One of the main advantages of being a registered hero, aside from not being hunted by the police, is that your headquarters doesn’t have to be hidden. A secret base sounds like a good thing to have, but most unregistered vigilantes aren’t quite as lucky as I am when it comes to their base of operations. They have to operate out of unfurnished warehouses, abandoned construction sites, and even their own apartments. The only reason I’m any different is because Jason spent decades setting up a better system, at great expense and under incredible secrecy.

By contrast, registered heroes get it much easier. The smaller teams and second-string heroes may not be able to afford much, but they can usually count on support from their local cops or fire department, or even petition their city or town to build them a base on the public’s dime. And the bigger heroes don’t just get their headquarters subsidized, city governments will even pay them to set up shop, counting on the influx of tourists to make it pay for itself within a few years.

The Peacekeepers didn’t need to take any money from the city where they’ve established themselves. Even before they were on the federal government’s payroll, they were financed by Anvil Inc., which meant they had the very best equipment possible. They also had a piece of prime real estate right in the middle of downtown Los Angeles. The Anvil Building was Machina’s corporate headquarters before he even established his team, but once he did, the entire top ten floors of the skyscraper were devoted solely to them.

Eventually, circumstances forced a change. The Peacekeepers grew in popularity and prestige, which resulted in two things. One, a large number of new recruits, which made accommodating all of them within a building already full of corporate executives difficult. Two, a lot of people interested in killing the lot of them. And the most obvious way to do that would be to destroy their headquarters. The mayor of LA didn’t love having a dozen supervillain attacks a year in the most densely packed part of the city, and the Anvil board of directors didn’t particularly appreciate being put in the line of fire. So a compromise was found. The Anvil Building was turned back into an ordinary corporate building, renting out spare office space to other companies at a premium. And the Peacekeepers got a tower of their own, constructed on an artificial island off the coast. It would be connected to the mainland by a folding bridge, so tourists could continue to pay sixty dollars for action figures in the gift shop, but with the option to cut them off from the city proper if villains continued to target them.

Robards’ new building was christened as the Keep, and beyond the shiny surface, it’s a fortress. Of the one hundred and one floors, only the first four are available to the public, featuring a gift shop, museum, and ‘trophy room,’ containing convincing replicas of the weapons and equipment of the group’s many enemies. However, the building itself wasn’t just built to withstand supervillain attacks, it was designed to survive the earthquakes and tidal waves endemic to the region in which it’s located. I’ve seen the structural analysis Jason ran- the rest of LA could crumble to dust and the Keep would still be standing. It’s Machina’s castle, and with his systems compromised, there’s no other place on Earth he’d go.

We’ve had the place under observation for a while. As soon as Robards let the Council’s facility, the civilians inside the building were evacuated, with a vague ‘potential supervillain attack’ cited as the reason. Once everybody was out, the bridge was raised, and the heroes inside put on high alert. Seeing inside the building is hard, but Machina’s office is on the top floor, and it’s hard to imagine him being anywhere else. He’s arrogant, for one thing, and the idea of locking himself in some subterranean panic room would rankle. Not to mention, he probably still thinks Zero and I are trapped in the Council’s base, even if he’s figured out that Grendel didn’t kill us.

According to Sandra, he hasn’t purged the virus completely, but it won’t be long before he does, and then we’ll be in trouble. The first two things he’ll do are try to contact Gilgamesh, which would be a disaster, and then move against Network. Thanks to Zero accessing his files, we have some idea what their countermeasures for Thorn will look like, and it’d be better if we took him down before he has a chance to put them in play. That’s not to mention the fact that Geas will be working on editing Blake and Beringer’s memories at the same time. In short, we’re on a timer. That means there’s no time to waste with infiltration.

“Looks like the entire Alpha Team is here,” Adamant reports. She doesn’t need binoculars to observe the Keep, her mechanical eyes have a built-in zoom. The solid silver orbs don’t change while she’s doing it, but she gets a look on her face that makes me think of a predatory bird picking out a mouse miles below and preparing to snatch it up.

“Good. I could use the workout.”

Vindicator is in a certain mood today. I came to him and Haley about the Council not long after Conrad, Sandra and I worked out our plan. The three of us are all clever, but cleverness alone was never going to be enough. Metahuman combat doesn’t take place on a level playing field, and if your enemy possesses superior strength, you need allies that can match it. But even beyond that, they’re my friends. Doing this without them would feel wrong. Especially because that’s what Jason tried, and it didn’t go particularly well for him.

The Peacekeepers are divided into various teams. Once the roster became overcrowded, Robards decided to split them up, keeping his core group as Alpha Team, and separating the newcomers into Beta Team, with a trusted subordinate to lead them. The same process has occurred several more times over the years, which has produced an interesting effect. Being a control freak, Machina won’t hand over control of a sub-team to just anyone. He needs experienced veterans, most of whom are chosen from the ranks of Alpha Team itself. But in doing so, he’s weakened that core group, forcing them to select more inexperienced recruits to fill in the gaps. Half his original team is dead or retired, and another quarter are leading teams of their own, which means there are only three real veterans among the Alphas.

Alpha Team’s field leader, and real leader in all but name, is Delta-V. She’s a techie just like Robards, and on the younger side, but the other two veterans were passed up for leadership roles because Machina felt they weren’t suited for it. Delta-V is his protege, or as close to it as a guy like him can have. As the name suggests, her specialty is in flight. The power-suit she wears isn’t as streamlined as Machina’s, but it boasts a significantly greater speed, something she shows off constantly. The Front Line tries to avoid interacting with American hero teams as much as possible, but Clay seems to see her as a sort of rival.

Besides her, the only real threats are the other vets. Typhoon, a hydrokinetic who I’d really rather not be fighting on an island, and Ephemeris, a density manipulator. The former has had some fairly public clashes with Delta-V over the fact that he wasn’t given the leadership role, despite being one of the first members of the team, while the latter shows no indication of resentment, despite being in much the same situation. Some of the other Alphas show potential, but they’re young and inexperienced, while we’re fielding two fire-forged powerhouses. And that isn’t all. Network’s provided a half-dozen combat enhanciles as support. The best he can do on short notice, without access to a translocator and the rest of the Council’s resources.

Aboard the Hercule, hidden by clouds and the VTOL’s cloaking field, it’s hard to pick out who most of our opponents are. Delta-V and Typhoon are easy to spot, as the former is circling the tower from the air, and the latter riding a vortex of water a short distance from the artificial island’s shore. The rest are gathered at the front entrance, arranged in a tight formation. They aren’t, in the strictest sense, our enemies. But they’re between us and Machina, which means they have to be dealt with. A direct strike on the Peacekeepers wouldn’t be a great look for the Front Line, but thanks to Network, the media should stay out of our way. He’s got plenty of experience obscuring the facts of sensitive situations when necessary.

“Well, no sense in waiting. Ready to go?”

Vindicator gives Adamant a nod. I hit a switch to open the VTOL’s back door. There’s a rush of wind, making Network’s various bodies reach for something to hold on to. Clay places a hand on Haley’s back, extending his telekinetic field to cover her, and floats out of the vehicle, taking her along. They circle around towards the Keep, and hold there for a moment. The sound of the wind would make it difficult to speak at this altitude, but neither of them has much to say. They’ve got years of experience working together, and this is a maneuver they’ve used plenty of times before.

Using his enhanced eyesight, Vindicator selects his target carefully. Then Adamant shifts position, crossing her arms over her chest in an X, and pointing her feet forwards. A second later, she’s gone. Fired like a human bullet towards the Keep. No human could survive the process- even before impact, their skin would be torn from their bones by the sheer speed at which Clay fired them. Haley is, obviously, different. Her costume was designed to withstand a great deal of force, and her body itself is virtually indestructible. The people in more danger are the ones she was fired at.

Luckily for the Peacekeepers, they aren’t the target. We need them out of the way, but not dead. Instead, Adamant crashed through their front door, turning the barricades that notionally protected it into scrap metal. The non-powered staff will have either evacuated to the mainland or moved into the underground panic room by now, so there’s no risk of collateral damage. Forcing the fight indoors does, however, benefit us. The most obvious reason is that Alpha Team will be reluctant to trash their own HQ, whereas Haley has no such reservations. Besides that, though, there’s a very specific tactical consideration behind this move. Ephemeris, the density-manipulator, is nearly unbeatable outdoors. She can remain intangible for most of a fight, then turn a fist superdense and deliver a crushing blow at exactly the right moment. Indoors, we can deploy countermeasures against her. Specifically, tanglewire. It’s useful for blocking off hallways temporarily, but that’s not what it was designed for. The true purpose is to prevent people like Ephemeris from going tangible, because they can’t be certain if they’ll end up with a nearly-invisible wire piercing a vital organ in the process. I can’t quite see from up here, but if Adamant is following the plan, she’ll have deployed the wire grenade already, effectively taking one of the most dangerous Peacekeepers off the table in an instant.

While she’s doing that, Vindicator engages his targets. Delta-V isn’t stupid- she knows that metal women don’t just fall out of the sky from nowhere. And her suit can track Haley’s trajectory right back to where she was launched from- right to Clay. He’s far enough away from the Hercule that we should be clear for now, but that won’t last forever.

Machina’s protege launches a barrage of rockets from her suit’s backside. It’s a bulky design, owing to the need for more fuel than Robards uses, but that also means it can carry more weapons. There are two large metal wings protruding from the back, which help stabilize her while in flight, with the main thruster located squarely between them. Delta’s helmet has a pair of smaller stylized wings on the sides, which are arranged in the same position as the real ones- pointed slightly upwards, to make a wide V. On the ground, the helmet appears to just have a tinted visor, leaving her mouth exposed, but when she’s in the air, that area seals up, connecting her to an internal oxygen supply, though I don’t see any obvious canisters.

It’s trivially easy for Vindicator to dodge an attack like this, even when the rockets are homing in on him. He can accelerate instantly from zero, something that makes just about every other flier jealous. But he doesn’t just dodge the rockets, he zips around in the air, collecting them within his telekinetic field. Then he moves in close to Delta-V and releases them, close enough that they’ve got no space to turn around back on him.

The Peacekeeper has evasive maneuvers of her own, and she sprays the rockets with bullets from a wrist-mounted cannon, destroying most. The others crash into the side of the Keep, but fail to even break the glass. Not looking to be left out of the fun, Typhoon raises his water-platform high into the sky, to meet Vindicator and Delta-V, before unleashing a concentrated deluge at Clay. For a moment, it seems to work, washing over him, but he doesn’t actually move from his position in the air. Then the water starts to swirl around him, and he fires it back- not at Typhoon, who’d just reabsorb it, but at Delta-V. Her suit is obviously waterproof, but a few hundred gallons is still enough to quench her engine’s flames for a moment, and she plummets, desperately trying to get the thrusters back online.

“You’re good to go,” I inform Network. All the ground-bound Peacekeepers have piled into the building after Haley, though at least one got thrown right back out, courtesy of a superpowered backhand. His enhanciles bodies leap out of the Hercule one after the other, deploying wingsuits that allow them to glide down to the ground. They’ll use slow-fall modules to brake once they’re close enough, and move in to support Adamant. She probably doesn’t need it, but she also isn’t proud enough to refuse help when offered.

That just leaves me. Atalanta and Winters are elsewhere, tracking down the exact location of the ‘Lethe’ facility Grendel told me about. The rest of the Front Line can handle Alpha Team- dealing with Machina is my job.

Having been constructed apart from other buildings, the Keep’s designers had some creative liberties, which they had no hesitation about taking. The base of the building is wide, to help keep it stable during earthquakes, but it narrows towards the top. In three spots, on the fiftieth, seventieth, and ninetieth floors, there are three large rings encircling the building, connected by sturdy metal struts. These are where Peacekeeper Teams Alpha, Beta, and Gamma reside. The other teams have their own smaller facilities elsewhere, though their members are essentially all just competing to get a slot on one of the big three. With the lockdown in place, all of the Keep’s windows have sealed, and Machina’s office has no windows to begin with. It’s really more like a sealed metal box resting atop a fairly normal building. That means the rings are my best way in.

Turning the Hercule around, I activate the winch, using the back-facing camera to select where I’ll fire. Once it’s locked on, I hit the button, and the winch launches forth, striking a spot atop the topmost ring and going taut once it’s latched on. Leaving the VTOL on autopilot, I step away from the controls and walk towards the still-open back. I have no illusions about flying away with the building, or even a part of it. But the winch can also double as a zip-line. I grab a magnetic handle and clip it on, making sure it’s properly magnetized to my gauntlet before I leap out into the open air.

The ride only lasts about thirty seconds, but with enough adrenaline in your system, thirty seconds can feel like a lot longer. That’s not a bad thing- I’ve long since conquered anything resembling a fear of heights I might have once had. And my heightened sense of awareness during the drop gives me enough time to activate my own slow-fall module. It reduces my weight temporarily, which is what prevents me from breaking a dozen bones on impact with the ring. Instead, I land with relative grace, careful not to stand up straight. I’m ninety stories in the air- a strong wind would send me falling to the ground. That’s not a death sentence with the slow-fall module, but it would screw up the entire plan, and we don’t have time for do-overs.

Crouched on one knee, I pull a welding torch from my belt. Acetylene wouldn’t do much to the Keep, but a bit of superheated plasma will provide me my way in. In the process, I reach behind me and detach the winch, which retracts automatically. The Hercule will remain in position, cloaked, in case I need a rapid exfiltration. If everything goes according to plan, that won’t be necessary, but it always pays to have backups plans. Less than a minute later, I’ve burned a reasonably-sized hole in the top of the ring, which drops down into the room below. After a second, I follow.

As luck would have it, I came in right above someone’s bedroom. Rolling off the mattress, I scan the room quickly, in case this place’s occupant happens to be in the shower. There’s nobody that I can see, but not a moment later, I hear a voice.

“Hey! Who the hell’s there?”

This ring should be empty, if for no other reason than that Alpha Team is currently occupied elsewhere. That means it’s probably a security guard or janitor who couldn’t get down to the panic room in time. Inquiry in hand, I venture into the adjoining room, where the voice came from.

Inside, I find a man half-costumed, standing on the other side of a coffee table and couch. The TV behind him is still on, which gives me some idea of what he was doing before I came in. As does the fact that he’s wearing his costume’s shirt, but a pair of sweatpants. This guy is a part of Alpha Team, but they left him on the bench.

“You. Hawkshaw.”

The cape has a buzz-cut and a slightly forced self-confident expression. He’s in what I assume he thinks is a ‘power stance,’ legs apart, arms up and palms pointed forwards. His shirt is generic as costumes go, white with orange shoulder pads, and a stylized Richter scale reading in the center.

“Sorry, am I supposed to know who you are?”

He looks offended, and takes a step closer.

“I’m the Earthshaker, asshole.”

Recruiting someone with earthquake-based powers to a team based on the West Coast seems like a foolish move. Either Robards has relaxed his hiring standards, or he’s gotten so busy with Council work that someone else is handling that stuff, and he hasn’t noticed yet. Maybe this guy got brought on while we were off dealing with the Andromedans.

“Oh, right. I remember reading about you. It was an article titled ‘The Top Ten Heroes Most Likely To Get Left Behind During A Mission.”

More quippy than I usually am as Hawkshaw, but there are no cameras up here recording me, and with this guy, it just feels right. He’s obviously insecure, and the way he reacts to my insult makes it obvious.

“Shut up! I’m gonna kick your ass, and show that Delta bitch who should really be in charge around here.”

Earthshaker shoves his hands forward, and half the objects in the room go flying. The entire ring shakes, staggering me, and I don’t have time to throw up my shield before his coffee table slams into my chest. It’s plastic with fake wood paneling, but still heavy enough to hurt. A lot. My armor prevents serious damage, but taking a hit like that will always be painful. I shove the table off of me, taking notice of the way that the ring takes a moment to stabilize. It’s increasingly obvious why this guy was left behind. If he cut loose on the ground, he could bring the entire Keep down.

“Not so funny now, are y—”

Before the Peacekeeper can finish speaking, I plug him twice in the chest. Rubber bullets, but the impact is still just as painful. He staggers back, clutching his chest, and howls in pain.

“Aaahh! You shot me! You fucking sh—”

This guy really doesn’t seem to get that you can talk and fight at the same time. It’s a skill, and if you haven’t mastered it, you shouldn’t try. It’s better to just fight, because your opponent has no obligation to wait until you’re finished speaking to attack. Hopefully the lesson is a little more obvious when I cross the room, vaulting over the couch he tipped over, and hit him in the nose with my free hand. He puts one hand to his nose, blood already leaking through the fingers, and shoves me with the other, sending me flying backwards with his power. I crash into the wall and fall forwards, dropping onto one knee and then forcing myself back up.

“Damn, they’ll really let anyone on Alpha Team these days. Does Machina even know you’re here? Because I know the guy, and he doesn’t tolerate dipshits like you on his team.”

Still clutching his nose, Earthshaker draws his free hand back, fingers in a clawlike position that suggests he’s building up power for another attack.

“Shud ub! You dunno abythig aboud him, or me!”

The fingers splay out, and he forces them forward again, this time with enough power behind the move to toss the entire couch at me. I’m ready for it now, though, and brace against the impact, throwing up my hard-light shield and letting it protect me. When it falls to the ground, though, it effectively pins me against the wall, forcing me to clamber over if I want to get close to him again. By now, I’ve already worked out a way to beat him, and it won’t even require landing another hit. The ring is shaking even more violently, and I can hear the nearest support strut making a distressed, groaning sound. Earthshaker probably hasn’t even noticed it over the blood rushing in his ears.

“Goddamn, you sound even stupider with a broken nose. I didn’t think that was possible. You know that’s probably never gonna look completely straight again? Say goodbye to leading a team of your own, pal.”

The Earthshaker doesn’t even respond with words. He just unleashes a primal roar, thrusting both hands to his sides, and tearing the entire section of the ring free. The wall behind him crumbles away, and the floor starts to fall out beneath me. Exactly as planned. The couch plummets to the ground, while I fire my grapnel gun and hook into the side of the building. At the same time as I’m being pulled upwards, the Peacekeeper’s shaky stance on loose ground gives way, and he starts to fall. Terror written plain on his face, he reaches out, and I contemplate letting him fall for just a moment, before reluctantly grabbing his arm.

With the hero holding onto my gauntlet for dear life, I pull myself onto the bit of support strut still connected to the building, before hauling him up next to me. Both breathing heavily, we sit there for a moment, watching a large segment of Alpha Team’s ring fall into the ocean. The others aren’t visible from this spot, but I can hear the sound of Delta-V’s weapons on the other side of the building. Ironically, destruction on this scale wasn’t really a part of the plan, but it won’t matter much either way.

“They’re gonna fucking kill me,” Earthshaker whispers. I’m not even sure he meant to say it out loud. Despite his arrogant attitude, I’m not completely without sympathy for the guy. He clearly thought he earned his spot on the prestigious Alpha Team, but in reality, he was just a warm body filling out the roster until a replacement could be found. He can’t control his powers or his temper fully, and it just caused millions of dollars of damage to his own team’s base. Demotion is assured, to a team that doesn’t even have rooms in the Keep- and that’s if he doesn’t just get fired.

“You can swim, right?”

Confused by the non-sequitur, and seemingly having forgotten I was here at all, he stumbles his way through an answer.

“I- whuh- yeah?”

“Great.” I grab a device from my utility belt and attach it to his chest before he can react. “Hit this on your way down, it’ll make you fall slower.”

In the time it takes for him to process what I just said, I shove him off of the metal girder and towards the water below. It’s a long fall, probably not survivable without the one-time-use slow-fall module I stuck to him. It’s pretty much foolproof to use, but if he somehow doesn’t figure it out, he should be able to use his powers to brake before he hits the water. That would require some amount of ingenuity, though. Really, the module is his best bet. I wait for a moment, making sure he surfaces after impact, and then stand up.

With about a quarter of the ring destroyed, I need to get back inside, so I can make my way up to the top. The nearest intact portion of the ring is a little too far away to just jump, so I connect my grapnel to the wall, and extend the line manually until I’ve got enough slack for what I’m planning. Then, I jump off of the strut and swing forward. Without a running start, I lack the momentum to clear the gap, so I swing back instead, and repeat the process a few times, picking up momentum with each swing, until I can detach the grapnel at the apex and land safely inside. It takes a lot of practice to detach the hook end of the grapnel at the exact right moment, but it’s better than just using them as if they’re disposable. If that was how I operated, I’d leave a dozen of them hanging off of rooftops in Pax every night, and my equipment expenses would probably be tripled.

Back within the ring, I head towards the nearest hallway connecting to the main building. The room I pass through seems to be Typhoon’s- he’s got at least one poster of himself from over a decade ago hanging up, as well as a lot of vintage boxing promotional flyers and other memorabilia. I don’t know much about him besides his powers, so it might be a hobby from before he became a hero, but I suspect he’s just a fan. Everyone’s gotta have interests.

The ninetieth floor is pretty small, thanks to the way the Keep narrows as you go higher. It seems to mainly be dedicated to a common room of sorts, connected to the Ring, so all of the members of Alpha Team have somewhere to gather. The neat arrangement of the chairs tells me that it doesn’t see a great deal of use. In the center of the room is the elevator, which is disabled thanks to the lockdown. The stairs don’t go higher than the fiftieth floor, but that hardly means I’m stuck here. After all, the elevator might not move, but the shaft is still there. And with my trusty plasma torch to burn a hole in the door, I can get inside with ease.

A quick glance upwards tells me that the elevator is beneath me, so there’s no risk of having it dropped on my head. That being said, Machina probably has cameras in the elevator shaft, and if he’s watching, he might decide to activate the car manually, in order to sandwich me against the ceiling. Maneuvering carefully around the edges, I burn through each of the cables one by one, just in case. Then, I fire my grapnel one more time, and ascend to the hundred and first floor.

Once I’m at the top, the final set of doors slide open. Typical supervillain move, letting you walk into their lair to demonstrate how unconcerned they are with you. If they were really unconcerned, they wouldn’t even bother to play mind games, which is why only the insecure or neurotic villains ever do it. Machina is more the latter than the former, but whatever his personality defects, he’s not stupid. I won’t be able to manipulate him into beating himself like I did with the Earthshaker.

“Hawkshaw.”

At the very least, he has the courtesy to address me by my alias. Robards is standing in front of his desk, clad in full armor. As I step into the office, he dismisses a dozen holo-screens, reserving his attention for me alone. The office itself is minimalist, though not quite as much as the Council’s HQ. He’s got a framed copy of TIME magazine on the wall- his own face, with the words ‘Pax Machina’ underneath. His Person of the Year issue. Not without his vanities, whatever people might think. There’s an alcove in one wall where the armor is clearly meant to go when not in use. A door which presumably leads to a bathroom. That sort of thing.

“Machina. This a bad time?”

Robards doesn’t dignify me with a response, just opens a palm and fires a beam of searing heat in my direction. He pans it across the room swiftly, giving me just a split second to roll underneath before it can melt through my armor and the flesh underneath. He usually sets the suit’s weapons to stun, at least when cameras are rolling, but it’s a weapon of war, and I’m well-aware that just about any one of its armaments could kill me.

Unclipping a grenade from my belt, I toss it in his direction. Reflexes assisted by his suit’s predictive algorithms, he swats it away easily, and it detonates against a reinforced wall. While he was occupied with that, I put some distance between us, before drawing my sidearm and firing. Machina is so used to shrugging off gunfire that he doesn’t even react, until the Koppel bullet pierces his leg. The spray of blood confirms he’s actually inside, which simplifies things. However, the hole in his armor that my bullet made seals up almost instantly, and he chokes back the rest of his scream. Painkillers already being administered, I’m sure.

“No more of that,” he says imperiously. A second later, Inquiry is torn from my hand, as his suit magnetizes it, along with every other metal object in the room. He catches the gun and deactivates the magnet, letting the rest of the items clatter to the floor. Then Robards slams the gun down on his desk firmly. A clear message- if you want this back, you’re going to have to come and take it.

I’d hoped to get a few more shots off before something like this happened, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve got other tricks up my sleeve. Like the latest upgrade to my armor, courtesy of Conrad Winters. A thin black wire spools out from one of my gauntlets. It’s a whip, but not just any whip. The wire is monomolecular, making it incredibly sharp. It’s also got a hell of a lot of reach, as Machina finds out. I flick my wrist in his direction, and the wire carves a thin, long gash down the chest of his armor. Not deep enough to draw blood, but it mars the logo in the center, which seems to aggravate him. Before he can try to grab the wire, I retract it, and get ready to dodge his next attack.

Instead of a laser, Robards readies a wrist-mounted rocket, which doesn’t seem small enough to have actually been hidden inside of his wrist. Maybe the suit assembles its munitions mid-combat. Not the time to ask, though. Whatever the rocket is, it’s certainly explosive. The force sends me flying, even as I try to throw myself out of the blast radius. Scrambling back to my feet, I pull the whip out again, and target his leg- the same one I just shot. The wire wraps around it swiftly, and I pull, trying to knock him to the ground. He tips backwards, but before hitting the ground, activates the thrusters in his boots, forcing me to retract the wire before he can start dragging me around.

Now hovering a few feet off the ground, Machina raises both arms, and activates a pair of wrist-cannons, resembling more advanced versions of the ones his protege, Delta-V, uses. I bring up my hard-light shield as he starts to unload on me, but the barrage doesn’t seem likely to end soon, and the shield is already starting to crack. I’m out of my weight class here. Haley or Clay could give Robards a run for his money, but I’ve got nothing except ways to forestall my defeat.

From behind the rapidly-deteriorating shield, I toss a throwing knife. Not something I have cause to use often, given the gun is a superior option in just about every way, but useful to have on-hand regardless. Machina raises one hand to deflect it, like he did with the grenade, but discovers that the blade, too, is time-locked. Bullets weren’t the only thing Koppel made during his captivity, and the inviolable knife was one of the many such objects Jason collected. The Council only seemed to have him making bullets, which is why Robards wasn’t expecting the knife to be anything other than ordinary metal.

Blade sticking out of his hand, Machina stops firing, and descends to my level. I drop the shield, not because I think the fight is over, but to give it a moment to recharge. It’s hard to tell what Robards might be thinking behind his featureless faceplate, but he’s obviously not happy.

“Enough of this. You realize I made that suit you’re wearing, don’t you? Did you really think you could kill me with a weapon I built?”

Machina presses a finger to his gauntlet, and I hear a digital ping. Then silence.

“Not really,” I admit. “That’s why I isolated the shutdown signal you use, and had some friends help me rig up a device to reflect it right back at you.”

Frozen still as a statue, Robards doesn’t make a sound. Or maybe he’s screaming in fury- without his armor’s speakers active, it’s hard to know. Really, this is just another manifestation of his fatal flaw- an inability to consider the agency of others. He never stopped to think if I might have had help preparing for this fight. Didn’t even consider that constantly advertising the existence of the kill-switch in all his tech might give someone the idea of weaponizing it against him. The man has a whole team of heroes at his disposal, but chose to take me on alone. The woman he calls his protege uses outdated versions of his tech, because he won’t help her improve it. Probably thinks it’s for her own good, but it’s also why I have no doubt Vindicator has already kicked Delta-V’s ass.

“Now, you’ve probably got some sort of manual override you’re already trying to activate. Not easy stuck inside of there, but I’m sure you’d manage, given enough time. Unfortunately, you aren’t gonna have it.”

I approach swiftly, heart still pounding, intensely aware that I’m not out of the woods yet. From a pocket inside my coat, I pull out a small handheld drill with a time-locked tip. One of the original Koppel set, initially intended as a way of torturing metahumans with unbreakable skin. Jason liberated it a number of years ago, and now I’m putting it to better use.

The hole I drill in Machina’s armor is small. Too small to even fit a finger through. Luckily, there’s plenty of room for a needle, which is exactly what the plan calls for. Leaving aside the drill, I pull a handheld injector from my utility belt and line the tip up carefully. The substance inside isn’t a toxic green, or anything so exciting. Just a slightly murky clear fluid, with a mind inside. Not just any mind, either- Axel Thorn.

Jason’s files contained information he- being a detective -had managed to glean from the other members of the Council. Secrets he wasn’t certain even Machina or Geas knew. Like the way Network’s power operates. Something about the explanation he’d been given never made sense. A metahuman’s abilities come from an identifiable gene, and none of Thorn’s bodies save the original had that gene. Yet all of them were capable of copying his consciousness in the same way. That was when he realized that Network’s power isn’t mind control at all. It’s transformation. One-way, and permanent. When Network’s power activated, he turned into a disease.

Patient zero was, of course, Thorn’s original body. It began to generate a virus unlike any other on Earth- one that contained his very consciousness. And instead of spreading freely, it would only travel from host to host by his will. Whenever he touches someone, he can infect them with his mind, which will near-instantly overwrite their own. Then their body begins to generate the virus as well, allowing them to infect others. Useful, especially if you want to keep someone like Marcus Robards around, while getting rid of them at the same time. Unfortunately, getting one of Thorn’s bodies in his office during a lockdown would be virtually impossible. So I brought a sample of the virus itself with me.

Machina doesn’t struggle- mainly because he can’t, as the armor is keeping him locked in place. I don’t know whether he’s aware of what’s happening, but it doesn’t matter for long, because mere seconds after I remove the needle, I hear his breathing change. Grabbing Inquiry off his desk, I take a few steps back, keeping the gun leveled at his head, and wait.

I don’t have to wait very long, because the armor comes online a moment later. Rather than attack, Machina stays still for a moment. Then the suit folds open to allow him egress. I don’t let the gun waver in my hands. This could still be some sort of ploy- which is precisely why we set up a system in advance.

“Opal epsilon twelve-twenty,” Network says, and I breathe a sigh of relief. Lowering the gun, I turn on comms to contact Vindicator and Adamant.

“Mission accomplished. You’re free to leave whenever.”

“Acknowledged,” Haley says flatly, then disconnects.

Network remains still for a few moments, then begins to stretch his arms experimentally, as if getting used to the new body. After a few moments of that, his posture shifts back into that of Machina- stiff and formal -and he strides around to the other side of the desk, bringing up holo-screens and manipulating them like a maestro.

“I’m still sifting through Marcus’ memories,” he says by way of explanation, ”but I remember how to operate this office, at least.”

As he speaks, the roof folds open, and I direct the Hercule to descend close enough for me to make my exit.

“Good. Because it sounds like Winters just found Geas.”

One down, two to go.