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Chapter 53: Interlude 5-a (The Long Night)

Interlude 5.a (The Long Night)

"Come back for more again? My clients usually can't handle the strain of receiving so many memories," said Cranial.

"Must be good genes," the client said as he walked in the door.

The client, known only by the moniker UnskilledNoob, had first contacted her only a little over a week ago, and arranged to buy some martial arts skills here in the same temporary exhibition area that Toybox was using during their stay in New York.

That Toybox moved every few months was a bit of an annoyance to her, but it was simply their group's method. Never stay too long in one place, lest they come under attack. Tinkers were, after all, highly sought after capes by both villains and heroes.

The downside was that members of Toybox couldn't build up a permanent workshop. Everything had to be mobile. The only exception was Dodge, who kept his workshop in a mobile pocket dimension, which the brat stubbornly refused to provide to anyone, even other members of Toybox. The only pocket dimensions he sold were attached to fix points in space, and moving them was not possible without first shutting them down.

"Not bringing your friends this time?" Cranial asked, noting the lack of the two cape bodyguards that usually came with him.

"We've done this a few times now and you seem like a decent sort. I didn't think it was worth the trouble to bring them along," he said.

"Hm." It was a mistake on his part, but one that Cranial would use well. While she would never do anything obvious that would disrupt her business in the long-term, she was a brain technology Tinker. Operating on the brain required a finesse that most other Tinkers lacked.

She could do things her clients would never notice, just a little nudge here and there, making them more likely to return, to offer up their memories for sale, and more.

"So what skill do you want this time? I should warn you that it could be dangerous. You've had too many memories transferred in too short a time," she said. That part was true. And if he noticed any peculiarities about this session, it could be blamed on his own failure to heed her advice. She had already provided a large amount of skills in martial arts, language, music, sports, sharpshooting, and more. It was far beyond the limit of most capes, even Thinkers, let alone someone who didn't have a Corona Pollentia.

"Well, can you transfer knowledge? The type of thing people learn as university degrees."

"It's possible, but quite difficult. Unlike the skills you've taken so far, that kind of knowledge has a low chance of imprinting properly, especially in long-term memory. I haven't had any clients who were satisfied with the results of that, though it's been asked for frequently."

"Shouldn't you be more eager to sell your services to me, rather than warning me of everything that could go wrong?"

"I try not to make good long-term clients scramble—"

Before she could finish speaking, her thought-interface with her tech suddenly shut down, as did all of the electronics in the workshop.

Then something stabbed into her from behind. She felt a foreign substance being pumped into her bloodstream, just before an excruciating pain flared throughout her body, as if there were a thousand needles stabbing her from the inside out.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a glowing portal being reflected on the metallic walls, with a mass of vines reaching through.

An involuntary scream was cut off by something thick and powerful constricting around her throat.

Her last vision was of the client calmly reaching inside a pocket.

So that's why he didn't come with bodyguards, she realized. He never planned to let her do the operation.

Then everything went dark.

O O O

Outside of Cranial's service room, Pyrotechnical heard the scream before it was silenced.

She took out a comms device and pressed a certain button, which would notify the rest of Toybox.

Then she rushed in to the room, guns raised.

She went through just in time to see Cranial being dragged away through a portal by a mass of vines.

Then her mind went blank as pain overwhelmed her senses.

When the rest of Toybox arrived at the scene, they found Pyrotechnical collapsed on the ground, and there was no trace of Cranial or her client.

O O O

Max Anders, CEO of Medhall, and secretly the cape villain known as Kaiser, leader of the Empire 88, shut the lights and got into bed for the night.

As he laid on the bed, his thoughts went to the invitation he had received from Faultline. A gathering of villains under truce, to discuss what to do about CRUCIBLE.

At first, he scoffed at the time. With two out of three major villain gangs gone from Brockton Bay, his E88 was the only one left.

It wasn't that he didn't see a need to deal with CRUCIBLE, or that he was arrogant enough to think that the E88 was strong enough to fight CRUCIBLE on their own. It was just that, who was left that could come to the proposed meeting at Somer's Rock?

Faultline's Crew was respectable, but other than that, the list of candidates was uninspiring.

The Merchants? A group of drug-addicted fools not worth his time.

The Undersiders? A ragtag team of kids that had no significant accomplishments to their name.

The rest were independents with even less reputation.

Yet, he ultimately found himself considering the idea seriously. Crime had all but disappeared from Brockton Bay in the short span of a week.

The E88's own attempts to seize territory from the vacuum left by the ABB and Coil achieved nothing but lost men in battles against CRUCIBLE's forces.

If it were just the mercenaries that everyone know previously worked for Coil, it wouldn't have been a significant challenge.

But the moment the fighting started, vast hordes of mutant man-sized bugs came crawling out of nowhere. All were Brute and Mover rated, with a wide assortment of other abilities and functions. They came from nearby alleys, from out of the sewers, from rooftops and garbage dumpsters. The quantity was far more than these places could hide, yet still they came, and their numbers seemingly endless.

Any that was cut down was dragged away and possibly replaced, healed, or revived.

There was an uncomfortable itch on his leg, which he scratched.

Their forces had no choice but to retreat every time, with videos of their humiliating defeats spread on the net.

Their illicit businesses had been put to an almost complete stop, and morale was rock bottom. It was a miracle that they hadn't lost any capes, but he had suspicions about whether that was intentional.

He tossed and turned in an attempt to clear his head and get some sleep, trying to ignore the itching. Restless nights had become all too common, and he sometimes jumped at the slightest hint of a mosquito in the air or a cockroach on the ground.

He spared no expense providing insecticide to all his capes and using it liberally everywhere. It was probably not good for his health.

The itch spread to his other leg, and he growled in annoyance. It was just a phantom sensation, he assured himself. There were no bugs in his room. He'd made sure of that after several nights of restlessness.

As if confirming his assurances to himself, his thoughts soon became hazy and he welcomed the peace of incoming sleep.

Then a portal opened beside the bed, and several man-sized bugs came through to drag him away. He remained blissful unconscious throughout.

Stormtiger was staying up late to oversee the shipment of new high quality drugs, which were one of the few black market businesses the E88 could still engage in. The subtle nature of their smuggling and low-key transactions with wealthy clients had managed to escape CRUCIBLE's surveillance for now.

Goods were being smuggled into Brockton Bay as part of Medhall's chemical supplies, then routed to E88 social clubs, delivered to clients in private rooms.

Stormtiger was in an E88 hideout as goods were brought in, keeping a sheet of air around himself so as to prevent bugs from getting to him, even after their hideouts were saturated with insecticide.

But these precautions were proven insufficient when small portals opened across the hideout, dropping off agony bombs.

Then everyone inside was quietly dragged away.

Victor and Othala had just reached the climax of their late night adult activities when their pleasure turned to sheer agony.

Krieg was watching TV when insecticide-resistant bugs swarmed onto him. He put up only a token resistance against the powerful sedatives before succumbing.

Hookwolf was holding a dog fight when Soldier bugs attacked en masse, knockout gas spraying everywhere into the audience. The villain shifted to wolf blade form immediately and shrugged off the effects of both the sedative and the agony bombs, slaughtering his way through the Soldier bugs and regenerating his blades immediately when they were destroyed.

His valiant fight was not to last, however, as combat drones entered the fight and sprayed him down with containment foam.

Hookwolf was hauled off through a portal while CRUCIBLE soldiers rounded up the audience for delivery to the BBPD.

Similar scenes played out across the city as all E88 members fell under attack almost simultaneously.

O O O

Tattletale smirked mischievously at Faultline on the opposite couch. "So you finally need the help of a true Thinker?"

"Don't play coy, Tattletale. Whatever differences we may have had in the past, they don't matter anymore. This is bigger than all of us," said Faultline.

"Maybe. But what's your stake in it? I don't think self-defense is your main motivation here," Tattlesaid said, giving a meaningful look to Grue.

"What you're talking about is a full alliance…preparing for a war. This isn't something we can get involved in lightly. It's not the type of thing our team does. If we're to…consider something like that, I think we need to make sure that we're really on the same side, that we have the same goals," said Grue, speaking with some difficulty. The overwhelming insect repellant in the room was suffocating.

Faultline considered him for a moment.

"Coil hired us to investigate Polychromic. But before we got anything useful, he cancelled the contract. Then he was captured. While I have no affection for the man, I did respect Coil's competence. For him to suddenly cancel the contract suggests that he was compromised long before he was captured. The most likely explanation is that Polychromic silenced him in secret. If so, then we may be the next targets." Faultline then took out a piece of paper with a diagonal Greek omega symbol on it. "Moreover, Coil identified a link to this organization, and that's something we have an interest in."

"I was expecting us to have a much harder time getting you to tell us that," Tattletale said suspiciously.

"Like I said, this is bigger than all of us. I don't have a choice. We have to work together to stand a chance. Already, they've placed the entire city under surveillance and destroyed two gangs in a matter of weeks. Their enforcers are everywhere and the bugs react within minutes to any crime. Even if CRUCIBLE doesn't come for us, we'd be out of business soon, as clients can't risk trying to hire us anymore with the surveillance everywhere. People are scared, Tattletale. So am I. The only way out is to leave the city…but I don't think they'll let us go quietly."

"You're serious. You really think CRUCIBLE is that dangerous," Tattletale said.

"It would take a fool not to realize that."

"I can't argue with that. But I'm not sure what we can do about it. I think they could have gotten us already. I'm pretty sure this bug repellant doesn't actually work on Skitter's modified bugs, you know? Only the regular ones," said Tattletale.

"Labyrinth is blocking the bugs in her zone." Said cape was currently sitting on the couch beside Faultline, apparently not paying any attention to the conversation.

"But we don't have that option. They could have gotten us before we came here, if they wanted to. If we join this alliance, wouldn't we be making ourselves into a target?" Grue said. "For now, CRUCIBLE has limited themselves to responding to actual crimes taking place."

"So you're just going to sit and wait until it's your turn?"

"No, but we can't agree to anything without a concrete plan. Polychromic is even more dangerous than you know," said Grue. He gestured to Tattletale.

"Consider this our own show of goodwill, for telling us that tidbit about Coil hiring you. We were there on that first fight when CRUCIBLE fought Lung. Polychromic knew how that fight was going to go. I'm pretty sure he's a precog. You may not know this, but Coil was a precog too. The strongest one I'd ever heard of. Then Polychromic beat him and somehow took over his whole organization practically overnight. You were right about Coil being compromised long before he was 'officially' captured. That whole Bakuda meeting? It wasn't Coil who showed up. It was a just a ploy to provide a public cover for Coil's organization being subsumed. They couldn't use the mercs in public until Coil was officially out of the picture," said Tattletale.

"And if he's a precog, that means it's not even the bugs we should be worried about. Whatever we decide to do, they'll know before we do it even if there aren't any bugs around. We were taking a big risk just to talk to you," Grue said.

"Then we need a precog of our own. Or a precog blocker."

"Except the whole city has been sealed off. Nobody can get in without CRUCIBLE's permission," said Tattletale.

"The whole city? I thought those were just rumors. I saw the videos of E88 fighting the bugs but to seal off the entire city would mean they must have hundreds of those things."

"That's probably low-balling it. The Teeth tried their luck earlier today when Spree and Animos came. It didn't work out for them. They were met by CRUCIBLE's forces at the border. Since then, both of them have disappeared, probably captured by CRUCIBLE."

"Animos too? That's the one with the power-nullifying roar. How did they defeat him? And how do you know about this?"

"I have some sources with the PRT. Animos' roar doesn't nullify anything Araliac already created, and apparently it doesn't nullify Skitter's bug control either when she's commanding them through a booster bug. I don't think they even noticed his roar did anything. That, or they used Cricket to counter the roar somehow. Officially, Cricket is still missing after she was captured by Coil, but…"

"Booster bug?"

"Oh, that's the name the PRT gave to a hypothetical bug Araliac is thought to have made for her that expands the range of her Master power. It's how she managed to cover the whole city. Her range wasn't that crazy before. With all her new bugs and the huge boost in range, her PRT rating's been upgraded from Master 5 to 10, with potential to be 12 if her range keeps expanding without limit. Impossible to contain, you see. The PRT would probably flip if they realized that CRUCIBLE has a lot more bugs in reserve than the ones garrisoning the city. They've been building up forces somewhere else and have a way to continuously ship in reinforcements."

There was a moment of silence as Faultline's Crew digested the information.

"Hey, sorry if this sounds stupid, but why don't we just leave? I think we have a pretty decent chance against the bugs, with me 'n' Gregor's chemicals. We've got Labyrinth too, and she's pretty damn powerful," said Newter. "If it's just to break out of the city, shouldn't be too hard, right?"

"There's nothing stopping CRUCIBLE from coming after us even after we leave the city," said Faultline. "Though I admit that is becoming a more attractive option by the day."

"Shit! We're under attack!" Tattletale suddenly yelled as she noticed the sound of something metallic dropping on the floor.

The next moment Fautline, Tattletale, Grue, Labyrinth, Bitch, and Spitfire all collapsed screaming.

The small portals which dropped agony bombs closed, then much large portals opened shortly after. Soldier bugs poured through and rushed towards the downed capes. Bitch roared a command to her dogs as she struggled back up. "Hurt!"

Newter and Gregor shrugged off the agony bombs with their Case 53 unique biologies, and dashed to intercept the bugs from reaching their downed teammates.

The room was erupted into an intense melee as the dogs and two Case 53s fought madly against the hordes.

Regent seized control of his teammates' bodies by force and plunged the room into darkness with Grue's power.

That turned out to be a mistake as the bugs were barely affected, while Newter and Gregor both cursed as the bugs overwhelmed them in that moment of disruption.

The Undersiders, under Regent's control, barely took two steps when the bugs reached them and spat globs of sticky liquid onto them, halting their escape.

Bitch's dogs were dead within seconds as the Brute rated Dung Beetle Soldier Bugs attacked with reckless abandon, and the acid sprayers blasted their acid without bothering to account for friendly fire as the bugs were all expendable.

The whole club room morphed into a white room with blood stains on the walls, corpses and skeletons scattered about on hospital beds. The portals disappeared cutting off the tide of bugs.

The darkness was removed and blocked from Labyrinth's zone as flashing strobe lights replaced it.

Terrible screeches and mad laughter could be heard in the distance, and the ground exploded at several points, releasing noxious fumes.

The walls erupted and lava poured in.

Large numbers of bugs were destroyed, but somehow the destruction perfectly missed the capes.

The skeletons suddenly moved as if alive and started to fight the remaining bugs, which had lost their connection to their master and were attacking indiscriminately.

The strobing lights disappeared, replaced by torches on the parts of the walls that weren't broken as the walls shifted to old and decaying stone. The lava coalesced and formed into humanoid monsters roaring their rage.

"Labyrinth, snap out of it!" Newter shouted from his position on the ground, heavily injured and unable to move.

The Shaker 12 kept screaming with wide eyes as if she didn't hear him.

"What the fuck is this horror movie shit?" Regent shouted. He and the rest of the Undersiders were trapped by the sticky goo from the bugs.

"This is the bad place! We've got to snap Labyrinth out of it before it gets really bad!" Gregor replied.

"How the hell are we supposed to do that when we can't even move?" Regent asked.

"Fuck!" Newter screamed as the torches blew out amidst a malevolent laughter, that was suddenly much closer than it was before.

The whole area was plunged back into darkness. Then a pair of baleful red eyes appeared above them. One pair turned into two, then ten, then a hundred, and a thousand.

The red eyes seemed to glow in the dark, and the capes found themselves just barely able to see each other again, but the unconscious members of their group were missing.

Tattletale groaned as she recovered from the agony, and blinked her eyes open. Then she shrieked hysterically upon seeing what was around her.

Shadowy tendrils wrapped around the capes and lifted them into the air, even as Labyrinth continued to scream.

The laughter returned while interspersed with "It's TiME fOor YoUr mEDicIne!", the voice repeating like a broken record.

The dark tendrils around each cape grew enormous syringes the size of a child's arm, and stabbed them into the capes over and over, eliciting screams from their victims.

Half a minute later, their screams died down, and the tendrils, eyes, and laughter seemed to retreat, leaving them in darkness again.

"Shit…is it over?" Regent asked.

"…this isn't real…this isn't real…!" Tattletale whimpered.

"It sure as hell feels real!" Newter said with a groan. "I'm pretty sure whatever happens to us here isn't just going to go away when we get out."

"You mean if we get out," Gregor's voice responded in the dark. "It's never been this bad before."

"Guys, hang on for a few more minutes, then I might be able to do something about it with my power," said Regent.

Then Tattletale shrieked again as she felt something slimy wrapping around her limbs.

The darkness receded to reveal that she was still in a dungeon, hanging above a murky, bubbling dark gold pond.

Labyrinth was trapped in some kind of bubble floating in the air.

Everyone else was nowhere to be seen.

Great gelatinous protrusions of flesh grew from the pond. They were protoplasmic self-luminous things of flowing flesh like dark slime.

From the flesh grew formed and unformed temporary eyes whose pupils rotated languidly, searching for the living, staring at her.

"Labyrinth! Wake up! Please! You have to wake up!" Tattletale shouted to the other girl. No response.

The cloudy pond underneath the flesh twisted and formed massive crystalline faces in a mockery of life.

She sank slowly towards the surface, dragged by the fleshy amoeba-like appendages.

"Oh no—no—no! Labyrinth, why? No—please—"

Tattletale's cries were soon reduced to muffled whimpers, chokes, and then silence.

O O O

At the CRUCIBLE Earth M2 comms room, video feeds showed the wall of darkness rapidly expanding out from the Palanquin, a thick veil of miasma obscuring everything within from sight, with the occasional massive tentacle lashing out to destroy nearby buildings, earth-shattering roars resounding throughout Brockton Bay.

"What just happened? I lost the connection with my bugs in there," said Skitter.

"Dimensional anomaly is interfering with signal transmission. Unable to generate new portals in target area," said Offensive Bias.

"Seems like Labyrinth's work. I didn't know it could create animated beings," Polychromic said.

Araliac's voice transmitted over comms. "I've finished processing the E88. What's the status with Faultline's Crew and the Undersiders?"

"Well, we've run into a bit of a problem. Best if you come over and see for yourself."

A portal opened and Araliac stepped through.

"…what is that?"

"Something we can't keep. But let's see what we can do about it first. Bias, deploy the dimensional flattening bombs with the planet-side missile system."

"6 Series B Dimensional Flattener warheads prepared. T-15 to launch."

Shortly after, hypersonic missiles were launched from the M2 base's silos through portals which opened in the Earth Bet stratosphere, within range of shard powers, and continued towards Brockton Bay.

When contact was made with Labyrinth's zone, the area was forced back to normal—almost. The Palanquin was wrecked with a mishmash of stone rubble, active fires, and hospital beds that weren't supposed to be there. Giant insect body parts and various fluids were strewn all over the wreckage. Faultline's Crew and the Undersiders were lying unconscious among the ruins.

"So Bakuda's anti-portaling bombs also work on powers like Labyrinth's. Good. Close the timeline and report back to me Calvert."

Back in the real world, Thomas Calvert reported the proceedings to the CRUCIBLE leaders, and they revised the planned operation to capture Faultline's Crew and the Undersiders before trying again.

O O O