The next day after he had greeted his new lackeys, Tim found himself once again peering towards the mansion owned by the hero Kevin. Not much had changed since his initial visit on the night of the party, with the mansion itself still presenting a lively atmosphere. Must be yet another party, Tim scoffed to himself. I guess that butler wasn’t all that important after all? Disgusting. Beside him in the room, Bert occupied a chair, looking as steady as a rock, and plenty bored.

However, Tim ignored him as this stakeout was vital to his plan. The plan itself was simple. First, find a building facing the mansion, and stake the place out. Find a good time to strike, when Kevin would be unaware, and then time to test his new weapon. Tim gave a little giggle just thinking about it. Well, even if this doesn’t work, I can at least contribute to the book of ‘weapons that don’t hurt heroes’. Mustard gas can go right under swords, spears, and nearly every other non-hero-level weapons. Tim slapped himself, annoyed with his pessimistic thinking. Then, almost as if he could read Tim’s very thoughts, a quiet whisper of a voice drifted out of his front pocket.

“Tim, just remember, remember that my friend, my good friend, can do little to help now. Be careful, so careful.”

Tim peeked down at his pocket. “Yeah, yeah. I know. I figured I’d have to do most of the work for now. Though, that makes me wonder… am I just not worthy or is there some other idiotic trope at work here?”

A scoff immediately met Tim’s whispered question. “No, no. Even for one as great as my friend, my good friend, a hero is too much to fight now. He needs to eat, eat more before a hero can be directly fought.”

Unfortunately, that made sense. Though the rats were more or less successful last time, they did fight a literal army. Their numbers had to be drastically reduced, and the rat king was essentially incapacitated. We couldn’t even kill Elena back then, and she was distracted by that demon at the time. Guess we just got lucky we escaped at all. I know beggars can’t be choosers, and I’m probably safe as long as there are alternative food options, but I’m not even sure if the swarm’s just a hive mind, or some sort of fucked up god. Tim shook his head and shrugged. I suppose that doesn’t really matter right now, there’ll always be time for research later.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

On the other side of the room, Bert leaned in his chair and yawned. He really didn’t want to come with his new boss here, but as his firs- err, second follower, it was his duty. Because after all, he also didn’t want to take the Wavey option. Just remembering that gave the usually hearty dwarf the shivers. Really is a damn shame, I never liked Wavey – what a creep! - but no one deserves to go out like that. Bert automatically prayed to every deity, angel, demon, and in-between that he knew of, thanking them for making him not act like a suicidal dumbass when he opened that door.

A few minutes later, after he had pushed Wavey out of his mind, Bert then followed the usual procedure of doing his damn best to ignore the occasional whispers and almost demented giggles emanating from Tim’s direction. He always failed, of course, but with each giggle and whisper he further cemented in his heart to ‘not fuck with the rat man’.

Once the whispering died down again and Bert could stop pretending not to notice the occasional words, and the strange movements of Tim’s shirt, the boredom came back to a vengeance. Bert let out a silent sigh. He didn’t even know why they were staking out this fancy mansion, or why Tim had given him multiple tin can-looking things, or why he had, in great detail, told him to never drop or open them if he valued his life. All he knew is that after that night in the slums, Tim had commanded that the boys go and pick up some strange alchemy ingredients with the reserve cash and to bring them to the library of all places. The bastard then disappeared with it all and didn’t tell them what to do. Bert had nervously hung around the library for goodness knows how long. He valued his life too much to be unavailable, but it had started up a cold drizzle and Bert’s nose still ran, and he was still irritated.

Still, for being creations of that lunatic, these canisters are surprisingly normal-looking, Bert mused, turning one of the tin canisters over in his hands out of boredom as his natural sense of craftsmanship kicked in. A bit shoddy on the design, probably meant to be consumable or temporary, in fact, it almost looks like they are supposed to break apart. I suppose if you wanted a release mechanism without any need to retrieve the canister, that would do, but its also janky as all hell. With each closer look, Bert unwillingly became more and more intrigued, though he was still careful to not break the flimsy seal Tim had placed on them. He wasn’t that stupid. In the background, a strange noise buzzed, but he ignored – fuck knows what the bastard was up to now - it in favor of studying the strange canister in detail. That is, until a cookie hit him square in the face, bringing his attention straight towards the mildly annoyed face of Tim near a window that was rapidly becoming dark.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Tim stared at the dwarf he had just thrown a cookie at. “Oi, Bert, you listening or what?” He crossed his arms in annoyance.

The dwarf in question immediately jumped up it what seemed to be surprise, shouting “Yes boss! I was just admiring those creations of yours!”

Tim chuckled in appreciation, his annoyance steadily declining. “Well, my short yet sturdy minion, those are surprises that will help us later, and I mean later as in now. How’s your throwing arm?”

The dwarf sucked in his breath, and, after a short pause, gave an uncertain answer. “Well, I ain’t too shabby if I do say so myself… but why ya askin’ boss?”

“Well,” Tim grinned, already imagining what would happen next, “it’s time for phase two of the test. I need you,” Tim pointed towards the dwarf, “to throw those canisters,” he pointed towards the canisters, “towards that mansion where a certain scumbag is in residence,” Tim finished with a dramatic flourish pointing towards the mansion. Bert’s heart sank – little to be gained by attacking a bigwig like that. Bert hesitated, then saw the creepy rat on Tim’s shoulder watching.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Bert stood in front of the window, canisters at the ready. He looked in all directions, noting that he was about two stories up from the ground, across the road from the mansion, and the wind was nearly nonexistent. He tossed one of the canisters lightly in his hand, giving himself a feel for the weight he would have to compensate for with his strength. After he could procrastinate no more and all his preparations were set, he gave the mansion a good stare and said a silent prayer for whoever had pissed off his new boss. Ah, not that I can help it anyways, I’m still getting paid for being in the Blinders, I’m just under new management. As long as little Lotte and Hugo were able to eat enough and go to school, what happens to me doesn’t matter. And with those thoughts steeling his resolve, Bert punched out the fragile glass in the window with his strong left hand, and Bert’s even stronger right arm followed up by throwing each canister one-by-one towards the mansion.

He surveyed his handywork. Yup, still got it. Bert couldn’t help but feel pleased. While he didn’t know what he had just tossed into the mansion, the fact that ten canisters had gone into ten different windows first try gave him some satisfaction.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Tim stood behind Bert and spent no effort in stopping the massive grin from taking over his face. Phase 2 was finished. Now, let’s see some results, Tim thought as he walked up to Bert and peered through the broken window to see a sickly yellowish-greenish gas drifting out of the windows. Yup, that looks like the descriptions, “and that means it’s time to fuck off!” Tim shouted with glee, sprinting out of the room with a startled Bert hot on his heels. It really does suck that I can’t see the full results for fear of personal safety, Tim thought sadly, but I guess I can do some recon later. For now, it is, as the hero Anna said, time to get out of dodge.

“See Bert, we can’t have any contact with that stuff. Even if you feel fine you’ll get strange growths in few years,” Tim said as they ran, and Bert looked at him horrified while on the other side of the street, in the heroes mansion, coughing and hoarse screaming began to ring out towards the streets.