Gravitas Pt 02 (Patreon)

Part Two: Finding a Place to Be

[A/N 1: This fanfic, as has previously been noted, is a crossover from the universe of Utopian Dreams. The first novel of that series, Welcome to Utopia, has since been published and can be found here or here.

[A/N 2: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]

[A/N 3: Several racial slurs will be employed from the point of view of an Empire Eighty-Eight character within this chapter. The author does not share these views.]

[A/N 4: After a discussion with Wildbow over previously unrevealed aspects of the canon Worm character Trainwreck, the character who was originally introduced as Locomotive in the previous chapter has since been rewritten (here and in the novel) as Pickup. His role in the story has not changed.]

[A/N 5: I’m also serialising the novel (one chapter per week) here.]

Danny Hebert looked up from his morning paper as his secretary leaned in through the office doorway. “Excuse me, Mr. Hebert,” she said. “A Mr. Hansen to see you.”

“Send him in,” Danny said. It wasn’t as though the news was going to change in the next ten minutes, and he’d already read all the details about Lung’s capture. He folded the paper and stood up from behind the desk as the young man entered the office.

Nearly as tall as Danny himself and almost as skinny, Hansen had shoulder-length brown hair tied back in a ponytail. He was wearing all black; shirt, jeans and zip-up leather boots. Clean-shaven, there was a certain intensity to his gaze that belied his apparent youth; as far as Danny could tell, he seemed to be in his mid to late twenties. Over his shoulder was slung a black nylon satchel.

“Thank you for seeing me, sir,” he said, with a hint of a drawl that put his origins at somewhere south of the Mason-Dixon line.

“Don’t thank me yet,” Danny said. “And the name’s Danny, or Mr. Hebert if we’re being formal. You are?” He held out his hand across the desk.

Hansen shook it, his grip stronger than Danny would’ve expected. “Jericho. Jericho Hansen. Someone told me that I might be able to find work that’s both casual and legal at the Dockworkers’ Association, so I came here to see for myself.”

Danny made a mental note of the fact that Hansen had made a point of specifying legal work. Also, that the unnamed informant had told Hansen that the Association was a potential source of such work. “Well, take a seat,” he said. “I can’t guarantee you any work, but I will say that I’m pleased you came to me instead of taking up with one of the gangs.” He sat down again and moved the paperwork on his desk to one side, replacing it with a pad.

“I once knew some folk who were forced to steal just to live, because of circumstances,” Hansen replied as he sat down. The satchel went on the floor beside him. “They got out of it, but it wasn’t a good time for them. I don’t want to go there if I can possibly help it.”

“Commendable,” Danny noted. “I’ll admit to being a little curious about you specifying that you’re looking for casual work rather than part-time or even full-time employment. Is there any particular reason for that?”

Hansen’s arms, which had to that point been lying in his lap, twitched and then settled again. Danny wondered if he’d been about to fold them. Then he wondered what the younger man had to be defensive about.

“Here’s where everything goes south on me,” Hansen said; his voice was still steady, but Danny noted a certain tension in his shoulders. “I’m a mite stranded at the moment. No ID that’ll help any, no access to my bank accounts, nobody I can contact. I’m fixing to stretch the money in my pocket out to a week or more if I can handle it, but after that, my options don’t look good nohow.” He waved a hand to gesture around at the Dockworkers Association building. “This here, looking for casual work, looks about my best option. Unless you can point out some other legal work where the lack of viable ID isn’t an instant deal-breaker.”

Danny suppressed the urge to raise his eyebrows. On the face of it, the younger man’s problems seemed a little far-fetched. Even lacking proper ID, an American citizen (which Jericho Hansen certainly sounded like) should face few problems in re-establishing their identity. Entire government departments existed for the sole purpose of ensuring that nobody slipped through the cracks. They weren’t infallible (few bureaucracies were) but it took effort to end up so far off the grid that it was impossible to get back on.

As a manager of men and women, Danny was reasonably good at reading body language and posture. He could spot bullshit a mile away, and could usually pick what flavor it was going to be before the bullshitter had finished spinning the line. In this case, it was easy to tell that while Hansen wasn’t giving him all the facts, what he was saying had the ring of truth about it.

He made the conscious decision not to pry, unless it got into legal matters. Turning to a fresh page on the pad, he picked up a pen and clicked it. “Is that Hansen with an e or an o?”

“E,” Jericho replied equably. It was probably a question he got asked a lot.

“Right.” Jericho Hansen, he wrote. “Hmm. Are you in a union of any kind?”

“No,” said Jericho immediately. “But I’d be willing to join, once I could afford the membership fee.”

Right. Lacking in funds. “I’m sure we can work something out,” Danny decided. “Do you have any heavy-machinery tickets?”

Jericho shook his head. “I could learn,” he offered. “I’m a quick study.”

That remained to be seen. In Danny’s experience, most people who boasted of being fast learners really weren’t. “Mm-hmm,” he said, making another note. “How about menial labor? Digging ditches, or night watchman?”

“Sure,” Jericho said readily enough. “I don’t mind getting my hands dirty, and I’m a night owl by preference anyway.”

Well, at least he wasn’t turning up his nose at the idea of handling a shovel, or standing around being bored for long hours of the night. Danny had done that himself once or twice when his father was a big name in the Dockworkers Association hierarchy; supposedly to help him ‘build character’. What it had built was a firm determination to never do that again.

He made a few more notes, then looked up at Jericho again. “Okay, this last one’s not for everybody. We sometimes hire guys out to do security on big events. I’ve vetted my guys for this, and I know who’s just a brawler and who can actually handle themselves in a fight. More to the point, I need guys who can take someone down without doing permanent damage. Proper security training is a definite plus. Do you have any experience with that sort of thing?”

Far from the ‘no, but I can learn’ that he expected, Hansen nodded firmly. “I don’t have formal security training, but I have been doing informal security work for about six years now. Everyone I’ve helped out has been pleased with my work.”

Danny blinked. “Alright, then. Come with me, please.” He stood up from behind the desk, recalling where he’d last seen Kurt. Back of the office. Right. “You understand, I can’t just take you at your word for that.”

“Well, no,” said Jericho. “Of course not. You gotta do what you gotta do.”

Danny made a mental note that the guy was amazingly agreeable for someone who was about one week away from begging on the streets. He’d known people who were just ‘going through a rough patch’ (whatever their personal definition for that was) who’d been stressed out, screaming at people and punching walls. If this guy was any more chill, his breath would’ve been puffing water vapor in the air.

They got to the back area of the office, where Kurt was in the process of pulling down a forklift to see why it was running rough. He looked up as Danny came out the door, with Jericho following behind. “Hey, Danny,” he said, then focused on Jericho. “Oh, hey. New hire?”

“Looking into it, yeah.” Danny gestured to Kurt. “Jericho, meet Kurt. Kurt, this is Jericho. I need you to evaluate him for security duties.”

“Security, huh?” Kurt looked Jericho up and down. Most people tended to lean back out of the way when the big guy did that; about Danny’s height, Kurt was more than a little broader in the shoulders.

Jericho stood firm and returned the appraising look. “I’ve done it before,” he said mildly. “No formal training, but I’ve done martial arts and I’m pretty good at the compliance holds.”

“All right then.” Kurt took up a rag and wiped the majority of the oil from his hands. Discarding it on to the seat of the forklift, he stepped away to a clear area. “Show me what you’ve got. Escort me to that door you just came out of.”

One corner of Jericho’s mouth quirked upward at that, though Danny had no idea why. He wasn’t laughing at Kurt; in fact, the remainder of his expression was dead serious. He stepped up to Kurt, but stopped just outside of arms’ reach. “Excuse me, sir,” he said firmly. “You’re going to have to leave the premises.”

Kurt grinned and dropped easily into the role of belligerent drunk. “Make me, wimp.” He raised his arms slightly, flexing his hands. Danny could tell he was deliberately making it difficult.

Jericho sighed, flicked the fingers on his left hand slightly, drawing both Danny’s and Kurt’s attention, then moved. Almost in the blink of an eye, he went from casually relaxed to explosive speed, darting in at Kurt’s left side and taking hold of his arm in a controlled blur of action. Tucked in behind Kurt’s shoulder, he lifted and turned, locking Kurt’s wrist in under his armpit.

Danny blinked as he watched one of the toughest guys he knew being frog-marched across the yard to the door by a guy about half his heft. Kurt wasn’t playing along either; even in his heavy work boots, he was right up on his toes and there was a strained look on his face that told Danny he wasn’t enjoying the experience.

They stopped just short of the door and Jericho released Kurt, then stepped away. The deferential expression was back, as if he’d never held any other. “How’s your arm?” he asked, slightly apologetically. “You looked like you were getting ready for me, so I had to rush it a mite.”

“Son of a bitch.” Kurt shook out his arm vigorously. “I thought I was ready for you. What the hell was that?”

“Uh, Krav Maga,” Jericho explained almost apologetically. “You’ve done boxing and wrestling, by your stance. I couldn’t let you get set, otherwise that would’ve been a sight harder.”

Kurt blinked and turned on Danny. “You brought a goddamned ringer in to try me out.” He shook his head, still working his arm around. “Yeah, we can test him on the other security stuff later, but he knows his moves.” He snorted, flexing his fingers. “And he knows my moves too, apparently.”

“Okay, then.” Danny caught Jericho’s eye and gestured toward the door. “We’ll leave you to make up suitable excuses for Lacey.” He ignored the less-than-polite reply as he led the way back inside. Once they were back in his office, he closed the door and leaned against the desk. “Okay,” he said. “Spill.”

Jericho had been relaxed all the way outside—except when he’d demonstrated his skill on Kurt—and back in again, but now the tension came back into his shoulders. “Uh … spill what?” The flicker his eyes made—door, then window—showed that he knew exactly what Danny wanted him to ‘spill’ about.

A grim smile on his face, Danny shook his head. The decision not to pry had just gone out the window. “You know what I mean. What the hell was that outside? You could’ve just told us you had training in Krav Maga, instead of soft-soaping it as ‘martial arts’. And you can tell what training other people have had, just from watching them? Were you in the special forces or something? Or are you on the run from some organization? Is that why you can’t use any ID, and why you’re holding back details like that?”

Instead of immediately answering, Jericho stooped and picked up his satchel. With it firmly in hand, he turned to Danny. “I told you the truth, earlier. I’m not on the run from anyone.” He seemed to be about to say more, then took a deep breath instead. “If you don’t think I’m a good fit, just say so. I’ll get out of your hair.”

“Sit your ass down.” Danny pointed at the chair. “This interview’s not over ’til I say it’s over. The reason I was asking all that is because Brockton Bay’s already got all the trouble it can handle, plus a bit more.” He moved around behind the desk and took his own seat. “Now, if I hired you on and gave you work, what are the odds that some shapeshifting cyber-ninja cape assassin will come busting in through the wall looking for you?”

He caught the same tiny quirk of a smile from Jericho, shortly before the enigmatic younger man replied. “The chance of someone like that coming to kill me would be effectively zero.” His tone was authoritative; he implicitly believed what he was saying.

“Hmm.” Danny picked up the pen and swung it between his fingers, thinking. There was no doubt that the guy was skilled. It was just that there were gaps in what he was saying, things he was careful to elide around without ever actually lying. Normally, Danny would’ve given him the flick for not being up-front about everything, but once more, he hadn’t actually lied. And then there was the guy’s financial situation to consider.

“I’ve got a question,” he said in the end. “You said you weren’t about to go to the gangs because you want legal work, yeah?”

Jericho nodded; his expression wary. “That’s correct, yes. Why?”

This was something Danny had never done before, but there was always a first time. “There’s no work going with the Association right this second, but I’ll put you on the books. Do you have a cellphone?”

“Not a working one, but I can check in on a daily basis.”

Danny nodded. “Good. In the meantime … would you object to working for known criminals, so long as the actual work you did was one hundred percent legal and legitimate?”

It was Jericho’s turn to blink in confusion. “I … it would depend. On the exact circumstances, I mean.”

“Good answer.” Danny put both hands flat on his desk. “You see, there’s a nightclub called Palanquin, which just happens to be run by a group called Faultline’s Crew. Every source I have tells me that the club itself is entirely legitimate and honest. No illegal drugs happen there, nobody gets hurt, and everybody has a good time. The owner, Faultline, runs a bunch of cape mercenaries who only take jobs out of state. They’re always in the market for good nightclub security, and somehow I suspect your lack of real ID won’t be a problem for them.”

“Oh. Right.” Jericho frowned. “They’re known to commit crimes out of state? And the cops don’t come after them here?”

Danny spread his hands. “Welcome to Brockton Bay. They don’t cause trouble here, and they bring in a lot of revenue to the city, so the cops and the PRT manage not to notice the goddamn nightclub run by supervillains.” The sarcasm he brought to bear on the latter half of the sentence should by rights have scorched the wallpaper.

“I see.” Jericho closed his eyes and rubbed fingers and thumb across his forehead. Danny wasn’t certain what was passing through his mind right then, but the grimace spoke volumes. The guy didn’t want to work for supervillains, but he was being backed into a corner. Out loud, he said, “Well, I guess I’ll go and talk to them. Thanks, Mr. Hebert. I appreciate it.”

“You’re welcome.” Danny stood up and offered his hand again. “Be safe. And whatever the rest of your story is, I’d love to hear it sometime.”

Jericho chuckled as he shook Danny’s hand. “Must be something in the water around these parts. Mama’s from up New York way, and she says that very same thing.”

With a snort, Danny shook his head. “No, it’s just part of being a parent. You pick up pretty quickly when someone’s not telling you everything.”

Something plucked at his memory. Taylor had been getting more and more evasive of late, even worse than before the locker incident. He hadn’t been paying much attention then, but he was now. Should I say something to her, or let her choose to come to me? A teenager’s investment in personal privacy could be frightening in its intensity, usually because the teenage years were the first time when such things actually became important. What if she thinks I’m prying? What if I push her away? It was a dilemma, one that he didn’t have the time right then to apply his full mental faculties to unravelling.

Oblivious to Danny’s internal monologue, Jericho shifted the satchel strap on to his shoulder. “Well, thanks anyway.” He left the office with a jaunty step.

Settling back into his chair, Danny made a few more notes, then put the pad aside. That had been a welcome diversion, but the pile of paperwork wasn’t going to get any smaller; no matter how much he ignored it. Before he got too distracted, he made a mental note to speak to Taylor that night, personal space or no personal space.

<><>​

Crusader

Some days, Justin decided, it just wasn’t worth the effort of getting out of bed.

The day had started pretty well. He’d gotten up early, and figured it was a good opportunity to take his Stingray convertible out for a spin, tunes blasting out of the speakers. Besides, what was the good in owning a true American sports car if you couldn’t show it off to the admiring public? Bright red—of course—the ’Vette wore custom Confederate-flag license plates like a badge of pride. He’d had the big V8 engine tuned and upgraded until people turned their heads when they heard the rumble of his exhaust, coming down the road, overlaid by the backbeat of whatever he was listening to at the moment.

And then he heard a real rumble. With a sound like distant thunder, an oversized pickup truck painted in red, white and blue slid up alongside him at the traffic lights. Twin chromed exhaust pipes stood up behind the cab, letting out a haze of diesel exhaust; a lightbar with enough spotlights and floodlights on it to illuminate a medium-sized football stadium graced the top of the cab itself. Even at an idle, the thing had a power to it that made his windows rattle. Justin wasn’t much more than a shade-tree mechanic at the best of times, but he could just about tell that the truck had once been a Dodge before someone had seriously gone to town on it.

There was just enough tint on the windows that he couldn’t easily see inside, but when he stretched upward a bit he could just barely make out the edge of a massive Confederate flag that looked like it stretched right across the hood. Waving to attract the driver’s attention, he gave the guy’s silhouette a grin and a thumb’s up. Props to the guy for driving a real American muscle vehicle, with a real American paint job to match.

The light turned green and he floored it as the truck’s engine roared next to him; the Dodge had plenty of get up and go, but its power to weight ratio just couldn’t measure up to the Stingray. He laughed out loud as he speared across the intersection and wove through traffic, changing gears with speed and precision. The next song up was an oldie but a goodie.

“Born down in a dead man's town/The first kick I took was when I hit the ground …”

He sang along with the Boss as he searched for a place to pull in and grab his breakfast coffee and roll. A likely looking place caught his eye and he indicated then swung across two lanes of traffic to hit the driveway just so, ignoring the honks of outraged drivers. What were they worried about, anyway? Nobody got hit, nobody got hurt. He slowed down as he went through the gutter so the ’Vette wouldn’t crunch its suspension too hard going in, then he pulled into the first available parking space. The music died as he killed the engine and pulled the ignition key; popping his seatbelt, he opened the door and stepped out of the car, still riding the high from driving such a perfect piece of American engineering.

The diner was nicely set up. Looking around, he decided that he’d have to come back here sometime. Not least because the waitstaff were all cute young things, probably college students earning an honest wage between classes. Justin being Justin, he flirted with the girl behind the counter and got a laugh out of her. As she handed him his change, he noted that she’d written a phone number on the receipt. Being a gentleman, he didn’t immediately fist-pump to let the whole shop know, but he gave her an extra-special smile that made her blush. Score.

Sliding the change into his pocket, he took up the coffee and pastries and left the shop. When he walked out through the sliding doors, what got his immediate attention was the pickup from the traffic lights, parked on the side of the road just a little ways down. It was big enough that it would probably have trouble maneuvering through the parking lot without bumping into something, so the driver had probably parked there so he could walk in and drink his coffee in peace. From this angle, he could see a lot more of the paint job across the hood, and he turned his head to admire it. Someone had definitely gone all-out; it was the best depiction of the Stars and Bars that he’d ever seen. For a moment, he considered going over and asking the driver where he’d gotten it done, but he dismissed the thought; any really good paint shop could probably do something just as good.

Then he turned his attention back to his own car, which was where things started going shitty. Because parked on either side of the Stingray, looking like mangy stray dogs next to a purebred greyhound, were a couple of beat-up sedans. Normally, that would’ve been no real hassle. Despite his distaste for allowing anyone to park next to his pride and joy, due to the chance of scraping the paintwork, it wasn’t actually illegal to do so. What made it a hassle were the guys leaning against the cars. They wore red and green colors, which made them ABB. And just like the red and green dragon decals on the sedans that proclaimed their allegiance, they’d apparently spotted the Confederate-flag license plates which made his own political leanings clear.

Oh, shit. This had the potential to get very bad, very quickly. He couldn’t see any weapons in their hands, but that only meant that no weapons were visible. His ghosts, if he manifested them here and now, would be unarmed, but they could still toss these guys around like rag dolls. Unfortunately, this would out him hard, and Max would yell at him. Maybe even kick him off the team.

In most any other circumstance, he wouldn’t have even considered the diplomatic angle, but right now it was seven against one. He couldn’t think of any other way of getting him and his pride and joy out of this situation without using his powers, and that was a big no-no. If I see these little slant-eyed pricks later, I am gonna kick their asses so hard.

Taking a deep breath, he plastered a smile across his face. “Hey, guys,” he said in as friendly a tone as he could manage. “How’s it going?”

They stared back at him with hard, flat eyes. He was pretty sure they hadn’t made him as Crusader, but that didn’t make them any less hostile. Two of them traded a comment in some chink language, then one spoke in accented American. “It’s going alright. This your car?”

Fuck. Do whatever I gotta do to get out of here in one piece. “Uh, no, actually. Loaner from a friend of mine. So I gotta be careful not to scratch it or he’ll take it out of my hide. You know how it goes, right?”

Another comment passed between them, and he gritted his teeth—speak American, goddamn it—but managed to keep his expression somewhere between neutral and friendly. “Yeah, we know how it goes.” The guy moved aside about two inches. “You want to be careful who your friends are, around here. People might get the wrong idea.” With a head-tilt toward Justin’s beloved Stingray, the guy managed to convey the point that they were fully aware that ‘whoever’ the owner of the car was, that person was at least sympathetic toward the Empire Eighty-Eight. And that they were about seventy-five percent sure that he was lying through his teeth. So why aren’t they kicking my ass?

That was when he noticed that two of the guys were looking at his hair. He liked his hair and took care of it … but that wasn’t the point. They weren’t admiring his coiffure; they were taking note of the fact that he wasn’t clean-shaven up there or wearing obvious Empire colors or ink. This was because he didn’t need to bother doing that sort of shit to prove his devotion to the cause. Costuming up and putting the hurt on illegals who should never have come to America to take the jobs of hard-working white folks was all he needed to do, and he was quite happy to do that all day.

Doing his best to fix their faces in his mind, despite the fact that they all looked the same to him, he slid past the one guy and got into the car. The coffee went into the center console and he put the key in the ignition. Turning it, he started the car, already mentally rehearsing the reversal out of the parking spot and the drive out onto the road. If these assholes decided to follow him someplace so they could boost the car where it was more private, he’d show ’em exactly how a Stingray performed in traffic. And if they caught up where it was really private … he’d show them why it was a terminally bad idea to piss off Crusader.

The key turned and the engine roared to life; as did the stereo. The last song he’d been playing blared out in all its glory.

“—off to a foreign land/To go and kill the yellow man—”

He jabbed at the stereo and shut the song off, but it was far too late. The look in their eyes went from contempt to anger in about half a heartbeat. They were reaching for weapons. There was absolutely no way he’d be able to peel on out of the parking lot before they shot him—and his car—full of holes. He was a good driver, but that sort of flying escape required a level of skill he’d never bothered learning. Oh, shit, oh, shit, oh, shit—

stomp Stomp STOMP

“What the hell do y’all think you’re doin’?”

He froze, hand on the stick shift, ready to try and make a getaway anyway. But the booming, crackling voice had come from behind and above him. All the Asian assholes froze in the act of pulling weapons out, and turned to look. Inching his eyes up to the rearview mirror, he saw a pair of mechanical … legs?

At that moment, he couldn’t not look around. So he did: at the twenty fucking foot tall robot that was menacing the Asian gang members. Three details caught his eye; the Confederate flag emblazoned across the chest region of the robot, the twin chromed exhaust pipes jutting up behind the shoulders … and the lightbar covering both shoulders. I’ve seen all that before. Glancing down at the roadside parking, he noted a distinct lack of a certain pickup truck with a unique paint-job.

Leaning forward, the robot reached out with one massively oversized hand toward the nearest ABB member. That was the last straw. They broke and ran from the parking lot, abandoning their cars and pelting off down the sidewalk. Not one of them even seemed to consider the concept of shooting at the robot, which he chalked up to the one brain cell they probably shared between all of them.

Watching them go, Justin sagged back in his seat and let out a heartfelt sigh. He was still going to kick their asses if he ever saw them again, but maybe he’d let some of them live. That had been way too close.

“You okay there, buddy?”

He twisted his head around. The robot was still standing there. If he had to make a guess, it was looking at him.

“Uh, yeah. Thanks. That was great.” He paused. He knew that Kaiser had been grumbling for days about even the ABB getting a Tinker while the Empire—the largest cape team in the city, bar none—still didn’t have one. He wasn’t authorized to try recruiting new capes, but this was a golden opportunity. “Uh, hey, I haven’t seen you around before. New in town? Nice paint job. I like the flag.”

“Uh, yeah, thanks. I like your car, too. Goes like a bat out of hell. Listen, you think you could help me out with something, buddy?”

Justin preened at the ‘bat out of hell’ comment, then nodded. “Sure thing. Whatever. You just saved my ass, guaranteed. Those ABB fucks would’a screwed me up nine ways from Sunday.”

“Yeah … um … mind telling me what was going on with that? An’ where I am? Because I am seriously, seriously lost here. I got no fuckin’ idea about what’s goin’ on with any of this shit.”

Oh, holy shit. This is amazing. Justin could almost feel his eyes light up with the glee that washed through him. “Come on. Follow me. Let’s go someplace we can talk, and I’ll fill you in on everything you need to know.”

As he backed out of the parking spot, he was already rehearsing in his mind what he was going to say.

Max is gonna love me forever.

<><>​

G-Man

It was the first time Jericho had ever been interviewed by a woman wearing a welder’s mask, but compared to his initial interview with Force Majeure back in the day, it was positively normal. Faultline didn’t even come across as a supervillain; more like a slightly harassed CEO.

“So you don’t have any ID, or even access to your bank accounts.” Her tone was matter-of-fact. “That’s okay. We can get around that. Of course, if you could give me your real name and incidentals such as date of birth, I know people who could dive into the bureaucracy and gin you up the appropriate documents anyway, if you wanted …?” With a tilt of the head, she left the suggestion hanging.

“It wouldn’t be worth the effort.” Even a half-lie like that went against his nature, but he didn’t want to chance telling her the full and unvarnished truth and seeing where that went. “I’ll be happy with however you want to pay me. Strictly nightclub security work, correct? Nothing on the other side of things?”

Her chuckle was briefly amused. “Hm. No. We don’t employ non-capes for our outside work. This position will be strictly involved in keeping our patrons safe and making sure nothing untoward happens on the premises.”

“I can definitely do that.” He felt safe in making that statement.

“Good.” She made a note on a piece of paper. “You’ll be paid in cash, and will sign a receipt for same, until you can arrange a bank account for yourself. Your tryout shift starts at six-thirty PM, the day after tomorrow. Wednesday the thirteenth. Be here at five-thirty.” She stood up, indicating that the interview was over.

“Yes, ma’am. And thank you for the opportunity.” He stood as well, offering his hand to shake.

She did so, revealing once more that her grip was stronger than that of some men he knew. “You’ve got the job, Mr. Hansen. It’s up to you to keep it. Send Gregor in, please.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said again. As he left the office, he encountered the two guys who had escorted him up to the office. He wasn’t the type to hold someone’s appearance against them, but if they were in any way typical of the Enabled he was going to find in Brockton Bay, it was surely going to be an interesting time. Nodding to the larger one with the shell-like growths on his translucent skin, he gestured back into the office. “Gregor? She said she wanted to talk to you.”

“Thank you.” Gregor headed into the office, while Newter turned to Jericho.

“Looks like it’s me and you, partner,” said the blue-haired guy with the orange skin and long whippy tail. Crouching on the wall, he gestured toward the door out of the waiting room. “So, you got someplace to be, or would you like to take the grand tour now?”

Jericho shrugged. It wasn’t as though he had any pressing appointments to attend. “We can do the grand tour, if you want.”

“Cool beans.” Newter skittered over to the door and poured himself around the doorframe in a way that Jericho knew he’d be hard put to emulate on his very best day. It honestly seemed as though the orange-skinned guy was faster and more agile when clinging to the wall or ceiling than standing on the floor. Between that, and the fact that his skin oozed hallucinogenic compounds (they’d warned Jericho of this when he went to shake hands), he would be an absolute nightmare to fight. Jericho sincerely hoped it would never come to that. “Okay, this way. I’ll show you the top floor, then work down.”

“Sounds good to me.” Jericho lengthened his stride to keep up, and followed on.

<><>​

Pickup

Pete Smith was very, very confused.

He’d done well as Savannah’s only superhero after G-Man joined Force Majeure and all that shit went down, but that was mostly because he knew his hometown like the back of his hand, and everyone there knew him. Pickup was the hero everyone looked up to, the one the cops went to first and the one the bad guys bolted from.

It had pissed him off to find that G-Man was back in town like he’d never left. Well, except that now the black-clad Enabled was a name to be reckoned with, and he was nearly certain that some of the cops were Gordoning him with information on crimes they needed help solving. Which was why, when he’d heard about the thing that had dug itself up from underground, he’d gone straight out there. He was a cog, what the big brains called an artificer, and G-Man wasn’t. If anyone could deal with something left behind by Doc Iridium, it was him. And once he’d dealt with the device, they’d realize how short-sighted they’d been in giving G-Man all the attention.

Of course, shit had gone sideways. He still wasn’t sure whether this was G-Man’s fault, or whether the thing had been programmed to activated by someone getting too close. His memory of what it had said wasn’t too clear, mainly due to the fact that he’d been doing his best not to puke inside the cockpit of his robot after G-Man hit him with that goddamn bullshit shake effect. But he’d been ready to go when G-Man gave him the opening, and he thought for a moment he’d made a clean getaway.

Until he looked around at the buildings, and at the city skyline, and realized that not only was it night-time, but he had no fucking idea where he’d ended up. Where he’d thought he came from was out of a solid brick wall. Worse, his GPS was on the fritz and his phone wasn’t returning any kind of signal. Which was total bullshit, because this was a city, and cellphone reception was right up there in the Bill of Rights next to the right to bear arms. Or if it wasn’t, it should be.

Seeing how he didn’t know which city he was in, and not wanting to step on any toes, he’d gotten on the police-band radio and tried to contact the local cops to let them know he was in their city. They’d yelled at him for improper use of police channels and told him to cease and desist immediately. Which was weird as fuck, because the Savannah cops had never had a problem with it.

But hey, if they wanted to get a stick up their ass about it, see if he’d fuckin’ help them keep the crime down in their special snowflake of a city ’til he got his bearings and figured out which way to go to get to Savannah. He already had an idea it would be south of where he was, given that it was chillier than he was used to, so that was a start. Boston, maybe. The cop who yelled at him had kinda sounded like he had a Boston accent. He’d never been to Boston before, and he wasn’t about to hang about if this was the reception he got from these assholes.

Still, to keep a low profile, he’d shifted his ride down into the truck form and gone cruising, nice and slow, to see if he could get his bearings. He found the waterfront pretty quickly, though he wasn’t at all certain that Boston had any kind of offshore construction with a forcefield over it. Maybe he was in Chicago, and Team Power had decided to move Power Plaza into Lake Michigan? Wherever he was, he figured it was gonna be one helluva long haul before he saw Savannah again. It made sense to conserve his energy and fuel, so he pulled into a quiet side-road, set the truck’s defenses to alert him if anyone tried to break in, and reclined the seat to catch some sleep. Maybe he’d figure out something by the time he woke up.

He actually got some sleep in, but not as much as he would’ve liked. When the sun was well and truly up, he got the truck moving again, looking around for a police station, or some other official-type place he could stop and ask for directions from. A gas station would do just as well, he figured.

Wherever this place was, it had a serious rush hour. Coming out of a side-street, he’d found himself enmeshed in morning traffic, forcing him to split his attention. His total lack of familiarity with the city didn’t help him in the slightest, and he had the sinking feeling he was just getting himself more and more lost.

Then he saw the Corvette Stingray. A twenty-ten model, he judged, with a flawless paint job and Confederate-flag license plates. He grinned to see that; whoever the driver was, he decided, the guy was a man after his own heart. Pulling up alongside the convertible, he looked it over. It was definitely well cared for, with a deep polish to the paintwork that gleamed in the morning sun.

Then the guy turned to look at him, or maybe just at his truck. Lifting himself up in the car seat slightly, the Corvette’s driver waved and gave him a thumb’s up. Shit, Pete thought. Does this guy know me? He’s acting like a fan. It wouldn’t have been the first time a good ol’ boy had shown up who just wanted to get a selfie with the famous Pickup. With those license plates, it seemed downright likely. Which was perfect; the guy couldn’t have turned up at a better time.

When the light changed, Pete blinked to see the Corvette take off like a scalded cat. Then a smile spread across his face. Some guys just couldn’t resist showing off just how good their rides were. And as someone with a Cog rating, he was as well placed to appreciate good vehicular engineering as anyone.

He was already moving forward; giving the go-pedal a bit of a nudge, he accelerated down the road in pursuit of the bright red Corvette. The guy in the other car might be quick off the mark, but he’d find that Pickup was no slouch either.

A quarter-mile passed under his drumming wheels before he spotted the Corvette parked outside a diner. That worked for him; he pulled over and swung the truck into a roadside carpark, but he kept the engine running. He wasn’t quite sure whether the guy was going to come talk to him once he had his order, or if he was expected to go inside so they could chat in semi-privacy. Understandably reluctant to part ways with his ride in a strange city, he decided to put off the decision until he could get a hint one way or the other.

A few moments later, the door to the diner opened again and the guy came out with a coffee and a paper bag, and he knew he’d made the right call. The guy even stopped and looked directly at him. But then he continued on toward the Corvette, leaving Pete wondering exactly what the fuck was going on.

Then he stopped wondering, because the asshole Asians parked either side of the Corvette were giving the guy a hard time, or at least that was what it looked like. There was definitely no love lost there, from the way they were staring each other down. Pete sat up in the driver’s seat and snapped the five-point harness into place, then began to engage the change option. He left off pulling the last lever until something happened, one way or the other. He didn’t need people like that screwing things up.

Just for a bit, it seemed like the guy was gonna talk his way past the Asians. He even climbed into the car and got it started. But something triggered them, and they started reaching for weapons. Pete wasted no time in yanking the final lever. The control mechanisms for the robot form closed in around his legs and arms and clicked onto his helmet as the robot rose to its full height. He lost direct view of the situation as the hood of the truck came up to cover the windshield, but that was okay; cameras in the ‘head’ of the robot were now relaying imagery to the HUD inside his helmet. He tromped forward into the parking lot.

When he challenged them, the Asians froze. That lasted until he went to grab up one of them and repeat the question. They bolted, leaving their cars behind. As soon as he was sure they weren’t coming back in a hurry, he checked that the guy in the Corvette was okay, then prepared to ask for directions. The answer he got back was partly encouraging—the guy was definitely willing to help out—but also confusing. What was this ABB thing he was talking about, exactly? The more answers he got, the more questions they raised.

He shifted his ride down into its truck form and followed the Corvette when it left the parking lot. The resultant drive had gotten them out of the city and up to the top of a modest mountain called (according to the signage) Captain’s Hill. Pulling into the otherwise-empty parking lot, the guy got out. After a long moment of hesitation, Pete did the same.

“Hey,” said the guy, holding his hand out. “Name’s Justin. Put ’er there, buddy. You sure as hell saved my ass back there.” He eyed Pete’s jumpsuit and visored helmet with a certain amount of understandable curiosity.

Well, he had to start by trusting somebody. And Justin seemed pretty genuine. Reaching out, he shook Justin’s hand. “I go by Pickup, but you can call me Pete,” he said. “So what was that there all about, anyways? Seemed to me like they was fixin’ to do you a mischief afore I stepped in.” He waved around at the skyline; at the city below, the ocean in the distance and the force-field covered installation in the bay. “And where the hell am I, anyways?”

“Well, to answer your last question first, Pete, you’re in Brockton Bay.” Justin snorted. “The premier shithole of the Northeast, and no mistake. Those chink sons-of-bitches you saved me from are all part of a gang of degenerates and criminals called the Azn Bad Boys, or the ABB. You can tell ’em by the red and green colors they wear.”

Pete shook his head in confusion. “A bunch of ’em, jes’ accosting upright citizens like you an’ me in broad daylight? Goin’ around wearin’ gang colors? Ain’t they beggin’ for the cops to bust ’em?” He didn’t make a comment on the ethnic slur Justin had just used, because why the hell should he care about the fine feelings of a bunch of criminal lowlives?

“Cops, pfft.” Justin rolled his eyes. “They don’t do shit. Even the PRT treats the ABB like they should be wrapped in cotton wool, because political correctness.” The tone he gave that phrase made it sound less appealing than dogshit. Before Pete could ask what the PRT was, he went on. “And you know, they’ve got a cape leader. Lung, the fucking rage dragon of Brockton Bay. I’ve even heard that they grab girls off the street, teenagers and younger, and send them off to be sex slaves in brothels. But everyone from the Mayor’s office on down shits their panties any time there’s a push to do something about the ABB, because they think Lung might get offended and come burn half the city down. Everyone knows it’s just an excuse to do nothing, because he never does.” The bitterness in Justin’s voice was testament to just how pissed he was at the current situation.

“Wow, fuck.” This Lung asshole sounded like major bad news. Justin had called him a cape and a rage dragon, which made for a nasty picture. “Pyrokinetic, huh?”

“That’s the one.” Justin looked at him oddly, then nodded. “And then there’s the Merchants. A bunch of drug-fucked drug pushers, with a nigger in charge. Skidmark’s his name, and that’s the least fucked-up thing about him. And of course, the cops are scared to bust him because he’s got his girlfriend Squealer building big-ass tanks for him. As for the PRT … well, personally, I think they leave the Merchants alone as an excuse for why they don’t move on the ABB.”

“Jesus fuck.” Pete shook his head. Justin’s language seemed a little rough around the edges, but it was hardly surprising given the situation he was living in. But he was also throwing out the names of Enabled villains Pete had never heard before … wait a minute. That other thing he said. “The, uh, PTR? Why don’t they do more? Aren’t they strong enough?” It sounded like some sort of local team, maybe?

“PRT? Parahuman Response Teams?” Justin snorted. “They’re fucking national. Sure they’re strong enough. But they aren’t there to bring supervillains in. They’re just there to keep the status quo exactly as it is and keep pulling a government paycheck. Half the cops are on the take, and the other half don’t give a shit. Which means that someone else has to step up and do what needs to be done.”

Pete was starting to get an idea what had happened. He hadn’t just been moved in space. He’d been sent elsewhere. To a place where the wrong people had powers, and were keeping good honest American folk in fear, attacking them on the streets. A place where the government had stopped caring enough to do even the minimum necessary to keep the population safe. A place that was crying out for an upstanding hero, someone who wasn’t afraid to do the right thing.

“Someone else?” he asked. He was pretty sure Justin hadn’t said that at random.

“Yeah,” Justin said. “I belong to a group. A team, you might say. Right-thinking people who are willing to buck the corrupt administration to keep the degenerates and illegals in check, and make sure they don’t go bothering good honest hard-working American people. But it’s a hard job, and we need all the help we can get.” He nodded toward Pete’s ride. “Can you make more things than that?”

Pete nodded firmly. “I surely can.” His heart was swelling in his chest with pride and anticipation. He’d always had the secret fantasy of being the lone hero, standing firm against the encroaching darkness, defeating it through sheer force of will. And now he’d lucked into a world where he could be that hero, albeit standing alongside like-minded comrades, saving society from its own innate depravity whether it wanted to be saved or not. “You gimme the materials an’ I’ll build whatever you damn well please.”

“I think we can manage that.” Justin held out his hand. “So, you in?”

Pete clasped it. “I’m in.”

“Good.” Justin clapped Pete on the shoulder. “Let’s go. Time to meet the others.”

As they started down off Captain’s Hill, Pete looked up at the sun, now high in the sky. The symbolism was unmistakable. It was a brand-new day, for him and for Brockton Bay.

“Y’all better watch out,” he said out loud, addressing the city in general. “There’s about to be a new sheriff in town.”