed, and the troopers they had seemed to be less than enthusiastic.

It painted a picture of an understaffed and desperate organization, which made it perfect for my needs. Especially when I eventually shot Strike Commander Thomas 'Coil' Calvert dead. That would open an excellent opportunity for advancement.

But that was for after I had secured a place as a trustworthy employee of the PRT, since I planned to pin quite a few crimes and catastrophes on him before he died. Plus they'd never promote the new guy to fill the spot of the secret supervillain that conveniently died just after they applied.

When the armored, but unhelmeted, and rather tired looking strike commander came in, I knew that I wasn't going to need to wait long. Fatigue was written across her features, her red hair crumpled and bedraggled where it had been shoved into a helmet or beneath the rest of her uniform and armor.

"Save us both the time. Any prior convictions?" She was straight to the point, her tone sharp.

"Unless you count a stint with the army, no. Couple of traffic tickets. One of those might have been a misdemeanor?" I scratched the back of my head as I answered.

"Prior service? Great. We'll have to break all your bad habits. Or at least keep you on confoam duty. Brass fucking hates it when any of us so much as draw a real gun, even when we're taking fire from a bunch of fucking nazi scumbags." She dropped the envelope of paperwork in front of me.

I had to unwind the string, then pulled a pen from where it rode on a holster for a multitool on my belt, seeing as how there weren't any on the table or in the envelope. I'd barely started on the mindnumbing drudgery of the paperwork before she interrupted me.

"Alright, you can do that later. First, I want to see how you shoot. Then, if you don't manage to shoot yourself in the ass like an MP, I can see if you can fight." She dragged me through the office building, descending into a small and cramped range through a series of heavy soundproofed doors.

The two of us flinched at the roar of automatic fire. Miss Milita was clearly working off some steam with a pair of uzis on full auto. Why she was in the PRT building rather than on the rig was probably due either to paperwork or the Wards; either one was a valid reason to want to shoot things.

I was just glad I'd had the foresight to slip earplugs in on the way. The range was clearly not supposed to be hot, there were a series of holders on the door for cards to indicate when it was hot, and all of them were empty.

"Milita!" My escort barked.

It was Militia's turn to jump, her power reforming as she startled into a vector tucked tight against her body as she turned to face us. I dove out of the way of the muzzle as it swept towards me.

An instant later, the gun was replaced by a knife and my escort was laughing her ass off.

"Sorry, no one had it booked. I didn't think there would be any harm in using it for a bit." Miss Milita explained sheepishly. "Are you new?"

"That depends on if he can hack it. If he can't, I'm not even letting him finish the paperwork. Now, why don't you watch him for a minute while I go sign out some guns, and actually get some earpro." She grabbed a slip from a folder, cursing the stupidity of keeping them inside the range.

Milita studied me up and down, doing a second pass once she'd completed her threat assessment. I clearly wasn't too objectionable as she stuck out a hand.

"You can call me Milita. I'm going to take it that you're the false alarm on joining the Protectorate?" She asked.

"John. John McDonnel. And yeah, I told them I wanted to apply to the PRT. How they got Protectorate out of that I don't know. No offense, but I'm not exactly Cape material. At least as a trooper they don't expect me to face an Endbringer." I gave a slight shudder.

"No one expects Capes to face them either, everyone has a choice." She tried to argue, diverted from any potential questions about me by the topic of Endbringer battles. "Everyone at those battles is a volunteer."

"Sure, no one has a gun to their head. But everyone knows that you'll end up shuffled to the worst postings and worst duties if they think you'll be useful and you turn down going. Meanwhile, every Protectorate leader has been to at least one. That's pretty clear." I said, winding her up a bit.

I tuned out of her trying to argue about it, already resolved to eventually agree with her. The point of it wasn't to take a position about Endbringer fights, but to put some distance between Cape life and me in her mind.

I was nodding along when the strike commander, who still hadn't introduced herself to me, returned. She was carrying a basket with a few magazines, some ammunition boxes, and a pistol, along with a couple of cheap earmuffs hanging over the side, along with a slung rifle.

Well, more of a carbine, since it was at least based on the M4 platform. I couldn't tell what in specific it was, considering how many versions of basically identical from the exterior guns were in service.

She set the basket in front of me, scooping the pistol out before I could even reach for it. I just helped myself to the earpro, and started to lay the magazines and ammo boxes out on the bench that divided the firing line from downrange.

Once I had them laid out, I casually started to load them. Thumbing rounds in one by one was relaxing, even if I normally preferred speedloaders for the time efficiency. At least the mags didn't suck, seeing as they were either Glock or Pmags, depending on what gun they went to.

"Why only 29 rounds? Those hold 30." Militia asked, clearly curious.

"Because it's a pain to stick a full mag in if the bolt is closed, and fumbling with the bolt release to lock it back manually is a pain. And you'd need to put an empty mag in to get it to lock open automatically when you run it." I replied, getting an approving nod from the other women. "Your power is weapons, but you don't do a whole lot with guns that aren't your power do you?"

"There's not really a point, anything that isn't tinkertech I can make just fine. And there's no reason for me to use tinkertech guns."

Once I'd finished loading, the guns were laid across the bench while Milita watched. I ran the bolts and eyeballed them just to see if I was being fucked with. Considering that the 416 had the windage on the irons cranked all the way left, I was either being fucked with, or their standards for marksmenship were absolutely in the toilet.

Once I was done giving them a quick once over, I inserted magazines but didn't rack the slide or the bolt, leaving them sitting on the bench.

"Problem?" She asked, so sweetly I knew at least some of it was deliberate.

"Eh, the zero's probably fucked. But I'm waiting for you to call the range hot. Considering you'd be the range officer." I shrugged.

"Alright, fine. Make ready and fire at your leisure." She said, poking a control that produced a projection of a standard silhouette target at the end of the short range.

It was scaled down a bit to simulate more distance than the tiny little range actually could use. I picked up the 416, running the bolt as I brought it up to my shoulder. I ignored the sights entirely, point shooting at a level that was passable.

All my rounds landed center of mass, some of them just on the edge of the A ring. The transition to pistol when it locked back was reasonably smooth, and I just brought the gun up and snapped shots off at a steady pace.

It was far from what I could really do, but it was what I judged to be on the upper end of what would be expected from someone with prior service. Entirely within the reach of anyone with enough training.

Once I'd emptied all the magazines, there was a whistle.

"What did you say you did for the Army?" The strike commander asked.

"I didn't." I responded dourly, before I chuckled and said "You didn't let me get that far in the paperwork. I was a small arms repairman. Lots of function tests and getting zero's vaguely back to right when someone screwed with them. Good practice."

"You had me going for a moment" Miss Militia said with a slight chuckle. "I didn't know you were a veteran."

"Nah, they stopped branding it on our foreheads. Too many barbers complained it made their jobs harder."

"Alright, you can shoot. I won't bother with confoam, that stuff is a pain in the ass to clean up." She stuck a hand out at me. "Commander Hayes. Considering you're likely to be assigned to the armory, we might as well be friendly. Even if I'm going to ask Aegis to beat the snot out of you."

"Making me pick on children? Why not ask Miss Militia to lend a hand?" I asked.

"Because Aegis is the safest for you to fight, for both of you. He won't hurt you too much, and you're not going to hurt him in any way that matters. Besides, Miss Militia is basically a normal person in a no weapons fight." She shrugged as she scooped the guns and magazines back up. "Besides, it's funny to watch a grown man be beaten up by a child."

I rolled my eyes, but followed Miss Militia when she gestured for me to do so. The destination was a modest padded room, which seemed to have the provisions to be used as a cell, considering that the door was obviously reinforced.

A red clad kid, more a young man just short of adulthood, entered the room followed by a much younger and shorter child. Aegis, and apparently Vista. Her green dress was shorter than was probably good for her, but it was a vaguely sound choice when it came to maneuverability. The leggings at least made up for any modesty issues, even if they were patterned to look more like stockings.

"Ah, the leader of the Wards and the most powerful member. I don't think I can manage against either of you, much less both." I grinned at them.

Vista obviously blushed, muttering something I didn't quite catch. Aegis was mostly managing to hold back a bit of laughter. I wanted to make a decent impression on the kids, if for no other reason than Kid Win as a modular tinker was potentially nearly as valuable of a resource as Leet would be.

And I was joining the PRT to get access to tinkers and their items for Rebecca, so that she could copy them for our own ends. As well as to exploit the position of authority as hard as possible when the time came. For one thing, I knew that I could order Dragon around, and I wanted her.

Though that would come after I killed Saint and took his stuff. I had a list of people to kill, and stuff to take somewhere. Granted, there wasn't 100% overlap on those two lists. But it came reasonably close.

Commander Hayes entered soon after, tossing me a package with a mouth guard. I appreciated the gesture, considering I doubted I was going to be treated by Panacea any time soon. The reason for Vista's presence became obvious as the room expanded rapidly to the size of a sports stadium.

"I'll avoid any shots to the uhhh…" Aegis started to say before he trailed off awkwardly.

"Family jewels." I grinned at him. "Much appreciated, I'll return the favor. Even if from what I've heard you wouldn't notice."

"It's really not pleasant, even if it's not crippling. Just let me know when you're ready. Might as well give you that much." He replied.

"Oh, not in the face, Aegis. PR would be on us if someone walked out with a swollen face or a black eye. People leap on that more than a broken arm or anything." Vista chimed in.

I stretched out a little, making sure to hold back to not being that strong or fast. I wasn't exactly superhuman anymore, but I was still at the peak of human, maybe just a touch beyond. But considering I hadn't quite healed from the damage the concrete had done to me in the base, it was sure to be painful.

"Alright. Go." I said.

Aegis started off flying at me at a moderate pace, fast enough to be hard to dodge, but not so fast I couldn't adjust. His fist glanced off my palm as I pushed him one direction and used his momentum to push myself in the other.

He pulled up and around in a tight maneuver, launching another attack before I'd even settled back into a proper form. His next attack was a bit faster, and rather nastier as I had to block a boot to the side of the head as I deflected him. I could feel the bruise form, and hissed at it.

I didn't have the mass to really hinder him or grapple with his flight, but he didn't like it when I gave a solid twist to his leg and a sharp yank as he pulled up. I didn't hear any bones breaking, though there was a solid twitch as the maneuver registered.

His next strike I managed to duck, twisting to plant a solid blow into his diaphragm. Solid enough that he drove a booted foot into my collarbone in retaliation. It didn't quite crack, but it hurt badly enough that one arm was practically useless.

I barely had time to notice as he smashed into me from behind. The crack of breaking bone signaled the end of the fight. I'd landed poorly, since I had only one working arm to try and control the fall.

"Aegis!" Vista scolded.

I had the girl pushing me into a seat that hadn't been there a few moments before, while Commander Hayes looked rather unhappy. Miss Militia looked frustrated, though she was helping Vista as the two of them cut away my shirt.

"Hey now, I'm applying for a trooper position, not a stripper. And you're too young besides." I shot Vista a look that had her crimson. "Granted, it looks like I'm probably out of luck."

Hayes sighed "No, I'm backdating your hiring to the start of the day. That way it's a training accident. There's a lot less paperwork for those, compared to if a Ward sends a civilian they're not arresting to the hospital."

Aegis, for all that I could tell, was looking very sheepish. "I didn't mean to, the way he took hits made me think he could take a lot more."

Vista had a sharp intake of breath as she actually managed to reduce my shirt to ribbons with Miss Militia's help. There was a seriously ugly bruise across most of my chest, mottled between jaundice yellow and rot green.

That had everyone looking at me. I'd somewhat hoped to have Aegis hit me in the chest and hide that under fresh bruising. Sadly, I'd have had to push my self-imposed limits to pull that off, since he'd not gone for any body blows before hitting me from behind.

"Anything you'd care to say about that?" Commander Hayes asked.

"Workplace hazard. It's why I'm getting out of mechanic work. Some dumbass cut the engine block loose before the hoist was ready, while I was getting some wires disconnected."

"I'm calling Amy." Vista said.

I did my best to look confused. It wasn't that hard to look disoriented with a broken arm and the number of bruises I had.

"Panacea isn't at the beck and call of the PRT Vista." Commander Hayes said.

"No, but she owes me a favor. And I'm calling it in." She said, her phone already up to her ear. "Amy. It's Vista. I'm fine. … I am not pregnant! No, I just want to call in the favor for someone else…. Yeah. Shut up. You know where."

Miss Militia was frowning down at Vista. "Why was one of her questions about you being pregnant?"

"Probably because that's one of her standard questions. When she's tired enough, she's asked me that." Aegis chimed in.

I could tell he was lying, but I wasn't about to enlighten anyone else. Honestly, a quick nap was probably the best answer.

"Not a Parahuman. Just an idiot. No chance of triggering either." Were the words I woke up to.

I opened my eyes to see Panacea, or Amy Dallon poking at me. I was still shirtless, but had been moved to a well appointed clinic. I no longer felt like shit, which was a very welcome change. Just because I was used to pain didn't make me like it.

"I resemble that remark."

"Yeah, you do. Try not to get hurt so badly. I'm not a magic undo button on injuries. Aegis I expect to be reckless and pile on injuries, you really shouldn't have been walking in the state you were in." Amy was scowling at me.

"You're the best Doc. I'll try not to make any more problems for you, or any other medics. It's not like I wake up in the morning planning to get hurt, it's just what happens sometimes." I smiled at her.

It seemed to soften her anger. Then I was hit in the face with a bundle of paperwork. The unfinished application, to be specific. I could hear giggling from Vista, who seemed to find the entire thing amusing. Amy started laughing after a short pause.

"Fill that out. I need to get it signed before you leave. I'll be back once I've gotten our half of it done." Commander Hayes said. "And I suppose I'll bring you a shirt from the giftshop."

I could hear the grin, and I expected that I'd be walking out in the most embarrassing shirt she could find. A small price to pay for what I expected to be a profitable career with the PRT. Besides, I'd be spending most of my time as either a faceless goon in tactical gear or a faceless mercenary in tactical gear.

Vista was clearly perched behind and above me, positioned such that she could watch as I filed in the forms. It seemed like she might have managed to develop a crush; either that, or she had the idea I was an E88 infiltrator and was going to sneak into my apartment with a knife in the middle of the night.

There were worse things than a pre-teens crush or threats. I wasn't interested in her romantically, but she did have quite a bit of power at her disposal, and with the right prompting could be invaluable in circumventing most security measures.

The Wards were simply easier to manipulate, as well as access. The Protectorate was out in the middle of the bay, protected by a forcefield. That put Armsmaster's lab and his equipment out of easy reach. Plus modular equipment was more useful than efficient equipment.

"Isn't that a bad side of town? Like, ABB territory bad?" Vista asked, which made Amy look straight at her.

"What? My apartment? Probably. It would explain why the rent was so cheap. They didn't insist on a long lease either. It's probably fine, I'm a light sleeper." I just shrug.

I genuinely didn't care. The place was a shithole, but it was a legal residence. And it gave me plenty of excuses to stay away from home. The Unwritten Rules were a joke, mostly. But government employees, no matter what they did, had more protection.

No one gave a shit if you offed an independent, but the government took real offense to giving lie to the illusion they were untouchable. Really, the rules protected people who were on a big enough team for there to be consequences for breaking them.

Sure, Troopers landed in the hospital constantly. And yeah, Hookwolf didn't even hold back from killing them. But for all the fights, there were only a couple of deaths a year among the PRT.

"Wouldn't it be safer to live in like, E88 territory? I mean, they wouldn't bother you. Well, other than to try and recruit you. You could probably get a better deal even." Vista asked. "Don't get me wrong, they'd still be Nazis. But you'd be safe if you kept your head down."

"Worried about me?" I chuckled. "It'll probably be fine. It's only for a bit, till I can afford someplace better. Besides, if they stick me out on the Rig, I'll be in the quarters out there according to this."

"I'm not sticking you out there. Too much work here, and those slackers are always refusing to transfer anyone back to shore." Commander Hayes said as she walked back in.

I was once again hit in the face, though this time it was a cloth bundle. It was a bit large for a t-shirt, and as I unfolded it I regarded Hayes with a level stare.

"Really?"

Vista was sputtering behind me, probably about where the hell the thing had come from. It was a mint green hoodie, with the front having a little drawing of Vista poking out of the pocket. The back though, that one was just tasteless.

"It's part of a shipment of bootlegs that got sent to us by mistake. It's fucking hilarious. You should see the ones for Armsmaster. The speedo is absurdly tiny, and it's got 'Certified spear expert' written across the back." Hayes shrugged. "We were out of stuff in your size, apparently Uber and Leet hijacked it thinking it was tinkering materials or something."

"You want me to wear a hoodie with a mostly naked teenager on the back, posed seductively with a phallic popsicle in her mouth and '100% Jailbait, 200% worth it' written on it?" I asked.

Amy seemed to have finally processed everything, and started laughing hard enough to make me worried. Vista was still sputtering, though now it was along the lines of her starting to grow. I just stared at it, wondering why in the hell they hadn't just thrown them out. Hayes was managing a remarkably straight face.

"Vista, sign this." I handed the hoodie back towards her, grabbing a sharpie from one of the tables in the clinic.

That had Amy fall out of her chair clutching her side, while Hayes looked to be regretting her decision. Vista apparently elected to use my back as a table, putting the thing on my back and scrawling something on it.

I finished my paperwork, trading it for the much smaller stack that Hayes had brought in a folder. I was starting to be worried about how long Vista was taking on the hoodie. I figured she would have just scrawled a name on and been done with it.

I reviewed it, finding the details pretty much the way I expected. It was a decent salary, good health care, and some allowances for hazard pay that applied just from being in Brockton Bay. I didn't expect the clause about being obligated to accept if I was assigned the guardianship of a Ward, or the allowances if I was assigned to be a Cape bodyguard.

I didn't expect those were standard clauses, since they were mixed in with the minor pay bump for my skills with small arms.

"Alright, it's ready!" Vista sounded overly excited, and I watched as Hayes pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Fine, let me see it." I said.

She'd apparently taken the time to do a reasonable line drawing of her in a tiny bikini, just far more endowed with '100% worth waiting for. XOXO Vista' written above it. I spotted something written on the inside of the collar, and decided it could wait for later.

I shrugged the hoodie on, surprised by the fact the bootleg was actually comfortable. Despite how tasteless it was, I might have to actually wear it more than the once.

"I'm getting you a jacket. There is no way that Image won't have my ass if I let you just wear that out of the building." Hayes said.

Vista stuck her tongue out at her in response, while Amy just gave Vista a look.

It didn't take too long to reach my apartment, considering I'd effectively blackmailed Hayes into driving me with the implied threat of wearing the signed hoodie around in public. I also had a large operations manual to review, along with a freshly printed ID card and badge.

"Man, this really is a shithole. You sure you're going to be okay here? I can front you the money for a hotel somewhere better." Hayes asked.

"I'll be fine. I'll just sleep with one eye open for now. Well, that, and not be home that often. It's a hole in the wall with no AC." I replied.

"Remember, orientation is tomorrow morning, 6 AM sharp." She reminded me, and I just gave her a thumbs up as I wandered into the dingy building that hosted my apartment.

The building was old and run down, but it had stout doors and thick brick walls. I didn't need much, not when all my actual stuff was stashed in the base and I didn't actually need to sleep. I just needed a mailing address and somewhere I could in theory sleep.

I changed quickly, tucking the hoodie somewhere it wasn't immediately obvious. I did read what had been written on the inside of the collar, and found it to be 'Missy Biron' and both a phone number and an email address.

I blinked, not expecting Vista to have decided to unmask to me already. This did not bode well, since I knew a stalker was a potential issue, even if I didn't know if I was going to be afflicted by one. I punched the details into my phone, saving the contact.

On a hunch I sent my own contact to the number, giving her a phone number and a secure email she could use.

From there, I spent some time browsing through news stories and PHO threads to figure out what the hell had happened when I'd been out cold in the base.

I didn't exactly like what I saw. It looked like the others had in fact gone off the deep end with their conflict drive, or else fallen victim to each other. There were probably survivors out there, I suspected that one of them was hiding out in Eagleton with the Machine Army, for starters.

But Pigot had been abducted and held hostage, dinosaurs had caused mass chaos until the Triumvirate had cleaned up. A new 'Endbringer' had popped up, only for it to end up being killed by an equally unknown hero that had ended up dying of his wounds.

I couldn't get a good read on what had happened to everyone, since it seemed like there was a lot of information control in play. And I didn't have any hacking tools at the moment. But it looked like Pigot had killed her captor, coming out of the encounter with her new look and no health problems.

It was rather annoying that the gun tinker I had been hoping to track down was in the wind without a trace, if he wasn't rotting in a ditch somewhere. I might just have to break out String Theory instead to make me anything like heavy weapons.

But I needed to start somewhere. And without good tinkertech to work from, Rebecca was far more limited in what she could do. I needed some targets, preferably ones with a good collectable bounty, and far enough away from Brockton Bay to not lead back to my civilian identity.

There was an informal one on the president of Ubisoft, which was safely in France. But perhaps killing someone who was legally a civilian wouldn't set the proper tone to start with.

Gesellschaft was an interesting option, it would set the tone of hunting evil well enough without being quite as high profile as Nilbog. I'd just need to figure out which of their capes I wanted to remove from the world.

Ah. Perfect. Einherjar. A Master 9. Reanimates corpses to fight for him, broad range of effect. Tends to collect trophies in the form of the bodies of parahumans, who are still able to use their own powers.

He's got a sizable bounty, one that families of his victims tend to donate to with regularity. He's not on the level of the Slaughterhouse Nine, in that he's not a roving murderhobo. He's just a genocidal maniac that Gesellschaft uses as their big stick when it comes to negotiations.

The rub is that he's got a child with him, a Thinker that's made him practically impossible to effectively combat by warning him of attacks that can actually kill him. Skuld had foiled multiple international coalition's attempts to kill him.

I focused on finding his location, browsing through PHO threads and letting my intuition and new deductive powers do the work. I had narrowed down his location to somewhere in the Polish countryside before I got a response from Vista.

At least it was only a regular selfie, and not anything more. Even with the security on my phone being unhackable, I didn't need anything like that on it in case someone was shoulder surfing. I ended up setting my phone up to not load any pictures unless I specifically asked for it.

I ended up taking a brief trip to Poland to scout out potential locations, narrowing it down to only a few sites before I ran out of time that night. The portal generator Rebbeca had repaired was invaluable, allowing me to quickly relocate without leaving tracks or papertrail.

I arrived at the PRT building early, using my ID to let myself in one of the back entrances. There was a map included in the operations handbook, which pointed out where the locker room and the briefing room where orientations were supposed to be held were.

It didn't list much else beyond that, at least not of any use. There was the break room and where HR was, along with the anonymous complaints box. Which, considering every space outside of the bathrooms seemed to have cameras, I doubted that complaints would actually stay that way if they upset someone.

I drew a set of fatigues from the vending machine in the locker room. They didn't want troopers to take their uniforms home, so they had a laundry contractor that handled all their uniforms. They also did the uniforms for the mechanics that maintained the vehicles.

I made a mental note to look into stealing a truck load of PRT uniforms at some point, since they might come in handy.

The freshly pressed fatigues were surprisingly high quality, considering they had to be treated to resist not just fire, but many other forms of threats from parahumans. I doubted they used tinkertech fabric treatments, so it was more likely a case of skimping on the fire retardant treatments that always made fabric stiffer.

I was waiting in the briefing room a few minutes before 6, sitting comfortably in uniform when a casually dressed office drone came in with a cart loaded down with carafes of coffee and individually wrapped muffins.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when I started transferring the contents of the cart to a waiting side table. Apparently 6 AM sharp didn't mean much here. Commander Hayes stepped in for a moment a minute or two after six, about the same time the first of the office workers in casual wear started to drift in.

She gave me a slight nod and left, apparently satisfied for the moment. Then the powerpoints started. I half listened to them, spending far more time reviewing the more detailed portions of the operations manual I'd been given yesterday or reading the paperwork that had been passed out at the start.

After several very boring hours of mostly useless governmental trivia, there was finally a break longer than it took for the office lady leading the presentation to drain her bladder and refill her coffee cup.

I snagged another muffin, careful to not let any crumbs fall on my uniform as I ate it. I expected there to be plenty of hazing and exact letter of the rules being enforced just because I was new.

Another trooper, faceless in his helmet, turned up to lead me on an abbreviated tour of the areas reserved for the troopers. The ready rooms, secure garages, armory, the control room where the console for the PRT was monitored, along with a few guard rooms spread throughout the building.

The Wards area was notably excluded, with the remark that most troopers didn't have any access to those areas for the privacy of the Wards. There were apparently some other facilities spread around the city, as well as outside of it that supported the headquarters.

But most of those were little more than a break room and a garage to stash a vehicle and a patrol, or were just for support like the larger motorpool that was located outside the city proper. Nothing I really needed to concern myself with for the moment.

After that tour, he dropped me back into the powerpoint hell for several more hours. I found out that the office workers got to go home after lunch, calling it an early day. I was informed that I had trooper specific training after lunch, the details of which remained a mystery for the moment.

The lunch available in the cafeteria was edible. That was about as much as I could give it. It was overcooked, lukewarm, bland, and dry. Which was about par for what I expected. It was pretty obvious that only a few people actually ate what they served, most of them instead making use of the microwaves and tables for things they acquired elsewhere.

I joined a knot of troopers, distinct in their fatigues from the casually dressed officer workers. All of them wore mirrored glasses, scarves, or something else that concealed at least part of their faces. It seemed that they didn't want to be easily identified even inside the building.

"You must be the new guy. Heard Aegis smacked the shit out of you so hard they had to call Panacea." There were grins and guffaws, along with jokes about losing to children.

I just shrugged, taking a bite of the lunch and chewing thoroughly before replying. "Would have helped if I hadn't worn myself out keeping your mother company the night before."

"My mother's dead you prick!"

I just shrugged. "Don't start shit if you can't take a hit."

Conversation turned more towards the regular complaints about the E88 and ABB always outgunning the PRT. Sure, they didn't stroll around with armored vans like the PRT did, but the PRT didn't occasionally whip out a rocket launcher.

That was the talk of the town, since it seemed like the gangs were laying in supplies for a hotter war after everything had been upended. No one wanted to rock the boat too hard, for fear of the entire thing going up like a powder keg. Not when there wasn't a counterweight to Kaiser and his Nazis, even if that counterweight had been a sex slaver rage dragon.

"After lunch, Hayes wants you at the locker room. We're doing the confoam quals today, then you get to qual on everything else. The Director signed off on an expedited course, since she wants more bodies for when something blows up." One of the more helpful ones informs me, reading off a phone.

I'd had a wad of clothes that smelled like either cat piss or old weed thrown at me when I got to the locker rooms, with the simple explanation that confoam doesn't like coming out of clothes. Considering everyone else had similarly ratty bundles, it seemed like a thrift store had been cleaned out for this.

At least there were new pairs of socks and underwear for afterwards, I didn't feel like experiencing what it felt like to have 'your balls glued to your butthole' like some of the other troopers apparently had in prior runs.

The floor of the training room was sticky, and the entire thing smelled like a blend of gasoline and oranges. There were build-ups of foam spread around the place, mostly dots of spatter flecked high up on walls of the ceiling. The door had a notable lip as you entered the room, and there were hose spigots along one wall, with covered drains.

It was larger than either of the rooms I'd used the day before put together, likely both because confoam was the PRTs calling card when it came to subduing villains, and because it needed to be with how much the stuff expanded.

"McDonnel, you're up! You're going to run towards the person with the sprayer. Smith! You get to run away from them. Keep moving, once you're solidly down we'll melt you loose. Don't swallow any, or it'll give you the trots." Hayes barked out instructions.

I spent the next couple of hours being intermittently doused with rapidly expanding and sticky foam, then melted free and roughly hosed off while they swapped out the sprayer and its user. I got subjected to everyone's fire, while everyone else got to take turns running away.

It was disgusting, especially when it got into your ears. But at least I had the good sense to close my eyes, as one of them learned that it stung like hell when it got into your eyes.

Finally, it was my turn. And I got the surprise of seeing Director Piggot in equally ratty clothing. The t-shirt was stained and oversized, tied off on one side to reveal just a hint of abs. It also served to illustrate exactly how massive her chest was.

"McDonnell?" Hayes pushed me, using the backpack as a lever.

"Didn't expect the Director to be joining in, touch surprised is all." I replied, readying the sprayer as Hayes returned to her spot by the door.

"I had a meeting." Was the director's simple answer.

She started to run when Hayes gave her mark, and I hosed her down. I worked from just in front of her up, causing her to sprawl face first into a growing pile of foam while I quickly tagged the retreating trooper.

Once they were both stopped, I layered the foam on for a full textbook encapsulation. According to the manual, it both prevented harm to prisoners and prevented escapes. I didn't want to be in the position to find out if the claims of it being an effective measure to prevent death in the case of an amputation were accurate.

Either I wanted someone dead, or I didn't want them crippled. At least mostly.

When Hayes got Piggot melted loose, she was clearly annoyed. Considering that her t-shirt had been ripped apart by a lucky glob of confoam, I figured it was best to not further poke her.

I did make sure to get a good eye full of a hot fit and very wet director while I stole a bit of the solvent by dumping it into a drink bottle I'd been given. I expected a solution to being caught in containment foam would be a valuable commodity.

Hayes got her turn to be blasted when Piggot finally got to wield the sprayer. Emily took a fair amount of glee in hosing down her two targets, probably because she hadn't been medically fit to qualify on the weapons in years.

"McDonnell, take twenty. Get yourself a shower. It'll take awhile to get all this crap out of our hair." Hayes fiddled with the sprayer pack for a moment before continuing. "Oh yeah, use the shampoo in the orange dispenser. It's not solvent for the foam, but it does help get the crap out of your hair."

Thirty minutes later, I was sipping on a fresh water bottle waiting for the two to come out of the women's locker room. The two emerged together, with Hayes being in plain fatigues and Piggot had a button-down shirt and slacks.

"Let's get the rest of the quals out of the way." Piggot commanded, bustling in the direction of the range.

Hayes and I fell into step behind her, with Hayes turning to me and quietly confiding "She forgot how much of a pain it is to get confoam out of that much hair."

What waited for us at the range was a variety of weapons: pistols, carbines, rifles, shotguns, grenade launchers, tasers, and even a net gun and paintball markers. It was probably excessive, but I suspected it was mostly for the benefit of the director, rather than myself.

"Let's get started. I don't want to waste time or skip anything, not when I'd have to work another session into my schedule if we miss something." Piggot said.

"Alright McDonnell, show me what you've got. Since the director signed off on it, let me see if you have what it takes to be an instructor. Then I can dump the bra… Wards on you."

With a deep breath, I spent the next several hours demonstrating the controls and how to detail strip everything in the room, before shooting each one in turn with Director Piggot. She was badly out of practice but took coaching well enough. At least to the point of hitting acceptable levels in Hayes's book.

"Alright, McDonnell. You're qualified instructor on everything but the sprayers. Well, that and we still need the two of you to get hit with the tasers and pepperballs. But I figured saving that for last, so you're not stewing in it and I'm not stuck in here suffering with you was the decent thing to do." Turning to Director Piggot she continued.

"And you Ma'am. I'm going to mark you as qualified. But you need to be down here practicing before you get your next renewal. Preferably with an instructor, but I don't tell you what to do."

"Noted. I'll try and pencil in time between meetings. Now let's get this done so I can go home, I'm exhausted already." Piggot replied.

Getting hit with a taser was distinctly unpleasant, making me miss my immunity to such things. Perhaps I should have insisted on keeping some of my original abilities. But the opportunity to score six more seasons of No Game No Life had made me a touch irrational.

At least the pain was over quickly. The pepperballs weren't as bad as I'd thought, but my tolerance for spice had always been quite high. Or perhaps that was nerve damage from getting peppers up my nose as a child. Who could really tell.

I spent the rest of the week with the PRT shuffling paperwork and finishing training modules, the closest I got to action was a few shifts running the console for the Wards, including having to call them all back when Oni Lee broke Lung out of the transport van.

In my off hours, I wandered the city scoping out various locations before pretending to sleep and slipping away to continue stalking Einherjar. He wasn't entirely stupid, keeping a low profile in an old manor originally built by the Nazis that had recently been part of a major redevelopment plan.

He kept Skuld close, along with his macabre menagerie of Cape corpses. I could see the skeletonized snake that coiled around her neck and draped down her back through the scope I was watching them with.

I'd waited for an opportune time, since it looked like the girl wasn't exactly a willing participant to the entire thing. I wanted to take him out when there wasn't someone else who could make it complicated to abduct her. I expected that the authorities or the rest of Gesellschaft wouldn't be kind to her, if for very different reasons.

It might have taken days, but I finally had the two of them alone. I cycled the action on the oversized rifle, working the crank on the 20mm anti-tank rifle to open the bolt. It shuddered slightly as the 20x138mm round slid home.

It was absurd levels of overkill, but I was hardly going to miss the opportunity to use the damned thing. Besides, it amused me to use an antique to kill someone whose entire ideology should have been consigned to history.

I sighted in on his head, adjusting slightly for the range, since I'd already dialed in the wind adjustments. A few heartbeats after I squeezed the trigger, his head exploded across the wall. I'd made sure that his face was clearly visible for the benefit of my camera, along with the corpses that collapsed like puppets with their strings cut.

I left the gun behind for the moment, jogging towards the ruined window that was supposed to be bullet proof. It just demonstrated that those things were never more than bullet resistant. Skuld had dropped to the floor, with what I imagined to be a shriek when the bullet had hit.

I came through the remains of the window in a spray of laminated glass, drawing my pistol before my feet hit the ground again. The girl was gibbering in what I thought was German, I ignored her for the moment as I stood over the corpse of a man that had terrorized Europe.

I shot the corpse in the heart twice, just for good measure before I hacked his right hand off. There wasn't really a fixed way to collect on Kill Orders, so I was going to make something of a show of it.

The girl was crying, terrified as she failed to recognize me. That was okay, I hadn't made an appearance yet. I patted her gently on the head, wiping away tears as I held a single finger up to where my mouth should be, if I didn't have a featureless mirror tinted slab of sapphire hiding my features.

Once she'd stopped crying and started to sniffle, I pinned a business card to his chest with one of the knives. Then I scooped the brass that my two shots had scattered into a pocket.

I didn't care who found the body first, since I expected that the authorities would leak to Gesellschaft, while if they turned up first, the authorities would find out about it when I dropped his hand and a video of his death onto the desk of Interpol.

I expected that this was going to piss off a lot of people, starting with the obvious Nazis. But the morons at Cauldron would probably be pissed that one of their potential options to keep powers around after the death of their user was gone.

But I was going to continue to piss them off. They'd grown far too comfortable dictating the rules of the game from the shadows, sacrificing anyone and everyone in the hopes that one more spin of the wheel would deliver them the salvation they craved.

I lifted the girl carefully, taking her well beyond the cameras around the manor before the police could show up. From there, a portal retrieved the two of us and the Lahti. I'd made sure to leave no footprints, and no physical evidence of my presence beyond the bullets.

"We have a problem; Einherjar is dead. Worse, it is almost certain that the world will soon know this. While we have other options to maintain our strength, he was most effective as a weapon of terror." The voice spoke in German and positively dripped with malice.

"Who killed him? And how was he not forewarned? Did the girl commit suicide?" Demanded another voice.

A screen clicked on, displaying a photograph of a card that had been pinned to a chest above a ruined heart. The card was plain, the sort of thing that anyone could print at home. It read:

A number followed, along with an email address from one of the providers that prided itself on hiring Tinkers to maintain it as a bastion of privacy. Or, if one were prone to flights of conspiracy, one that the Toybox maintained themselves to make it easier for customers to contact them securely.

"The girl is gone. A useful asset vanished without a trace. The man that killed Einherjar took her before he himself vanished. What I do not know is how he bypassed her foresight, which was the closest to absolute that has ever been found. Even if it was limited to threats to herself or those in immediate proximity to her, it was quite strong." Hissed the original voice.

"We should consider hiring this man, turned against our enemies we could capitalize on his appearance. Beyond that, we may find the opportunity to 'convince' him of our leadership." A third voice added.

"I cannot imagine how this could end poorly." A final voice added, positively dripping with sarcasm.

I'd spent some time getting Skuld settled, most of which was making sure she understood I had no intention of killing her. Then trying to get a name out of her, but apparently she didn't have one of her own. At least none she remembered.

I'd have to figure something out and forge her an ID or something. But that was a longer term project than fit in the time I wanted to kill before I dropped into the headquarters of Interpol.

I was honestly debating between spending as little time in France as I needed to, and taking care of the brothers Guillemot on a slightly more extended outing. In the end, I decided that waiting for someone to offer actual contracts would be a far more reasonable approach.

I couldn't just kill everyone I disliked, not unless I wanted to give away far too many clues as to my identity.

I emerged from a portal atop a nearby building, carrying the hand in a sack, along with a glossy print of Einherjar's face just before the bullet had struck it. It took me practically no time at all to work my way to the entrance that wasn't really meant for the public.

The guard on duty inside the atrium dropped his coffee when he spotted me, since I was a massive middle finger to the normal rules about 'Capes' not carrying or using guns. I'd made sure that the laws that enabled kill orders didn't require me to ID myself, and found that while it was heavily suggested, collecting the bounty anonymously was allowed.

It just meant they'd take the taxes out before paying me at a steeper rate. Government affiliated Capes were actually tax exempt for this, which had to be one of the weirder incentives you could use to recruit someone.

'You know, if you kill someone we won't tax you on that income' was a comical thing to think of a recruiter trying to get someone to sign on the dotted line.

"I'm here to collect a bounty. Einherjar." My voice was distorted, the line prerecorded from a text to speech program prior to being processed into a mechanical sounding drone.

I dropped the bag on the counter, along with the picture and a USB stick containing the footage of his exploding. Rebbeca had promised to upload the video to PHO while I was there, since part of the point was to be rattling cages.

"Uh... Yes sir." The guard had already pressed the silent alarm, and I just stood impassively, folding my arms as I watched a tactical team spill out of various doors.

The guard picked up the phone, speaking in rapid fire French to whoever he'd called. I was ignoring the shouts from the tactical team, having already determined that they weren't actually going to shoot.

They wanted me on the floor, or at least to not be so conspicuously armed in their building. They gave up after about five minutes of shouting, probably because the guy at the desk gestured at them to shut up while he was still on the phone.

He'd taken the hand out of the bag and flinched. Then he'd run the thing through their fingerprint machine anyways. His eyes had widened when he'd seen what had come back. Only a minute or two later, an inspector had come out of the offices.

He yelled at the tactical team until they left, then came over to address me. He even stuck out a hand to shake. I took it, giving him a firm grip and little else.

"What proof do you have that the man is dead?" He asked in accented English.

I gestured to the USB, then at the hand. "There's a video of his head exploding on the USB. I thought you'd find the entire corpse to be impolite."

He shook his head, chuckling to himself. He plugged the USB into the computer right at the front desk, and then watched as the autoplay triggered the video on full screen.

He turned slightly green, while the man whose desk he was at made use of the trashcan to hold his lunch.

"I don't suppose you'd care to identify yourself, or reveal how you killed the monster without his pet warning him." He asked.

"My card." I handed him an identical card to what I'd pinned to the corpse.

He narrowed his eyes and squinted up at my face. He was probably trying to make out any details through the lens of my mask, but he wasn't going to be able to see through it that easily.

"Give me some time to collect your payment. I presume you desire cash?"

"I'll wait. And a mix of bills is ideal. Euros, pounds, and dollars are all fine."

I had to wait the better part of an hour before they'd gathered together the money. It filled a pair of large duffle bags, probably because it was in assorted values. I opened the bags, rifling through it and roughly estimating it. It didn't look like they'd shorted me, other than the expected withholding for taxes.

"Please, do not do this again." He begged.

"I'll try to have an account for a wire transfer before next time." I answered, ignoring his actual intent.