It was a good thing that the job was posted with time to spare. It meant that Marrie had time to rest, after another day of training. The last time she'd given herself a break was when she and Walking Church had met Oliver, so a two day break leading up to today was a welcome relief. It also gave her time to buy ammunition, just in case. After all, if it came down to humans being the problem, as unlikely as that may be, it was better to be prepared than have to save mana. She glanced over the details of her mission one more time, and the two she had rejected as well. It sucked that she had to turn down Raphael's version of the job, but...

If Marrie had her way, she'd save both of the behemoths. But was she really going to fight other espers, G.E.M.I.N.I. directly, to save a monster that would almost certainly not survive against them? And what if she tried and failed, or the monster ended up being evil? She couldn't risk that. This was her trolley problem, to choose to sacrifice herself trying to save something that was presumably doomed or to try to save something that was likely to survive. Her id and superego both wanted so badly to choose the former, but rationality won out in the end. She'd save the one who could survive, and hope that the other avoided combat in the first place. And if all went perfectly, maybe she'd get her wish anyway. Preferably with little to no bloodshed on any side, though she knew that was a pipe dream.

Which meant that she was headed to meet up with Maverick Alternative once again. As she biked her way to the meeting place, she couldn't shake the thought that things would go exactly against how she hoped. That the behemoth she expected to fight G.E.M.I.N.I. would be the kind one, and that the one she would presumably interact with first would be the evil one. But she held out hope that together with Maverick, they'd save them both regardless of her preconceptions. Regardless of what was sure to be reality.

Marrie had ducked into an alleyway to transform before continuing biking her way to where she was told to go. When she turned the final corner, she couldn't help but stop her peddling and freeze in place. A dragon, a real, genuine dragon, sat on the roof of where she was going. She could only stare in amazement up until the thought of it getting hurt burst its way into her mind. But that just meant she had a bigger target than usual to protect, and she wasn't going to allow herself to fail this time, regardless.

Picking up her bicycle and walking the rest of the way, she would have waved if her hands weren't full as she called out to the golden dragon and what seemed to be the only other person, presumably an esper as well, that was with it.

"Hey! How's it going? Here's hoping for an easy time, for once." She placed her bike against the front of the garage. She'd prepped for the mission when she transformed earlier, donning her kevlar coat and hiding it under her Style, making sure her tungsten rod and pistol were within easy reach and that the gun had plenty of ammo. Now all she needed to do was wait for any other allies and make sure she kept everyone and everything alive that she could. Barring any evil garbage that might be involved, of course.

@BrokenPromise@Vertigo@The World

Himiko had decided to try something a bit different this time around. She had spent a fair bit of time messing around with Puddy and Gemini already.

She still had business with Puddy to handle, not to mention the Clockwork Killer. Though she supposed she should also eventually get around to the current team leader of Gemini as well, Tighty Brighty. But that could wait until later.

It was time to see what Maverick had to offer in comparison.

Though she had no real affinity for either organization, both had their issues after all. Issues that she couldn’t see either ever taking care of or changing.

But they paid well enough and it provided her with more than enough entertainment to keep her busy. Which was what mattered the most at the end of the day. Besides, it also allowed her to take care of her own business and do some of her own scouting in person.

Having made her way to the meet up location in no real hurry. She arrived with a little time to spare. Though from a distance she could already see there was something far more interesting than she could have ever dreamed for.

A golden dragon, now that was something that put inspiration into her own golden heart of greed. A wide grin hidden beneath her mask formed as she tilted her head to the side. She just had to make him her own somehow, no matter the price or task. She just couldn't pass up this golden opportunity, she couldn't believe her luck.

It was show time, the other two espers had already arrived.

One she recognized from before during the operation to secure the water. She hadn’t really had the chance to speak with her for too long, but she was the bold and brave type. The one that would throw herself into the fray at a moment's notice. That would make Himiko’s job a fair bit easier at the very least.

Though the other esper wasn’t one she had encountered before. Meaning she must be the Maverick representative, along with that Golden Stallion of course.

With that observation made, she decided to circle around a little bit and approach from the other side of the Golden Dragon. Moving with a swift, almost graceful silence as she leapt atop of the Dragons back. Peering down at the Esper who seemed far more interested in her phone then she was anything else.

“Ditch them?, my my, that isn’t very nice, I would have missed out on this glorious golden creature, that just wouldn’t do….so what’cha looking at? Some cute boys? Maybe one that is as cute as a button? Orrrrr are you more of those Tick Takers, or whatever that thing is called….” putting her hands on her hips as she turned her gaze up towards the Dragon and away from Ciri.

“Now as for you my handsome lizard boy, with such golden glory that you are bestowing upon this world, it is only right that you join my team and we become partners, it would only be natural…we would make a perfect dynamic duo” Her own golden eyes seeming to glow at the mere thought of having a Golden Dragon around. It would just match all her aesthetics after all, it was like destiny.

“Oh…one more thing, since you're golden and all,would your insides also be golden? you wouldn’t happen to have golden blood would you? I heard it can really knock you for a loop if you aren’t prepared,enough so that you might start carrying around a pet rock, orrrrr that is at least what I heard from someone one time….Anyway….that isn’t important, sooooo how about my offer?” The mission being pushed to the back of her mind. Only the thought of having a golden dragon by her side consumed her. Just how glorious it would be to ride in, double golden revolvers blazing away atop a golden dragon. It would be so much better then her beat up motorcycle that she had struggled to slap fake gold on it that would stick for too long.

@Ponn@Majoraa

Mika would have picked up Finn first. When she first decided she was going to do this, he seemed like a cool, if not very well put together individual. Basically, someone very similar to herself. But after that happened it was clear that they didn’t have that much in common after all. Perhaps any of the new agents could have been picked up first, but Mika didn’t trust them. They were new hires and could have been plants from the mole. As much as Mika hated to admit it, Ashley was the lesser of two evils, and so she swung by her first. Not only that, but she had some aversion to letting Mika and her neighbor interact. It sounded stupid, but it meant that Ashley could show up a few blocks away from her home en route to someone else.

She didn;t exchange any words with Ashley. The door to her mother’s van swung open and she was able to step in out of the rain. Then she was off again. The wipers were working overtime to keep the window clear. After driving for a few minutes, they entered a more affluent part of Pax Septimus where Finn’s home was. But again, Mika couldn’t get too close. This time it was because of police directing traffic away from the homes, as the area was suspected to be hit directly by the hurricane. Once fin was inside, Mika started driving again.

"I told you guys we have a mole." She had told Finn before their “date” at the fair, and she had told Ashley in person just a day afterwards. She made sure both times she was away from HQ so that nobody would know. But she hadn’t told them much more than that. "Someone sent Dante stuff about Timekeeper the day of the operation. I saved it in the glove box." If Ashley cared to look in the glovebox, she would see a single page dossier on Finn. An outline of his abilities, his appearance in both esper and normal form, as well as his close family and notes about his behavior. "I think the nuns were told about me and Oros too. We were told about our jobs a day before. There aren’t a lot of people the mole could be…"

---

@Vertigo@The World@Nakushita

The rain hadn’t quite set in over Boteg and Ciri yet, but as the clouds started to move in, he extended his wing over the oni so that she would stay dry. When she asked if they could ditch them, Boteg pulled his head back as if she had just farted.

”Big tech ask me to wait for signal. ” Boteg looked out ahead. ”Time is important. If thy scares cannot assemble before the signal is shown, methinks it would be best if we enacted the plan ourselves. ”

What plan hadn’t been said yet, which was a maverick standard. Billy was very big on winging things, and likely knew Ciri wouldn’t have the willpower or attention to repeat everything to the freelancers. That said, it was anyone’s guess was to why Boteg was left with the plan. He was a flight risk, and he had a tendency to turn everything he said into something incomprehensible.

Before long, the Freelancers started to show up. The first of which was Marrie, who greeted everyone on her arrival. Boteg’s expression immediately brightened, and his tail swung side to side. ”Methinks thy quest will be difficult, but thy optimistic attitude tis most pleasing!” An observant eye might have noticed a nervous twitch in Boteg’s eye. Even now, he was really nervous around espers.

And he didn’t feel any better when Himiko showed up. First she badgered Ciri, then she started half-flirting with Boteg, which was about as effective as Ciri’s puns when she tried to sway Boteg last week. ”Beg pardon!?” The conversation only got stranger as Himiko went on about what his blood was made out of and asked him to reconsider her offer. Was this a threat? Boteg’s eyes went wide and he looked to Ciri, silently pleading for her to save him from the tiny human on his back that was interested in his blood. and companionship.

As Ashley walked the short distance from her apartment to Mika’s van, the light drizzle rapidly intensified into a torrential downpour. Thankfully, like Olivia, she had remembered to bring an umbrella, and so her seat remained relatively dry after she stepped through the van’s front passenger door. A quick look around the vehicle’s interior revealed that she was apparently the first agent to be picked up, thus, the ensuing ride to their next destination passed in a predictably awkward silence. However, that all changed once Finn stepped inside. As soon as they had begun moving again, Mika brought up the possible mole in their ranks, noting that she had recovered info about Finn from the ruins of Dante’s diner. Opening the glove box as she was directed, the Knight of Tomorrow found the dossier in question and began reading over it. The information it listed was troubling enough, but that wasn’t the only thing that concerned the high-tech heroine…

“Does Director Moller know about this?” Ashley inquired, although she was pretty sure she already knew the answer. A part of her could understand keeping the information out of the hands of a potential spy, but if the mole was actually the director herself, then they were in far more trouble than the Knight of Tomorrow cared to imagine.

“As for potential suspects, and as much as I hate to admit it, I think the most likely candidates are Faith and Binky. The later was recently held captive by The Hand, and it’s very likely that The Hand was responsible for inserting the former into the Diver as a power source. In addition, they both have access to a great deal of sensitive information, including most of Director Moller’s plans. Now, I don’t mean to say that they are knowingly betraying us,” she hastened to clarify. “It’s very possible that they were brainwashed, or were simply implanted with some form of hidden surveillance equipment. That said, there’s one other significant possibility.” Pausing for a moment to take a breath, she continued. “While Betty isn’t a part of GEMINI’s command structure, you’ve been spending a lot of time with her, Finn,” she noted, turning to face the young agent. “Have you told her any potentially sensitive information? On a related note, I was just informed by my neighbor that, in addition to giving her tours of the city, you also revealed to her that you were an esper. I sincerely hope you didn’t tell her that you worked for GEMINI as well, or mentioned any classified mission details, but even if you didn’t, can you see how that was still a massive security risk?” she inquired, her eyes and voice filled with a mixture of disappointment and concern.

Although this really wasn’t a conversation Ashley wanted to have, it was better to get it out of the way now, as opposed to after the other agents were present as well.

---

Soon as Finn climbed into the back of the Van, Mika had brought up the mole issue. When she went on to explain how Dante had a literal dossier on him, Timekeeper and all, he couldn't help the frown that formed on his face. He was set up! Why can't they just see that already?? It was a good thing Mika had found it before it got into someone else's hands, but that doesn't change the fact it was there. It was scary to think about. Doesn't help that whoever was behind it set up the ambush at St. Bianchi's too. Finn quietly listened to the conversation between the other two agents, including Ashley's theories on who leaked the information.

And then the topic turned...targeted. The Timekeeper gave their glorious leader a pointed look as she went on about how Betty and fucking Olivia of all people could be suspects too. Just cause of their association with him. The machine sharply breathed in through his nose, then dryly chuckled.

"Y'know, you can just accuse me of being the mole. Makes things much easier." He crossed his arms with a hateful grin. "Since I'm already such a liability and all? Come the fuck on, Orion, for how much bullshit Betty's been through I somehow doubt she'd still be working for the very same people who kidnapped and enthralled her and god knows what else they could've done." Unless Ashley was accusing Betty of being a sleeper agent. That'd align with the current peanut gallery with both Faith and Binky having been in contact with the Hand too. "Compared to the rest of you assholes she's been the one of, if not the best to me. Unless you're saying I've been too reckless with who I trust?" Betty had been aware the whole time she had been controlled, according to her. She knows how much he'd gone through hell and back to save her, why would she suddenly betray him after all that? He had rose a brow, then his grin dropped to a glare.


"Especially if you think an innocent girl like Olivia can be a threat? I didn't tell her jackshit beside that I'm an esper, okay? Even then she could've tried to kill me in the catacombs when we went down there if you're somehow worried about that but she didn't. She just talked to me about stuff like her school and her partner." ....That he barely paid attention to. Hopefully mentioning that Olivia's taken doesn't give Mika anything to make a snide remark about though. His eyes then widened in an exaggerated tilt of the head, eyes boring holes into Ashley's skull. "Frankly if you think she's such a threat why don't you go ahead and go kill her yourself after this, hm~?"

Letting the tension simmer for a moment, the machine leaned back against his seat, reeling himself back. "Though having a potential sleeper agent does make sense. Had either Faith or Binky acted strangely over the past few days?"

Marrie liked to label herself as observant, but having been triple checking herself for a possible battle, she missed seeing Boteg's hint that he wasn't doing well. That is, until he exclaimed his confusion at Himiko. At which point he had her full attention.

"Hey now. Let's not aggravate the really cool dragon, okay?" she called up to the girl she only knew as Sovereign. "And maybe don't ask for someone's blood, like... at all, but especially not when just meeting them. Makes you sound like a serial killer, or something." Truth be told, Marrie wouldn't be super surprised if Sovereign turned out to be a maniac, but she hoped that she wouldn't prove herself to be one.

She also waved again, this time directly at the esper who had already been there when she arrived, but from the look of her and the assumption that she was a Maverick esper, it didn't surprise Marrie that the girl seemed to be sulking. Or rather, antisocial to some degree. Though that might be unfair to the girl. It wasn't like she herself was especially social either, though she was much more... she would charitably say "shy," and uncharitably perhaps call herself "terrified of making people upset," than this other girl seemed to be. At least as far as first impressions go.

---

Patience was a virtue, a virtue that Asher hoped his new employer had because Asher was late. It was starting to become a habit, unfortunately Asher wasn’t too particularly interested in remedying it. That had been one of the complaints when the band fell apart actually. The other guys always told him they felt like Asher never cared about anything because he never seemed to care about arriving on time. Asher always told them they took things too seriously. Hopefully this new employer didn’t take things too seriously, Asher needed money.

Asher had gone with a new employer for this one, the church. He wasn’t really a religious fellow, unless you considered money a spiritual icon. But he’d already run an op for one of the city’s big players, although the contact and information he’d gathered had been minimal. As for the other, they’d met in a bar over a few smoothies and a gelatinous blob monster. That had been far more interesting, Asher had actually learned something new. Rare.

For some reason Asher felt like taking a third party approach to this next one, choosing not to side with either group. Did he want to see how they operated from afar? Did he want to evaluate them further before choosing some sort of side? Asher didn’t really have a reason, he’d not put much thought into it truthfully, just felt like more of a hassle to get involved with.

The bright red doors of the church were the first thing that caught his eye. The sight pulled Asher from his thoughts as he started to take in the scene. He couldn’t help but smirk a bit, the last time he’d been to a church he’d let himself in with the heel of his boot. Good times. Asher approached with his hands in his pocket, eyes looking from person to person as he inspected the little team he’d joined up with.

“Well well, nice little posse we’re formin’. Sorry I’m late, what’s the plan?”

Noah found herself incredibly thankful for the stamina her esper form granted her, as it was more than likely the only thing guaranteeing that she wouldn’t be horribly late. Instead, just mildly late. Not enough to get marked absent from a class, but certainly enough to be docked points. She could only hope that it wouldn’t go like college.

She’d been too wrapped up in her own head. Ever since she saw the job and read its description, it’d been just stuck in her mind like a bug in a glue trap. She’d seen the man who’d put up the request mentioned a few times on the Esper app, whether it was in passing or a suggestion to seek him out. But she always avoided looking too deep into him, or looking for him.

Why, though? Whatever reason would someone who’s esper form, their transformation that was said to represent their hearts desires, was a modified nun outfit, have to actively avoid others of her own religion? Well… Noah didn’t really feel like getting into it.

But she’s getting sidetracked. Just being conflicted on the person sending out the job wouldn’t be enough for her to think so hard about a job that she was going to be late. If this had been her first job, she would have absolutely been on time because she’d have nothing hammering a nail through her perspective.

The whole problem she’s having came down to the fact that this was her second job, and her first job involved Oliver. Even if she’d done her best to not let it show at the theater, the boy (Man? She wasn’t sure of his age.) had gotten her unsure of the perspective she’d walked in with. In regards to monsters, she means.

He was strange. Her thoughts of monsters equating to demons did still make some sense to her, but only distantly. It was a bit difficult to hold that perspective and look at the ghost she and Marrie had gone to investigate when seeing him act like he had. After the job, Noah had been trying to get what she knew in order to see how Oliver fit into what she already knew, and, well…

He did, is the thing. He fit rather solidly inside the box of a hellspawn. And it was hardly unheard of the devil and his minions to take on a sympathizable form to trick you. But it was more like… It just didn’t feel correct to Noah. She couldn’t help but feel like she was missing something the more she thought about it, but she couldn’t figure out what it was that she was missing.

And then this job comes along. Well, one of three. There was one from the government, one from that terrorist group, and then the one she took, from a third party. Together, they painted a pretty clear picture. Two monster trains were on a direct course for the city, normal people only saw them as hurricanes, and everyone wanted to stop them in their own way. GEMENI wished to destroy one of the trains, the terrorists wished to save one of the trains… and Raphiel wanted to destroy one and save the other.

Why save the other? Apparently, one of the trains was an angel.

That was the sentence that threw Noah for a complete loop. How did he know that- what did he even mean by that? Where was the distinction? Clearly her idea of monsters being demons had some amount of validity if someone working directly for the Vatican voiced the same thoughts, but if one of the trains was an angel, however that worked…

Noah couldn’t wrap her head around it. It just didn’t make sense, with what she knew about monsters. And that was what had gotten her to take this job over the government’s request. She knew she was missing something, and this was a prime opportunity to figure out what that missing thing was. (Also, she needed money for rent.)

… And that was all well and good, but Noah was still late. Not terribly late as she’d already said, only a couple minutes, but still late. No matter the reason, she couldn’t help but feel embarrassed about it as she finally saw the church that she was told to meet the other espers at.

St Bianchi Church stuck out rather clearly between the rest of the surrounding city, and its uniqueness was only made more obvious with the cast of characters standing at its entrance. One of which appeared to have only just arrived.

Noah felt a little ashamed at the relief she felt when she realized she wasn’t the only one late.

Slowing her run to a jog, and then a walk, Noah made absolutely sure she wasn’t harshly glowing before properly approaching the other espers. She’d learnt a little from that first job.

Coming in just behind the man who looked like he’d gone to a Halloween store and bought everything off the shelves, Noah followed his example. “Ah- I'm sorry as well. I was caught up on the way.” The choir said. Noah checked behind her. “Are we the last ones?”

@Ponn@Majoraa

When Ashley asked Mika if Fritzi knew about her plan, she slowly shook her head. "She knows I found something. I didn’t tell her what it was. It’s hard to get her by herself." It wasn’t that Dr Moller wasn’t trustworthy, she just surrounded herself with a lot of people. Whoever the mole was, they were someone that she trusted very much. Thus, keeping her discovery a secret from the doctor was a must. Maybe that was the wrong call, but at least Mika knew Ashley and Finn weren’t moles. It wasn’t totally impossible, she supposed. But as much as Ashley and Finn drove her nuts, she didn’t feel like they would make for good double agents.

That didn’t mean they weren’t going to find their own ways to sabotage the operation. Ashley decided now was the best time to press Finn about his relationships. He retaliated with all the maturity someone of his age was afforded. Maybe Himiko was right, but Mika wasn’t ready to admit it.

"Can we talk about the mole without bringing up Timekeeper’s girl friends?" It was something Mika was personally done hearing about, and didn’t feel like wasting more time on someone that absolutely wasn’t worth it. "And maybe don’t do the chuuni act? I’m being serious guys…" Hopefully there wouldn’t be any more incidents. "So our prime moles are Binky and Faith. I trust Timekeeper didn’t tell Betty our mission. If I remember correctly, he met with her before the meeting and didn’t see her again until after it concluded, right?" Mika hated coddling Finn like this. There were a lot of reasons why she detested it, but the main one is that she had to acknowledge that Ashley was the more mature one of the two of them. "Has anyone spent any time with either one of them? Faith always acts weird to me and I haven’t personally spoken with Binky. What should we do?"

They didn’t have long to devise a plan. The others would be joining them shortly.

---

@Vertigo@The World@Nakushita

As bewildered as the dragon looked at Himiko’s comments, that confusion seemed to melt away as soon as Marrie started talking. Boteg grinned and his head bobbed up and down. ”’Tis most splendid to be called ‘chill.’ Thou art most right! Methinks asking for thy blood tis most unusual. If thou wish to devour captain crunch, go to the glass rectangle and get a chewy block!”

This seemed to pacify Himiko Or the shita just forgot to post and Ciri was too busy being antisocial to respond. But there was someone present that wasn’t too antisocial to respond .

”’Hey girls!” Trixy gave everyone a big wave. One so big that it might have even shamed Marrie with how big it was. It was a full hundred and eighty degree wave, and her feet practically left the ground with every swing of her arm. ”’You guys must be the freelancers! I’m Trixy! Boteg here is going to fly us over to Crazy Train, at which point you guys and Ciri are going to hop off. Then I’m going to stay with Boteg and keep him safe. The other Mavericks are going to join us later via cars, but you guys need to figure out what has this behemoth so upset and see if we can rectify it.” She rubbed her chin. ”’Like maybe it’s giving birth, or it wants to meet up with the other train for a hot date. I dunno, monsters are weird sometimes. But if we can find out what it wants, we can calm it down.”

---

@TaintedMushroom@Kero

When the two late arriving espers arrived, Raphael turned to look at them, but answered Noah first.

”Yes, you are the last ones to arrive. Though while you have arrived late, I suppose it was inevitable. The storm made getting here a little difficult, didn’t it?’” He folded his massive arms. ”But none of the other factions have acted yet, so we still have time. Would the lot of you like to get introduced?’”

The other freelance espers would turn to look at the newly arrived. Both Noah and Asher might be taken back by what they saw. For Noah, it would be that there were four other nun espers not unlike herself. For Asher, it would be that these nuns had tried to kill him in the last operation they were on. Though one of them a nun wearing little more than a habit and some wraps seemed to be a new addition, or just wasn’t present during the attack. Or maybe she was present, and she had just gone unnoticed?

”We’re familiar with this one, anyway!” Lenore stepped up to Asher and stuck out her hand. ”No hard feelings about last time, right? We’re freelancers, and we’re all in it for the money in the end. Bobo might be scowling right now, but she won’t shoot you unless you shoot her first.” She winked.

Nova and the new nun were grinning right along with Lenore, but Bobo wasn’t smiling. ”Small world.” she groaned.

Raphael looked between Lenore and Asher. ”Is there a problem?’”

The new nun strutted past Asher and approached Noah. She was a tall woman, and her massive head dress made her seem taller still. ”Well, these are all new faces to me.” A smirk crossed her lips as she, too, extended her hand to shake Noah’s ”I’m Lexi, and the four of us make up Black Sabbath.”

Well, it seemed that Boteg, the name given by Trixy, at least understood that she was trying to compliment him on being impressive, if perhaps somewhat differently than she had intended. Also inferred from Trixy's explanation was the name of the Maverick esper who would be accompanying them. Marrie gave a slight bow of her head towards the seemingly excitable girl.

"Sounds like a good plan. Thank you for keeping this guy safe." She pointed her thumb at Boteg as she mentioned him. "My money's on both, though. Let's be honest, with the luck this city has, they're a duo who are mad because they're looking for each other while one's pregnant with their offspring who will, of course, be meaner than both of them combined."

She paused for a beat as a thought occurred. "I assume they're actually trains, given their names, but if they're giant hands maybe calling in Mario would be smarter."

After a sigh and a stretch of her arms over her head, Marrie decided it was about time to get focused. "So, a few questions. Do we know if it speaks? Preferably english? What about a trajectory, do we know if it's on track to hit the other?" She didn't register her accidental pun. "Is there any extra info that might help? And... if we do run into the other one, what's the call? Do we try to help save it too, or leave that to the church? I know that 'Crazy' is the target, but in my limited experience, things tend to get messy even with easier jobs than this."

Deep down, she knew that this wouldn't end without a fight with at least one of the other job posters, but she could hope that she was wrong.

Predictably, Mika had not, in fact, informed Dr. Moller of the dossier on Finn she’d found in the charred diner, but Ashley didn’t allow herself to be too concerned by this fact. After all, Mika’s reasoning for doing so was sound in light of the need for secrecy, and besides, the Knight of Tomorrow had a far larger problem to deal with…

Ashley’s eyes widened in shock as Finn went on his little rant. She knew he’d been having a hard time, and that he was still just a child, but the cruel vindictiveness he was exhibiting was taking things to another level. To say that it was worrying would have been a massive understatement. Especially when he joked(?) about her murdering Olivia to keep the girl quiet.

“Kill her?” the Knight of Tomorrow repeated. “Finn, what has gotten into you? Clearly I’ve struck some kind of nerve, but that still doesn’t give you the right to start acting like a deranged psychopath! Look,” she added after taking a deep breath. “I don’t think you’re the mole. All I’m saying is that I’m worried you might inadvertently reveal sensitive information, based upon your recent actions. Furthermore, I don’t think Olivia is a spy either, but as you said, she’s both talkative and innocent. If you tell her something, who knows who else she might naively reveal it to? As for Betty, no, I don’t think she’d willingly serve The Hand, but she was brainwashed by one of their members, so I think it would be foolish to discount the possibility that they may still have some form of influence over her.”

Finn then inquired if Faith or Binky had been acting oddly of late, as if his recent outburst hadn’t even happened, making said inquiry all the more ironic. Mika followed that up with some comments of her own, before asking how they should go about discovering the mole’s identity.

“Well, first off, I think we should try to get the Director alone and bring all we’ve learned to her attention,” Ashley began. “Then perhaps we could have her share false information with each of the suspects one by one and see if The Hand responds. I’m afraid I haven’t spent a lot of time with Binky since we rescued her,” the high-tech heroine continued. “But when I did, she seemed like her normal self. Faith is an… interesting person. She’s certainly acted rather strange on the few times we’ve conversed, but I don’t know how much of her eccentricities are natural aspects of her personalty, or signs of mental manipulation. We also can’t rule out the possibility that they don’t even know they’re supplying our enemies with information. Based on what we’ve seen so far, I think it's safe to say that implanting hidden surveillance technology or employing magical means to replicate the same effect is well within their capabilities. That said, there’s a more immediate concern I’d like to address.”

Taking another deep breath, she turned back to fix Finn with an intense gaze.

“I don’t know what, exactly, is causing you to act out like this, but if things are too much for you right now, then I think it’s in everyone’s best interest if you sit this mission out,” she told the young agent in a firm tone. “I can’t say we don’t need all the help we can get against a threat of this size, but if you’re just going act like an unhinged loose cannon, instead of a GEMINI agent, then your presence will do far more harm than good. So, what will it be, Timekeeper? Can we count on you to control yourself and cooperate with your fellow team members, or should we leave you behind to work through whatever problems you’re dealing with?”

---