48

Date

2011 February 7th - Monday - Earth Bet Time

The meeting room was awash with anticipation, all the participants restlessly sitting at the meeting table waiting for the Director to show up.

The heroes were talking between each other, with Assault entertaining Dauntless with a joke, with Battery shaking her head next to her husband, while Miss Militia watched with a small smile, and Armsmaster stoically worked on something only he could see.

Several researchers were sitting on the other end of the table excitedly poking several tablets, ignoring everything around them.

The agents and workers of the PRT were sitting in their seats, silent and tense.

This was the scene that greeted Emily when she walked into the room, followed by Renick. Several people stood up to greet her, but she just waved.

"At ease, people. We have a lot to talk about, so let's not waste time." Several people nodded and sat back.

She walked to her seat, sat down gingerly, aware of the acute pain in her side. These meetings weren't doing anything good for her health. Renick simply sat next to her and immediately began to arrange the papers he brought with himself.

She took a few seconds to look at everybody in the room before speaking.

"Very well. Let's begin the meeting. Armsmaster, I would like to hear your report about the intrusion." She wanted to stay calm, but everybody noticed her thinly veiled anger at the topic.

She was already getting calls from other Directors about it, and of course, none of them called to offer her help.

Armsmaster nodded and stood up. "Yes, Director. With Dragon's help, we traced the intrusion to a device that was added to the server room and was hidden behind several layers of equipment. Dating of the device says that it was created several years ago, and the layer of dust shows that nobody disturbed the scene in years."

Hearing that, everybody in the room sat up straighter. That didn't sound right to anyone.

"But, the device only allowed someone hidden access to another device, and that device was connected to another and so on. We traced this daisy-chain of devices through the building and the city, and we ended up at Coil. Who as you know is currently locked into his own base, guarded by Dragon."

Assault chortled to himself, and several other people were sporting malicious smiles. The Director's face, however, could have been carved from stone.

"Any other output for the devices?" she asked, her voice flat.

"No, Director. Everything terminated at Coil's base."

"Good." was the only thing Emily said, but everybody who heard it felt a tiny bit bad for Coil. "Did you manage to remove them?"

"Yes, we did it yesterday. Had to remove several compromised pieces of equipment from the system, but they were up for an upgrade so it wasn't a problem. I'm happy to report that thanks to Dragon's help, we are well within budget."

Emily let a quiet sigh. At least that was something. With how much she had to fight for every cent in her budget, hearing that gave her a brief moment of happiness.

"Thank you. Please also convey my thanks to Dragon as well. I will personally talk with her when I have time."

"Yes, Director."

"Anything else?"

"No, Director. I added several routines to our firewalls that will watch for these kinds of attacks, and patched up several vulnerabilities, that you can read about in my report."

She nodded, and he sat down.

"That's done. Before anyone speaks up about it, I'm aware that's not that simple, but I want to have everybody on the same page. We will have a detailed meeting about cybersecurity at a later date." She was happy to note that several people relaxed and began furiously writing notes.

She just sighed at the prospect of more meetings. It seemed nowadays she was only having meetings about what happened, always reacting, never acting.

Maybe with what happened, and after Coil was captured, she could plan some operations.

She wrote down a few things, then started speaking again. "Next, Oni Lee."

The silence that followed that was rather telling.

Finally, one of the officers spoke up. "He is currently in one of the secure cells, blinded to prevent teleportation."

"And Lung?"

The man just shrugged. "Nothing official, but word on the street is that he is angry."

"That's nothing new, he's always angry!" interrupted Assault.

"Thank you, Assault, for that," said Emily, giving him a glare, then turned back to the officer. "What about moving him?"

The officer grimaced while she had a bad feeling. "I'm afraid, nobody really wants him, or more like Lung's attention, and arranging transportation farther would take more time."

Emily closed her eyes and contemplated how fucked up the situation was. She stayed silent, and the room also fell silent, filled with nervous energy.

After brief contemplation, she finally broke the silence. "Fuck. Well, if that's how they want to play, then I will play." She turned to the officer. "Double guards around him and double the observation on Lung. I want to know when he makes his move."

The officer nodded in understanding and wrote it down. "Understood. Anything else?"

"No. I will deal with transportation; you just deal with security, Thompson."

The man nodded again, thankful. She nodded back and was about to continue the meeting when Armsmaster interrupted.

"Director? I may have a solution for the Oni Lee situation…"

"Oh? What's it, Armsmaster?" she asked, curious and somewhat hopeful.

"If we attribute the catch to Dragon, then the Guild would become responsible for Oni Lee. Dragon is ready to transport the man out of the city."

There was a surprised silence in the room after hearing that, and everybody turned to look at Emily.

Emily thought about it and tried to compare the positive PR that they would get against the possibility of Lung trying to break out his lieutenant. It wasn't really a hard decision.

"Contact her." Armsmaster immediately began to speak into whatever device he had in his helmet. "Thompson, prepare Oni Lee for transportation."

Thompson stood up, saluted, and hurried out of the room.

"Director, Dragon is on her way," said Armsmaster rather smugly.

"Thank you," she replied, relieved. "Now let's take five…"

After the break, they returned to the room and continued the meeting.

The feeling in the room was much better than at the beginning. Apparently, avoiding Lung's wrath was enough to lift their spirits.

"Very well, gentlemen and ladies, let's continue," said Emily. "How about the Kingsway street fight?"

This time Triumph spoke up. "Not much to tell, Director. We showed up, observed, and watched as the Empire took out Trainwreck."

"Not much loss…" came from several people.

"What about what they were protecting?"

An analyst was the one who spoke up next. "Several witnesses say they were packing chemical equipment into several trucks. So probably a lab of some kind."

"Any luck with following them?"

"We traced them, but the trail ended up at a construction site."

Emily gave the analyst the strongest glare she could. The man quailed under the glare and gave a halfhearted attempt to brighten up the situation. "At least we got some evidence about illegal activity…" but he fell quickly silent, seeing Emily's glare intensify.

The man sat down, shame on his face.

She sighed for the millionth time today, made some notes. "Okay. Let's shelve that for later when I don't want to strangle anyone." The analyst ducked his head even deeper.

She took a deep breath, preparing herself for the meat of the meeting.

"Okay. Next… the Merchants and their fucking great idea for a crime." This time she actually smiled a little when Assault laughed out.

It was Miss Militia's turn to give a report. "Apparently their goal was to capture Panacea and trade her for Squealer and Skidmark. Or make her use her power to heal them and make super gang members. Or sell her. Depends really who you ask. As one expects, they weren't really organized."

Emily snorted in derision. "What about the other parahuman with Mush?"

"Chariot. Independent mobility Tinker. Mush hired him to provide wheels for the operation."

"And he accepted?" interjected Dauntless.

"Yeah…"

"Wow, there are some stupid people out there…"

"What about the explosives?" interrupted Emily, hoping to steer the conversation back on track. "Because I saw the specifications, and I'm hundred percent sure that no Merchant is capable to put something like that together."

"Yes, Director. Dragon and I examined them. Standard Toybox fare. Dragon found several of them in Coil's base."

"I see. So more than likely Coil was behind the Merchant action."

"Yes, Director."

"But why?" asked Assault. "He must have known, if he abducted Panacea, everybody would be on him like a fat kid on a cake?"

"We, Dragon and I, and the analyst team," spoke Armsmaster, while nodding with respect towards the analyst's side of the table. "Believe, that the purpose of these actions was to draw out the new parahuman. Watchdog agrees."

The room took a few seconds to digest this news.

"Any idea who the new cape is?" she asked slowly, almost afraid to hear the answer.

Armsmaster answered without missing a beat. "Watchdog gives 67% that it's Serenity."

Just as she expected, she didn't want to hear it. "I thought Serenity was a Tinker/Thinker combo?"

"As you know, Director, we never verified that, so…."

"I see."

"Thank you for the heads up. I'm sure I'll be getting a call about that."

Armsmaster gave her an awkward smile and Assault a supporting thumbs up.

"What about the sisters? Are they alright?" she finally asked.

Miss Militia grimaced, and the stone in her stomach dropped.

"Actually, I got a call from Brandish this morning. They want to put Panacea through M/S screening."

"Why?"

Miss Militia took a deep breath, as if bracing herself before speaking.

"She second triggered."

Another heavy silence filled the room.

"And… why does that necessitate M/S screening?" Emily asked slowly, barely believing what she was hearing.

"Her new power is too different to what she had, they just want to make sure, nothing happened during the event."

"I see. How did Panacea react?"

"She agreed."

"Really?"

"Yes, Director."

"Fine, arrange it," she spoke tiredly. She didn't really care what they wanted, as long as they didn't cause more work for her.

She made another note, quietly mourning her free time, then absentmindedly asked a question. "What's her new power?"

"Wide-area plant manipulation, super strength, self-healing…"

"Wonderful…"

They were going over some minutia; the room filled with the voices of the people. Emily was tired, but she refused to give in. So much hinged on these things that if she failed, the best thing that could happen to her was losing her job.

And she was rather attached to her life, so she wanted to make sure every t was crossed and I dotted.

They just got the news that Dragon picked up Oni Lee.

"Smith!"

"Yes, Sir?"

"Make sure the news of Dragon taking Oni Lee away is leaked to the appropriate people. I don't want Lung at my door."

"Yes, Sir." saluted the agent, and immediately left the room to execute her orders.

She was about to get back to her work when the door banged open and a man came in, breathing deeply. The man stopped, leaned on his knees, and tried to catch his breath.

"Agent, report!" she barked out, inwardly worried about what kind of new hell would rain down onto her and her city.

"Director… Grey Boy… The bubbles…"

Date

2011 February 7th - Monday - Earth Bet Time

"… so both you are okay?" asked Taylor, as she spoke to Vicky through her phone, while she put together the dinner.

"Yes, Taylor. Nobody got hurt, Amy even managed to second trigger!"

She blinked at hearing that. "Were you supposed to tell me that?"

"Eh!" she could practically hear the other girl's shrug. "It's not like it would stay secret for long, plus I trust you. She's got new plant powers! They are super cool!"

"Alright, thank you," she replied with a smile. It was nice hearing that. "What are you guys gonna' do? My dad asked me to stay home for the week, while they clean up."

"Yeah, we are staying low, too. Amy is going to go in for testing, but otherwise, mom wants us to be careful." Then her voice turned comically sad. "No patrol for at least a week."

"Poor Vicky… Can't hit bad people for a week!" she replied cheekily. The reply was only laughter from the other hand.

"Listen, Taylor, it was nice talking to you, and I'm super happy you are alright, but I have to go! Mom wants something…"

"Okay, Vicky. Have fun and say hello to Amy for me!"

"'Key! Bye Tay-Tay!" And with that, she was left with a silent headset. She smiled to herself, put the headset away, and continued to cook the dinner.

Danny and Taylor were finishing dinner when the TV left on in the background blared up. Both of them looked at it, and Taylor couldn't help but feel her mouth open in surprise.

"This is Channel 9, Breaking News! Today we are happy to report that thanks to the tireless work of the Guild, and the Guild Tinker Nero, they managed to negate the time bubbles the infamous criminal, Grey Boy left behind."

The video showed a nondescript facility, with an annoyingly pretty reporter standing in front of it.

"The Time Bubbles were famously collected and brought here to this facility in Montana. As is it is well known, in the past several Tinkers tried to break the bubbles, but none of them succeeded. Well, people, that changed today!"

The video panned to one of Dragon's suits, and several Guild personnel before the reporter continued.

"We don't know yet, in what status the victims are, but Dragon assured us that all of them are alive so those who are related to them are advised to contact the facility through the following number…"

Taylor and Danny watched the full report and even some repeats, both of them entranced by it. Taylor occasionally checked the internet, and it seemed everyone was celebrating.

She snuggled into her dad's side as they sat on the sofa, happy and content.

She didn't notice the smugly smiling Admin floating behind her.