2.4

April 5th, 2010

I never considered myself a dog person. Sure, I liked dogs, maybe even a bit more than cats, but I never had that phase when I was begging my parents for a puppy. There WERE a couple of years in pre-school when I tried keeping spiders, centipedes and praying mantises in a jar in my room, but after a few times I've got some nasty bites that landed me in ER, I was sorta over it.

Either way, I began to really like these walks with Lady, Mr. Calvert's dog. I mean, I had to spend literal hours playing Madison's nanny and trying to keep my grades afloat in Winslow, with the latter half of the day (and most of my weekends) dedicated to crafting, planning - and from this day onwards, likely also to a hour or two of patrolling with our newest associate. It was nice to just walk a dog for a hour, as this sort of a breather in-between the madness that my daily life turned into.

As if by an unspoken agreement with Lisa, we avoided talking shop during this hour - and I attempted to not even THINK shop, even if my thoughts constantly shifted back to the projects I've had running. But all mindfulness guidelines said that it's not a failure to get lost in thoughts - you just needed to acknowledge it, and try to return on the right track.

"Did you hear about Panacea? The New Wave cape?" Lisa pulled me out of my thoughts.

"What about her?"

"Rumours are, she's been volunteering at the hospitals, just going down the lists of patients and curing them of whatever."

That was pretty impressive. If she really was just curing sick for free, that was FAR more heroic than anything the local PRT was doing. Still…

"Wait, like, EVERYONE? Not just critical patients and people with cancer and stuff?"

"Yeah. Just emptying out hospitals."

"Okay, that's just stupid," I noted, doing some quick math in my head, "Brockton Central has what, 250 beds? Even if she only has to spend two or three minutes on a patient, it'd round to four, maybe five minutes with the travel time per person. That's, like, 16 hours of straight up work at minimum, without counting Emergency Room?"

"A bit over that?"

"Yeah, and if she's curing EVERYONE daily, they won't just wait for new people to come, they'll pull patients from nearby hospitals, and then from other cities. Except, studies show that people are only really productive in the first four hours of work. After that, they start slowing down, and making mistakes more easily - and nobody wants to know what a healer cape can do if they make a mistake."

"So… You think Panacea should work shorter shifts?"

"Yeah, like, four hours, or until everyone who's critical is healed, whichever is longer. Tops. After that? Pay up."

"I thought you'd suggest she should've done it for cash to begin with."

"New Wave's been getting more donations thanks to her, right?" Lisa nodded in confirmation, "Then she can afford to work pro bono - but not at the cost of her own wellbeing and sanity. Four hours of volunteering a day is still 48-60 people healed for free, more if she stays in one room and the doctors just wheel patients in as soon as she's done to eliminate travel time. And the rest could be well cared for by trained professionals at the hospital."

"So what you're saying is you DON'T want her to cure your nearsightedness," my friend chuckled.

"She could do that? Hm," I thought about it for a second, "I don't mind my glasses - except for when I have to replace a pair, I don't even notice them. And once again, getting on her list means adding one more thing for the stupid girl to stress over. I'll deal."

If it came down to it, I could just suggest some sort of quid pro quo to Panacea - same way I suggested a partnership to Not-Scarab (who, just like me, was still trying to decide on their name). Maybe a personal Chameleon Circuit? I imagine having people recognise you even when you go grocery shopping gets annoying after a while. I'd just have to find a way to 'lock' it so only she could use it. Or… Most of New Wave could fly, but if she couldn't (healer, after all) - I could make her a Floating Engine, just like the one I was making for Lisa.

Well, preparing to make - she finally found a proper, sturdy branch somewhere in the woods, and I went through debarking it, and treating it to a bath of chemicals - most of them storebought. Yeah, it was weird how dunking a stick in a bath was supposed to make it dry faster, but who am I to disagree with the process? Still, it was going to take at least a few weeks for most of the moisture inside to evaporate, after which I was going to be able to finish treating it, and finally get to carving.

She also brought a full basket of different mushrooms, and some berries. Back at the workshop, I was currently making carvings in wooden planks to make these long, garden-patch-like pots Lisa could grow things in - while she was practicing her sewing.

Because as it turned out, those off-white bandages mummy wannabe wore? Were actually spider silk - which is basically this wonder material, as light as cloth and sturdier than kevlar five times its bulk. Enough to stop a pistol shot - which even with my defence talismans, was a very desirable redundancy in the Gunslinging States of America in general, and Brockton Bay in particular. Given that, according to our tests, my enchanted tools were able to easily penetrate spider silk, I've made a pair of scissors and a large needle yesterday - and Not-Scarab was currently creating full rolls of cloth we were going to turn into three sets of costumes - one for our associate, and two for us.

Like I said, quid pro quo.

"Well, at least Panacea's in New Wave, and not in the Wards," Lisa smirked.

I thought about it for a second.

"I don't know about that," was I furrowing my brow? Yeah, probably, "Doesn't PRT have some sort of pearl-clutching moms-united organisation always breathing down their necks?"

"Youth Guard, yeah."

"And if these organisations care about anything, it's kids being 'mistreated', at least what they think as such. Which means, on one hand, if a young cape joins the Wards, they can kiss fighting criminals for the betterment of their city goodbye, since that'd be 'too dangerous'. But on the other hand, a kid working unhealthy hours? They'd also crack down on that, hard."

"So, uh, wait… You think Panacea is the only local cape who would benefit from being put in the Wards?"

"Not necessarily. Maybe some of them want to be safe more than they want to do good. I don't get it, but it's a valid approach to life. And maybe some of them actually need adult oversight so they don't just go off the deep end and start killing 'acceptable targets' left and right."

"You think they shouldn't start collecting Nazi scalps?" my friend snickered.

"I think the law, unfortunately, frowns at killing people, while simultaneously considering the Nazis as equal enough to us humans to count as such. Maybe some ancient wrinkly ass in the Washington is a secret Confederacy survivor from the Civil War, I wouldn't know. Either way, the last thing a kid cape needs is a body count."

"Think someone in the Wards has one?"

"Triumph, almost guaranteed," I deadpanned, "There's no way he didn't bury someone under rubble after stepping on a LEGO or something."

"Touche, Tay. Touche."

Soon, we've returned Lady to Mr. Calvert.

The man looked terrible - not as bad as on our first day, but it felt like he was slowly deteriorating, bags under his eyes becoming more pronounced with each passing day. He also gained some weight - but not in a healthy way. Like, he was still skeletally thin, except his belly was now protruding, visible even through the fancy casual clothes he wore at home. Either he was going wild with junk food, drinking heavily, or both. Not that I caught more than a whiff of alcohol from him so far.

And yeah, we were just a bunch of hired teens walking his dog, but I couldn't help but worry.

Upon returning home, we immediately began changing into our 'sneaking outfits' - since once again, we had some cape-related plans.

"Ah, this reminds me, how's Emma?" my friend smiled, putting on a pair of snow shoes on top of her sneakers.

"About the same as always," I shrugged, even as I was slipping into baggy clown pants, "Well, almost. With me being next to Madison half the time, she's getting antsy."

"Which means, she'll either escalate, or switch targets," my friend sighed, adjusting her glittertastic tutu.

"And she doesn't want to escalate against me. Not if there's a chance I might humiliate her in public," I squeezed into a large cardboard box 'chestplate' with a 'TИNKEЯTECH AЯMOUЯ' drawn with a black marker in bold letters on both front and back.

"Which means, the rest of the girls are feeling really nervous right now," her face was now hidden behind a plastic plague doctor mask.

"Yup. The cracks aren't obvious, but if you know to look? She's losing support, and fast," the gorilla mask was definitely the most uncomfortable part of the entire ensemble. It collected SO much moisture, I had to pull its bottom up every few minutes, just so it didn't nastily slosh in there.

"Which means, she might just solve herself in a few weeks," she nodded, the rainbow wig bouncing with the motion, "Ready?"

"I'd say it'd take more than loss of all followers for her to be stopped. Ready," I sighed, finishing up with a fedora, "Let's go."

It took us about 20 minutes to get to our warehouse, from where we separated. Lisa went on to practice sewing - she was getting pretty good, so I was sure she'd be able to do basic outfits once we get the spider silk cloth - as long as we double-check the cutout outlines. I sent a message to our associate's burner phone, and flew out on Hanzo for our first joint patrol.

In another half a hour, we finally met up in that alley we've had our first talk at. The noir mummy was already there by the time I arrived.

"Hello there," I greeted them, decloaking as Hanzo was landing.

"...hi," they acknowledged my arrival, "...I... ...Came up with a name… …It's Brightbug General…"

That was certainly a combination of words. In English, even.

"Oh. Um… Why?"

"…it's less threatening," they explained, "…this costume was a necessity… …but if I can, I want something… …something approachable…"

"I guess this name's approachable enough," I agreed, "You'd get constantly shortened to 'Bug' though."

"…I can live with that…"

So, an Ordinary Witch, a Brightbug General, and a Turtle Miko walk into a bar… Ugh, no. Definitely not 'Turtle Miko'. Also, that was quite a collection of characters already.

"…here…" Brightbug offered me a… Walkie talkie? "…we can use these during a patrol…"

"You want me to fly overhead, while you cover the ground?" there was a nod, "Good idea. We'll need to test if my stealth talismans work with it though. If they do, and something happens, we get an element of surprise."

The basic idea was that I would chaperone Brightbug's patrols - their ability to find and stop crime-in-progress was very good even solo, but a bird's-eye-view could help - and parahuman help on call was practically invaluable. With these? We just might be able to coordinate beautifully.

"Alright, let's get this show on the road," I sighed, "Stay here for a bit."

Also, me only interfering if they were in over their head was probably good for their self esteem - for someone with the power of command, even over simple arthropods, they were almost painfully self-deprecating. Seriously, who in their right mind would be fine with being called 'Bug'?

I've activated my SEP talisman and flew about twenty feet into the air, before turning on the walkie talkie.

"This is, uh… Hanzo Airlines. Do you hear me?"

"…THIS IS BRIGHTBUG GENERAL… …HEARING YOU LOUD AND CLEAR, AIRLINES… …OPERATION A GO..?"

"Yeah, let's start."

"…MOVING EAST, TO BRAGG'S AVENUE…"

"Copy."

We went through multiple city blocks, until General stopped a single mugging, even before we arrived there. This time, they stayed with the victim, until a police cruiser picked up the mugger. Gave a statement too, despite how uncomfortable Brightbug's body language was through the entire process.

Then, the process began anew, until I it was my turn to notice something happening.

"Brightbug, I'm seeing ten people trailing your movements. Can't see the details, but we're in Empire territory."

"…COPY… …THERE ARE ALSO FIVE AHEAD, ARMED… …ONE VERY WHITE…"

Ah, crap. This was an ambush.

"I am extracting you in thirty seco-"

"…NO… …I HAVE A BONE TO PICK WITH ALABASTER…"