8

Initialization 1.8

Miss Militia's energy turned into a gun I didn't recognize and pointed towards the direction of where Araliac's shot came from. She moved back and took cover as she looked around.

I saw with Agate that Araliac was back in hiding. Skitter never came out of hiding as she could direct her bugs without line of sight.

"Miss Militia, this is Polychromic! This is a misunderstanding. Velocity attacked me because I was holding Lung hostage and my teammates retaliated by accident. We called in earlier about capturing Lung. We are heroes," I called out from my spot on the ground, looking to defuse the situation. Miss Militia was obviously waiting for PRT troop backup, and not foolishly attacking into a possible ambush that took out both Oni Lee and Velocity.

She looked towards where I was foamed and helpless on the ground.

"Polychromic? How do I know that it's you? You never registered with the PRT so we can't identify you. And how do I know the call wasn't a trick?" she answered back.

"Miss Militia, you can confirm this with our actions. I have not fought back myself despite being hit with containment foam. Araliac and Skitter can come out in the open and they will not attack you. We will explain the sequence of events which led to our current situation," I replied.

There was no response for almost half a minute.

Finally, when the sound of two PRT vans driving up from behind her reached me, she responded. "Very well. Don't make any sudden moves."

"It's alright Araliac, Skitter! You can come out! We should cooperate with the PRT," I called loudly.

And so they slowly moved out into the open beside me as Miss Militia and armed PRT troopers moved in formation towards us.

The PRT forces kept their guns pointed at us and only stopped when we were surrounded completely. Then a portion of their troops went to secure the ABB and Velocity. A couple of PRT troops came to hold me upright.

"Alright, so what happened here?" Miss Militia asked me.

"Skitter, you were here first, maybe you can start from the beginning before we arrived," I redirected to her.

Attention shifted to Skitter, who was tense and curt.

"I was patrolling the area when I noticed a group of ABB. I snuck up and kept hidden, watching them for a bit from the rooftops. Then I overheard Lung ordering them to kill kids. I did a bit of research before online…I knew Lung was strong and I probably wouldn't be able to beat him. But they were planning to kill kids…I had to do something. So I gathered my bugs and attacked," she narrated.

"Your power is to control bugs?" asked Miss Militia.

"Yes. Insects, mosquitoes, spiders, all of them. I sent my swarm to cover the ABB members and start biting," Skitter answered.

"Are there any limits to your power? Range, number of bugs controlled?" Miss Militia asked.

I cut in before Skitter could answer. "Skitter, you don't have to answer that, just so you know. Independent heroes have the right to privacy on the limits of their powers. The PRT will appreciate knowing because it helps in coordinating our efforts and you might also benefit from power-testing with their experts, but ultimately the choice is yours. It's not a crime to keep your weaknesses secret if you don't feel comfortable exposing that. You could also go in by yourself later if you don't want Araliac and I to know. We won't be offended."

Miss Militia gave me an unreadable look. After a while, Skitter spoke up, "I think I would like to keep it to myself for now, then. Sorry."

"I understand, we will respect your choice. Power-testing is something we offer at any time to independent heroes. All you have to do is schedule an appointment, and we will have our experts help. Many Protectorate heroes have discovered new things about their powers that way. The Wards also get much more support and training, if you decided to join," Miss Militia explained calmly.

Skitter nodded.

"Please continue then."

"It seemed to go well at first. Their unpowered members were going down, and I was hurting Lung. But he grew armor and started to regenerate from the bites. So then I went for weak points on his body and used venoms. It didn't seem to do much. Then he exploded with fire and all the bugs around him died. I tried to get more bugs on him after that but they were just getting killed by the fire. Eventually I decided I couldn't win and was just about to leave. But then he heard me. He has superhuman hearing," Skitter described the fight, and paused briefly.

"Yes, when Lung grows he gets many superhuman senses. He is a very difficult opponent," Miss Militia added.

"He immediately came after me, jumping up and grappling on the wall to climb toward the roof. Right when his head came over the roof, I sprayed his eyes with pepper spray. And then…" Skitter trailed and looked towards me.

"That's when we arrived. We were already in the area and came running as fast as we could run when we noticed a fight going on. We saw Skitter blinding Lung and rushed to stop him from getting over the roof to reach Skitter, using guns we picked up from the fallen ABB on the way. Lung tried to get us with fire but we dodged and kept moving. Then I taunted him until he came after me on the ground, and Araliac and I defeated him with a special anaesthetic. Lung was significantly weakened by Skitter's attack and went down fast," I succinctly replied, glossing over details.

"I see. That's no small accomplishment. Especially for new heroes. And this was your first time going out as heroes?" Miss Militia looked at all three of us.

"Yes," Skitter said.

"That's correct," said.

"And Polychromic and Araliac, you two are a new team, but this was the first time you met Skitter?" Miss Militia asked.

"That's right."

She nodded back.

"Then you called the PRT. Now what happened with Oni Lee and Velocity?"

"At first, we were just waiting for you to come but nobody came after five minutes even when the operate said you were already in the area," I paused deliberately, hoping she might explain why.

"I got the call from headquarters but on our way we noticed traces of ABB. So we moved cautiously. We discovered an ABB group led by Oni Lee hiding in the area. We had to go after them first. We chased them here," she explained.

I nodded to her thankfully.

"We noticed your fight as well. When we realized it was Oni Lee, we developed a plan to use Lung as bait to ambush him. Skitter's bugs tracked him as he got closer, and when he arrived with Velocity, I held Lung hostage to distract Oni Lee. I pretended to be highly stressed and could shoot at any time to make Oni Lee hesitate. Then Skitter and Araliac took the opening to finish him off by coordinating a bug and anaesthetic spray attack. At that point, I dropped the act with Lung but Velocity didn't realize my ruse so he tried to subdue me and remove me from Lung. I knew he was just doing his job so I didn't resist being foamed. I shouted to clear the misunderstanding but he was moving too fast, then Skitter and Araliac retaliated, taking him down," I explained. I spoke as I was capable of resisting being foamed. I couldn't, but I also didn't resist.

"Do you have any proof of this? That it was only a ruse to defeat Oni Lee?" Miss Militia asked.

"I do. I have recordings of the fights tonight, including when we planned the operation against Oni Lee. These will be uploaded online as part of our team debut video," I said.

Miss Militia stiffened. "Are you still recording?"

"Yes," I bluntly answered.

"This is an ongoing PRT investigation. You can't be recording this, please turn off your recording devices," she ordered.

"I apologize. I would comply with your request, but as you can see, I can physically indisposed at the moment. I'm afraid that if I remain indisposed, the recordings will go live automatically in the morning." I answered nonchalantly. I was going to edit the video and make ourselves look incredible first, but if the PRT captured me, this was my get-out-of-jail card. They would have to release me or risk getting public outrage over unjust treatment of the heroes that defeated Lung and Oni Lee, who were clearly cooperating with the PRT to the best of their ability.

Miss Militia excused herself for a minute before coming back and ordering the PRT troopers to defoam me.

"Thank you," I turned off the recording devices. For now.

Miss Militia ran her eyes over the three of us in a measuring gaze. Velocity was still out cold and would stay that way for a while because Araliac wasn't going to reveal her powers.

"I understand. Velocity was hasty in attacking you, then. However, by law he was within rights to disarm you, having seen you threatening to kill someone without a kill order, even if he was a criminal. As he was already defeated, it wouldn't be considered self-defense," Miss Militia finally judged.

"I don't blame him. I had to play the role properly to convince and distract Oni Lee. It just worked a little too well," I admitted.

"Still, even if it was in your defense, Araliac and Skitter attacked a member of the Protectorate while he was performing his duty. I'm going to have to ask you three to come in with me to PRT headquarters to report to the Director, and she will have to decide what to do," she decided.

Araliac turned to look at me.

"But I have school tomorrow, I have to get back home," Skitter protested.

'I think I figured something out from Lung and Miss Militia's powers! I should be able to generate parallel dimension portals after five more hours!' Agate cut in with a mental message.

'Good work!' I thought back. Two days were just saved, that certainly was a breakthrough. Now the question was, would we need additional equipment/resources to do it? And would we have fine control over the portals or would they be like Professor Haywire's in their permanency?

'I'm not sure yet. I don't think we'll need any more equipment to do it, I should be enough by myself. But making temporary portals or closing a portal might be a bit harder,' Agate assessed.

"Sorry, but rules are rules," Miss Militia answered sadly.

Miss Militia's cloud of energy was subdued as she spoke to us but it was still clearly visible. Her power was to manifest weapons from that energy, and corresponded to her emotions at times. It would cycle through various weapons at times of high stress with no direct input from her. So despite her calm attitude she was clearly still ready for a fight if we were to forcefully resist this unofficial arrest.

"Araliac and I will come with you," I agreed after pretending to think about it for a bit. A meeting with Piggot was exactly what I needed…this would increase the chances of success for the next operation to complete the isolation and recruitment of Skitter, which was my primary objective tonight. It would be a little dangerous considering the search for Panacea, but I believed they would be cautious of attacking me immediately. If I really was a Master, they would be putting themselves at risk by making the wrong move with no information about my powers. One peaceful meeting was all I needed. They at least had to entertain the unwritten rules and respect that we were supposedly heroes for now. They couldn't just come out and say Araliac was Panacea without substantial proof, of her identity as well as her being Mastered. Her "crimes" against the Dallons were nowhere near significant enough to be breaking those unwritten rules yet.

With that, Skitter slumped in resignation and we moved into the PRT van.

On the way, Miss Militia decided to continue pressing us for information.

"I'm surprised three new independent heroes appeared in one night. That doesn't happen often," she remarked from her bench opposite of us, sitting in between two PRT troopers.

"Araliac and I have been active for a while," I knew that anything we said might be recorded for Armsmaster's analysis later, so I was carefully choosing my words. "Active" and "a while" was suitably vague and suggestive. "We just didn't go out until tonight. Only fools start a career fighting dangerous criminals without proper preparation."

Miss Militia nodded. "You're right, of course. Many young heroes unfortunately don't recognize that and go out at the first opportunity."

She looked between Araliac and I. "If you don't mind me asking, what are your powers?"

I hadn't told her about my scouting abilities in my after action report. Instead, I had merely stated that we noticed it was Oni Lee Skitter sent her bugs to track him, allowing her to assume that Skitter detected them. In reality, Skitter's powers at this point weren't developed enough to process the visual and auditory signals from her bugs cleanly, so she didn't identified the combatants, but they wouldn't know that.

"Sorry but we do mind. It's better to keep as much of our powers secret as possible. It's better for us if villains don't know why they're losing," I said quickly.

"That's true, but I don't think anyone here is going to tell the villains, and knowing your powers, even just the basics, is how we can identify you," she argued calmly. Miss Militia was a true patriot. You could tell by the American flag motif on her scarf and costume.

"I'm sure you won't tell the villains Miss Milita. Sadly, PRT information networks are compromised. The major villains in this city have access to everything you do. I know you're going to write a threat assessment on all of us, and when you do, their spies will have it too," I brazenly declared.

Skitter looked over at me, perhaps in surprise.

Miss Militia eyes narrowed at me. "Compromised? And how would you know this?"

"I can't tell you. This van might be bugged right now," I said while deliberately shifting my head slightly towards the two PRT troopers. I was expecting Coil to be listening in even as we spoke.

"What I can tell you is this. Your networks are compromised. And not just by hackers. You've got infiltrators in your midst, some with significant authority in the organization. And if Armsmaster reviews a recording of this conversation with his lie-detector software, he'll know I'm telling the truth," I added. It wasn't certain that any such recording existed, but since this was the inside of a van, it only made sense. The most powerful part of this statement however, was the mere fact that I knew of Armsmaster's software. Very few people knew about that.

Everything I said was indeed true besides. Coil was a supervillain that literally was in the PRT, and he had substantial authority even. He some kind of important consultant and had the title of Commander in the field. Then there was Cauldron, who had a couple of capes in the local Protectorate. Triumph, the mayor's son had gotten his powers from a cauldron vial, but I didn't know if he spied for Cauldron. Battery, on the other hand, I knew was in league with them.

I heard a hitched breath from my side. I expected Skitter to be listening carefully. This was partly for her benefit. It would also help if I began proving more of my claims to Araliac.

Miss Militia's eyes widened.

"How did you—never mind. You're serious about this. But how could this have happened? We have very strict Master/Stranger protocols and comprehensive security reviews to weed out infiltrators," she said with worry.

"And if they know what your protocols are, or worse yet, wrote the protocols themselves?" I challenged her.

She was silent for the rest of our trip.