4.4

Medhall?'

You felt stupid asking, but it was hard to even picture. While Medhall was in Empire territory and you had all known something was going to happen, it was difficult to picture Iron Rain making her move on such a recognisable and significant piece of the local landscape. Medhall made up a significant portion of Brockton Bay's economy and employment figures, and with an attack of this scale there was no way that she could simply hope that nobody would respond. Something had to happen.

'Yes, Medhall. I'm leaving now, I want you present.'

'Yes sir,' you began, brain rapidly circulating. 'You go ahead and I'll rally the Wards for support. We'll meet you there as soon as possible.'

Armsmaster paused for a moment, evaluating your proposal, before nodding sharply and striding off. While it wasn't silent, you were impressed by how quiet his armour could be despite the pace, and you wondered how you'd noticed it in the past. Maybe he had made some improvements, though you couldn't be sure.

As he left, you saw fit to throw some questions though your mind, seeking out information that you could pass on to either Armsmaster himself or at the very least, whoever was working Console such that the information could be passed on to wherever it was most needed.

Chances that this is Iron Rain's big move?

100%

You bit your lip as you made your way back down through the corridors, aiming for the Ward headquarters. Iron Rain was insane, but your power had previously told you that the attack was more likely to be targetted than a massive bombing campaign, which meant that Iron Rain probably had some sort of reason to suspect that Kaiser would have been present, or at least had some other kind of investment in Medhall. The prospect of escalation from an arson attack to a confrontation between both of the leaders of the Empire was not something you wished to countenance; you were sure that they could be overcome, neither of them had the same kind of terrifying strength that Lung could bring to the fore, but you didn't want to see the kind of damage they could wreak before things were pulled back into control.

Chances that Kaiser was present at the time?

100%

Dread continued to build, and you allowed yourself to slip into a short sprint to make it to the end of the corridor more quickly, shovelling yourself through the door and into the Wards' headquarters.

Inside, there was a general sense of peace. Much of the room was empty, though Kid Win was manning the computer consoles at the back and Vista was reading on one of the couches that encircled the desk in the middle of the room. Nobody else appeared to be around, and you suspected that someone was probably out on patrol already in some sense.

Your charge into the room did not go unnoticed, and both sets of eyes flicked over to you; neither of them had ever seen you in a state of panic, and you attempted to straighten your posture somewhat to restore some of your image, though you weren't entirely sure how successful it was.

'Iron Rain has struck,' you spoke through rapid breaths. 'Medhall's been destroyed. Armsmaster's en route, we've got to go after him for support.'

Before you had even finished your sentence, Vista was on her feet and had begun to move across the room. She had none of the frenetic panicked energy that you felt welling up in yourself and you wondered whether she didn't feel it at all or if she had simply reached a point of control over it. Sometimes it was easy to forget that for every week of experience you had as a parahuman, she had six months or more, and was more experienced than some of the newer members of the Protectorate around the country.

She slipped into the leading role comfortable, issuing orders to Kid Win.

'Kid, contact Clockblocker and Aegis on patrol and re-route them to Medhall area. Stay on Console yourself, we're going to need you to co-ordinate for us.'

The tinker looked at Vista and then across to you, and you dipped your head in concession. Her idea sounded sensible. Kid Win shrugged, as though not entirely convinced, but nevertheless turned back to the monitor and began typing, pulling up some windows that you couldn't really make out from such a distance before grabbing his mouthpiece and pulling it forward.

You didn't waste time standing around to hear what he was telling the other Wards, and you moved out quickly. Vista followed, her shorter stature forcing her to use her power to warp the corridor to keep up with you: you weren't moving at a sprint but you had long legs and there's all manner of rushing that panic can instill.

'Where are you going?' Vista asked, voice rising and falling in pitch as the space between you and her was compressed and expanded time and again.

'Getting help. Give me a second.'

Rushing into the room where your squad had been staying, you were glad to see Rachel and Regent both present. Regent's mask was lying on the table and you were stunned to see his face for the first time – you weren't entirely sure where but you were certain that you had seen him before. Pretty, distractingly so, though with a glower pasted across his features as he stared down at his lap, cradling a glowing screen. When he looked up, he seemed equally as surprised to see you, though you supposed it made sense: most of the time, you would at least knock before charging in.

Rachel, by comparison, seemed to understand the situation immediately. Perhaps she read it on your body language or heard you coming, but she was strapping her mask on when you walked in and as you had your momentary stand-off with an unmasked Regent, she pulled her coat back on.

'Fighting?'

You raised a hand and wavered it. She didn't react.

'Sort of. Medhall's exploded. Mask up, Regent, we're going on support.'

'Oh, I see,' he said, throwing his console onto the table with an alarming clatter and palming his mask. 'Heroing again, so soon.'

Without any time to explain further, you turned and exited the room, confident in hearing Rachel's footsteps behind you and knowing that Regent wouldn't be fair behind. He gave off a lackadaisical air but thus far he had actually done everything you had asked of him without any stutters or hesitation. The only thing that appeared to give him any kind of pause was the concept of empowerment and you were still working on that with him. It was an issue for another day.

Spilling out into the hallway where Vista waited, she was surprised to see Rachel on the move behind you, but she didn't question it. The Wards knew that the probationary Wards were there, after all, even if the two groups weren't fully integrated into one another, and though you hadn't received explicit permission from Armsmaster to bring them along it had also not been forbidden.

Regent was the last to exit, and that left him far behind the rest of you. Though you couldn't see him, you almost heard the sigh and he began following after. Something about having to put things into a hurry almost offended the boy and you smirked a little internally comparing his own childish behaviour to Vista's soldier-like efficiency. He must have been at least four years older than her but if someone was asked to guess based on behaviour alone, nobody would see it that way.

Making your way towards the foyer, you realised that other than yourself, and potentially Vista in a tangential sort of way, there wasn't much in the way of mover capacity. While Rachel could always transform and utilise her speed to help her navigate the city, Regent would be left behind and as far as you knew there weren't motorcycles to rent.

'Regent,' you said, trying to keep your voice even despite the pace you had been pushing. The foyer came into view as the elevator doors opened. 'I'm going to carry you. We're going quickly.'

A moment of silence hit the air.

'Fine.'

You got the sense that he was more neutral to the idea than he seemed but then, teenage boys always had to keep up some level of bravado you supposed.

'We're all heading to Medhall; as quick as you can. Once we get there, Armsmaster's in charge but for now I'm suggesting that we work on establishing a perimeter and then evacuation.'

'Actually,' Vista started, voice confident and clear, 'I think it might be best if I start on controlling the space first. Clean-up for ease of evacuation, that's usually what I do on support. You guys should probably focus on evacuation though, that makes sense.'

You didn't see the need to argue – it made sense when you considered it. Vista wasn't that large, and while she could always use her power to help her get people out of tricky spots it was also true that she was probably more at risk inside a hazard site than a larger individual – especially if that larger individual happened to have brute powers.

Beside you, Rachel didn't appear to need much of a prompt and as you made your way through the foyer she began to grow. You hadn't yet seen her transform in front of your eyes, and while she didn't quite reach the size that she had while fighting Hookwolf, it was still strange to watch someone grow first slowly and then, all at once as the transformation overtook her. There was a shuddering in the space around her, and what little of her skin was exposed rippled before it began to swell and bulge in spots. Fur sprouted from the spots between islands of skin which hardened into bone plates. Her costume, though you didn't think it came from Rhizome, handled the shift admirably; the looseness of the pants seemed designed to accommodate some degree of expansion and the stretch of the bodysuit below held up well. Even her trusty jacket, which you were certain wouldn't survive a true challenge, managed to stay intact even as it strained at the seams.

Her transformation was complete by the time you reached the door, and she stood comfortably above you – perhaps six feet eight or so, as you felt that she was now taller than Armsmaster too – and her bone white mask betrayed the curl of canine jaws from below despite hiding her face admirably.

As soon as you reached the street, Vista began warping the ground ahead of herself and shifting off at a rapid speed and Rachel – Skýla, now – began to follow. She was fast. Not quite as fast as she had been while fighting Hookwolf, but moving faster than anyone you had ever seen sprint and she didn't appear to be flagging as she reached the horizon, slipping below cars and street signs. Still, you knew that you had her beat when it came to maximum speed.

Pulling out your phone, you rapidly typed in the responses you had got from your Thinker power before launching them off towards Armsmaster. You had no idea when he would get them, but you presumed there was some kind of notification system built into his armour. If there wasn't, you thought that there probably should be; if anything, he should be able to minimise a telecommunications device into something smaller than single component on a typical device's motherboard and place it somewhere surreptitious.

Turning towards Regent, you looked at him dully.

'Ready for a ride?'

'Be gentle.'

You rolled your eyes before allowing your wings to sprout from your back and an arm to wrap around Regent's waist, before rocketing off into the sky. You had flown with passengers a handful of times by this point and so the fear of crushing him had largely waned, but as he wriggled in your grip it felt uncomfortably like a hostage situation. Something told you that he wasn't much a fan of flight – that, or of being in someone else's grip. Internally you shrugged. It was a little bit hypocritical of a master power type to get antsy about other people controlling them for a change.

Flying was interrupted by a new, distinct buzzing sound echoing inside your helmet, and you were quickly alerted to the voice of Kid Win speaking over the console system – apparently he had followed through as rapidly as he could.

'This is Console to all networks, Clockblocker and Aegis have been alerted to the Medhall crisis and are re-locating. Further Protectorate support, both preventative and reconnaissance, have been dispatched. Armsmaster on location at Medhall.'

You didn't see the need to reply, nor did you feel as though it was expected. The message had been fairly clear; the other Wards were going to come for support as well, and the members of the Protectorate had been sent off to other key locations around the city in case this was being used as a distraction for another assault or in the case of some opportunistic criminals taking advantage of an ongoing crisis to launch an impromptu attack of their own. With Armsmaster already on scene at Medhall, you expected Miss Militia to be leading another unit somewhere, potentially Dauntless with another, and there would be a continued main perimeter around Empire territory and someone would probably go to check out the borders of Lung's stomping grounds to make sure nothing appeared to be poking its head up.

While none of this was certain, and you couldn't be sure about every member and their specific assignments, it seemed to make sense and match up with what conversations you had already had regarding planned targets for surveillance while awaiting Iron Rain's initial strike. That it had happened now simply meant you were already set up to manage it in some regards.

As you moved, you contemplated the idea of empowering some people. That was the entire point of trialling it, of course, so that you knew who and what you could empower when necessary out in the field. The possibility of Vista was enticing; she had shown seemingly massive power changes once empowered but while that was the case, you weren't entirely sure if it was the kind of thing she was able to manage as effectively as her primary power. In the end you decided that you would probably hold off on empowering anyone, at least at first – if circumstances changed, that could be important, but you didn't want to simply boost people up without consideration for the practical difficulties. Not every power could be as instinctive as Miss Militia's had been, of course – you had Armsmaster's strange fugue to remind you of that.

Coming closer to Medhall, you saw the damage from a distance. Regent let out a quiet, almost amused scoff – something you barely caught through the combination of rushing air and your own wings buzzing – but you didn't think it was something to scoff at.

From the distance, it looked as though the entire top two floors of Medhall had been totally removed and the materials that had made them up scattered across the entire street and down the roads opposite. Rubble, sometimes as large as a desk or a copy machine, had been launched at high speeds out and the damage was evident: cars had been crushed in, the facades of buildings opposite crumbling themselves under the weight of the shrapnel, glass windows shattered and glittering across the floors, and smoke was spiralling into the air with a malevolence.

Cruising in to a landing, the braking happening rapidly enough to make even your own head spin for a brief moment, you set Regent back on his feet and gave him a moment to re-settle his brain while you sought out Armsmaster; the man was stood off to the side, speaking to a man in a fire fighter's uniform, his armour covered in soot and dust as though he had already been inside the building at least once.

Crowds of civilians, both pristine gatherers from the surrounding area and crumpled escapees from the wreckage, were stood around in hoards watching as the rescue continued.

Moving over to Armsmaster, you alerted him to your own arrival. As you did, Skýla and Vista made their appearances after only a few moments. They were not shocked to see that you had beaten them there.

'Armsmaster, Penumbra reporting. I brought backup.'

'Good. Get some of you on a perimeter, everyone else involved in clean-up and evacuation. Brutes in the building – Aegis is already inside,' he turned to face Vista and Skýla, who was indeed a solid few inches taller than him at this point. 'Vista, you know your role. Regent, neither you nor Clockblocker can move inside the building unharmed, so you take the perimeter. Patrol and ensure no civilians come inside. Hel- Skýla, you work with Penumbra.'

'Yes sir.'

There wasn't much to argue with. While Regent would probably be somewhat helpful moving people within the building, you yourself had noted that he would be fairly vulnerable to damage inside in the same way that Vista was, and he didn't even have the advantage of warping space-time to get him out of sticky situations. Placing him with Clockblocker – who couldn't do much unless he could touch something – seemed like a sensible option. There was even a chance that their personalities would mesh, though you weren't sure about that.

Shuddering at the thought of a Clockblocker and Regent duo, you decided never to contemplate such horrors again.

Everyone scattered, and you began to move.

It was strange – every rational part of your brain knew that the situation posed essentially zero threat to you. There had been fairly little in the arson attack Coil had orchestrated that had posed a danger, and since then you had eliminated even those small issues by acquiring Rhizome's helmet. The mundanity of a fire, or falling rubble, seemed almost boring in comparison to the combat against Hookwolf or the tinker lasers of Coil's men, and yet there was still a part of you, deep down, that recoiled from the idea of walking into a burning building.

You smothered it, and walked directly forwards with Skýla trailing behind you. The lower level of the building seemed to be empty, which made logical sense, and you began making your way up the stairs, not trusting the elevators for very obvious reasons. Even if they were still running, that could change at any time.

Medhall had a strange look to it, a combination of a hospital and an office, with laboratories alongside wards that you assumed they used for trials and volunteer donations of things like blood and plasma. Meanwhile, accounting offices and even a small call centre showed up in your navigations. There were only a handful of individuals still within the building, and as you made your way up you passed Aegis, who appeared equally as unphased by the dangers of the building, but who was struggling to move some of the larger pieces of fallen architecture.

You made to assist, but were cut off by Skyla's hulking form; you weren't entirely sure how her strength scaled with her size, but it clearly wasn't a direct correlation because she was considerably smaller than twice her civilian mass but you had difficulty imagining even a dozen Rachel Lindt's moving the fallen half-wall as easily as she did now. Aegis, too, seemed somewhat surprised, as the weight was taken from him and hauled aside with almost contemptuous ease, freeing the duo of trapped individuals behind and allowing the crimson Ward to lead them out.

Continuing up, you reached what was clearly the last structurally sound – or at least, semi-sound – floor of the building. There was an almost palatial opulence to it, and as you moved through it you saw why: a door, blown in two and scattered across the ground, still bore the brass nameplate of Max Anders. Medhall's CEO was a local celebrity and, when you thought about it, probably one of the two or three richest men in Brockton Bay too. If someone was going to attack Medhall, it made sense to target where his office presumably was, and finding it with such extravagant decoration, far removed from the clinical rooms below, couldn't have been difficult.

The question arose, however: why target Medhall at all? Certainly, it was within Kaiser's territory and was a landmark, but Iron Rain didn't strike you as the type to make symbolic overtures, particularly when so much of her manpower was gone with Alabaster and Hookwolf's removal. All she had left was Stormtiger, Cricket, and whatever aid she could scrounge up from the more neutral elements of the Empire, and creating such a disastrous assault as a threat was simply inviting destruction. Your thinker power had already confirmed that she was going to get it, and soon, and so if Kaiser had been present – perhaps he worked at Medhall, you reasoned – he had survived.

You picked your way through the rubble, kicking some of it out of the way and keeping your wings active; you never knew when the floor might fall out from under you, and the level of structural damage from fire was sometimes difficult to identify. It seemed clear that if you ran into anyone on this level, the probability was that they had either been seriously injured or trapped entirely – or else they would have already made their way to a lower floor. In either case, allowing for a further degradation of the structure could be disastrous.

Making your way inside the large office building, you felt a burning sensation ahead of you. The familiar glow of a parahuman: Skýla must have been somewhere ahead and below you, or perhaps Aegis had decided to fly up to the top floor after helping the previous handful of evacuees. Still, knowing that the Empire was involved you made sure to stay on alert. It wouldn't do to assume that the parahuman you were sensing was Skýla, only to find Iron Rain still around and searching for Kaiser.

You doubted the probability of that, though. If the explosive destruction of Medhall had confirmed anything about your prior knowledge of Iron Rain, it was that she wasn't subtle: if she was going to fly out and try to kill you, she wouldn't be likely waiting in a cupboard somewhere.

Creaks came from the floor as you slowly and patiently stepped through the room. Ash coated the expensive rug that had been thrown to the side, and a heavy mahogany desk had been blown to splinters, torn asunder at the woodgrain, and had accumulated across the front half of the room. From the look of the hole torn in the wall and ceiling, leading to open sky, you assumed that this was where the initial explosion had taken place – here, or on the floor immediately above it.

Metal clattered and you turned abruptly, attention drawn to a network of filing cabinets in the corner of the room. They looked as though they had been partially fused together from the heat, but the smoke that filled the air made it hard to see clearly. You could see, however, a human hand emerging from behind the gathered scrap.

Slowly, a man extricated himself; you recognised him immediately. Though you had never seen him in such a state, blood pouring in a deceptively heavy slash across his scalp and staining his blonde hair pink, suit ruffled and crumpled, it was inarguably Max Anders. That he had survived was a surprise in itself, but that he was even conscious seemed even more improbable. Surely he had to have had a concussion at the minimum: if he had been seated at his desk when it was thrown, he could have been crushed beneath its weight.

Despite your scepticism, however, he took a wobbling step forward.

'Mr Anders, I'm Penumbra from the Wards. Let me escort you to safety.'

You stepped forward, extending a hand in classic heroic fashion, and were surprised when he was clearly reticent to take it. Shock could take a number of forms, and you wondered if he wasn't perhaps entirely sure about what he was seeing. Maybe he had been concussed after all.

His hand raised up, shakily, to take yours after a moment though and you swept him into your grasp before allowing your wings to lift you from the ground, carrying you to the hole in the wall from which you emerged into the smoky sky and began to navigate the millionaire to the ground. The view of the assembled crowd, parahumans, paramedic, and civilian alike, looked up at you as you closed the distance rapidly. He coughed a handful of times as you moved, and you felt the warmth of his blood sinking into your shoulder; you absently noted that he was only around your own height. Television had always made him look taller.

Touching down to the ground with the wealthy man, you set him on his feet. With fresh air coursing through his lungs, he seemed to be recovering fairly quickly to a state of semi-lucidity, and he was able to stay upright without your support after only a moment on shaken ankles.

Armsmaster, seeing your emergence, moved over rapidly. Clockblocker and Regent were stood in the distance, speaking to a gathered group of civilians, and you could see Skýla placing an evacuee on the ground near an ambulance which must have arrived shortly after you went inside. Vista was co-ordinating well, the road held open for the paramedics by her warping and the occasional over-eager onlooker being pushed back impossible distances as they attempted to surge forward. In some ways, she was a single human crowd-control machine.

'Mr Anders,' Armsmaster spoke. 'Are you injured?'

Clarity slowly bled through Anders' eyes, the blue light in them sparking off the sunlight as though a film of ash and dust were being burned away.

'It's not serious,' he spoke. 'I've had worse injuries, certainly.'

You raised an eyebrow at that, and Armsmaster apparently felt the same sense of scepticism.

'And when would that be? You've lost a lot of blood, Mr Anders.'

'Mensur,' he answered quickly. 'Academic fencing. No man in the Anders' family would last long without proving their mettle.'

Armsmaster appeared to take the response at face value, and you allowed yourself to be reassured. You had no idea what the man was talking about, but chalked it up to a combination of things that sounded particularly foolish or particularly strange; if your Dad had suggested that you had to prove yourself through some form of sword fight, you would have told him various unkindnesses.

More words passed between the two men, as Armsmaster was apparently willing to take the addled executive's statement – at least in preliminary form – there on the street, but as they discoursed a loud crack hit the air.

The sky was aflame. Heat washed across you, so hot that Anders' liquid blood felt as though it boiled against your skin, and you felt a deafness ringing in your ears. You turned as quickly as you could, and saw the entire top half of the Medhall building, perhaps another four floors, teetering on their own axis. Rubble began to fall. Another detonation.

Vista acted before you could. Much of the mass crumbled inwards, and much of what fell was in a singular large section – perhaps tonnes of weight in concrete and glass and steel – that the younger Ward simply boxed up into a container of miniscule space, shrinking it down and warping the distance between the sky and ground into a millimetre, not allowing it any momentum or to spread as it fell.

Errant slabs of concrete, however, still tumbled free, as did a handful of large panes of glass, moving with shearing intent.

You moved as quickly as you could, and tracked the largest piece of rubble; your wings buzzed furiously, sounding like an endless zipper, as you intercepted it. Hands to the sky, you felt it crash into you with enough force to draw a small exhalation, but it wasn't nearly as heavy as any of the boats had been in the graveyard and you were confident that it would hold. Drifting back to the ground with it under control, you felt it slip and dug your fingers into the concrete, as though creating a make-shift bowling ball grip.

As you landed, you saw that Skýla had intercepted a similar piece, batting it away; her solution had saved a particularly erstwhile civilian, but had unfortunately crumpled the exterior of a particularly expensive looking car.

Regent, hand twitching, gave you a nod and you followed his eyeline to see a fallen paramedic roughly two feet from an explosion of shattered glass.

One benefit of the outing, it seemed, was that nobody could posit a reason to cast aspersions on the former Undersiders anymore. If they did, you thought that they deserved some alone time with Rachel.

Turning back, you were surprised by Max Anders' appearance. The man had gone bright red, his face flushed, and the blood pulsed in larger spurts as circulation flooded his skin. Any trace of his remaining unease seemed to flood out of him with it, dripping to the ground in a steadily growing pool around his feet, until he locked eyes with Armsmaster's visor.

'I want this fixed. Solved. Whoever did this, I want them caught yesterday, do you hear me?'

'Mr Anders, trust that the PRT will support the Brockton Bay Police Department in their investigation. We may already have a lead.'

'You had better! The insurance will pay for the building, but I could have died – do you know what that would cost this town? My business is the only business in this entire city worth significant money, people are going out of jobs for this, Armsmaster. Fix it.'

Nothing you had ever seen of Max Anders had implied that he was prone to such tantrums, but you supposed that the concussion must simply have been worse than you thought. Maybe you should recommend him a trip to see Amy at the hospital.

'We will do what we can, and support any further investigation. Right now the important thing is to help those wounded and inform the families of those who may have not made it. I'm sure you understand, Mr Anders.'

Armsmaster's response, subtly reproachful in its new focus, seemed to work well enough, as the blonde man straightened his posture and had the good sense to at least feign a return of his ill form.

'I do suppose that I should make similar calls. If you'll excuse me.'

Blood dripping behind him, Anders moved towards the ambulances stationed on the far side of the street, his suit dyed an irreversible ugly brown.

'Penumbra?'

Armsmaster's deep voice resonated even more effectively with its lowered volume.

'Yes, sir?'

'Chances that Kaiser's response will end in either he or Iron Rain's death?'

'Seventy five per cent, sir.'

'Will either of them die in the next twenty four hours?'

'No, sir.'

His gaze appeared locked eerily on Max Anders' back.

'Interesting. And yet we know Kaiser's response will be coming soon. I wonder what form it will take.'

You wondered yourself, but you couldn't quite formulate a question that might help. The flames of Medhall burned down to coals as the fire department flooded the scene. Max Anders' blood soaked into your boots.

Actions Remaining:

- Do a PHO Q&A

- Do First Aid training with the PRT on April 8th

- Try your thinker power on Endbringers (after the Empire is done with)

- Consult the others on strategies for engaging the Empire

- Get in touch with Dragon to talk about the Birdcage

[X][ACTION]Request a way to contact Dragon from Armsmaster

[X][ACTION]Finish practicing snake transformation power

[X][ACTION]Speak to the doctors to see if they've learned anything about your power through study

Medhall's wrecked, folks. Max Anders is alive but mad and injured, and Armsmaster may be somewhat suspicious. We might be able to work out how/what Kaiser's response will be, but we know it won't be a successful killing in the immediate future. So we've got some time to play with before the next move is made: what do we do? I've made some suggestions related to our existing actions and goals, but you may have more: do we try anything pro-active against the Empire, for example? Do we do anything with the cleanup? Check to see if the ABB are responding in any way? What do we do?

4.4

The two of you stood together for a moment, before Armsmaster instructed you to return to work and continue the clean-up process.

The entire area was a mess. There was no hope that the street would resemble itself anytime soon and the best that you were able to hope for was that things would be clear for the emergency services to make their way in and out more effectively sooner rather than later.

Most of the civilians had begun to disperse; not necessarily out of a desire to do so, but out of fear. The final explosion had sent a number of pieces of dangerous shrapnel flying around and though the quick action of yourself and the other Wards had prevented any immediate deaths, there had been some people who found themselves with nasty nicks and scratches. The sight of blood more close to them rather than distant enough to resemble a television screen had sent the majority of the onlookers away.

Not all of them, however, and as you returned to the melange of parahumans meandering around the disaster-zone, camera flashes and the occasional yelled comment passed through your perception.

Much of what you had to do was elementary. As the strongest Ward present by far, you were mostly dedicated to moving rubble from the roads and piling it up on the pavement that lined the sides of the streets, creating a network for people to actually move around, albeit at the cost of the foot traffic. Glass had to be cleaned up, but that was beyond the abilities of anyone present in any effective way and you were resigned to allowing that to wait for a more specific clean-up.

Dust turned to sludge underfoot as the torrential flow of water from the firefighters extinguished the remaining flames of the Medhall building, glass particles and concrete sand turning into a putty that clung to your feet as you moved around, and you took to hovering an inch or two above the ground at all times just to avoid the feeling of quicksand clinging to you. Nothing about it was pleasant.

Much of the work was quiet and, in fact, largely automatic; there wasn't much room or need for discussion, as those who were capable of helping in the practical parts of clean-up did so without prompt and those who didn't possess the required powers devoted themselves to controlling the informally established perimeter, liaising with officials and civilians, and in Armsmaster's case, doing both; as you shifted a particularly heavy chunk of concrete to the side, adding it to a precarious pile and propping it up with a piece of broken rebar, you saw him now in deep conversation with a journalist. His neatly tailored suit gleamed audaciously and he looked ludicrous stood in the wreckage. Armsmaster's dusty, scorched armour felt far more impressive even without a single reflection of light.

On the rare occasion that you found yourself passing close by to another Ward, a few words might have exchanged. Nothing serious, other than checking each other for injury and ensuring that all was well; Vista remained almost unscathed, brick dust and a light spray from the hoses being the only evidence that she had been involved in some kind of commotion at all. By comparison, Aegis looked as though he had extracted civilians through an innovative method of using his own body as an abrasive; blood streamed down his chest and arms from a number of small wounds and you thought that you could see one of his fingers set off at an uncomfortable angle even from a distance.

As you neared Skýla, you allowed the generic silence to break somewhat.

She looked better than most – the bony ridges and plates that made up a form of natural armour had apparently held up well against most of the threats that the Medhall explosion had provided, though some of the longer fur at her ruff and wrists was lightly scorched.

'Good work there, catching that. People would have been harmed if it weren't for you.'

'Mhmm,' she growled out. In her semi-transformed state, she was still capable of language it seemed but not particularly loquacious; in that sense, she was much like her civilian self.

'Well, I'm grateful anyway.'

'Just because they're stupid doesn't mean they deserve to die.'

Regent's voice came from just behind you and you turned quickly in surprise. Skyla's affirmative growl indicated that she agreed with him.

The two of them were strange. Both of them were abrasive figures in their own ways, though those ways happened to be very different, but you got the idea that they would probably end up doing the right thing in most circumstances. Faith of that kind was strange to have in someone. You trusted Armsmaster to do the right thing but not necessarily in the right way; his actions over Coil had disabused you of the notion that he was nobility personified. Someone like Legend might have been a better example of that – everyone loved Legend, and you thought that the New York leader might even be too nice. There was a tangible sense of danger that accompanied the other members of the Triumvirate; Alexandria in particular had a sort of stony authority to her and Eidolon had a sense of almost divine mystery of a kind that only Scion could challenge, but Legend just seemed like a nice guy who happened to have powers. It was sickly, in a way.

Regent was not that. Skýla was not that. Neither of them were going to go out of their way to do the right thing all the time. But as long as you were there, and as long as nobody gave them a reason to do otherwise, you thought that it was pretty safe to trust them to be heroes. Their actions over the previous thirty minutes or so had proven that beyond all doubt; they had been villains, but not malicious ones. At least not as far as you could tell.

'I'm still happy you did it. And I think you probably earned yourselves a lot of points with the public too, if that kind of thing matters to you.'

'Of course it does. What would I do without an adoring public?'

'Hm.'

Skýla heaved up what looked like the remains of a splintered cabinet and tugged it out to the edge of the street and Regent quickly split off, heading back to stand alongside Clockblocker and Vista, who were leading the charge in detail with the remaining cohort of civilians who had yet to flee. While taking pictures, as irritating as it might sometimes be, was permitted, the occasional passer-by wanted to get more acquainted with the scene than was either safe or helpful and they had to be redirected away. Diplomacy went far, but in the moments where it failed Regent was happy to give a nudge to anyone who needed to leave.

Part of you just suspected that he liked having an excuse to mess with people, but you weren't going to question it; the PR handbook had been fairly clear that casual usage of powers on civilians was seen as inappropriate but given that it was in service of a positive goal, you didn't much feel like pointing that out to Regent at the time. Knowing him, he might simply take the admonishment as encouragement.

While working the events of the last hour swirled around your mind. The chaos of the explosion wasn't exactly what you had been expecting from Iron Rain. While she wasn't a subtle person and the explosion wasn't a subtle thing, it also felt as though it was more distant than you expected. Something about her reputation implied she would want to get her hands dirty when going after her rival, and a bomb – or two, you supposed – didn't seem to fit her style.

Plus, the Medhall connection kept coming back. It simply didn't make any sense for Iron Rain to attack Medhall unless there was a strong and consistent connection between Medhall and Kaiser, and her desire to bomb to top floors implied that Kaiser probably worked there in some major capacity. How could he be so high up in both Medhall and the Empire without someone picking up on it?

Prominent figures hobnobbed with the executives of Medhall on television, at social events, red carpets; the idea that the mayor or Director Piggot could have met Kaiser and never realised it was chilling.

Quickly, you decided that speculation wasn't worth the effort, and you would simply ask a few questions. You had been through a few already that day and you didn't have huge number left, and without having testing out your thinker medications thoroughly you didn't want to resort to them while out on duty, but a question or two couldn't hurt.

Chances that Kaiser works for Medhall in his civilian identity?

100%

Chances that he works in a position of influence and authority?

100%

You winced as a sting began to rise in your head, a shooting pain, and you felt as though you probably had one more question left in you before you were done for the day. Deciding to take a broader approach, you used the final question on establishing a baseline.

Chances that the rest of the Empire members also work for Medhall?

66%

You had started getting used to the way your power worked by this point, and so you were slightly more confident with such an unusual number than you were when Coil's power had made it ruinously difficult to get anything usable weeks earlier. You weren't exactly sure how many members of the Empire there were, or whether your power was considering some of the captured figures like Victor or Hookwolf to still be members, but the answer seemed clear that at least the majority of the Empire had some kind of employment; each member was dividing up the probability, just like Coil's power had been, and each affirmation was one hundred per cent of that small portion. An inbuilt efficiency to your power that you hadn't been reading quite right before, but you supposed it made sense when you asked questions about diverse groups.

If that many members of the Empire worked for Medhall, though, it made sense as to how a bomb might have been planted. Hell, if Iron Rain herself worked there she may have simply planted it on her lunch break and nobody would have been any the wiser.

Working out what to do with such knowledge was a difficult thing, but you knew that thus far keeping Armsmaster informed had led to some successes, even if it had also led to a variety of frustrations, and so you made up your mind to give him at least some of the information. Perhaps you would even be able to leverage it as a means to get contact with Dragon; a bluff, certainly, as you would tell him anyway, but you weren't afraid to bluff if it gave you even the slightest edge in a request.

Deciding not to appear too obvious to too desperate, you slowly worked your way over to Armsmaster, clearing rubble and engaging in light conversation with the other Wards as you passed them. Not much was communicated, as everyone was hard at work, and the majority of the destruction was being at least ameliorated rapidly; the amount of manpower on hand was significant, even without the entire team or most of the Protectorate getting involved. Armsmaster himself made it difficult, as the older man seemed determined to speak to every single senior officer or official who had arrived and as such was meandering his way through a network of red faced individuals in suits.

Eventually, however, you were able to catch up with him and signal for his attention; a question mark displayed in relatively small size on your helmet while he was looking in your direction did the job without being too obvious to those in the area. Only a handful of people were ahead of you, and most of them didn't appear to be looking; Armsmaster alone seemed to notice the call to attention.

Pardoning himself from his ongoing discussions, he approached you. Much of the authority that he had commanded earlier seemed to drop away from him and you got the idea that he enjoyed the interaction almost as much as the average citizen enjoys paying taxes.

'Yes, Penumbra?'

'Yes sir,' you said, voice low. 'I've been asking a handful of questions and I thought you might like to know my thoughts on our suspects.'

Phrasing things in a manner that wasn't immediately clear to anyone who might have been able to eavesdrop was difficult, and twice so when you couldn't use your sensory field to depress their perceptions; if you were to do so, Armsmaster himself would have been suddenly hard pressed to make out what you were saying. Whispers, too, were most suspicious than not. Instead, you were forced to keep an even, low tone while attempting to appear as boring as possible.

'Go on.'

Outlining your journey from entering Medhall to the top floor – or at least, the highest floor that had then been intact – didn't take long. Running through the process of sensing a parahuman, locating Anders, and rescuing him too even less time, and Armsmaster listened without interruption. Towards the end, you summarised your conclusions, at least as far as you had them.

'It appears that most of our suspects are currently employed with Medhall itself,' you shifted a piece of rubble the size of a large dog with contemptuous ease, covering your dialogue with progress, 'and the leader appears to be in a position of some power. I suspect you or Director Piggot may have already met them in some capacity.'

Armsmaster didn't respond immediately and instead took a moment to process the information. You got a sense that he was almost doing so literally, and you wondered how quickly he would implant a computer into his brain if he had the chance. The man seemed to be more concerned with efficiency and speedy solutions than he was in anything else, and a solid state brain seemed to be his style.

After a brief moment that stretched over several heartbeats, you got your response.

'I believe you may be correct on both counts. In fact, I believe that you may have met him as well.'

Shocked, you looked up, only to find Armsmaster staring with a steely glare over your head and into the distance. Following his eye-line, you found it locked on a medical station where a paramedic was administering some kind of first aid. Behind the man in the white coat, talking to another man in a sharp suit, you saw Max Anders; the blood had dried across his forehead and someone appeared to have done some rough but effective field closure of his head wound, which was no longer leaking quite so profusely.

Looking back to Armsmaster, he didn't meet your eyes. Instead, he kept his focus on Max Anders, and you suddenly suspected that he had probably not taken his eyes off Anders for more than thirty seconds since you had left his side earlier to go back to clearing things up. Perhaps he had been on the ball even before you had been; nevertheless, it was good to have confirmation.

Ultimately you decided not to press things. You had no more questions to ask in that moment without running the risk of putting yourself in a difficult position of trying experimental medications out in the field and you weren't exactly going to tackle Anders even if you were certain that he was Kaiser; while you didn't particularly care much for the unwritten rules – had been sceptical of them from the first moment you saw them all those weeks ago, in fact – it would still not do for a Ward to arrest such a prominent figure seemingly at random while he was evidently concussed in the street. Instead, you would lay low for the moment and allow Armsmaster to conduct whatever operation he was undoubtedly planning.

With that dealt with, you did you want to press Armsmaster. When you had been interrupted by Medhall exploding in the first place, you had been on your way to his office to talk to him about contact Dragon and now was the perfect time. You had him semi-captive.

'Armsmaster, may I ask you something?'

'You already have, Penumbra.'

Closing your eyes and inhaling deeply, you decided simply to ignore it. He was a strange guy, you weren't going to challenge it.

'Something else, then.'

'Yes, you may.'

'I was wondering if it might be possible to be put in contact with Dragon. I have some questions for her that I think might be important – questions that came up during Hookwolf's escort to the Birdcage.'

He paused again, but this time his response came more quickly and with less ominous implication.

'I'll pass her your number and let her know that you would like to speak. She's extremely busy so please don't expect anything too immediate, but she will be in contact. I have never known Dragon turn down a good-faith request, especially not for something so simple as questions.'

You worked your jaw, certain that there had to be something else to it. Something you would have to do to earn her attentions, but nothing more was forthcoming. Though you were far from a lie detector, you considered yourself to be fairly experienced in detecting equivocation and subterfuge, at least of the verbal sort – a consequence of your time watching for it so intently at Winslow – and there was no sign whatsoever. Armsmaster appeared to be telling the truth, and for that you were grateful even if you were confused.

'Thank you, sir.'

Nodding, Armsmaster took a few long paces away and picked up conversation with yet another man in uniform; this time a fluorescent yellow jacket with bright silver strips across it for visibility. You noted that his stance was such that Anders and the ambulance remained in the corner of his vision the entire time.

Thursday, 31st March

Much of the previous day had finished off in a blur. After completing the clean-up (at least as far as it could be completed by a bunch of parahuman teenagers) and getting out of the way, you had been forced to fill out some paperwork attesting to your actions and confirming that you weren't forced into doing any of the potentially dangerous things you had done in the field. Further, you personally had been taken to Piggot to relay the same information that you had given to Armsmaster; she had given no more instructions than he had, but you had been otherwise instructed to go home and try out one of those medications. Your services would, you were told, not be needed for the rest of the night so it made some degree of sense.

And so you had.

Upon returning home you had assured Dad that you were okay and that very little of actual danger had occurred, at least on a parahuman scale. Apparently he had heard about the beginnings of the bombing during work on the radio, but it hadn't been until he had been on the commute home that he caught the radio re-counting the entire debacle and had heard of both your presence and a second blast. Getting to see you so quickly had resolved much of his stress, but you could tell he would probably never get used to the idea of you being involved in things like that.

Afterwards you had taken one of the thinker medications for the first time before showering and eating a meal, and then settling down in bed.

The overall impact of the medication was unusual. While you wouldn't say it completely removed any sensation of something on your mind, it did remove the sharper edges of the pain. The painkiller ran like sandpaper over the surface of the splinters that stabbed into your brain and dulled them off, leaving the pressure persistent but much more tolerable. In exchange, you lost some of your lucidity; not nearly enough to matter, and you were confident that if you were attacked under the influence you would be able to sprout wings and fly with no problem, even rescuing another, and with your resistance to damage you didn't think much would be able to hurt you. But without that durability, you would have been hard pressed to get through conflict; the idea of fighting Victor again, as skilful as he was during your last bout, while your mind was in the throes of medication made you feel cold.

Being bailed out by your powers wasn't new as a concept; it was well known that parahumans got away with lots of things that were, in all honestly, quite stupid simply by virtue of their own powers; these ranged from the ridiculous (Bambina's explosive movement) to the sublime (any number of Scion's own achievements could go in this category) but they were stupid on paper regardless.

In your own case, being so physically tough had relegated the need to learn hand to hand combat – something you had planned for almost two months ago now – behind the need to learn how to fight without making people explode by mistake. While it had been amusing pasting Alabaster across the floor time after time, it was only cathartic because of his own specific brand of parahuman nonsense; if you had behaved like that against Victor, or had lacked the training Manpower had given you when you fought to subdue Hookwolf, you would probably have killed someone. Multiple someones, even.

It was disconcerting, to say the least.

Maybe, you had thought to yourself before you drifted off, you should look into seeing if there was any way to train in combat through the PRT. You didn't need to become a black belt in anything, but it would be nice to be able to deal with an incoming strike without simply obliterating the limb delivering it, or grapple someone who came close to your own strength.

How many of those people existed, you weren't entire sure, but there had to be some – and even if there weren't parahumans on that level, there were boogeymen far greater than merely the Empire lurking out there. The subdued, dulled edges of the void writhed in response to your waking dreams, and you were pulled into slumber.

Waking up on Thursday morning had brought a level of refreshment you hadn't felt in quite some time, your body appreciating both the extra long sleep and the dissociative reality-wavering strong medications always granted a user.

Stretching, before performing your morning's ablutions, you went through the motions of getting breakfast and going for a run before returning to your home and once again putting yourself through the routine of perfecting your snake transformation. The process was already faster than it had been at the start, with your ability to conjure scales and your heat sensing organs growing faster and faster, and you were able to feel your entire body beginning to shape almost like clay rather than the sequential blockiness of earlier transformations.

You hadn't timed yourself, but after what must have been an hour of hard work, you could feel yourself slipping between your human and serpentine forms with a surprising sense of ease; in fact, a full transformation was almost effortless after the first dozen shifts between forms. Gaining speed and confidence seemed to go hand in hand; the most difficult transformation, though still one of which you were handily capable, appeared to be the shift between parts of your body.

Apparently attempting to transform one part of your body into fully serpentine form almost demanded a shift in the others, as though limb independence was forbidden. You could manage it, but there were limitations; most simply, the limbs a snake did not have, you could not change independently at all. You couldn't simply coat a hand in scales with zero other changes; the closest you could get was focusing a growth of scales on your chest and allowing them to populate your arms and legs.

If you shifted your legs into a singular tail, the appearance was strange. Your arms desired to shrink in accordance with it, and while you were able to prevent that particular change, you couldn't stop your torso narrowing in a taper; eventually it became clear that you couldn't quite become snake from the waist down so much as you became snake from the sternum down, with your stomach and hips providing the required space for the narrowing from human torso to snake-body to occur.

Producing a tail that matched the breadth of your torso, by comparison, was simply impossible. You sensed instinctively that you did not have the body mass needed for that particular change.

By the time you had finished tinkering around with the ironclad natural divisions between mammal and reptile, your father had gone off to work and you noticed lunchtime creeping up on the clock; time to get to PRT headquarters for a patrol.

Armsmaster had sent out an alert the night prior – after having told you to take medications and sleep, which seemed something of a contradiction – stating that you were to be on patrol again, as given the recent events (a euphemism so transparent you weren't even sure it was worth using) there was concern about the possibility of escalation.

If there was one thing you were sure was going to happen, it was escalation. So you couldn't fault him on that.

The response was to amplify ongoing events. While Armsmaster was sensitive to the timed threats presented by the Empire, in lieu of a better suggestion he was hesitant to trigger any events himself, preferring to corral the Empire into a smaller space and – as Director Piggot had proposed earlier in the week – simply allow them to burn each other out while preventing as much collateral damage as possible.

Medhall in smoking ash didn't appeared to be an effective prevention, but then, nobody had anticipated that Iron Rain would take quite that approach.

Regardless, Kaiser's revenge was poised to take place at some point soon, and so you noted the need to enhanced patrols before getting in costume and finding yourself out at PRT headquarters, where Skýla and Regent were waiting for you; this time, already in the lobby.

With protocol established, they didn't need telling again. Skýla in particular impressed you; her memory seemed to be stellar, and she recalled not only the locations you were to patrol but also the specifics of the Richard Anders Memorial Hall, where it was in relation to Medhall, and how best to get there on foot as a suggestion for Regent. Even you felt less confident in navigating that area of town despite having lived in Brockton Bay for yours entire life, and Rachel's accent implied that she was far from a native Brocktonite.

Rapidly, you found yourself outside the surprisingly clean streets surrounding Medhall. The wreckage of the building was thoroughly cordoned off, and some of the superficial repairs on nearby buildings had already been undertaken; the luxury of the wealthy, you supposed.

Patrol was largely peaceful, with very little worthy of note, and you found yourself contemplating the need to apologise to Regent. Despite Rachel's gruff exterior, she seemed much more relaxed about facing patrols with little to no outcome, but you got the feeling that Regent wanted some activity at some point. You wondered, not for the first time, if he had some kind of attention disorder; his fixation on video games might be explained if that were the case, though you were hardly qualified to make any sort of diagnosis even to yourself.

Peace was broken, however. On your return journey, while passing by the Memorial Hall, you were witness to some undeniable drama; six men, all tall and blonde, spilled out of the doors of the Hall. Blood poured down from the broken nose of one, and you winced in sympathy; you knew what that felt like. Another's white shirt was stained but you couldn't see where the blood had come from – from the looks of things, he might have been the one to break the first man's nose.

The other four were engaged in a similar state of conflict, unarmed but otherwise vicious; four of them appeared to be working in conjunction with each other against the other two and despite the ferocity of the smaller group there was simply no overcoming the numerical disadvantage.

Regent and Skýla looked to you for instruction and you felt frozen for a brief moment, but you were gradually becoming more used to working quickly when surprise struck, and after floating through a collapsing building where Iron Rain could have emerged from any shadow, the thought of dealing wth some civilians in a scuffle was almost quaint.

'Skýla, the larger two. Regent, the smaller; I'll take the middle.'

Skyla's growl was enough, and Regent didn't make a sound, simply moving forward with his staff held confidently and his free hand twitching. You stayed back for a moment, allowing them more space with which to work.

Regent worked quickly; while he was clearly not trained in fighting with a staff, he was clearly practiced with it – an entirely different and, in some ways, more useful skill. The sparking buzz that you remembered brushing off when it made contact with you instead rendered those he touched insensate, twitching as they dropped.

By comparison, Skyla's entanglement held none of the same clinical precision or care but was perhaps even faster; partially enlarged, perhaps as tall as eight feet, she had simply grabbed the shoulders of two men – one in each hand – and yanked them away from the conflict before lifting them from the floor. Each of them scrabbled to pry at her fingers, but both the awkwardness of the position and the vast differences in physical strength left their desperation intact.

The final two, you dealt with easily; still stuck still in surprise at the rapid end of their fight, you had zero issue overwhelming the physical strength of the two men and zip tying their hands behind their backs before sitting them on the floor. Quickly, you performed the same task on Skyla's terrified aerial duo and then on Regent's unconscious pair, leaving all six fighters trussed up on the ground. Blood splattered their shirts and one had what appeared to be a nasty gash on his brow from where an elbow had caught him, but they were otherwise unharmed.

Perhaps that definition of unharmed was generous, but from the harsh black lines of the tattoos peeking out from under the sleeve of one of the men, you weren't particularly willing to be a bleeding heart about their health.

Congratulating Skýla and Regent with a look, you grabbed your phone and made to contact both Brockton Bay Police Department and the PRT; while technically your involvement made the PRT the official jurisdiction of the case, the Police Department would nevertheless be interested; you remembered as much from your first patrol with Glory Girl all those weeks back. Parahumans you may be, but the criminals themselves were civilian and their crime was a civilian crime.

Before you could place the call, however, your communications system crackled to life in your ear.

'Penumbra this is Console, do you read?'

Gallant's smooth voice came through the speaker well, and you confirmed.

'Please make your way with your group towards the intersection of Barwell's Lane and Port Street; Fenja and Menja are present, enlarged, and are in conflict with an unidentified target.'

'Unidentified as in we don't know them, or as in the report didn't state?'

'Didn't state. Could be anyone, really. Get over there, you're going to be needed. Miss Militia and Triumph have been dispatched already, rendezvous with them and take instruction.'

You looked to the ground, seeing the tied up men and weren't sure; you couldn't exactly leave them, but nor did it make any sense to wait until re-enforcements arrived. Yet staying away made no sense either, and asking a member of your team to stay behind to watch them felt like a sure-fire way to create dissent and alienate someone.

Sometimes you wished you weren't a leader.

Actions Remaining:

- Do a PHO Q&A

- Do First Aid training with the PRT on April 8th

- Try your thinker power on Endbringers (after the Empire is done with)

- Consult the others on strategies for engaging the Empire

- Get in touch with Dragon to talk about the Birdcage

Some suggestions:

[X][ACTION]Take your entire team with you, but take the time to call the arrest in to BBPD

[X][ACTION]Leave someone (your choice) behind to watch the civilians

[X][ACTION]Spend the time to ask Console's advice first, and follow their lead

So, we've got our snake transformation down quickly. Armsmaster thinks he's on to Anders. Something is happening involving Fenja and Menja (and someone else). Is this Kaiser's move? We have to make a choice regarding how we deal with out civilian hostages first: do we risk them getting away by darting off to the cape crime? Do we risk alienating/annoying a team member by leaving them behind, and if so, which one? Or do we do something else I haven't considered?

And of course, how do we deal with the situation when/if we arrive? What do we do?