The days ticked by without much happening. Jumpspark had told Lucy about the gyms that he knew about, but the young girl had backed out of getting a gym membership after dithering over it all weekend. Consequently, she still didn’t know how strong she was. Instead, Lucy’s weekend had been spent in her room, mindlessly checking updates in her feed, and spending a lot of time by herself.

Jumpspark hadn’t said much since Friday, which Lucy understood. She’d basically signed up with the villains he used to fight, and there wasn’t a thing he could do. Not about it, or anything at all. There had been some small talk, but that had been limited to updates regarding Liam’s missing person’s case. So far it had been gaining traction, but was far from headline news.

That would probably change when the Sentry revealed that Jumpspark had gone missing. Neither the hero in question or Lucy knew why that hadn’t already happened.

School went the same as it had the day after Lucy’s blue vial had been denied to her, but with the added benefit of not having Gracia approach her. She was still around, but Lucy didn’t pay her any mind. The periods rolled by, and then the afternoons, and then it was Wednesday.

“hey” “lucy”

The sudden hissing in her ear made Lucy flinch and almost fall over. “Jeez, Liam!” She hissed back. “You scared me.” The mostly dressed girl looked down at herself, and quickly started buttoning up her blouse. “And wait until I’m dressed next time.”

“this is far from the most indecent i’ve seen of you” Liam deadpanned. Lucy had started calling him by his name at some point over the weekend.

“Well that’s because when you’re a crossbow, I forget that you were a boy.” She shot back, gesturing in between working on two buttons. It was true though. When she was left to her own devices or stayed inside all day, Lucy tended to let her clothes become disheveled. She definitely didn’t move about her room naked anymore.

“i wanted to ask you something” The hissed words came slowly and measured. Lucy slowed down on her buttons, giving him more attention. “do you live here by yourself”

Lucy’s eyebrows twitched towards a frown. “Not anymore, I guess.”

“you guess” Liam repeated. “what about the man that comes back after ten and leaves before six” “he barely sleeps enough and doesn’t stick around to eat”

“He doesn’t.” Lucy agreed with a touch of melancholy. “That’s dad. He works a lot. I like him.”

Liam’s next question didn’t come right away. “i’ve noticed you also come back here before four every day”

“Really?” Lucy asked.

“like clockwork”

“Huh.” Lucy looked out the window. “I guess I’m just like him then.”

“what about your mom”

“She works out of town. Hopefully she actually takes a break this weekend.” She was supposed to do that last weekend. “Her job had an unexpected number of reshooting needed, or something.”

“then i guess the question i want to ask is if you have anybody you speak to” “that is, other than me” Liam added after a moment. When Lucy said nothing, he was the one to break the silence. “do you seriously have no friends”

Rather than answer, Lucy resumed gathering her things for school. Her mask and crowbar were hidden in her wardrobe, and Liam’s frame had found a spot on a high shelf where the strange wire wasn’t immediately obvious. When she was done and on her way out the door, Lucy looked back at the crossbow on the shelf.

“I had friends.” She said. “It didn’t work out.” Then she closed the door before that conversation could go on anymore.

For the first time she didn’t look forward to returning to that room after another day at school. Circumstances however had different ideas about how Lucy’s Wednesday was going to go. A familiar face was waiting outside her first class, and it wasn’t Gracia.

Hanna’s dark hair was more unkempt than usual, as though it had been purposefully styled that way, and only just kept tamed by a hair tie that half of the hair had already escaped from. Her simple grey tee was half tucked into her shorts, and the socks were colourfully mismatched. Although they were put on haphazardly, everything on Hanna was spectacularly clean. The only part Lucy recognised of the other girl was the colour and shape of her face, and even that was altered by bags under the eyes.

When she saw Hanna, Lucy altered her path to skirt around her, but the other girl was clearly there to find her. When Lucy realised that meant a conversation, indecision gripped her, and then Hanna was right in front of her.

“Hey spine, any hard feelings you need to air?” Hanna demanded, right in the middle of the hallway.

Lucy glanced to the sides, aware that people were watching. Mostly because they were annoyed at the two girls standing still in a high traffic area.

This ambush is not malicious, oh student mine.

“No.” Lucy decided. “You didn’t owe me anything. You weren’t the one that did it.”

“Huh. Reasonable.” Hanna’s fingers tapped and scratched at the cloth above her pockets. “Good too. For you. Got thinking about everything and realised you got a short deal. Might be able to, I dunno, consolation prize?”

She’s an adept. Lucy remembered. The bottle of The Adept’s Oil had gone with Hanna. She tried to think about why somebody with the power of invention would be approaching her. “Consolation prize as a test subject?”

“Shit, you’re right.” Hanna said immediately, eyes darting around accusatorily. “But be quiet about it, will ya?”

“What’s your focus?” Lucy asked.

“I said quiet!” Hanna hissed. “Not the place.”

“People will only listen in if they sense gossip.” Lucy said, paraphrasing one of Gracia’s lessons. She paused to sort out the complicated feelings that arose, affecting an evaluation of Hanna’s appearance to cover it up. “And boys will only care if we’re dressed sexy. I’d say you’re about here.” She wobbled a hand level with the ground. “Just don’t shout it to the world.”

“Hah?” Hanna sounded as though she hadn’t followed.

“Your legs are what I’d say is the most distracting about you right now.” Lucy said. “Real disheveled look going on. If you want to minimise it, pull your socks up, but not all the way. Let them stay wrinkled a bit. People get weird about socks when they’re all the way down, all the way up, or if just one is up while the other is down. I’ve seen less about mostly pulled up socks.”

Lucy received a hard stare for her trouble. “What?”

Just what I saw on the internet. She thought sourly. “Forget it. Your offer, what about it?”

Even though Lucy had said to forget it, Hanna still half crouched and pulled her socks up to how Lucy had suggested. It kind of had the intended effect. “The fuck are you doing judging clothes when you’re dressed like that?”

“I dress comfortably.” Lucy said. “My mom taught me that the clothes make the woman. Since I wanted to be confident, and that comes from a place of comfort, and no doubt, I dressed comfortably.”

“You dress like a prude.”

Lucy ignored the flicker of irritation that arose. Even if her tendency to wear long sleeved clothes without cleavage meant that was true, she wasn’t going to admit that here. Her dressing to cover the marks of Jumpspark’s power hadn’t involved changing much.

“Are you going to get to the point, Hanna?” She asked tiredly. “You have your thing, and I was denied mine. You including me anyway is an enticing thought, and is the only reason I’m still here. But I’m not looking for friends from that avenue. It’s a thoroughly burnt bridge.”

“Look, it’s difficult to explain. So stop being a wordy bitch and give me a minute.” Hanna hissed.

Lucy gave her a flat look in return, then jerked her head towards class. “Tell me inside. Class is starting soon.” She started walking but Hanna didn’t follow.

“That’s not my class.”

“It’s not.” Lucy agreed.

“You’re different.” Hanna stated.

“Meeting Tyr will do that.” Lucy deflected. “Mr Gardener won’t give a shit if someone new is in his class so long as you don’t start something. If you just walk out, he’ll ask after you. I definitely won’t rat you out in that event.”

Hanna frowned at her, not that it was much different from how she’d been the entire conversation. “I thought I asked you to stop being a wordy bitch.”

After lingering eye contact for another few seconds, Lucy turned and walked into class, purposefully stopping herself from shrugging. By the time she sat down in the back, Hanna had followed her in. One of the five empty seats around her was then taken by the suspected Genius.

“So?” Lucy asked before Hanna could really open her mouth.

Hanna’s answer didn’t come right away, so Lucy watched her from the corner of her eye as the other girl tapped her fingers on the desk and rubbernecked at seemingly random places in the room. Whatever she was looking for, Lucy didn’t know. She spent a fair twenty seconds looking out the window, and all that was out there was the rest of the school, but mostly it was sky. In the end Lucy got her relevant workbooks out and settled down to wait.

“Emitters.” Hanna said eventually. They had been the first inside, but two more students had sat down by the time Hanna’s answer came. “That’s the best I can put it.”

“And what is it that these emitters emit?” Lucy prompted.

“I don’t have a goddamn clue what to call it.” Hanna said, frustrated. “It’s not like I’ve had an abundance of opportunities to test this shit out. I like not having heroes busting down my door, and I need to settle a score with a Big Dog.”

“Not a Bad Dog?”

“Nah. You know what I’m doing here? Coming to you with an offer to do cool shit with a power, right? Imagine that cool shit was actually terrifying. Now make the offer one that you can’t refuse. Not because it’s too good to pass up or blackmail or whatever, but power. Cerberus did me wrong. That’s all I’m saying.”

Lucy arched an eyebrow, remembering Hanna mentioning something like that back on Thursday. Wonder what she’d think if she knew about Issey. Her first fight wasn’t until Saturday, and it was a debut fight so it probably wouldn’t be all that impressive. To others, that was. Lucy was just looking forward to being in a fight again. The feeling she’d got beating down that drunk refused to be forgotten.

Hanna continued, heedless of Lucy’s inner thoughts. “So a little background, I got this power to get back at that bitch. She has the power to make shit of energy, right? Make ‘em move around and explode or whatever.”

“Combust.” Lucy corrected. Cerberus’ power failed to produce any shockwaves worth noticing.

“Or whatever.” Hanna repeated firmly. “So I wanted something to really make her eat dirt, but the stuff that I got just emits Something that should let me hack into the wifi. And I have a compulsive need to hide things now. I’m a fucking broadband company hiding my cell towers now, and I’m pretty sure some of the stuff I could make would give off actual cancer making bullshit.”

Lucy leaned back, taking that all in. “The internet’s gonna love you.”

“What?”

“So how can I help?” Lucy asked. “I hope whatever you say doesn’t have anything to do with that… cancer stuff.”

“Shit, is this how thank thanks strung you along?” Hanna asked back, making Lucy frown. “You just basically said yes without arguing about it. Do you need a hug That badly?”

“No. I don’t need a hug.” Lucy said. “Thank thanks?”

“Gracias Gracia.” Hanna said, eyeing two boys that just walked in. Lucy followed her gaze, and deduced that Hanna was interested in the wireless headphones one was wearing. “Winds her up and she can’t even argue because I’m not saying Gracie.” She shook her head. “What I need… is a place I can do things. My home isn’t just my home. If I do my stuff there, I’ll be found out and shipped off to the Sentry in LA or something, miss my chance to settle the score.”

Lucy leaned her head on a hand, watching the more frequent flow of students walking in as she thought it over. She had a lot of house to herself most of the time, which would be pretty much exactly what Hanna was asking after. Not only that, the basement was her mom’s workshop during the fleeting times that she was home. It was well stocked, mostly with art supplies, and would probably need a dusting.

Had needed a dusting. Lucy had spent an afternoon down there cleaning up before spending twenty minutes applying paint to her new mask. It looked more fierce now, but that was neither here nor there.

The fact of the matter was that Lucy was leaning towards inviting Hanna into her home. Not because of the company, the two didn’t have any chemistry. Not really to be a test subject either. If anything, Lucy was morbidly interested in what would happen if she beat up Hanna and activated her power again.

Hanna was an Adept, a genius that pulled inspiration from concepts that didn’t make sense to anyone else. When Liam turned into a crossbow, he was able to push his power into Lucy, though they both had been reluctant to practice that. Or Liam had, and Lucy would respect at least that one wish of his. There was no way of predicting how that would work, since Hanna’s power was technically that inspiration.

But Lucy wouldn’t do that in the foreseeable future. If Hanna disappeared after visiting Lucy’s house, then she’d be investigated, and that would lead to all sorts of bad things that Lucy didn’t want to think about.

“Can you give me your number?” Lucy asked. “I want to think about it.” Her phone vibrated before she was even finished talking. When she looked at the notification, it was a text from an unknown number saying Bitch, it’s me.

Lucy looked over at Hanna, who had her hands in her pockets and had sunk a ways down in her chair. “How did you do that?”

Hanna hesitated, then pulled a hand halfway out of her pocket to reveal something that might have been a phone at some point, but had been disassembled, reassembled, and modified with chips and metal pieces to the point of being unrecognisable. “Had it queued up before you got here.” She pushed it back into the pocket straight away.

“And what other stuff have you done?” Lucy asked carefully.

After another moment of hesitation, words began to flow from the other girl’s mouth. “Yeah, get you on my side. There’s a little stand in my room that I hid in my closet that eats dirt. Other things too. Keeps my clothes clean, mostly.” Hanna picked at the cloth over her breast. “Not that I can just use that. No laundry would be suspicious, but now things just get clean in my room so I had to move my dirty shit closer to the washing machines. Now my stuff is going missing. Had to spend money on replacing that instead of buying things I could actually use, which was fucking annoying.”

Lucy squinted her eyes at the other girl, not getting it until Hanna thrust her hips up and ended up sliding further down the chair. If she was interpreting the other girl right, Hanna’s underwear was being stolen. By the people she was living with, no less. “Ah.”

“Made a tone maker, but nobody could hear it. I ended up turning it off. No clue what it did.” Hanna continued as if she hadn’t said anything impactful. “Took apart my laptop to try making… another something. I think I was trying to make something to do with stillness, though how throwing stillness around works, I have no idea. Ended up using the parts for my phone. Other than that, just a bunch of half cocked ideas that got throttled by a lack of parts because my fucking panties are going missing!”

Hanna faltered when the nearest students all turned to look at her. She stared back from her position with her head leaning against the low back of the plastic school chair, and eventually was left alone. Lucy decided that was enough power talk for the time being.

“And I found the data centre.” Hanna continued, cutting off what Lucy was about to say. “The school's one. Not that well hidden, and you can literally take the lock off the door. Managed to stop myself from doing anything too stupid though.”

Lucy waited until the noise in the classroom rose back to a level she was confident would muffle their conversation. “And what would something too stupid look like?”

“Ripping it apart to try finishing that stillness thing.” Hanna responded without missing a beat. “It’s really funny, the parts wouldn’t move that far. Give me a few hours down there and everything would’ve been moved into the walls and ceiling. Anybody walking in would just see an empty room, then not have been able to leave.” She laughed at the idea. “Nah, I just did something a bit stupid.”

Lucy waited. As much as she liked to talk to others, Hanna seemed like she needed to let some things out. Or maybe the other girl just liked the sound of her own voice.

“I hacked the school. Corrected my attendance for the past week or whatever.” Hanna confessed. “Didn’t change too much though. Never thought I’d be a hacker, but there you go. School system is a bitch to get around on my new phone though.”

That pretty much decided it for Lucy. “I’ll think about it.” She said. “Let you know by the end of the day.”

Hanna’s fingers moved to the desk and started tapping again. “Not going to ask me to make you a perfect student?”

“It’s tempting.” Lucy admitted. “But no.”

The fingers stopped. A few moments later Hanna stood abruptly and walked quickly out the door. The teacher walked in right after, looking back at the girl who just walked out. Mr Gardener turned and looked at the class, who had stayed about as noisy since his entrance. “Anyone care to tell me who that was?”

Lucy leaned back in her chair, aware that some of the closer girls were giving her glances. They weren’t friendly enough with Lucy or didn’t care enough about her to throw the girl under the bus though. So she just picked up her pen, started fidgeting with it, and said nothing.

~~~

People never appreciated how much paperwork went into being a villain. Sure, given enough superstrength you could walk up to a vault door and punch straight through it, terrorise weaklings by pressing barriers against their bodies or just holding lasers to their necks, and win most every fight you got into up to a point. The problem with that being only one of those things actually got you any real money, and every one of those things could very well be the last thing you ever did as a villain.

For Cerberus, super villainy involved managing two fighting arenas, prepping two more backups in case the cops busted one or both, and keeping about two dozen assholes in line. One of the drawbacks of her life was that anybody willing to work for her was probably also an arrogant shithead who thought they knew better than the black woman with pyromaniac powers, meaning her orders either needed to be repeated, or painfully emphasised.

It was a miracle she didn’t have a brand that she dolled out. If she did, Cerberus probably would’ve attracted Control into Streamrock just to deal with her. And that was with the damn Courtesans living less than two dozen miles away.

Cerberus leaned back in her chair and raised the latest sheet of paperwork above her head, as if placing it between her eyes and the lights would make it more readable. It didn’t, since the paper was now between her eyes and the lights, but a quick application of her power made red light flicker up from a new collar made with a thought.

The sheet she was looking at was actually rather empty in comparison to the contracts and CVs her high turnover job required her to read or throw away. It was the light piece of work she used to top off the day when she could, so that she left work with the feeling that she had accomplished something. Unfortunately, it only came around once a week.

It was one of seven fight rosters. There was another sheet left on Cerberus’ desk that named all her available fighters. On the day in question, she had seventeen to choose from, so somebody was getting left out. All of them wanted to fight as well, since Tyr insisted they be paid regardless of winning or losing. Winners just got paid more.

Well… there were a few that were fighters just to fight. Cerberus’ new collar crackled as she empathised with a name that would be near the top, Danver, who was just that. She’d never deny him his fights, no matter how enticing denying him a fight so he challenged her might be. Cerberus’ fights didn’t rely on strength, so it wouldn’t be fair on him.

The paper finally gave into gravity and crumpled down to caress Cerberus’ face, so she slapped it back onto the desk and threw her collar away. It burnt away into nothing as it flew through the air, and Cerberus returned to her boring evil job.

Sometimes she couldn’t believe that she was even doing this. The underground fights were exactly that, underground. The betting and the employment was all for show. The Bad Dogs weren’t a business, they were a gang. No taxes were paid because everything got laundered, and about seventeen other boring things that Cerberus’ mind refused to process. All she did was keep the wheels greased and moving, collected what money Tyr gave her, and also hit the streets in the best of ways when the right occasions struck.

Still, there were fights to organise. A light smile twitched onto the villains lips as she traced a finger down the list and came upon the new name. That was right, Issey had vibed with Cerberus as well. The other girl was about the age that used those words, or so Cerberus thought.

The villain leaned back and tapped the index and middle fingers of each hand together as she contemplated if she should pit him against Danver for her debut, or if she should take pity on the girl. As fun as that thought was, there was no way Cerberus was putting her up against the closest thing she had to a champion for the first fight. Issey would be working her way up from the bottom, and the next lowest fighter was Jordan, the previous newcomer who only had three fights to their name.

But doing that would be like taking pity on the girl. More things to consider.

After picking out the people that would definitely be fighting, Cerberus picked a name at random to exclude from fights this week for each day and delivered all of her paperwork to someone that would scan it all and pass it along to the people that knew what to do with it. Then she checked the time and swore. It was twelve. In the middle of the day, not midnight.

Another thing about super villainy that nobody appreciated was the lack of a consistent sleeping schedule.