The four walls of its cell. The door, its hardened translucent window, and the limited view it gave out into the part of the lab it could see from within. That was Taylor's entire world now, all it could experience aside from what was pumped into its cell. More accurately, the scientists referred to it as a "mobile containment unit", though it still never moved from this spot. Taylor had been moved between units a few times, each stronger and more specialized than the last, but it was always in this room. Its current cell had to have been constructed specifically for it. Taylor had damaged some of the past cells, but this one was strong, it was insulated, and it had specialized nozzles and other equipment to pump chemicals and energy into it, all without even opening the door. Most of what Taylor could see through the large, translucent door was computers and sensors to collect data on their experiments.

Right now, Taylor could see some of the scientists outside, calibrating equipment, making notes. Those in this particular group had never spoken to it, though the nametags on their lab coats meant that it knew all of their names by this point. There had been a time when Taylor had tried to talk to them, tried to reason with them, but it knew now that was a pointless endeavor. When it was time for their experiment to begin, the covering of a nozzle on the back wall of the cell opened, immediately spraying and igniting and incendiary fuel that immolated the whole of the chamber in an unavoidable flame. Far from harming Taylor, however, it could not help but to absorb the intense heat of the flame into its very being. By the time the last of the flame was gone, Taylor had grown considerably in size and mass, towering over the average Human. The dark tendrils of its essence danced excitedly upon the surface of its loosely-formed body, and its many eyes glowed in a brilliant white. For Taylor, it felt amazing to have that power surging through its essence, but it had been through this enough times to feel only dread at what was to come.

Taylor found it hard to be sure exactly how much time passed. After being immolated in fire, its cell was now chilled well-below freezing. There was no day or night, no way of judging for how long it was meant to suffer. It could have been hours, or days, though the latter likely would have killed it. All Taylor had was the constant hum of computers and sensors collecting their "readings" on what its body was suffering. It did not feel merely like being cold, but rather like its lifeforce was being slowly, but viciously torn out of every tendril. Taylor was now somewhat smaller and leaner than a Human, hardly moving, and most of its eyes were not even visible any longer. Taylor had been through this torture half a dozen times in the past few weeks, in all likelihood so the scientists could collect a better sample size on their observations. It wished it could sleep, if only to be given some reprieve from the pain.

It was hard for Taylor to even notice when the cell started to warm, as the pain lingered on across its body. It was only some movement outside that caught Taylor's attention. It crawled slowly towards the door, looking up at the woman that had come to check up on it. She was the one welcome sight that Taylor had in this hell in which it resided. Her name was Marian Allen. She was the only one who had given Taylor her first name, and the only one who really talked to it at all. She wore a similar lab coat to the scientists, but she was a nurse. At least, that was the best way Taylor could describe her. She monitored its health, and presumably the health of other subjects, based on what she had told it in the past. She was the only reason that Taylor was even aware of the existence of other subjects. She had freckled, pale skin, red hair, and was still slightly overweight, despite having been on a diet for the past two months. She represented the final shred of hope that Taylor had in this place.

Marian knelt down in front of the clear door and looked directly into Taylor's eyes, something that all of the others tended to avoid, consciously or not. "It's okay, it's over. The experiment is over now. It's going to be alright."

As Marian was just about to stand, Taylor lifted one of its limbs suddenly up and pressed it against the window, its tendrils forming the shape of an open hand. "Please..." Taylor began. It did not have a mouth with which to speak, but its energy could simply form the sounds directly. Its voice had an otherworldly, echoing quality to it. Marian did the same, pressing her own hand right up to Taylor's.

"...let me...die." Taylor continued, sounding just as weak as it looked.

Marian swallowed as she closed her eyes and lowered her head. Taylor did not doubt that she would grant its request, were it in her power. Her tears told it that much. But, those tears were all Marian could give for now, as she had no choice but to stand and go to the control console, pressing the button that gave the entire metal interior of the cell a powerful electric charge. Taylor absorbed the energy, revitalizing its body and mind up to its former strength.

All so the cycle could repeat again.

---

For a time, Taylor was alone. Aside from the times that Marian could actually be alone with it and talk freely, these were the "best" times for it. If that word could even apply to its life. Within its cage, the closest thing that Taylor could generally experience to joy was simply the lack of pain. The experience of consuming electricity or other kinds of energy did have an inherent pleasure to it, true, but even that had been corrupted by the expectation of suffering to follow. They rarely fed it any more than its basic requirements of energy unless they had something in mind to "test". Right now, Taylor felt positively empowered by its energy, which gave it all the more dread for the scientists' next visit.

However, for the first time in what felt like months, Taylor experienced something new. Something unexpected. It did not have the best angle from inside its cell, but it could see the screen on one of the scientists' open laptops change. Odd and distorted as it was, Taylor could see that it was a face. Then, a short phrase played through the speakers: You are not alone.

Taylor could not be sure what happened. It had been such a short, simple, and strange occurrence. There could be no guarantee that it had anything to do with Taylor, yet in the absence of anything else, its mind could not help but to wander.

The Ratman stood on the rooftop, looking out at the city below. Marlon never slept, but today it was filled with a confused energy. He knew what it was, and he was sure everyone in the city knew too. The face that had invaded every screen in Marlon for just a few moments. People no doubt wanted to find who that had been, and why. Naturally, the Ratman wanted to know too.

He turned away from the edge of the building and began walking towards the fire escape.
"You are not alone."
A cryptic message, in spite of its simplicity. It was safe to assume that the message was the result of one or more powerful parahumans, due to the nature of the event.

The message itself meant nothing to the Ratman, and it wouldn't mean much to normal humans. It didn't seem like something the government or the corporation would do, even accepting the possibility of a grand conspiracy. That left 2 options, the Para Protection Society, and the Church of the Para. Of the two, this was more likely an act of the church. He didn't know much about them, but he knew the Para Protection Society, for the most part, tried their best not to draw the attention of the public. Nevertheless, he couldn't make any conclusions yet. It was entirely possible that this was the opening act of a new third party, or maybe just the efforts of an individual. He didn't have much information to go on, which meant it was time for him to do something about it.

As the Ratman approached the fire escape, his body squirmed. His body's shape deformed as rats poured out of his clothes. The wave swept away his coat, his hat, his bandages, everything, until only his bones remained. One by one, they divided Adrian's skeleton and moved away. The swarm moved down the fire escape carefully, until they hit the streets below. They immediately split off into small groups, some carrying his possessions for safe keeping, the rest moving into the city to find information.

What they needed now was knowledge. Who or what had done it, and whether or not they were friend or foe - these were the things they needed to know the most. Ratman didn't know where to start, so he'd need the entire swarm to search. He wasn't sure he would find anything, but the pack hadn't failed him yet.

Chester sat at his desk in the detective bullpen of police headquarters. Filling out paperwork, furiously writing the incident report from today's arson of the donut shop. The guys around the station were pissed that he had to hand over the perp, but at the end of the day when it comes to the Lorne corporation he couldn't do much. They owned every police officer on the force, and to fight them openly would only make him a target to his superiors that had been bought off, which was essentially all of them. You don't so much as go digging into the Lorne corporations garbage without someone knowing, and wanting your life, and your badge. So until he could find a good way to expose them without being known, he'd have to play their game. But his desire to change the police station, and how people viewed paras was still heavily on his mind. He'd do anything to make these streets a little safer, and to make sure his sister could live a happy, and pleasant life while she still remained on this earth.

All of his thoughts eventually made him start to worry, so he reached for his phone as soon as he brought it up there was a hiss of static, and a voice. "You are not alone." It spoke, and for a brief moment there was a calm set of panic. He thought he had been found out, but when he looked up the other officers in the bullpen were also freaking out their work had been interrupted by this voice, and for some it had unnerved him just as much as himself, he could imagine it would be creepy for a para to appear on your screen.

What happened next was only a matter of timing, as the police station went into lockdown. They had this procedure put in place after one of the officers had been found out to be a para, and fought his way out with fire. He had caused enough damage for them to put in a procedure whenever they thought there was a parahuman threat to the station, it probably wouldn't be lifted until they found out they were in the clear. But the check was very short, as they had discovered that the message had played city wide, and apparently dispatch was getting calls full of people complaining about their broadcasts being interrupted, their holovids, their internet. "Fucking para scum, just making us work harder." A detective behind him muttered, but Chester tried his best to ignore the comment.

But things did eventually calm down, dispatch eventually did stop getting those calls, and if it didn't clog the line it would of been hilarious. But then it happened, something to shake him out of the dull repetitive work of writing his reports. "Eyy CJ got something on the horn for ya, bunch of rats dropped a skeleton in an officers car. Took his donuts as well, from the other... Donut shop, the less delicious one. DNA testing of the bone marrow on our victim says he's pretty high up the chain, so we're looking for fresh eyes." One of the detectives asked him, Chester recalled his last name as Vickers. "Sure let me get the ol helmet on, and we'll head out." The pair of detectives were quick to get ready in their full body armor, and helmet get up, their weapons were checked out from the armory, and their cruiser checked out from the garage, then it was as quick as getting into the cruiser, and leaving.

The ride to the scene of the crime had been a short, silent one. When they got out of the cruiser they found the cruiser in question had been cordoned off, and the robotic units had been sent in to keep the peace. The silent sentinels didn't even so much as glance, or stop the officers. They had everything they needed to know instantly, so they knew who the real officers were. "So our witness is a cop, and all he had to offer was that these bones just dropped into his lap from a bunch of rats, who then proceeded to steal his donuts. Camera footage confirms this story, but does not confirm where the victim was originally, or who killed him. Because I doubt a bunch of rats would attack, and kill a full grown man. So we essentially have nothing, but the brass wants everyone who is available on this case, as this high profile of a death going unpunished would mean some very important heads on a chopping block." Vickers' stated, much of it was the obvious, but seeing as now he was on the scene any detective who didn't solve it would essentially find themselves also on the chopping block for their failure. So everyone here was bound by an unspoken oath to find out what happened. The only obvious thing about this crime scene was that whoever had done it was trying to send a message, but what kind of message remained to be unseen, but Chester didn't doubt it was one of the more extreme gangs that had taken to the streets. But with a sigh, he resigned himself to more work, and looking around the crime scene.

Once she was in the clear and back in her own skin, she retraced her path back, stopping by the donut shop she passed earlier as she almost surely wouldn’t be back in time for the hotel’s breakfast. A few hours after her foray into the Starlight apartment complex, Tamara was back in her hotel room with her feet on the table and a donut in her hand, finishing up the Charity donations misappropriation story and getting it ready to be filed. She tried to imagine the expression on Mr. Church’s face when the guard told him someone’s made off with such question-raising pictures, and the image warmed her heart. Those photos alone could’ve caused quite the headache, but combined with the materials her colleague originally working on this had gathered over the past eight months before gallbladder surgery complications put him out of work, she imagined the fallout from this would be much worse. Even if it would be at least a week before the story got published, she couldn’t think of any excuse Church could cook up that would hold any water. Human beings generally did not take kindly to someone messing with their money.

With this sudden, though far from unwelcome bit of work out of the way, she could redirect her focus back to the reason she was back in this city. Of course finding Parahumans and getting them to talk to her to get their side of things wouldn’t be as easy as opening a shitty lock and getting past a blinded mall cop, since parahumans were all either in a para camp, blissfully unaware of their state or hiding it like she was. Sure, there was the Church of Para, but if even half of what she could dig up about it was true, she’d feel safer punching a bear while wrapped in bacon than intentionally contacting that group.

Fortunately, there were other vectors of approach. She opened a different browser with several recent articles related to parahumans. Increase in funding for para camps, a couple of muggings and robberies, a blown up donut shop… Unfortunately, it wasn’t much to go on, and spread out all across the city. With a sigh, she opened another tab, looking for rental vehicles. Probably a motorbike to get through heavy traffic more easily. She turned the TV on to provide some background noise, currently showing some wannabe comedy so awful one could sprain forehead muscles from cringing.

Minutes later, the room fell into silence. At first she thought the programme interruption was due to a malfunction or an emergency broadcast, but then the same happened to her computer. ”Co do cholery?” Tam jumped in her seat when the voice spoke, standing up as quickly as she was able to and turned around to face the empty room. To placate her panic, she started a full system scan with her laptop’s antivirus, switched off the TV, retrieved her equipment, sidearm and backpack from the bedroom and headed out, double-checking that the door was locked. She had places to be and questions to ask. As always, she stopped by the reception desk to greet the person working there. The hotel employees thought she was just being nice. They’d be surprised if they knew.

Tunnel City

---

---

William turned over in his sleeping bag. Groaning with frustration as a sound came over the emergency announcement system. Some voice saying that they weren't alone. Of course, they were. 'Tunnel City' was where all the outcasts went to live. An old service tunnel that had collapsed years ago partway in. Nobody had ever bothered to open it up again, why bother when it was out of service? So the homeless moved in. It was a shelter, and the wind was only ever a problem when it came from the east. He crawled out of his tent, stumbling slightly over a piece of debris that sat outside his tent. He ran his hand over his face. Still smooth. He may have been homeless but at least he had enough money that he didn't look the part, unknown to him he did. The stench of alcohol and filth oozed from him, his eyes sunken and hollow.

He stumbled through the streets, unable to sleep. Everywhere he went he heard people talking about the face and the voice that had told them all they weren't alone. Different theories spread throughout the city, near the poorer areas a lot of the homeless doomsayers were sure that it was aliens. Letting them know that they weren't alone in the universe, a precursor to invasion. As he got into the second ring where industry was rife people thought it was something to do with the Church of the Para. Some message from Atom acting as if he was a god. William spit as flem rose in his throat, disgusted looks being cast at him from a group of girls who seemed to be enjoying a night on the town. He didn't even bother them with a response. William stopped in his tracks. Ahead of him was a police cordon outside of a donut shop. The robotic units stood guard as they let two detectives answer. He swore as he dove into a side alley. Heart racing.

He recognised the number on the side of the police unit. He was back within the purview of his former precinct. That meant that these officers knew him. He silently cursed himself, he had been half asleep and not even concentrating. He avoided this area like the plague and now he had just walked right back in. He had to avoid being seen by any of the units, one look with thermal imaging would oust him as a Para. The weather was turning cool as Fall was coming in, and yet his body radiated heat like it was the middle of summer. Diving down an alley he risked a look back. When he collided with something solid, falling back down on his ass he looked up at whatever he hit.

Before William was Brutus. One of the Atoms henchmen, who had previously been on the loser in against William as Atom had tried to recruit him into his deranged plan. William raised his hands in a sign of peace as Brutus leaned down and placed one of his rocky hands around Williams throat and lifted him up. "Thought you were told not to show up in these parts 'gain?"

William clawed at his throat, he dared not risk using his powers. His voice came through raspy as he struggled to find the air to speak. "Look-" He choked slightly coughing up. "-the police are just back there. We can't afford to do this right now. We need to get out of here."

Brutus grinned, rock grinding against rock as the mans face re-arranged. "Well. Maybe I should go and you should go say Hi." Brutus pulled William closer to his body before throwing him back out of the alley and into the middle of the road. William grunted and his vision flared for a moment as he hit the road, coughing as the wind was knocked from his body. He could taste the iron of blood in his mouth, and his whole body ached. As he sat up he saw two robotic units scanning him, drawing their sidearms they started to approach sirens wailing.

"Fuck."

The sewers were a disgusting place to most people, but to people like Holly, it was a home. The only members of the police that came down to the sewers were drones, both because of the smell and because it was too dangerous for them. Holly snorted to herself at the thought; any normal guy or girl that walked the sewers would be greeted by the friendliest of criminals; so long as you didn't mess with them, they didn't mess with you. If you helped them, they helped you. The homeless in the sewers were given phones and made to be lookouts for food. If a drone came down, they'd call up, and those upstream would hide until it passed. The only time they really had to move is if they had to knock out a drone, because other units then poured into that section of the sewers to find out what happened to their precious drone. A part of the sewer was unsettled by the criminal underworld, and purposefully so; it was a hunting ground. Drones were hunted for sport and parts simultaneously. A few times, the pigs had tricked the hunters by having patrols a safe distance behind the drone, so as soon as it was knocked out the culprit would be caught, but it was irregular: even the police were smart enough to know if they pulled that trick with every drone, they'd stop catching people because they'd stop hunting drones.

Holly was getting ready to leave one of the sewer hideouts, patting herself down to make sure she had everything on her. Withdrawing her phone, she was just getting ready to take a skim of the local news when the screen changed.
"You are not alone."
Chaos ensued. Lookouts were calling to the main hideout that they had similar messages play on their phones. Someone was smashing their own phone, and someone else was walking around with a hammer, demanding everyone hand over their phones to be smashed. It was clear that they all thought they were found out. Holly wasn't sticking around, and she wasn't smashing her phone either. She slipped her phone into her pocket and quickly made her way out of the hideout and into the sewer tunnels, scrambling up the ladder to the surface. Whatever that message was, she wasn't sticking around for someone to track her down. She was going to break her phone, but before she did that she needed to find the hotspots, the places that the police currently were and weren't. Then, she was going to go phone shopping; it looked to her that there would be a market for that soon in the criminal underworld if that was happening to mobile devices.

However, it became obvious to Holly as she walked through the alleys that it wasn't the police that sent the message. There was no reason for them to do so, to give warning of an attack that they were going to perform on a criminal hideout. It could have been another fellow criminal, warning them of an attack to come soon, but they would have said more than just you are not alone. That, and if it was a fellow criminal, he would be regarded as a friend to some, but an enemy to others, to the smarter ones. A lot of people had things they didn't want to share, some of which were on their devices. If someone managed to get in like that, they would be regarded as a breach, a target to get rid of before they spread secrets. That meant it was someone else, an unknown.

Someone that Holly didn't care about. If even the homeless lookouts had gotten the message, then it clearly wasn't some special message. It wasn't for her directly, and she wasn't affiliated with that hideout gang, just stopped by every so often to give them stolen goods in exchange for cash or other tools or just to rest. It didn't effect her, so it didn't worry. To her, it looked like another justice junkie. Well, he was going to be found and arrested like the rest. And then his home, with a now arrested owner, would get broken into and his possessions looted, the rest thrown out by the landlord.

It wasn't long before Holly got an update. Police were apparently investigating a crime scene at a house somewhere not too far, but far enough for Holly to sweep a nearby small electronics store. Quickly confirming that the store was closed, she slipped her phone back into her pocket and walked her way to the electronics store. It was a store connected to a larger mall building, so all she had to do was pretend she owned the place and she'd be able to get into the back areas. The best part was that nobody would know because there were plenty of other stores attached and until she got into the back of the store she was targeting everybody would think she just came from a different store. It was easy enough unless there was an overzealous security guard standing around.

Once she arrived, everything went to plan. She carefully trailed someone that was in a staff uniform for one of the shops in the main mall area until the reached one of the doors leading into the back areas. When the employee opened the door, Holly walked in with her. "Thanks," Holly says, making it all the more seem like she was meant to be there, and closed the door behind her. "Saves me taking out my card."

"Sure thing, these cards don't work half the time anyway. Had to try my card twice there before it actually opened," the employee says, before walking off. Holly went her own way, giving friendly smiles to whoever she walked past. Holly had been to the electronics shop once before, and she knew it was either the grey door or the door next to it that lead to the back. This was where the problem was going to begin; both doors were alarmed, and if she didn't scan her nonexistent card the alarms would go off a few seconds after she opened the door. Most people didn't pay attention to the first few moments of an alarm, they were always going off as employees fumbled with their alarm fobs, it was when the alarm didn't stop that suspicions would arise.

Before she tried anything, Holly activated Pause. Everything slowed, giving her some time to think, to try and remember which room it was. She visualised the room from the last time she had been in it. Most of the phones would be locked away, but there were always a few phone boxes left out; whether it was because employees were too lazy with their underpaid jobs to lock them away or they needed to be out in case phones in the front ran out and more were needed quickly, Holly didn't know. She just knew that it was an easy catch so long as someone wasn't walking about when she left the room. After a moment of thought and trying to remember where the phones were last time, she was farily sure it was the grey door. So, she opened the first, grey door.

Luck was on her side, as she recognised the interior immediately. Quickly stepping inside, she spied four rectangular boxes with various phone brands on them. She mentally counted seconds in her head as she slipped her bag off, opening the zip and quickly lifting each of the four boxes in one-by-one; The weight of each box confirmed there was a phone in each. As she was putting in the second phone she heard the door alarm. Shovelling in the two last phones, she closed the zipper and quickly walked out of the room. Nobody was there, but she knew that would change quickly.

Holly quickly walked back the way she had come, peeking over her shoulder behind her. Just as she rounded a corner, she heard someone calling out behind her. Taking no risks, Holly broke out into a run. She only stopped as soon as she was at the door, where she opened it and quickly blended into the crowds, walking to the exit as security swarmed. In no way did Holly know she was safe, or at least, safer, until she was outside of the building, and immediately trotted into the alleys to move in the safety of the darkness.

The police officer had been on the scene for less than a few minutes before he was contemplating wanting a cigarette as this crime scene was career suicide. No concrete witnesses, hardly any evidence of what killed the guy, and the camera angles were hazy on everything except the rats dropping in from off-screen, as he was about to turn to Vickers and say something he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. The robotic units sprang into action as well, which means they detected something abnormal about the man in front of him, so it had to be a parahuman no doubt about it. ”Hey you hands up, and above your head! Do not attempt to resist.” Chester shouted, the robotic units only echoed his statement for the strange man to put his hands above his head. Gun’s were drawn, and clearly aimed at the man any funny business would probably be met with a hail of gunfire. Hopefully, the perp knew that, and wouldn’t try anything funny like running away.

William stood up slowly, his hands visible as he did so. “Look, I don’t know what you think I did but Brutus, the enforcer for the Church of Para just tossed me-” William pointed down the alleyway he had came from. “-If you’re quick you can get him, I can be on my way. Everyone is happy.” He made sure to throw a croak in his voice. He did his best to look the same, despite being homeless, but he hoped that maybe, maybe the officer hadn’t recognised him. Disguising his voice just meant that the robot couldn’t use voice recognition, and instead needed to get close enough to perform a facial or fingerprint scan. At that point, he could getaway. He had to getaway. He had been on the job long enough after the Tower explosion to know what happened to Paras. They got carted away by Lorne, no paper trail and never heard from again.

The officers looked at one another, Brutus was on the most wanted list. But this might be too good to be true, this guy could be bait to lure them in after prime prey, and get themselves captured, maybe even just murdered for a message. He sent one of the robotic units down the alleyway that the criminal had said they had encountered Brutus in if anything happened to it the thing would send out an alarm to every cop in the area to converge on its location. ”L-4, did you get a positive id on this guy?” Chester asked, his voice masked by the helmets voice disguise. “Negative, detective. Voiceprint unable to be recognized, suggest moving in for facial, or fingerprint recognition. Confirm directive.”
[color=violet]”Confirmed, move on in.” He addressed the man now. ”Clearly the machine recognized something about you, so if you have priors or something I'm sure it can be worked out. But if you just admitted to working with para’s I doubt that’s it. But if you come peacefully I'll put in a good word for you. Okay?” With that cleared up, the robotic unit moved in closer to the man trying to get a scan.

William swore under his breath as he started backing away. “Listen. I didn’t confess to working with a Para. Don’t twist my words. I confessed to getting attacked by a Para. There’s a difference.” He stopped backing up but kept his face low to make a facial recognition scan as hard as possible. He’d have to come in close for a fingerprint, and that's when he’d get him.

The man was backing away, so the two detectives tightened the grip on their pistols. Chester set his for a three-round burst, in case things were about to get hairy with just a quick, practised flick to the side of his piece. When the robot got close enough it reached out for the criminal, and it probably wasn’t going to be gentle with identifying the man, if it did get a grab on him.

As the robot moved to grab him William used his knowledge in its systems to his advantage. He placed his hand on its faceplate pouring all the heat he could manage through his palm into its face. Melting away it’s faceplate and corrupting the systems within the robot leaving it a husk. He then grabbed its torso and held it between him and the officers as a body shield waiting for the inevitable attack from the officers. He shouted from behind the robot. “Look. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I know Lorne and Backup are on their way, and with the region of the city we’re in it’ll be about two minutes before they turn up! I’d like to leave now please!”

“You aren’t going anywhere, freak!” Vickers shouted, but Chester had other ideas his current clip had enough for four, three round bursts, before he would have to reload, more than enough to get his point across, but also to keep his ability hidden. He fired three bursts widy, like a rookie on a range, but his mind had calculated that these shots would miss his target, his last burst on the other hand one round would bounce off a street sign, and if he had calculated it fast enough it would find itself into the soft flesh of his calf. To most it would be a one in a million lucky shot, to him it was just how his para ability worked, he didn’t know how but it did. He hoped Lorne medics, would treat the guy when they came, and grabbed him.

Standard procedure dictated that right now they were shooting to contain, not to kill. As the gunshots rang out William dove for the nearby alley. What he wasn’t expecting was that one of the bullets would hit him despite his cover. He swore as his roll and dive turned into a fall and he cracked his elbow against the pavement. It wasn’t broken but it was going to bruise. He stood up again, wincing as he went to put weight on his left leg, bending it at the knee so all of his weight was on his right. He was acutely aware that he was bleeding out, and running was out of the question. His heart raced as adrenaline was pumping through his body. Subconsciously with the option of flight being removed his body wanted to fight.

His body temperature rose, red swirls in his eyes as he looked at the officers. “I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

The criminal made a dive, but he wouldn’t be able to go far, and even then their helmets would be able to pick up on the tiniest droplets of blood the perp left behind on the scene. But instead, he looked like he was getting ready to turn, and fight. Vickers looked at the perp, and began to speak. “That’s too bad, we want to hurt yo-”
”Shut the fuck up Vickers. Listen man we don’t want to hurt you either, but how far are you gonna make it with that hurt leg? Even if you get it treated, and you go back to the streets you’re gonna get taken advantage of until it heals. Lorne is gonna seem like paradise compared to what criminals are gonna do to you when they detect weakness. So do the right thing. Put your hands above your head, and turn around, you said so yourself back up is already on the way.”

William sat down on the sidewalk, sighing as he did so. “Fine. Though you’re wrong about one thing.” He raised a finger, a flame similar to that of a blowtorch came out of his finger and he grimaced as he placed it beside his wound. Burning it closed, stopping any further bleeding. “Anyone want a smoke while we wait for my life to end?”

“Didn’t you arrest a perp, that had fire powers earlier today, CJ?” Vickers asked, Chester shook his head. “Similar, but the other guy had combustion powers, and if he stored up enough energy he could explode like a bomb, that’s what took out the shop.” Both of them sighed, and Chester quickly pulled a cigarette from his pocket, and lit it, before handcuffing the parahuman. “Wait a moment, I know this guy, are you Locke? You were top of my class at the academy!” Vickers, asked the man. The sounds of sirens were getting closer, as they helped the man up off the ground.

William groaned as he was lifted up off the ground. Trying his best to keep the weight off his bad leg. He may have stopped the bleeding but it still hurt like a bitch. He winced as one of the two recognised him. It was going to happen sooner or later. “Yeah. That’s me alright. So when do the suits get here?”

“They can wait a bit.” Vickers said. Then he delivered a right hook to the side of Locke’s head. “This is for burnin the station you fuck!” He shouted, he went in for another blow, but Chester quickly moved both Locke, and himself out of the way. Then he gently set Locke on a fall to the ground, before stepping into the other officers instep, and pushing him over onto his back. ”Get a hold of yourself man! We’re cops, not animals! Our job is to enforce the law, not take it into our own fucking hands. Now go wait your ass in the cruiser, I don’t wanna see your face until this one is down the road.” With that said, and the other officer grumbling as he walked back to the cruiser, Chester helped Locke up, and escorted him back down the alley. ”Sorry about that, guy has no brain sometimes.” He stated. He sighed, behind the helmet it sounded oddly sinister. ”Sometimes we like to think we’re above the law, but you’d know all about that wouldn’t you? Using violence to achieve your means, turning the other way for the bad guys. Your file comes across our desk sometimes. Gotta say you’re famous around our precinct. So bravo.” This was said with barely veiled contempt, but there would be no beating to follow this, no nothing. Just the sound of their footsteps, as he marched him toward his doom.

William spat out blood. “You know I could have hurt a lot of people the day I ran. I didn’t. I never let the killers go, the murderers. You can’t win every fight, you have to be selective. I’ve made my mistakes, I’ve paid for it in full, or at least I thought I had.” He winced as he put too much weight on his bad leg. “You know, I never asked for any of this. If I had my way, I'd still be cleaning the streets of scum. Instead a freak accident makes me a criminal.” He gave a smirk, which looked decidedly menacing with blood trailing out of his mouth. “Seems fair to me.”

”You are a cop, doesn’t matter if you aren’t one now, you always will be a cop as soon as you pick up the badage, and even when it’s gone. You don’t get to be above the law, you don’t get to pick what laws you enforce. As officers of the law we should be twice as susceptible to the law, because we have to set the precedent. You forgot that long before you graduate, and you’re a disgrace to the badge you wore. But you should know now, it’s nothing personal I’m just here to enforce the law, and if putting you away is the law, then I guess I'll have to follow it.” He said his speech with much force behind it, one could hear his jaw tightening behind his helmet.

As they reached the end of the alleyway, there was more Lorne agents than when he arrested his last perp, the one without hair looked at him, and Chester was sure that if the agent had eyebrows they’d be raised. ”One condition before he goes, and then I'll hand him over.” He stated to the agent, who clearly granted it with a slight nod, the least the agent could do for him catching two parahumans in one day. With a quick jog Chester returned to his cruiser, and opened his aid kid pulling out a canister of medical foam. With practiced hands he applied it. The foam would harden forming both a splint, and if the wound was still open it would have sealed it, the chemicals inside it also acted as a pain reliever to the area making whatever it touched feel slightly numb. ”He’s all yours, just be nice to em. He might be parahuman scum, but he was still one of us.” With that said, they tucked Locke into the back of the van, and Chester watched as they closed the doors. For a brief moment, he couldn’t help but see himself in the man, but that thought was pushed down, so he could get back to work.

The White Rabbit begins to stalk the streets in search of his newest target. A few moments earlier, he received a new contract detailing the request of one Holly Farstel. A young girl who has seemed to find herself allying with certain gangs. The contract requested that Holly be brought to them alive. Apparently, she has seemed to have made her home within the sewers beneath the city and has been spotted stealing some valuable merchandise from surrounding shops. A picture of the sewer entrance she usually uses has been provided. It is odd, with all this information you’d think they’d do it themselves. However, Rabbit wasn’t going to complain.

He makes his way near the entrance, and immediately begins to look for any shops. Fortunately, they seemed fairly close and would be a natural target if she attempted to thieve from them. In a way, Rabbit could relate to that as he began remembering his own past. His reminiscing was shortly interrupted however by the sound of an alarm ringing out. Rabbit broke into a sprint as he began to follow the noise. He used his Vector Dash to hop up to the roofs and gain a vantage point. Seemed the alarm was coming from some kind of Tech Shop. She couldn’t have gone too far.

Surprisingly enough, he spotted a small figure diving into the shadows. That was easy… Rabbit jumped across, the Vector Dash making what would be an impossible leap no more than an inconvenience. As the target began to take a moment to rest, the Assassin dropped down from the neighboring building, landing with the softest touch as he began to approach her. ”Good evening, Miss Farstel.” He greeted, announcing his presence as he draws his sword. ”I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to come with me…”

Only the big bossmen of the criminal world would have called her Miss Farstel. Holly spun to face the man following her, and her eyes widened a little even as they flickered up and down, as if trying to gauge where he came from rather than who he was. She began to take a few steps backwards, shaking her head. There was no way he was some kind of angry storeowner or traditional security guard, perhaps not even part of the police forces with that kind of attire.

“I hate to disappoint, but I’m not going anywhere. I don’t know who you are, I don’t know what you want, but I’m not a big fish. Go find yourself some crimelord, not a kid like me,” the girl responds, her eyes slipping to his blade. She was most definitely not a fan of that - she had her pistol, tucked under her hoodie, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to draw it. He might take that as a no-win situation and kill her instead of capturing her, or whatever he wanted to do with her.

The Rabbit shook his head as he now began to point the blade in her direction. ”That as it may be, there’s clearly a reason why I’m being paid to take you to my employer. I’m going to give you one more chance of coming quietly rather than making me drag you all the way there. He threatened. With a single click, the blade crackles to life, activating it’s HF mode as a show of force.

Holly took a glance behind her as the man activated his blade, checking her routes of escape, before looking back to him. She was a little scared, he would give him that. But she had a head. Narrowing her eyes, she said, “I doubt you’re going to kill me with that. Not because you can’t, but because you want to take me alive. Unless that thing turns into a cable tie, I have no clue what you’re going to do with that.”

With that, she activated a Pause. She even impressed herself with the Pause, able to see the blade vibrating very slightly and slowly as a result of the enhanced reaction times of the Pause. But her goal wasn’t to observe. Holly wasn’t sure she could escape, but even if she couldn’t, she was going to make it hard for him to grab her by picking the best routes possible.

There was all sorts of places she could go. She could run backwards, which her brain calculated to be a move she could one-hundred percent do. The rational part of her brain noted that it was obvious she could do that, but that wasn’t going to get her anywhere if he ran after her. Running toward him was also an option, though not as efficient unless he was closer - some people didn’t expect the culprit running straight past them if they were close enough.

The best option seemed to be the various pipes and climbplaces on the sides of the alley. If she could make it to them fast enough, she could scamble high enough that at the very least he couldn’t grab her ankles. She wasn’t too sure she wanted to take that option either, though - she’d be trapped on the rooftops. Unless…

She formulated a plan in her head. Holly had no idea if it would work or not, but she knew she had to try. She was going to climb up the pipes, and if he ran after her, she’d drop straight back down on top of him. With hope, it’d knock him to the ground or at least give her a bit more of an opening to run.

Holly ran it through her head a few more times, and then Unpaused. She sprinted straight for a pipe that was directly to her right, springing her feet and jumping straight onto the thing. She quickly began her scramble up.

Rabbit follows Holly as she begins to try and ascend the pipes as much as possible. He sighed, sheathing his sword and turning off HF mode as he launches himself up using Vector Dash. He lands just above Holly and grips onto the pipe, blocking her escape for now. ”Running really isn’t going to get you very far.” He advised, almost like a friendly situation. ”I will say, pretty quick on your feet Kid…”

Holding onto the pipe, Holly stares wide-eyed up at the man for a moment, and then glances down to where he had previously been, and then back up. She knew instantly that he was a Para, like herself. She didn’t comment on that, however - she just wanted to escape, and she suspected he would have little care if she was a Para or not. Heck, he probably already knew that she was a Para. Loosening her grip, she slid down the pipe quickly, letting go just before the bottom and hit the ground running, headed further into the alley.

The White Rabbit shook his head. This girl sure was stubborn. Another Vector Dash and he was already hot on her heels. As he gave chase, he noticed they were still in the alley ways. Blocking her direction would be fairly easy in such a closed environment. Rabbit gracefully Dashed up to the wall on the right, before dashing back down in front of Holly, merely folding his arms like an impatient parent.

As soon as the man appeared in front of her, another Pause was triggered by Holly. The man’s speed was unbelievable, and she had no doubt in her mind that unless she got him to give up, which there was no guarantee that she’d be able to do that, she would be captured. She ran through options in her head - she could try and dodge him, but there wasn’t much luck in that. She could also try to brake, but then she’d be an easy swipe. Drawing her gun was also a low chance, as in the time it’d take to get it out he’d be on top of her. Or she could try and fight past him. His arms were folded, and she doubted he could unfold them as fast as he could move his legs (or at least, she hoped so). Unpausing, Holly ducked as she ran straight into him, not stopping, not trying to dodge him, but rammed herself at full speed straight into him in an attempt to just bolt straight past.

Rabbit, not expecting such an unorthodox approach, was almost bowled over by the young girl and momentarily lost his balance. Okay, now this is just getting old… Rabbit cracked his neck as he began to sprint again. This time when he Vector Dashed, Rabbit seemingly appeared at Holly’s side and attempted to sweep her legs with a swift kick to her shins. ”This isn’t a choice, Holly…” He said, appearing a little frustrated.

Sometimes, Holly was lucky enough to Pause and plan out her landing if she knew she was going to be falling, to try and get the landing that would hurt the least. This was not one of those times however, and she went crashing to the ground as she was kicked in the shins, but quickly got to her feet, fast-walking backwards away from the man. “Don’t care! I ain’t being taken anywhere! Do you know what they do to girls like me? You’re going to sentence me to that?”

Rabbit continued to walk towards Holly, but behind his mask he winced at her words. Shaking away the doubt, he Dashed forward and grabbed her by the wrist. ”That’s not my business… Your actions joining gangs have led you to this moment. I will be escorting you personally, so I will see for myself just exactly why they want you in particular so bad.” He said, more trying to reason with himself rather to her.

She wasn’t going peacefully. Her wrist was grabbed, but she still had a fighter’s heart. Holly propelled herself into him, using her free hand to punch at his chest; it was nothing too strong because of her physical attributes, but it was determined. “How the fuck do you think you live around here? You join a gang or you’re a castout! Just let me go!”

Rabbit sighed, the soft thud of her fist not doing much to shake him off. Without much effort, he crouched down and began to hoist the protesting child onto his shoulders. He wasn’t sure if he was able to Vector Dash while carrying someone, so the streets it was. ”I’ve done just fine without a gang, and like I said, letting go of you isn’t an option.” He explained as he began to navigate through every alley and backroad he knows to get to the employer’s chosen location. ”I’m not above knocking you out for this by the way. It’s your choice…” He warned.

Being carried, there wasn’t much she could do but squirm. However, the man had made one vital mistake - he had failed to search her. She thrust her hand up the bottom of her hoodie, slipping her pistol from it’s hidden holster, and thrust the end of the barrel against the back of the man’s head. Her hand was trembling, she had never shot anyone before, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to, but she didn’t want to end up as a cage girl for the rest of her life - or worse. ”L-Let me go,” Holly stuttered, forcing her hand to stop trembling.

Rabbit felt a knock on the back of his helmet. Shit… Little spitfire had some toys of her own. He slowly put her down, slinging her off her shoulders. ”Alright, alright… You’ve made your point.” He said calmly, setting Holly down gently. However, it was just a ruse and Rabbit lifted his leg rapidly for a swift kick into her hand, aiming to send the pistol flying out of her grip.

Holly had her pistol aimed at him the entire time she was put down, making it an easy target for the man. As such, her precious pistol went flying out of her grip as soon as the kick made contact. Holly instantly went with one of her previous plans, making an attempt to duck straight past the man whilst he was still in the motions of bringing his foot to the ground and run away behind him.

Rabbit sighed as he turned on his heels and started chasing back down the way they came. Perhaps he could use this to try and herd her closer to the location. He activated a route on his HUD and plotted out the best ways to lead her there. Rabbit Dashed up behind her and then traced one of his previous maneuvers, Vector Dashing onto a wall and then back in front of her. If he could grab her again, excellent. If not, then this would have to be his tactic. He attempted to grab her waist as she would either stop or run into him.

The problem with Vector Dashing onto a wall first was the Holly heard what was coming and immediately reacted. With the help of a Pause, she immediately darted to the left, and then to the right, slipping right past him. What’s more, she spied the manhole cover she was looking for not too far away. She ducked down, gripping the manhole cover and heaving it aside with all of her might, looking to get in before she could get grabbed.

Rabbit grunted out of frustration upon his landing and sprinted after her still. Seeing Holly try to make her escape down the sewers, he had to try and grab her this instant. Otherwise, trying to take her from her home would be even more difficult. In a last ditch effort, he dived to try and grab her, tackling her over the manhole cover if he had to.

The move by the Rabbit somewhat worked. Holly managed to get the manhole cover open and drop her way in at the same time was the Rabbit dove for her, and though he didn’t manage to catch her on the surface, the impact of the dive caused her head to strike the side of the manhole opening before her body was fully inside it. She was in a bit of pain when she hit the bottom, and used a Pause as soon as she was on her feet to get her bearings.

This was not necessarily a good thing. Pausing slowed everything, including herself. That meant that the pain she felt remained there, true and powerful, attacking her and she could do nothing about it. All she could do was force herself through, trying to recall which direction lead to what. Her brain told itself that she should start tearing up from the pain, but being Paused meant those didn’t come, not yet, anyhow. The moment she exited the Pause, she knew where she wanted to go, but tears dripped down her cheeks as she ran further into the sewers, back toward where the hideout was.

Rabbit cursed under his helmet. That was not his intention at all. However, means must and all that. He slipped down the manhole and landed down, feeling the cold water on his feet. While his helmet could block out the smell, it didn’t make the feeling any less gross. He listened out for the splashing footsteps of Holly and began to follow suit, Dashing wherever he could to catch up.

As soon as she made it to the hideout, Holly yelled out, “A kidnapper is following me!” which made many of the people there perk up. Even though this bunch wasn’t a real gang and just a hideout for criminals, they knew who came through and knew Holly as a friend, not a foe. As such, they let her in, and she immediately ran to one of the sleeping pods and closed the door, hiding herself inside. Meanwhile, those standing guard waited for whoever was following her.

Rabbit saw the opening but immediately stopped in his tracks when the echoes of Holly’s warning rang out through the tunnels. Shit… this just got ten times harder. Why didn’t you just knock her out and be done with it? He tutted, and tried to creep closer, drawing his sword and getting a view of whoever would be waiting. He really didn’t expect to be doing this but he was left with no choice. He sparked up the HF mode and sprinted out, immediately dashing to the closest guard and swiftly swiping at his neck with the katana. As he landed, Rabbit tried to locate the highest level threats. Any with guns would be his first targets, and he attempted to deal with them first.

As it was, the first few thugs were obvious, with their pistols out and only one really looking like he knew how to use it. Rabbit immediately Vector Dashed to these people first, aiming his sword strikes to amputate the arms and immediately dealing with the gun problem. Sprays of blood splattering against his suit and on his helmet too. The fall of the gunmen seemed to shock a few others in the hideout, and some others (obviously the owning group of the hideout) came out with guns and knives drawn, whilst others stared and watched. Funnily enough, some seemed so used to this kind of thing happening that they still went along with their business, even as knife-wielding thugs charged at Rabbit.

The Swordsman waited for the knife-wielders to come to him first. As one lunged at him, Rabbit effortlessly spun to the side, slashing at his stomach before facing forward to the next combatant. Rabbit stepped forward and beat this one to the draw, decapitating the target with a single swing of his katana. It was then that shots were fired from the thugs holding guns, shooting to kill the intruder who had killed their buddies. Rabbit was forced to dive out of the way. An idea crossed his mind and he had to commit. He slipped behind the nearest person and held the blade to their throat. ”Nobody move! Just give me the girl and no one else gets hurt!”

It was then that the entire hideout, not just those involved with running the place, got up. “You can mess with the owners, but not with the clients!” One roared, waving around a newfound pistol. What he said was quite true - nobody cared if you messed with the hideout’s owners, but the second a client came into harm, everyone was on top of that. A larger man then came out from where he was hidden before, waving his hand up. “Put him down, stranger. Enough blood has been shed. We ain’t telling you where she is, you can find her on your own, but we won’t fight you any more. Just don’t go killing our clients,” he says, loudly. He was clearly the owner of the hideout as after he had finished, everyone was putting down their weapons and sitting down, though plenty seemed unhappy about the whole thing.

Rabbit shook his head. As if he was going to give up his only insurance after killing their men. ”These clients that important to you? Then take his place.” He offered as he inched closer, still keeping the hostage infront of him with the sword still drawn. Despite the fact that weapons were being lowered, Rabbit couldn’t take the risk. ”Or we can just skip all that and you can help me out here?” He offered alternatively.

“Listen mate, you clearly have been sent here by someone, despite not knowing shit about the underground. You mess with a client like that, word is going to get around ‘bout you messing with clients and you ain’t getting any more jobs,” The bossman thumped his chest with his fist twice. “You best drop him, or serious shit is going to go down, and not just here.” As he spoke, several others were already raising weapons again and drawing knives, even those now behind Rabbit, surrounding him, ensuring if he killed the client, they’d just pour in and stab him from all sides in a wave.

Rabbit tutted, realising he no longer had the upper hand. He shoved the ‘client’ away and deactivated his blade, sheathing the sword. However, he still kept his wits about him as he began to walk across. He spotted the sleeping pods and began to make his way over, still keeping an eye over his shoulder for anyone with their sights still trained on him.

The thugs were all true to their word. Though a few kept wary eyes on the stranger, everyone had their weapons away now and were chatting amongst themselves again. A couple bearded, clearly homeless people were already cleaning up the dead, probably for cash. And nobody tried to help Rabbit by pointing out where Holly was hiding. He sighed as he walked up to the sleeping pods, peering inside each and every curtain available slowly but surely.

As soon as Rabbit got to Holly’s pod, she leapt straight out of the curtain, intending to run again. Holly stopped instantly, however, staring at those that Rabbit had killed. She looked to Rabbit, and then the dead, and then to Rabbit again. She could barely stutter the words, “You killed them.”

Rabbit nodded slowly. ”I had to…” He sighed as he placed his hand on her shoulder, and began to start pushing her away from the bodies and towards the exit. ”Believe me, I was hoping this was going to be a clean job…” Rabbit admitted.

Holly didn’t resist now as she was pushed toward the exit. Tears were streaming down her cheeks again, but from what she didn’t know; fear that he could do that to her, upsetedness that her fellows were killed, or anything else. “Why can’t you just let me go? Why did you have to kill them, to go so far just for me?”

Rabbit could see how upset Holly was… but this was how it had to be. The contract was accepted, and Rabbit needed to make it work. On the other hand, he couldn’t exactly say ‘Because you made me…’ Rabbit’s only option was to stay silent as he eventually lead the girl out of the hideout and towards the sewer exit…

Holly only seemed to get worse as they walked to the exit. She turned and lunged at Rabbit, punching at his chest again and crying out, “You’re an asshole! You do nothing right, and now you’re killing innocent people! Fuck you!” However, it seemed that her protests fell on deaf ears as Rabbit continued his silence.

He looked down and grabbed her fists, letting her struggle but doing nothing more. Shit… was this really going to be the path he was gonna go down? It’s not like a simple sorry was going to cut it either. As he restrained her with one hand, he began to pull at his tie, unravelling the knot and tried to fight her as he used it as a gag.

After a small fight, Holly was promptly gagged. She now just looked like a depressed kid, walking sadly wherever Rabbit wanted her to go. Holly felt doomed. She had no idea where he would be taking her or what she would be doing there, but she couldn’t fight any more. She had given up.

A while later, and after some more backstreets, Rabbit and Holly were about to round the corner of the location. He undid the tie and stuffed it into his pocket. Throughout the whole journey, Rabbit didn’t say a word. He sighed and lead Holly out to the employers. ”Here she is. Alive as promised…” He said, his voice void of any emotions. The employer smiled as Rabbit pushed Holly towards him. Rabbit checked on the back-up, identifying their weapons too.

Holly had cuffs snapped onto her wrists immediately despite her protests, and was pulled in by a large man who was not afraid of pushing her about. She tried to throw herself at him like she did with Rabbit but the man slapped her hard across the face, resulting in the resumption of Holly’s crying and tears. The man barely lead her wherever he wanted her to go, he gripped the back of her neck hard, pushing her along in front of himself as she wailed.

“Thank you, your payment as discussed,” one of the employers said. He withdrew a healthy amount of credit chips, tossing them to Rabbit, before turning to the big man pushing Holly around and halting him. The main man stepped in front of Holly, bending over a little to be at level height with her and ran his finger through her hair, chuckling at her flinches and sobs of protest. “A day or two before delivery to Lorne won’t hurt,” he spoke, before motioning for the big man to continue taking her away.

Rabbit was about to turn away after checking the credits. However, the ears on his helmet perked up when he heard the man say that. This wasn’t what he was going to become… and he’s not going to let this be Holly’s fate anymore. Rabbit drew his sword and Vector Dashed towards the big guy handling her and thrusted the blade through his chest. He turned back and kicked the boss away before cutting Holly’s handcuffs down the middle after withdrawing his blade from the other guy’s torso. ”RUN!”

But Holly didn’t even do that. She dropped to her knees as she was freed, her hands fumbling on the ground trying to hold herself up, tears dripping onto the ground. She almost fetal-positioned right there and then, but instead she crawled her way to the side of the alley, over by the wall, and just tried to make herself as small as possible.

Rabbit pointed the blade at the boss. “You forget about her…” He threatened before turning to Holly, noticing she was curled up. ’Oh for fucksake…’ He thought as he sheathed his blade and Vector Dashed. He could hear the arming of guns as the boss shouted orders to his cronies. With time running out, he scooped Holly into his arms and sprinted down the alley as fast as he possibly could. Along the way, he kept muttering ”I’m sorry… I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” quietly as they attempted to escape.

Once the pair had made some distance, the gang gave up. They couldn’t chase after someone who could Vector Dash like that, and nobody, especially the boss, wanted to put their life at risk trying to fight him and ending up with a blade cutting him up. Holly clutched Rabbit tightly, because although she hated him he was all she had to hold onto currently.

Rabbit set Holly down gently and knelt by her side. ”Shit… I’m sorry Holly… I’m so sorry…” He mustered… Such a stupid idea taking that contract in the first place… Sure, it was a good payout but once again money had blinded Rabbit without thinking through the consequences.

Holly tucked her knees to her chest, hugging them close to her. The reply that came was an upset and slurred “Leave me alone,” that sounded as if she had just said a single word instead of three. She knew it was bad on the streets, and knew what could happen. She would have gotten over the deaths she saw within the day, but how close she had come to being lost struck her.

Rabbit’s ears drooped down as he lowered his head. ”Look… I fucked up… okay? I shouldn’t have… I just thought…” Rabbit tried to come up with something but he shook his head. ”No… What I did was inexcusable… I’m so sorry… If you really want me gone… then fine… but if you’ll let me, I will try my hardest to make it up to you…”

The girl grabbed Rabbit, pressing herself against him to cry into his shoulder. She wasn’t sure she fully forgave him, definitely not yet, but she needed to hold onto someone, and he was that someone. In her mind, the first thing he was going to do to make it up to her was to be her pillow to cry to. “The least you can do is stay. Bastard,” she sobbed into his shoulder.

Rabbit was taken aback at first, but he was thankful in a way too. He chuckled lightly, wrapping his arms around her... for as long as Holly needed.

_{Written by me and @datadogie}

William was gagged and blindfolded until he was thrown unceremoniously into a cage. At some point he had been knocked out and treated as his leg still hurt like shit, but less than it had before. The blindfold was removed from him as he was left in a white cell with nothing but a toilet and a door, the door was transparent. He rushed up and punched the door as it closed. "Let me out of here! I'm not a criminal." He continued to punch the door as his rage burned. A couple of scientists looked up from their workstation with complete and utter dispassion. His rage continued to boil as flames started to form from his hand. As soon as they did he found himself pulled over as there was a rush of air as it was pulled out of the room. He groaned, leaning against it fueling more power into his hands. The air being pulled out of the room pulled him to his knees. The lack of oxygen starting to affect his cognition he fell to his knees before passing out. Unbeknownst to him that the flame he was trying to pour out was being redirected with a gush of air into the cell next to him.

A cell that contained something that didn't look human anymore.

He sat with his back against the cell wall when he regained conciousness. Tapping the walll. "Anyone else there?"

For Taylor, this was new. Unexpected. It was used to the scientists, nurses, and occasionally a Lorne executive coming down to check on their experiments. It was only ever people of the company that came near it. Until now. This voice was new, and he did not sound like the rest. He was emotional and angry, unlike the seemingly detached scientists. More than that, Taylor could hear the voice, muffled as it was, through the right wall of its cage, instead of the door. Was this one of the others that Marian had spoken of? One of the other test subjects of Lorne? Taylor had always been alone in its room, as there were no other cells nearby. If this was a new prisoner, then why had they finally brought a new cell into its room after months of solitude? What was different about this one?

Taylor did not undertand what was going on or why it was happening, but after hearing some shouting through the cell, it was bathed in flames from the same direction. It eagerly consumed the heat and energy of the fire, but as always, it was suspicious of what was to come. What test were they performing, and how did it relate to this new prisoner?

---

It was a fairly short time before Taylor heard the man's voice again through the cell wall. Taylor looked out through its door and did not see any scientists outside the cell at this point, though it knew it did not have sight on the entire room. They could always be waiting nearby. Regardless, Taylor tried to look out to the right from the door to see if it could get a line of sight onto this new prisoner, but it had no such luck. It seemed the prisoner was in a cell directly adjacent to Taylor's, so they would not be able to see one another.

"You are...new. Are you new to this room? To my room? Or are you new to this prison?" Taylor asked.

The precinct was in utter chaos when Samantha arrived. The tech division, usually hidden away in their own rooms were spread throughout, grabbing at every computer or data-pad they could find; anything with an internet connection. Normally Samantha would have been curious about how exactly they planned to track down an anonymous source that was apparently able to hit the entire city, instead she was more than a little ticked off that she hadn't been called in to even help. It wasn't as though she and Briars had done anything all day. She unclasped her helmet and made a turn for the change-rooms, only continue, making the turn a full circle before pressing her helmet into her partner's hands.

"Put this on my locker for me? I'll be back in a minute."

Briars gave her a confused look before peering around the corner, taking note of the impatiently waiting Captain, then nodded and took the helmet under her own arm. Samantha mouthed a silent thank you, then made an inconspicuous dash for the elevator.

The detective's floor was notably less chaotic than the lower bull-pen. Undoubtedly it had more to do with the individualized offices and lack of end-of-shift processing line up. Upstairs was too good for public urination cases it seemed. Samantha could swear even the smell was different, but her reverence was quickly dismissed after receiving one too many confused looks at her near-fully uniformed appearance. She slid into Dan Hiegle's office without knocking.

"Captain's looking for you" Samantha's former partner didn't even look up from his desk to great her.

"I forgot how charming you can be." She approached his desk just as he snatched up the data-pad he was reading, keeping its contents just out of her view. "Seems like quite the mess down there, could probably use some help."

Dan placed the pad into a drawer and slammed it shut with much more force than was probably needed. "Formality, Lorne's breathing down our necks but the hack is being shifted off to another precinct. We've got enough on our plate."

Still apparently not enough to share with her though. There wasn't anywhere to sit, Samantha surveyed the room for some hidden chair in a corner. "Seriously do you just hate guests?"

"What do you want Sam?"

She consigned to lean against the desk, Dan obviously hated it, but made no motion other than to fold his arms. "You know what I want. I want my job back."

"It's not my fault you left Sam, and just because you think you're ready to come back-"

"I'm not even talking about the detective job Dan. I just want to be a real cop again, I'm sick of teaching some kid how to do a road-stop."

"I figured you'd like Briars"

He wasn't missing the point, but ignoring it entirely. Samantha retaliated in her own manner by leaning in and batting her eyes. "She's no you Heigle."

Dan scoffed, but at least gave something that could have been, in some universe, construed as a reaction. She'd hit enough buttons, and pushed the issue. "Come on, just one little request to put me on your team. Don't you owe me that?"

"I don't owe you shit."

Bullshit. She could practically feel the guilt radiating off it, buried deep under his eternal aura of smugness. But after working together for almost a decade, she knew conceding to his pride would go further than tugging on heart strings. "Fine. We're even. But I still deserve this."

"Fine." He was abrasive, but even that was far to easy for the Dan she knew. She stared at him for a few brief moments, trying to measure his attitude before realizing.

"You already talked to the captain."

"Yes."

"And?"

"You have to take the PR job on top" Samantha stood up straight again, glanced to the open office door, and did her best to reel herself in. "Do you want to job or not?"

"Why does he want me so bad in the first place?"

"People are scared, ever since the tower they're not sure who to trust. A pretty young mom being the face of the masked police force isn't a bad move."

"Don't flatter me Dan. You're coming out of this an ass in my book either way." And with a bright gold star next to his name in someone else's for doing what the captain had failed to for weeks no doubt.

"You'll take it?"

"Of course I'm going to take it." She turned back to Dan and reached out a gloved hand. "I expect to get some real action here Hiegel."

Dan accept her hand, a small smirk of satisfaction threatening to break his suave facade. "See you in the morning Officer Wiles."

William practically jumped out of his skin when he heard the voice. Okay, that was a little bit creepy. Not 'my voice when I wear my helmet' creepy. He mentally scolded himself for that one. He didn't have a helmet anymore, he was no longer MPD. He raised a hand to his head as his head began to pound, apparently the pain had been the last thing to wake up. He would have preferred it if it had not woken up at all. Whatever equipment they had set up in this room was designed in a way that the moment he used his powers they seemed to remove the air out of the room. Create a vacuum which wasn't terribly healthy for him or fire. What was surprising is that they weren't keeping the room cold. They weren't trying to make it hard for him to use his powers, just that if he used them he wouldn't cause any form of damage. It required some experimentation to figure out, but if he played his cards right. He could get out of here.

"New. I was captured... I don't know how long ago. It's what happens when you get gagged, blindfolded, shoved in a back of a van, surgery performed on and then suffocated into unconsciousness in a secret testing facility that is probably underground. Illegal things usually are afterall-" William turned towards the door as he raised his voice. "-AND THIS IS ILLEGAL! I KNOW MY RIGHTS!" He lowered his voice again. "So, what's your story? How long they had you for?"

The rats scurried across the city, scouring the streets for clues. The chaos helped them pass undetected, but it also hindered their activities. Some leads turned out to be accidents brought about by paranoia. Other leads stayed hidden, repulsed by the commotion. Nevertheless, they couldn't afford to let anything go. So many leads and so little time, but at least they had a lot of bodies.

One rat passed by the donut store he'd left his mark on. The police were already on the scene, though that wasn't too worrying. They wouldn't get anything by trying to catch Ratman's tail. The mouse moved on.

Somewhere else in the city, in the nearby sewers, one rat caught something unexpected. A girl ran through the tunnels, chased by a strange swordsman with a rabbit mask. Ratman had seen the girl on the streets, and he'd heard of the swordsman. Why the latter was chasing the former wasn't immediately obvious, but they couldn't spare much power on finding out. Adrian doubted that it would help him find the answers he was looking for, but he sent a few rats to tail the pair regardless. After all, they couldn't afford to let anything go.

At the same time, on another street, a confrontation began between 2 parahumans. One rather large, the other looking homeless. The confrontation was over soon enough, but it had put the homeless man into another confrontation, this time with the police. There wasn't much the rats could do to stop the homeless parahuman's capture; they didn't deal with robots very well, and they didn't have the numbers for that kind of attack in the first place. Still, he was sure he knew where they were headed, and he had a mind to follow them.

When the car arrived at the facility, the rats had already arrived. Adrian remembered the place when he was alive. He'd never been inside, but he knew about it. About half of the swarm had settled in the nearby area, hiding whever they could. The other half remained in the rest of the city, still searching. The swarm had been watching the facility for a while, as they knew it was a place where lots of parahumans went in and not many came out of. Nevertheless, they'd never entered before. Security was always tight, after all, and not even a rat could enter unnoticed. This time, then, they would send in a handful of rats instead.

The van entered the facility and its occupants emerged, dragging their prisoner into the facility. Unbenownst to them, the rats shadowed their movements. They moved only when their marks moved, making as little noise as they possibly could. As soon as they were inside the threshold, the rats scattered, dividing their forces. It was time to see what exactly was inside the facility.

Taylor started to let out an echoing laugh as it moved up closer to the right wall of its cell. "Lorne cannot break the law if Lorne is the law." It remarked. "You are here for the terrible crime of...existence. Like me."

While Taylor, so far, had more conscious time to think about why they might be kept together than the other prisoner, it still had no answers. Any guesses it could make would likely be meaningless. "I came here on my own for...hope. For help. For a cure. I was already here, actually. Near the tower when it exploded. I went to them when I was still Human, but there is no help here. No cure. Their tests, their experiments do not care for our pain or suffering. You are something new, though. They have never brought any of their other victims to share my room before. If they test you as they have tested me, then you may not survive, but I would still know your name. I can be called...Taylor."

Morrigan watched the contents of the vial settle. Her personal lab inside ExoGenesis was never fully questioned, after all, the Director himself had a massive one she used to study in, and through her rather generous donations she was able to acquire her own lab, free from prying eyes. Today's topic of discovery was with the transitional state of metals in a vacuum. It had two purposes; one to further her understanding of her powers, and to further her own fame in the scientific community. She also still had no idea how scientifically her powers worked, other than the ability to spontaneously gather material around her and force it into a state of constant fusion through gravity. Her main goal was to find out how to overcome the infamous Witching Hour. For the last two months she'd been able to keep her two personas apart in the public eye. However, this month, the Full Moon would rise in two days, on a Friday. She was running out of excuses, and if she didn't manage to secure a method she would be ruined, and captured by Lorne.

The thought of the company caused her to start sparking which she gathered herself and stopped the small almost white sparks emanating from her hands. She almost wished she'd gotten powers similar to her husband, who's ability to change density was hardly noticeable and for a man as in control of himself as he was, he wouldn't suffer ill for it. In fact, the MPD he worked as a Liason for from the Military had no idea. She grimaced as he was slowly growing tired of it all. Their marriage had suffered greatly with the loss of their unborn child, the murder of her brother who was his best friend and the extreme hat towards Paras, who never asked to be this way.

Her secured phone dinged with a message, one she'd gotten from the enigmatic Orwell at a pretty hefty price, with a disturbing message. Every screen was taken over and she froze as dread flowed through her as the message "You are not alone." played. She immediately sent them a text, asking how anyone could hack one of their devices, they were supposed to be the best, a hacker of immense skill who most deemed a collective of like-minded individuals who collected information, mostly in the form of corporate espionage, blackmail, and secret blueprints they used to establish a sort of Information Broker empire with. She'd met the face often attributed to them, a robot they called The Eye.

Orwell>We are unaware of how such a feat occurred, only that we too were effected. It was city wide. They Blinded us momentarily. I am at a loss. We require further information.

Darkspire>That is deeply disturbing, and quite bad for business I assume.

Orwell> Anything not on a redundant server loop was affected. It's as if they _were_ the signal... We would be ver much interested in seeking this information out. We have queried the relevant sources. Also Atom has accepted your request for a chat. He will be sending a Porter to these coordinates. We are well aware that he seeks to recruit all Level 4s, and you are very close to that classification now, Darkspire. Do not get caught, your resources are very beneficial to Us.

--Chat disconnected--

A building and floor was sent and Morrigan nodded as she looked at it. Atom was a dangerous man. But she had very little choice and the thought of being called a Goddess was rather intriguing to her. She already knew she was but she did not like having people tell her what to do, watching her every movement. She would attend the meeting and find out more about this possible arrangement.

------------

Darkspire pulled out the phone, sitting against a filthy wall in the slums, a shadow keeping her hidden as she sent Orwell a message.

D> There was... Interference..

O> Of course. We have... No idea who this... Alice and Chesshire is... For now, we have alerted our contact within the Church and the Resistance of the events. We will alert you to the new coordinates when we know them. For now, remain as you are. We do not detect any lifethreatening injury on you with the scanner in this device.

D> Do you spy in on everyone?

O> Only the Priority Assets. You, Atom, The Resistance, we are currently using a slow acting worm script to hack Lorne again. That one we find to be a near Top Priority.

D> You don't say.

O> The MPD is our main concern since Lorne uses them as their Enforcers rather than hire their own security force outside the Tower. Maintaining a mole there is crucial to keeping out of sight and making sure they don't find anything that would... Decimate us. We will just leave it at, we have an particular interest there.

D> They have someone you want.

O> Yes and No.

D> Who?

O> That is none of your immediate concern.

D> Someone important to you. Who's in danger.

O> Darkspire. We highly suggest that you drop this line of thought, lest we broadcast your location to Lorne.

D> What happened to Priority Asset?

O> They are above you. By far. Also... We have news... Earlier today MPD captured one William Locke. Parahuman, Beta, Rank 4. We tracked his location to a Detention Facility where they hold other Rank 3s and 4s. Of course, such a place "doesn't exist" as it violates human rights, but everything is owned by Lorne.

D> Poor fool. I would sooner throw myself of the building than be captured.

O> We know you'd survive.

D> Then pray they never take me.

O> Will do. Our attentions are needed elsewhere. We will be in contact soon.

---Chat Disconnected---

It took a while before Holly was ready to let go of Rabbit, but she only did it when she was sure she was rid of her emotions for the moment. She never liked the idea of halting an emotional wave just for it to come back moments later and the whole cycle to start over again - she just found it frustrating. She was used to seeing gruesome and horrible things, many times having to walk past some of it as it happened right before her. It was the idea of those things happening to her that gave her the shudders.

Holly signalled the completion of her upsetedness by removing her arms from around the Rabbit. She sucked in a shaky breath through her teeth, and took a moment to stare at Rabbit. She still didn’t like him, nor did she really trust him. A side of her wanted him to go away, to leave her alone. Another part of her knew that he was, at least until she got another weapon of some sort, her only form of protection now. Holly was almost forced into having to stay with him, but she put a footnote in her head that she could ditch him at any time. She knew she wouldn’t feel any remorse over such an action.

Even so, there was a little bit of hesitation in Holly’s next set of words. She knew what she wanted to do, but she didn’t know if she could do it with him tagging along. Rabbit was to conspicious for not only the alleys and sewers but for the streets, too. Holly also had no doubt in her mind that Rabbit had his own enemies, and probably plenty more had made him an enemy in return, too. She asked, in a shaky voice nonetheless. “What now?”

Rabbit slowly stood up, turning away for a second to affix his white tie back to his neck before turning back to the young girl. You’ve really fucked it up now Rabbit… It’s not like he could just leave her like that, even though she probably wanted to never see him again. On the other hand, what else could they do? The Hitman sighed and offered a hand to Holly, offering to help her up off of the floor. ”I dunno… Maybe we should… try starting from the right foot this time?” He nervously chuckled. ”I’m the White Rabbit… or just Rabbit usually…”

Whilst a part of her mind told her not to take the hand he offered to her, Holly did it anyways - she didn’t like him, but that didn’t mean she had to be too rude. As selfish as it was, and as little as it was, a helping hand up benefitted her by getting her off of the ground, and so she’d accept it. She knew others that wouldn’t even do that, and to be fair to them, to strangers she would sometimes not do that, either.

“Well Rabbit, you already know my name,” Holly replies, trying to keep the venom out of her voice. She gave her clothes a little bit of a dusting off now that she was back on her feet. “And starting anew is a fake concept. I appreciate the gesture of starting again, but nobody ever truly forgets the past.”

Ouch. That certainly was one way to put it. Rabbit’s robotic ears drooped down a little as he rubbed the back of his neck. ”Well… guess I tried at least…” He awkwardly chuckled as he began to check either side of the alley. ”I think we lost those guys.” Rabbit noted as he began to look down at his now bloodied clothes. Well, that’s certainly going to be an issue (as if his outfit wasn’t garish enough). Rabbit then looked down into his pocket, remembering that he still got the credits for that job. The man pulled out the pack, beginning to count them up before his ears perked back up. ”Wanna spend this?” He suggested, waving the credits.

As she saw the credits, Holly became a little bit confused with herself. At first, she wanted to say yes, to indeed agree that she wanted to spend the credits and perhaps have some fun with them - she could probably even use them to buy a cheap little pistol somewhere if it was around the regular for a kidnapping, though she had no idea how much Rabbit usually charged. Even a crappy homemade pistol would be enough to ward off most people, however; nobody liked getting shot.

But on the other hand, those credits were the very cause of everything that had happened. She would have been in no danger if those credits had not been promised to the very man in front of her. She would have pawned off her stolen phones - which still rested within her backpack - for a usual fee, and continued on her days as normal; perhaps use the credits on a hotel room for the night to have a comfortable bed to sleep in, perhaps gotten herself a decent meal.

Holly eyed the credits for a few moments longer, before shaking her head. If Rabbit hadn’t changed his mind at the last moment, those credits would have resulted in her being locked away in a cage for a few nights and then transportation to the place that she would not have wanted to go, she knew that. It was the only reason she would have been picked out as a target when there were many other girls like her out there. It made her wonder how exactly she had been picked out as the target, and primarily, who ratted her out and if it was their fault.

“No,” Holly half-heartedly responded. “I don’t want anything to do with those credits. You can keep them, don’t throw them away or anything, that would make me feel worse. I don’t care if you spend them on me as long as I don’t know about it. Just don’t give them to me.” She rolled her shoulders a little, trying to relax herself a little bit. “I’m fine.”

Rabbit tilted his head before shrugging and slipping the credits away. ”Suit yourself, I guess… Offer’s there if you change your mind.” Rabbit added before leaning against the wall behind him. Well, he wasn’t going to not respect her wishes after everything he put her through but damn this felt even more difficult than getting her in the first place. ”Sooo…. What’s your thing?” He inquired, awkwardly, only then realising that he should probably be more specific. ”I mean… you’re a Para, right? Only reason they’d give you to Lorne anyways.”

“You mean you weren’t told?” Holly asks, tilting her head a little. She spoke her next thoughts aloud, “I’m surprised they wouldn’t have told you as part of your, I don’t know, tasking or whatever.” She half-expected what she said was true, and that perhaps they did tell him and it was just another attempt at conversation. She indulged in it, however, giving up at least partially on her ignorant behaviour. She needed something to take her mind off of the recent happenings, anyhow.

“I can slow everything down. At least, for me. I can boost my reaction times a lot, and see things a lot slower than everyone else because my brain computes it faster. Something like that,” Holly explained, her fingers coming up to tap at her chin as she tried to think of an example. “Oh, like your sword. It’s a high frequency one, right? I could tell because when I was looking at it when we first met, I could see it wiggling a little as it vibrated, going slowly. Was probably wiggling very quickly for you, because it’s vibrating, but I could see it as it buzzed.” She moved her hand from her chin, making it do a slow vibrating motion as a visual representation of her example. “I call it Pausing, because I kind of have to stop to use it. My reaction times are super fast when I’m Paused, but that doesn’t mean I’m fast. I’m just as fast as I normally am.”

Rabbit listened intently. His now ex employers didn’t choose to disclose this information, maybe not thinking it was necessary. He glanced down at his blade when Holly recognised its function before nodding and smirking behind the helmet. ”That’s right. It’s pretty good too. My friend made it for me, and this too.” Rabbit explained, tapping the side of his mask. Something like this Pause would be pretty useful in a lot of the situations Rabbit ends up in, which is usually because of his own ego clouding his judgement. Rabbit then unsheathed his Ninjato, twisting it around in his hand. ”This one has a High Frequency mode too. Ever used a sword?” He asked, offering the handle to Holly to let her get a closer look.

“A knife, but not a sword,” Holly replies, taking the handle and lifting the sword to get a look at it. It was lighter than she expected, but still was unfamiliar in her hands. She was far more used to a knife or a gun, something that she could easily hide or conceal, than a large sword. She knew how to use both of those that she was familiar with, too, despite not having to use them a lot. The sword was, however, past her knowledge of use. Rabbit clearly knew how to use it well, but it just seemed too big for her. Plus, if anyone else came running out with a sword, they’d be shot. They couldn’t just dash straight to their target like Rabbit could.

She voiced her thoughts to Rabbit; “Though I think a sword is a bit large and obvious if you can’t dash at your target. Plus, people’ll know you’re armed. Without dashing, the second you go for this thing or run at someone, you get shot. It’s a little useless outside of, say, a subway train or bus.” Holly tried to imagine someone using the weapon in either of those situations, and couldn’t help but think a wrong swing would probably hit a lot more people than just your target. She nodded to herself in agreement with her own assessment as she handed the handle back to Rabbit.

Rabbit considered her argument, which was true if you tried to fight people head on, but that is something that he tried to avoid as much as possible. Sure, Vector Dashing made that a hell of a lot easier but if he didn’t see the shot coming then it wouldn’t matter much. He took the Ninjato carefully and sheathed it back into its scabbard. ”That’s why I try not to get spotted in the first place.” Rabbit retorted. ”And I like the reach it gives me…” He added with a shrug. For someone so young, she had a pretty smart head about combat and stuff like that. ”You got a good judgement about those kind of things, though I guess judgement comes pretty easy with your ability, huh?”

Holly shrugs her shoulders. “Well, when Paused, I’ve noticed I become a little smarter, I look at things a bit more, I calculate my routes and my chances of actually completing a route without failing or being interrupted. I guess even though I’m not as smart as I am when Paused, some of that knowledge I get from being Paused stays.” She raised her eyebrows suddenly. “Then again, in calling myself smart, I think I’m kind of an idiot.”

She slips her backpack off of her shoulders, placing it on the ground. The four phone boxes that she had taken before were removed from her backpack, and she opened one up, moving a bit of packaging out of the way so that she could get the phone out. Holly was moving with a little bit of urgency, as she realised that she had made a mistake. “I forgot to remove the EID chip in these before I stole them. They’ll probably be tracking these as stolen since I just ran straight out the front doors and didn’t get rid of the chips afterward.”

Rabbit chuckled at what Holly said about herself before noting what she said about the chips. This kind of thing was nothing new for Rabbit. He stole plenty of phones back when he was a kid, but usually they were pickpocketed rather than straight out of a store. Rabbit crouched down and took one of the other phones, unpackaging it fairly quickly and taking out the phone. ”Well, we better get a move on.” He commented as he began to look for any crevices to pull the back casing off.

By the time Rabbit was looking for a way to pull the casing off of his phone, Holly was already in her phone. She removed the battery, and then the phone’s motherboard, flipping it over so that she could get to the other side of it there was a tiny little pin that she was looking for that stuck up slightly, and after scrutinising the motherboard a little, she looked around for a tension wrench that she usually used to pry the thing gently out of the motherboard.

It took her a moment to realise that she hadn’t actually taken out any of her tools and they were still in her pockets. With a disassembled phone in her hands, she couldn’t put down any of the exposed parts without possibly damaging them. It wasn’t something that she wasn’t used to, however; she could pry the EID chip out with her nail, it was just a little more finicky. In a couple of moments, she had the pin out, and put it on the ground - she’d step on it once they were all in a nice pile to break. She began assembling the phone again, putting together the pieces she had taken apart, and then got to work on the next phone.

Rabbit glanced over, noticing what Holly had done and tried to imitate it as best as possible. Although he managed to get to the motherboard too, the piece started becoming more finicky for himself and his larger hand. He almost got the chip out before the phone began to slip out of his hand. Luckily he managed to catch it before anything touched the floor but it was close, the motherboard itself only a millimetre away from being ruined. He nervously chuckled as he finally managed to get the chip out and place it beside the first one and began to put it back together. ”Man, I never was good with this tech shit.” He muttered idly as he slipped the phone away into Holly’s backpack.

“I don’t think I am either,” Holly replies, placing the third chip next to the other two, slipping the third phone into her bag and then starting quick work on the last phone. Speaking as she worked, she says, “I just know enough to get the job done. I pay someone to show me how to do it right, that guy gets some cash, I get myself a source of sustainable income. I sort of know how these things work, like what lots of the parts of the motherboard do, but you won’t find me in a plant manufacturing them.”

She slips the final phone into her bag, placing the final chip next to the rest. Climbing onto her feet, she slams the heel of her shoe down on the chips, crushing them all, and then twisting her foot so that she crushed them even more. Holly looks back up at Rabbit with an almost innocent shrug. “It’s how I survive. Stuff I don’t know, I can be taught, and a lot better than any school or university. Not that I’ve been to a university, or spent a lot of time in school.”

Holly begins walking, and after a moment of hesitation, waves for him to walk with her. She had no idea where she was actually going, but didn’t want to stay in the last spot that the chips were active. “In case you end up staying around me longer, if you ever want to know when I am clueless, have no plan or don’t know what to do, I’ll just be walking. Or pacing.”

William walked to the door and pushed against it slightly. It was solid, it was almost as if it was designed to stop things from going through it when it wasn’t unlocked. He tried to look into ‘Taylors’ cell with no avail. He couldn’t get an angle on it. “Names William, and I don’t plan on sticking around long enough for any tests to be happening.” He put his hands against the wall as he walked around the cell, feeling out the smooth wall. It was cold to the touch, and as far as he could tell the only seams were the corners and around the door. Still, he paced it, feeling it. He closed his eyes, trying to find any source of heat. Anything he could use at all.

“So, what can you do Taylor?”

Again, Taylor responded first with a low, echoing laugh. “The prisoners never plan for anything. We don’t decide, or act. We just...accept. Or resist, but it changes nothing.”

It seemed obvious that there was no way for Taylor to get any sort of sight onto William’s cell, so it contented itself to lay down close to the wall. “But for what I can do? I can sit here, and do nothing. I’ve tried before to hit the walls, break the door, damage what I can. I have damaged a few of my cells before, true, but not this one. I have not been out of a cage since they put me in one. All I know of anything outside this room is what Marian has told me.”

Well that was a scientists name. He’d be sure to look her up and make sure she knew he objected to this at a later time. “Yes, but how did you damage them? What can you do? I can create and manipulate fire. When I know what you can do, I can figure out a plan to get us out of here because I’m not accepting nothing, and I ain’t just going to resist being tortured. I’m going to get out of here.”

Taylor hummed to itself for a moment. Or at least, let out something of an eerie sound that could be construed as a hum. “You want to know what manner of existence I am? The mutation I have? I...consume. Energy, heat, electricity, radiation. All of what they have tried fuels me. And I always hunger for it. Perhaps...I have a guess as to why you are here, when they have never brought another to me before. They might have...tests in mind for us.”

William turned towards the wall of which Taylor existed on the other side off. “Okay, so you absorb energy. Then what? What happens when you absorb it? Can you use it? I’m looking for something useful here Taylor. If I need to do the heavy lifting so be it, but if you could explode in a fiery ball destroying our cells or something that would be pretty useful.”

Inwardly, Taylor felt amused at William’s optimism. It was an attitude that, for a brief moment, brought its mind back to a time before...everything. Back to a time when Taylor still remembered what it was like to feel through Human hands or see through Human eyes. At any rate, it was enough for it to want to humor him. “It strengthens me. I consume it like you consume food or water, but for me, I can grow stronger, larger, more resilient. I have never been...full, though. I have never felt truly satisfied. I always feel like I can have more, so I do not know how strong I can become. But Lorne...they never give too much, not since they learned how it empowers me. I think they want to make sure their cages can handle it first.”

Well that was interesting. It strengthened exponentially, obviously this latest cell was just the newest way to keep it contained. This was information William could easily use. He walked back over to the wall where the oxygen was drawn into earlier then wrapped his knuckles against it. “So is this you through there?”

“Hmm, yes. That is the correct wall between us.” Taylor answered, standing back to its feet. “These cages we are in, I heard the scientists call them ‘mobile containment units’. Perhaps like...cargo containers. That is how I have imagined it, at least. I have never seen the outside of it. But I do not know what you expect to do with it. Even if Lorne has learned nothing from their tests...I have taught them how to make better cages.”

William had never let loose, not really. He had always contained himself, brought himself back in. From causing major harm, destroying things he didn’t mean to. That wasn’t a problem he currently experienced. The problem was that he was going to have to put out as much power in as short as possible amount of time before he was rendered unconscious. He had to assume that there were temperature sensors in the room, that when his body heat reached a certain level the failsafe activated drawing the flame and the oxygen from the room.

“Well, how you feeling right now, you feeling hungry?”

William would be met with a deeper, bellowing laugh from Taylor this time. “William, I am always hungry.”

It took about two days for Samantha to question her discussion to work with detective Hiegel. She didn't typically allow herself regrets; staying with the same man for fifteen years wasn't done without learning a good deal of forgiveness and a general go-with-the-flow attitude. But the flow began pulling her in too many different directions at once, and Samantha felt herself wearing thin. It of course didn't help when her new boss seemed to be going out of his way to make her life miserable.

"You know I'm not in today."

"Look, we're stretched thin. Not many people I can trust with a para-hunt. But if you don't want in I can call another precinct..."

"No, damn it-" She raised her voice to be heard over the baby that had suddenly gone from sleeping to hysterical in her arms. "I'll be at precinct in twenty minutes"

"Briars is already on her way to you." She could hear the self-satisfaction in his voice above the wailing and through the phone, it was borderline impressive. Samantha closed her eyes and threw the phone on the bed for a better hold on Brady whom she began to bounce gently.

"Everything okay in here?" Joseph was standing in the doorway, all surprise and concern.

"I'm fine." She tired to give a reassuring smile as Brady's shrieks subsided to quiet whimpers. "We're both fine."

Her husband came closer and peered down at their son. "But he never cries with you."

"I think he appreciates what a P.O.S. mommy's boss is, don't you darling?" She kissed the top of Brady's head before handing him to Joseph almost absently.

"You're leaving then." It wasn't a question, and there was more than a slight edge of bitterness in his tone that made Samantha feel about a foot tall.

"Emergency meeting, they need a debrief with the city about some para activities." Samantha moved for the bathroom trying to put some distance between herself and her husband.

"I thought the whole point of this new job was that you wouldn't need to rush off like this."

He'd followed her to the bathroom, she kept her eyes focused on the mirror, tying her hair in a regulation plait.

"Well, its more specialized now. You know how it is, hundreds of suits in the streets but there are only a couple liaisons." The silence that followed her half-truth weighed too heavy to leave well alone. "My ride will be here any minute."

She moved passed him to the hallway without daring to look at his face. Staying with the same man for fifteen years made it harder to keep secrets from him.

"Okay. Love you Sam. I'll have dinner ready when you get back."

"I love you too" She turned to smile back at him, relieved at being able to give at least one whole truth, and took two steps back to kiss him before rushing to the front door. "I want Lang's!" Were her final words, just as the unmarked police car pulled to their front door.

--

"What the damage?"

Briars looked at Samantha, who was still strapping on her gear, and tossed a datapad onto the dashboard and hitting the holograph button.

Samantha squinted, trying to differentiate the text in front of the moving scenery behind the windshield.

"I get dragged out for a couple of measly phones?"

"No, that was a few hours ago. Same girl was seen meeting - fighting?" She shook her head "who cares, she was with a para before they both disappeared."

"And our little thief forgot to de-chip the phones." Samantha finished as she clasped her helmet in place. A map displayed itself on the inside screen, showing their location and destination. "Whats our info on the para?"

"No a lot, no one got a very good look. Gamma they think, speed related. A couple odd rumors about a guy in a mask, apparently a sort of boogie-man in some parts of the city."

Samantha nodded silently. The little blinking red light marking the phone's location wasn't in the best part of town, and it had stopped moving for longer than she would have liked. She began reading the more detailed report as her partner sped through the worst of the center-city traffic to the quieter south streets.

"Wiles, Briars" The helmet earpiece crackled to life with Dan's voice. "Your guys have been leaving a bit of a blood trail."

Sam toggled the map display on her helmet off and tucked the data-pad away between their seats. "Stop here Briars, I don't want the car tipping them off. Whats the report Dan?"

"We're having a hell of a time getting numbers; was in the sewers. A few reports about some gang violence a bit further back on your route we're still looking into. But you should know that the para is armed with a blade of some sort. I'll send along details as we find them."

"Ready?" Despite herself, Samantha was almost giddy with excitement she hadn't felt since her first few weeks on the force. This was what she'd signed on for.

Her partner nodded without a word, and the two officers left their car locked on the side street and began clearing the surrounding alleyways. It wasn't long until they spotted the couple walking almost leisurely back towards the more populated streets. The seemed rather calm for a pair of thieves and murders, but the strange silhouette of the taller one and a nod from Briars cinched it. Samantha drew her regulation firearm and called out to them.

"MPD, Hands up and turn around!"

Walking with Rabbit, Holly tried to find a reason other than I don't trust you to say to Rabbit. She had already concluded that she would have trouble staying with him, especially longer term. To her, Rabbit clearly had enemies - in his line of business, it was inevitable. Families of targets, gangs of targets, the police, there was a lot that could be reasonably slotted onto that list. Whilst Holly had her own list of people that didn't like her, she knew that list would be considerably shorter than his would be. That, and Holly could easily fix relationships with the criminal factions of her shitlist; nobody refused free gifts. Hanging around with Rabbit not only reduced the amount of people she could sell stolen goods to but also put her at more risk than she normally would be.

She was also a little bit worried that a refusal of staying together with him would make him immediately turn her back around to the gang that wanted her, or even to the police. She knew people just like that, who flipped like a switch if things didn't go their way. Usually they wouldn't effect her, but Holly knew that this was one case that could if Rabbit turned out to be like that. He had risked a lot and lost an employer by saving her. If she turned away from her, he could claim her to be ungrateful. As she started to work things out in her head, Holly began to work on the phrasing and wording. She wanted things to be clean in case she ever saw him again, which she wasn't sure wanted to happen. However, none of that worked out. Holly heard words that she always feared hearing.

"MPD, Hands up and turn around!"

Holly didn't put her hands up and did not turn around. Instead, the instant the words stopped being spoken, Holly activated a Pause. There was little worry in Holly's head, as she had been faced with the MPD a few times before and had managed to flee. She always knew that one unlucky time could be her last, however. Picking cuffs was most likely in her record somewhere, so she couldn't try that one again unless she managed to do it before they checked her records. To the woman standing behind her, Holly was probably just another small-fish criminal girl.

In front of her, Holly sought out escape routes. She could try climbing pipes on the sides of the alley like she had tried with Rabbit, but the problem, wasn't super speed this time, but the prospect of getting shot in the back - nobody was going to complain about a dead street girl. What were they going to do after that, tell the orphanage that she had last slept in a few years ago? They'd probably just leave her for the rats. Running for the streets or other alleys would probably be a similar story. The only real hope in her own personal regard was that she was a kid, so whoever of MPD's finest had found her might hesitate in popping her. Holly didn't know who else was with the officer behind her, though, as she couldn't turn around while paused. For all she knew, it was a SWAT team that had been looking for Rabbit.

A risky plan slowly built into her head as she thought of Rabbit. If Rabbit didn't just kill whoever was behind her, she could use him to get out of her crimes. He was clearly the larger one here, the more adult, the more criminal of the two with his blade and obvious Para ability. She was pretty much forced into her plan, so she tried to run through it cleanly in her head. She was going to claim Rabbit was using her for his own advantage. The phones which were probably the reason why the MPD were in the alleys in the first place - damn those EID chips - could just be claimed to be what she was giving him. The Rabbit's present criminal occupation could easily fill out the reason as to why she was doing it - the threat of death. She could hopefully get out of a formal check by claiming to be a helpless victim of the criminal beside her. And if not, she would have to make up another plan on the fly.

It wasn't a good plan, but there wasn't any other plan she could act on beside hoping Rabbit killed the officers. A larger risk came with that, however: A healthy addition of murder would be added to her record. It didn't matter if Rabbit did it, she was right there with him, and would be classed as his partner in crime. Holly would rather try her plan and risk Rabbit's disapproval than a murder added to her record. She'd be hunted down in days by MPD. Plus, it would be that reason she was looking for to part ways with him.

Holly ran through the plan in her head once more, before Unpausing. Slowly raising her hands up, Holly did as she was and spun herself around to face the officer slowly. It turned out not to be one officer, but she appeared to have a partner with her. Either way, it didn't affect her plan. With her head tilted ever so slightly away from Rabbit so he wouldn't be able to see it, but still facing the woman, Holly silently mouthed the words "Help me," to the female officer, with a light shudder starting in her body. The shudder was not by her will, though - she was genuinely worried about what would happen next.