78

Chapter 78

A Darker Path

Part Seventy-Eight: The Bada and the Boom

[A/N: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]

Director Emily Piggot

Emily closed her office door behind her and crossed the room to her desk. She felt physically and mentally drained; that had been the longest she'd ever spent in the presence of Wards when she wasn't actively chewing them out for the latest bullshit they'd pulled. Apart from Scribe, they'd even been respectful.

She was pretty sure she'd caught Scribe eyeing the claw as though she'd like to pocket it, which didn't surprise her as it was still her firm belief that the girl should be in juvey, not the Wards. It didn't matter that Rune had only been caught because she'd been abandoned by Victor and Othala when an attempted bank robbery went wrong; in Emily's view, a criminal who was also the victim of betrayal was still a criminal. In this particular instance, it seemed the presence of the other Wards (plus Emily's eye on her) had kept the ex-villain relatively honest, but that wouldn't always be the case.

As she settled into her chair and dropped the claw back on the desk, she wondered if it was Legend's influence that had the Wards acting so politely and respectfully toward her. Back in Brockton Bay, Armsmaster should have been in charge of the Wards but several factors had militated against that, so the duty had fallen mainly to Renick.

Her deputy had tried his best, and indeed she had to admit that the Brockton Bay Wards (with one glaring exception) hadn't turned out badly. However, all the will in the world couldn't put more hours in the day or teach him what having powers was really like, so they'd been far from the squared-away teens she'd just been talking to.

She tapped her personal code into her laptop to wake it up again, and called up the Wards roster once more. Yet another reminder that she wasn't in Brockton Bay anymore: she had three times as many Wards to keep track of, and some of the names had slipped her mind while she was talking to them. To her, that was unacceptable; she began reading through the list again, matching names to costumes. Even if she wasn't in charge of them, they were still ultimately her responsibility.

And then there were the two potential problems, one more so than the other. For a moment, she thought about dealing with it later, but then she squared her shoulders. Better to get it out of the way now than keep putting it on the back burner.

Taking out her phone, she hit the speed-dial for Henderson's number. He answered a moment later: "Yes, ma'am?"

She got directly to the point. "Are you busy with anything that can't be pushed back fifteen minutes?"

There was a brief pause, but only for a couple of seconds. "No, ma'am. What do you need?"

"Your presence, my office. I'm going to talk to one of the Wards, and I'd like you as an impartial witness."

Again, the brief hesitation. Emily could only imagine that Wilkins had never asked this of him, which spoke volumes about their working relationship. "Yes, ma'am. I'll be right over."

"Thank you." Emily ended the call, then hit the speed-dial for the PRT duty officer. She didn't know all her people by sight yet, but she was working on that too. "Director Piggot here. The Wards are still in the building? Good. Please have Badaboom sent up to see me."

Badaboom

Alice Takawara stepped out of the elevator and headed down the hallway toward the Director's office, the PRT trooper who had been detailed to escort her walking precisely one pace to the rear and the right. She had no idea what was going on; the meeting with Director Piggot had been interesting enough, but she'd barely said three words the whole time.

It wasn't like she'd cursed the older woman out, or brought up that stupid nickname, like Scribe had. If anyone was going to be called to the Director's office, it should be that bitch. 'Sabrina the teenage Nazi.' Now, that was legitimately funny.

The Director's secretary, or personal assistant, or whatever she was, looked at Alice once, and nodded. "Go right in."

"Uh … thanks?" Alice moved forward to the office door and turned the handle. The door opened, and she stepped inside.

Within were the Director and Deputy Director, the latter of whom was sitting on a chair off to the side of the office. Director Piggot looked up as Alice entered, and nodded. "Good, you're here. Have a seat." She gestured at the chair planted front and centre before the desk. "Trooper, you're dismissed."

"Ma'am." The trooper left the office again, closing the door behind him.

Alice walked forward and sat down, trying to calm her nerves long enough to make her jittering left leg stop bouncing. She didn't spend much time looking to Henderson for answers; even during her brief time in the Wards, she'd figured out that he was basically there to do the stuff Director Wilkins couldn't be bothered doing. Director Piggot was the one she needed to pay attention to.

When Piggot spoke, it wasn't even to Alice. "Deputy Director Henderson, is it SOP in this building for Wards to be escorted to my office by a trooper?"

Henderson seemed to be as surprised by this as Alice was. "Uh, yes, ma'am. It's the way it's always been."

"Mmm." The Director didn't sound pleased by this, but at least it was nothing Alice had anything to do with. Also, she belatedly realised, the trooper escort wasn't something the Director had ordered to intimidate her. "Make a note. Protectorate and Wards have the right to be anywhere in this building they're cleared to be, just like the PRT does. They don't need troopers to hold their hands everywhere they go."

"Understood, ma'am."

Piggot nodded once, then turned her attention to Alice. "So, Badaboom. I have a few questions for you. Hopefully, we can clear them up and let you get back to your regular duties." She paused for a second. "This will not be an interrogation. I don't do interrogations. We have people for that. I would just like to ask you some questions and get some honest answers, so we all know where we stand. Deputy Director Henderson is sitting in as an impartial witness, and this entire conversation is being recorded. Do you have any questions about what I've just said?"

"Um …" If Alice was being honest with herself, when Director Piggot said that this would not be an interrogation, it suddenly started looking a whole lot like an interrogation. "Am I going to need a lawyer for this?"

"Only if I thought you'd actually committed a crime, which I don't." Piggot's eyes bored into Alice's. "I have zero interest in initiating any legal action against you, no matter what is said here. I just want answers, and for each of us here in this room to be on the same page. Is that understood?"

Tentatively, Alice nodded. The Director had gotten her attention, and her respect, during the talk. As far as Alice could tell, she had zero bullshit in her. "So, uh … what do you want to know?"

"Well, first, do you intend to keep the name Badaboom?" As she said the name out loud, Director Piggot winced as though she'd put pressure on a sore tooth. "Have you been to see Image for potential alternatives?"

"Uh … that's actually Monday, ma'am." Alice was relieved that she had such an easy one to start with. "And no, I don't intend to keep it. Not sure what I'm going to replace it with. I was thinking maybe Shebang." Her head dropped as an unpleasant memory came up. "Scribe suggested Pearl Harbor, and Jouster yelled at her for it."

"I'm not surprised. I would have too." From the set of the Director's jaw, she would've had a great deal to say to Scribe. "Has she been giving you problems in other ways?"

"Nothing physical. Just, you know, words. Stuff she can pass off as a joke if she gets called on it. Flechette called her on it anyway, and threatened to clean her clock. She backed off." Alice hunched her shoulders as she recalled the weird feeling of having one of the best-known Wards in the US step in on her side.

"I see. Don't hesitate to report it if she tries it again. I do not want friction between my Wards, and I have zero tolerance for troublemakers." Director Piggot paused for a beat. "Now, I'd like to ask you some questions about the attack on Cornell."

Alice blinked. She wasn't fantastic at reading people, but this sounded a whole lot like Piggot was just starting to get around to what she wanted to talk about. "Um … sure, I guess?"

The first question set alarm bells ringing in Alice's mind. "Did your trigger event happen before or during the attack by Fenja and Menja?"

Nobody else had asked that question, especially in the way Director Piggot was asking it. Specifically, like she already knew the answer and was just confirming a suspicion. Oh, shit. She's figured it out.

But Henderson didn't even seem to have expected that question. Troopers weren't pouring into the room to arrest her. And the Director was just … looking at her, with steel-grey eyes that seemed to bypass normal barriers and peer straight into her soul.

'This will not be an interrogation'. That was what Piggot had said. Alice decided to test the waters. "Director, I'm not comfortable with talking about my trigger. May I go now, please?"

"Certainly." Director Piggot gestured to the door. "Enjoy your afternoon. And try not to let Image browbeat you. At the end of the day, you're the one who's going to have to wear the costume and name, not them."

"Thank you, Director." Alice got up from the chair. She didn't quite flee the office, but she speed-walked down the corridor toward the elevator, quite a bit faster than she'd come the other direction.

All the way down in the elevator, she tried to figure out what had just happened. The Director hadn't come after her with accusations, but she had to know the truth all the same. So why hadn't she had Alice arrested?

'I have zero interest in initiating any legal action against you, no matter what is said here.' Piggot had said that; was it possible that she'd actually meant it?

Alice went back over the conversation in her mind; as far as she could tell, she hadn't said anything incriminating. And not wanting to talk about a trigger event was perfectly normal. Nobody liked talking about that shit. It always dug up bad memories.

So why did she ask? No matter how Alice went at the problem, she ran into the same answer. She figured it out, and just wanted to let me know that she knows.

And?

The elevator door opened, and she saw the Wards who'd waited back for her. Scribe wasn't among them, thank God. More importantly, there were no PRT troopers prepped to arrest her.

And nothing, I guess. She's okay with me going ahead with being a Ward, and a hero, even though she knows the truth.

She wasn't sure how she felt about that.

Director Emily Piggot

Once the door had closed behind Takawara, Henderson turned to Emily. "I'm … not entirely sure what just happened," he said, a little plaintively. "Why were you asking her about the Cornell incident, and why did she blow out of here like she'd just manifested a Mover rating?" He stared at her, his head tilted to one side quizzically. "And why are you okay with that?"

Emily hit the button that stopped the recording. "I confirmed my suspicions, and now she knows I know." She observed his ongoing expression of confusion, and sighed. "Look, she triggered either before or during the attack, yes? She refused to talk about it because she knew I'd figured out she triggered before it."

Henderson frowned. "She could've triggered during it and was just being cagey."

"No." Emily waved his words away. "She had at least three bombs ready to hand when the attack happened. One bomb thrown together in the heat of the moment, I can accept. But not three. Tinkers need relatively specialised materials. Trust me, I've signed enough requisition sheets for Armsmaster and Kid Win. There's no way she could've had materials for all three bombs on hand at the moment she triggered, if it was during the attack."

"Okay." Henderson nodded slowly. "I can see that. So, she triggered before the attack. What's the big deal there?"

"The big deal is, she's still a recent trigger, and she had bombs to hand. Why was she building bombs on the Cornell campus?" Emily held up her finger. "Or rather: Why. Did. She. Trigger?"

"I don't know why capes trigger." He spread his hands. "I mean, I read somewhere that good powers come from something really good happening to you, and bad powers—"

Emily cut him off brusquely. "Bullshit. Nothing good comes from getting powers, and getting powers come from nothing good. I'll bet you a year's salary she was under intense academic stress and failed a class. So, she snapped, and triggered with a destructive Tinker ability. And then she started building bombs with some vague idea of 'showing them all' that she wasn't stupid." She wasn't crass enough to make actual air quotes, but she flicked her fingers briefly to put the concept across.

Henderson finally caught up with her train of thought. "And then Fenja and Menja attacked, so she transferred her anger to them instead, took them down with the bombs she'd already constructed, and became an accidental hero."

"Well, the reports did say they were shouting racist slurs while they were attacking," Emily noted.

"Apparently they were trying to attract like-minded people to their cause." Henderson rolled his eyes, then cleared his throat. "So, when you asked that question, she realised you had hold of the one thread that could undermine her implied cover story. That you'd figured everything out, but you weren't going to actively call her on it." He paused. "But … why didn't you?"

"She may have started with the intention of committing a crime, but we're not thought police." Emily laced her hands together on her desk. "She never went through with it, and in fact helped capture two dangerous villains. And now she knows that we're onto her but I'm willing to let her run with being a hero. Because I'd rather a Ward or hero who started out with sketchy motives but who's trying to make something of herself, as opposed to a villain on the run." Or even a villain being forced into the role of a hero, but we can deal with Scribe later.

"Huh." Henderson shook his head. "No offense, but I'd always heard you were a bit of a hardass when it came to capes. No give at all. I guess the rumour mill has a lot to answer for."

"None taken, Mr Henderson." Emily smiled tightly. "Let's just say, the events of the past two months have given me ample reason to reconsider my stance."

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Topic: Three, Two, One, Boom

In: Boards ► Brockton Bay ► New Capes ► Atropos

Atropos (Original Poster) (Banned) (You Wish) (UnVerified Cape) (Can Actually Kill Anything) (Yes, Really) (Watch Me) (Verified Dethpicable)

Posted On Mar 7th 2011:

Here we are yet again, my friends.

You will be happy to know that no dire threats encroach upon Brockton Bay and that our latest crop of new citizens, the Robotic Americans lately of Eagleton, are settling in nicely. Each and every one of them has chosen to sign up to work for the Betterment Committee, and I'm told they are paying strict attention to their training courses. So if you see a mechanical guy wearing a hard-hat scuttling up the side of a building, he's on our side. More specifically, he's on *your* side. Helping build a better Brockton Bay.

In more international news, I was recently contacted by none other than Interpol, requesting that I apply my very specific talents to a particular End. See, they've been cracking down on Gesellschaft recently, with the pushback that Gesellschaft has been sic'ing the Three Blasphemies on them. Now, they can handle the big G, but they've offered me a cool hundred mil' to get the Blasphemies off their backs, because they heard somewhere that I'm really good at killing stuff.

I have NO idea where they got that notion. None whatsoever. Total pacifist, that's me. (And if you believe that, I've got a PRT building to sell you, going cheap. A total steal, you might say.)

So anyway, this is the same warning that everyone else gets. To the Three Blasphemies: I know you follow PHO. As of this message, you have 24 hours to surrender yourselves to Interpol.

You could try to bribe me, but I don't take bribes from those who constitute a net drain on society. Likewise, you could try to go after my friends and family. Go ahead; look at what happened to the last idiot who tried that. Or you could just try to kill me first. It'll save me the trouble of coming to you.

You're not human (woo! Spoilers!) so I'm going to treat you like you're undead, which every church ever basically agrees to be blasphemy in and of itself. Zombies get shot in the head and vampires get decapitated, their mouths stuffed with garlic, and staked through the heart.

You've seen what I can do. Blasphemies: your hours are numbered (24, to be exact). Surrender peacefully, or I'm coming over there.

Toodles!

(Showing page 1 of 176)

►Bagrat (Veteran Member) (The Guy in the Know)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

Hahaha what?

Oh, man.

Aren't the Blasphemies supposed to be some kind of advanced Tinkerbot? And now they've got Atropos' close and personal attention.

Hey, Blasphemies, just a quick heads-up: look at what she did to Eagleton.

Atropos don't play.

►Jackstraw (Verified Interpol Agent)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

Atropos, this was not in the agreement. Why publicise this? Why even give them a warning?

►Atropos (Original Poster) (Banned) (You Wish) (UnVerified Cape) (Can Actually Kill Anything) (Yes, Really) (Watch Me) (Verified Dethpicable)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

Jackstraw: I never agreed not to tell everyone what was going on. Also, I try to give my targets fair warning. Some even choose to surrender before I get to them. As I've said before, that saves on ammo.

But hey, it's a win-win situation for you. Either they choose to give themselves up, and they're off your back. Or they don't, I End them, and they're off your back.

Whatever happens, the Betterment Committee gets paid.

Mwahahaha.

►UnconcernedFox (Verified Atropos Fan Club Member)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

*pats Interpol person on the head and offers them some popcorn*

*dis gun b gud*

►Brocktonite03 (Veteran Member)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

Well, this should be interesting.

As I recall, the Blasphemies don't stay dead.

On the other hand, nothing Atropos has set out to End has survived.

Including literal Endbringers.

My money's on Atropos.

Any takers?

►EmmaTheTwiceWarned (Verified Follower of Our Lady in Darkness)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

Blasphemies, make your peace with whatever you consider sacred.

Nothing will save you except surrender.

►GstringGirl (Verified Human) (Verified Atropos Fan Club Member)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

Brocktonite03, I don't think *anyone's* stupid enough to take that bet.

►White Fairy (Veteran Member)

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

What I want to know is, how's she going to decapitate an Alexandria package murderbot? Much less *three* of them?

►XxVoid_CowboyxX

Replied On Mar 7th 2011:

I think we're going to find out.

I, personally, can't wait.

End of Page. 1, 2, 3 ... 174, 175, 176

Blasphemy Alpha

Chosen Designation: Persephone

Location: Airborne over Luxembourg

Not bothering to pause in her relentless flight westward toward Paris, Persephone sent a message winging across the ether to her two sisters. Have you seen this? Framed within the message was the challenge that had been posted on the superhero message board.

A flock of geese appeared in her path, but her hyper-attuned reflexes allowed her to roll out of the way and avoid a direct collision. In her wake, the Mach 2 sonic boom wreaked havoc, killing half the geese outright and scattering the rest far and wide, but she didn't care. While her enhanced outer shell would likely have been able to withstand the impact, she saw no need to arrive at her destination splattered with goose entrails.

Yes, replied Nemesis and Alecto simultaneously. Alecto fell silent, while Nemesis continued to speak. What should our response be?

Cape designation 'Atropos' is dangerous, Alecto noted. Success rate against opponents up to and including S-class is unbroken.

This is understood, agreed Persephone. Atropos is also skilled in combat against multiple opponents. Challenge is likely to be a ruse, intending to draw us into single arena. I suggest Eidolon protocols.

When facing truly powerful opponents, such as Eidolon, it was best for one or two to hang back, perhaps never even showing up to the fight. Their individual defenses were good, but it was always possible for a hero to get in a lucky shot and destroy one body or another. If the one in combat was damaged badly enough to be disabled, they would update one last time then self-terminate. The others would then retreat and go dark while they rebuilt their comrade.

It was a tried-and-true strategy, one that had seen them through many battles. Sometimes they overcame their adversaries, sometimes they were in turn overcome, but they were never beaten. Sometimes they could even make use of data analysis gleaned from combat to pull off a return victory.

Atropos was merely the latest challenger to take them on. The chance of her actually succeeding where so many others had failed was infinitesimal.

Persephone flew on, secure in her confidence that they would win by merely outlasting their opponents.

As they always had.

Monday Evening

Atropos

I crouched and shuffled through the portal, keeping as low as I could. On the other side, the reason for this became clear; I was perched atop a set of shelves, with barely half an inch of clearance between my head and the ceiling. As far as I could tell, this combination storeroom/workshop had been set up in the top floor of an abandoned monastery in the Swiss Alps. It had electricity, but the shell company that owned the property (itself owned by a Blasphemy proxy) ensured that nobody encroached on it.

This wasn't the only cache of spare parts they owned, but it was the most remote, and it was the one they would retreat to if they were hit the hardest. And I intended to hit them very hard indeed.

The reason I was crouched precariously on the shelf was that there were cameras liberally situated around the room. There were exactly four blind spots, none of which encompassed the floor, and one of which was in midair. I already had my phone in my hand; without any further unnecessary movement, I set about hacking the cameras. It took me two and a half minutes to set up loops that ran freely while the time-date stamp kept on advancing (they would absolutely notice a glaring error like that), then I lightly vaulted down to the floor.

Now that I was free to move, I could retrieve the bomb, which had been too bulky to initially bring through into the cramped conditions atop the shelving. Opening a portal into our basement, I reached through and grabbed it. The portal closed afterward, which was fine. I knew the security system overseeing the cameras was due to do an error-check on their software in another five minutes (for agents of chaos, the Blasphemies were remarkably stringent about their personal security) but I'd be gone long before then. The hack itself would quietly self-delete ten seconds before the error-check came through.

I looked around, at the workbench on one side of the flagstone-floored room and the rows of shelving on the other. Cameras mounted on the walls and ceiling stared back at me blindly. The main trick here was to conceal what I'd done after the fact; if the cameras registered any changes after I'd gone, the Blasphemies would stay the hell away from here, which would defeat the entire purpose.

Moving up to one end of the room, I mentally calculated angles and trajectories, then took a burner phone from my pocket and set the alarm to go off at a specific moment. The phone itself was easily hidden behind a can of industrial lubricant. That was the easy part.

At the far end of the room, I looked around to see what I was working with. Cardboard cartons of various sizes contained bits and pieces of equipment, apparently all useful to manufacturing a new body for one of the Blasphemies. One of them seemed to be the right size, so I lugged it off the shelf, carefully opened it, and just as carefully consigned its contents to the flip-top trash can in the corner.

Placing the carton and the gallon bottle side by side, I noted that the bomb was about half an inch too long to fit correctly, so I used my shears to carve an opening in the end of the carton. No cameras would be able to see that end of the carton once it was back on the shelf, which was all I was worried about. Then I woke up the phone that was taped to the side of the bomb; tapping on the keypad through the layers of plastic that kept the tell-tale odour of ANFO from permeating the workshop, I set the timer to go off at a specific moment.

The phone would then take a photo, and attempt to utilise the flash. As I'd removed the light from the phone and soldered wires in its place, a spark would thus be sent to pass through the cartridge primer buried within the ANFO itself. With hopefully catastrophic effects at the right time and place.

I had thirty seconds to go as I double-checked that nothing had been left in plain view, the incriminating end-piece of the carton having been deposited in the trash can along with the rest. Flipping up the cover on the teleporter, I tapped in the coordinates for home, hit the go-button, and stepped through the resulting portal.

Back in my bedroom, I took off the hat and mask. I hadn't been wearing the coat because I hadn't wanted to lose a chunk of it when the portal closed on top of the shelving, but it didn't really matter; there'd been nobody there to see me anyway. It only took me a few minutes to change into something less Atropos-y and put the teleporter on to charge, then I headed downstairs.

"Hey, guys," I said as I entered the living room. "What're you doing?"

"Showing Cherie some of our old board games," Dad replied from the kitchen. "Dinner's cooking, so I thought I'd get a few of the old favourites out and take a trip down memory lane."

"We never really had much chance to play these properly," Cherie admitted, looking over the pieces Dad was laying out on the board. "Someone would have a tantrum and pieces would go everywhere, and we'd never find them all. And the rulebook would always go missing, so we'd start making up our own rules."

"From what you've said about your family, I'm totally not surprised." I pulled out a chair and sat down. "Okay, I'm in. Let's do this."

Cherie beamed.

05:59 AM Central European Standard Time, Tuesday, 8 March

(11:59 PM Eastern Standard Time, Monday, 7 March)

Blasphemy Beta

Chosen Designation: Nemesis

Location: Brussels, Belgium

It was still well before dawn; even to Nemesis' enhanced senses, the sun was only a smear of light on the eastern horizon. An hour or more would need to pass before the first rays intruded on the sky overhead. Also, there was no moon, which made the night darker still.

She stood on a rooftop opposite the regional office for Interpol, looking down at the lit-up windows. The street-lights made for pools of radiance below, which exacerbated the gloom in which she lurked. This would be the perfect time to act, to disrupt their operations further and buy her employers more time to dig themselves out of their problems.

Focusing on one of the windows that seemed to have nobody beyond it, she accessed her teleport function—

A living being was right behind her, inside the protective bubble of her force field! Even as she began to turn, bringing up her hand and activating the razor-dart thrower built into it, there was a crashing report as something struck the base of her titanium-alloy skull. She stumbled, her processors thrown out of smooth operation by the impact. Less than a second later, as she fought to bring her systems back to nominal, it happened again. Emergency parameters kicked in, and she teleported a kilometre across the city.

What was that? Peripheral visuals had registered a piece of black cloth down around ankle level, but nothing more. It was enough. I am under attack from Atropos. She has managed to catch me by surprise. As she sent the message out, she reached back and explored the damage from the double shotgun-strike to the back of her head. There was a significant dent there, and she suspected the protective armour might be weakened.

Her external armour wasn't as durable as Persephone's; it would stop pistol bullets almost indefinitely, but two shotgun slugs in the same place, at literally point-blank range, had done noticeable damage. Reports were already scrolling upward in her HUD.

Understood. That was Persephone. Will you need to retreat?

Damage is minor so far. She put her back to the wall so that the same trick could not be repeated. It will not—

Atropos appeared right in front of her, left hand slapping aside her right, shotgun barrel jamming into her mouth, trigger already pulled. There was no hesitation, no gloating. Nemesis' jangled processors reacted just a little too late, and the shotgun slug tore into the unarmoured interior of her head. Massive damage reports bloomed in front of her eyes as she tried to shred the importunate cape with shards of razor-sharp metal, but somehow Atropos managed to twist aside, pull a pistol and put it to Nemesis' eye.

The first shot smashed her eyeball in. Less than a fifth of a second later, the second blasted a hole through into her processors. She only registered the third as a distant impact as her thought processes spiralled into oblivion.

I … can't …

Nemesis died, as she had a dozen times before.

She would return, of course. She always did.

Blasphemy Alpha

Chosen Designation: Persephone

Location: Airborne over Paris, France

Nemesis! Respond!

Only Alecto answered. Nemesis has been destroyed. Atropos is … effective.

How? How did Atropos manage that?

Analysis of data suggests that she teleported inside Nemesis' force field and shot her repeatedly with a heavy-calibre weapon.

Persephone recalled the force field in question. It had its uses, including the ability to teleport others within it if Nemesis had chosen to do so. Her own armour was a good deal simpler, and nobody could teleport inside it, and Alecto's force field was form-fitting. Well, she won't be able to do the same with either of us. We'll go back and rebuild Nemesis.

Am complying. The monastery?

Affirmative. I will meet you there.

Persephone took a moment to look northeast toward where Nemesis had fallen. Atropos would be made to regret this. The Blasphemies didn't experience emotions, exactly, but they knew the value of maintaining a reputation. If the black-clad cape kept killing them, they would have to take her down. Even if Atropos shot her point-blank in the eye—

At this point, she was travelling at about two hundred kilometres per hour when the smoky grey portal appeared one inch in front of her face. All the hyper-reflexes in the world would not have helped her, given that her flight power was simply incapable of overcoming her own forward momentum in such a short time. Her head passed into the portal and she saw some sort of garden bed in front of her, at very close range.

Approximately one-two-hundredths of a second after it had formed, the portal vanished again. Only Persephone's head had come through; severed from it by the portal, the rest of her body was left behind to hurtle in a descending arc and crash-land southeast of the city. Running only on her backup processor battery, she felt her head smash into the garden bed, half-burying itself in the soft loam with the force of the impact.

A pair of boots stepped up alongside her, then a gloved hand grasped her hair and lifted her head out of the dirt. As her processors began to fail one by one—the battery had not taken the impact well—she saw the faceless mask of Atropos for the first time. Then her mouth was prised open and vegetable matter was forced inside. With the last of her agency, she tried to smile triumphantly.

I will be back. And … I … will … kill …

Persephone died, assured of her return. Alecto, after all, was still on the way to the monastery.

Blasphemy Gamma

Chosen Designation: Alecto

Location: Monastery Base, Swiss Alps

Alecto could run at Mach 4 if she really wanted to, but normally she kept to lower speeds. Also, the lightweight protective force field that ensured her clothing didn't shred to pieces in seconds was harder to maintain at higher velocities.

Right now, she didn't care. A long rolling thunder followed her as she tore down less-trafficked back roads, dodging the few vehicles with the ease of long practice. When things got too congested, she took to the air; it couldn't match up to her running, or even Persephone's flight, but it was as fast as the average airliner, and got her past obstacles relatively quickly.

She scorched up the rough path that led to the monastery, then entered the complex code to let herself in through the front gates. Each succeeding barrier had another code-lock on it, which she opened in turn. She could've flown in, but that would expose her to the defenses that were specifically designed to deal with airborne intruders.

Finally, she reached her goal: the combination storeroom/workshop where she could rebuild both Nemesis and Persephone. As she closed the door behind her and heard the reassuring beep of the security system recognising her, she tried to recall the last time two of them had been taken down at once. She had personally never been in this situation herself before, she knew that.

It would be easy enough to remedy; within her memory banks, she held the compressed personalities and memories of both the others. They all knew how to assemble a basic body, then add on the parts that made them unique. Atropos could trumpet her victory all she liked: in a few days, they would be back, giving her claims the lie.

They would go on. And sooner or later, they would kill Atropos.

She was halfway down the room, reaching for one of the larger cartons of components, when she heard the foreign bip-bip-bip-bip coming from a shelf at the end of the room. Reacting instantly, she retreated to the far end of the room, energised the laser emitters in her eyes, and torched the whole section. Atropos was here? She set a bomb? How did she find—

There was a click from right beside her. She turned to stare at the innocuous carton sitting on the shelf, noticing far too late that it had been opened then sealed shut again. Her super-speed needed a split-second to kick in; as she tried to back-pedal away from the box, her perceptions began to slow down. Working on emergency protocols, she fired a laser burst into it.

The sound of the explosion was long and low, almost subsonic to her stretched hearing. In front of her, the box disintegrated in all directions at once, but a red-hot streamer of molten metal streaked toward her, faster than she could dodge aside from. Her force field was up, and would have protected her from the blunt-force trauma of the bomb, but the high-velocity metal burned straight through it, as well as through her chest armour, and obliterated her power core.

As she was flung backward by the wavefront of the explosion, she was vaguely aware of the shelving coming apart violently; one piece, directly in front of the carton, speared forward and punched into the hole that had been seared into her chest and out through her back. It did minimal damage—she was already down, her processors deteriorating rapidly—but she had just enough time to recall the words she'd read on the PHO post. Staked through the heart …

Alecto died, aware that they'd never stood a chance.

The Three Blasphemies would never return.

End of Part Seventy-Eight

[A/N: End of posting for another couple of weeks. You know how it goes.]