Ned stopped himself from letting his hand drift down to the hidden pouch on his costume. Resisting the instinct wasn’t easy but the whole point of stuffing Fencer’s dimensional wallet1 in the hidden compartment was to keep anyone from knowing he had it.
Speaking of temptations, oh man, did he want to take this thing to someone to get one of his own. Ned had always wanted one of these and it hurt to finally hold one and know he couldn’t keep it. Fencer had warned him that this was a one-use storage and that he wouldn’t arm a hero with anything this useful if he thought Ned would be able to reverse engineer it. The spider hero had no idea if this was tech or magic, just that Fencer had warned that when Ned pulled the ragged armor bits from inside it, the device or artifact was set to self destruct.
Ned had inquired how destructive that was going to be and didn’t like the smile that crossed the villain’s face.
He ran through a list of options for safe places to open the wallet up which weren’t too far of a hike to carry the costume around as a door manifested behind him. Ned didn’t waste a second, knowing that he had moments to leave this exhibit before Fencer had to let the League in. Fencer had said this place was full of enough anti-scrying wards to keep them from figuring out he was the one with the prize and also that he planned on feeding them a lie to really throw them off his trail. However if they caught sight of him here then they’d no doubt investigate the arena and do whatever the middleman was afraid of by rewinding their previous conversation somehow.
Without even bothering to turn, Ned threw himself at the doorway, hearing it open while his body was in midair. He let his mechanical legs unfold to catch himself as he felt the world shift around himself, the change in the air sending a tingle down his spine as he crossed the threshold. The view around him resolved into a familiar alleyway and all sorts of alerts began to trickle in as he reconnected with the city’s network.
He once again ignored them all and brought up his map. While he had a fairly good grasp of Victory from years spent high in its skyline, it wasn’t like he knew the best spots to open what could be a bomb which were also a short commute from his workbench by heart. Reluctantly, he also wasn’t about to bring back villain tech to his hideout, even if the knight cosplayer hadn’t implied it was set to explode and even if he really wanted some sort of extra storage to compliment his very formfitting outfits.
Before he had a chance to start scrolling around, a sense of recognition caused him to pause. This wasn’t the alleyway he’d come in from. But why was it still familiar?
It turns out that wondering about a question like that while also having half your vision covered in a map and unread alerts is a little too distracting sometimes, as Ned missed the warning of the incoming attack.
He slammed bodily against the wall before his reflexes could take over. Despite that, even as the wind was driven out of his lungs, years on this job saw his body almost on autopilot and he still attempted to twist himself in such a way that he’d be able to fight back. However, everything was going so fast and even as he tried in vain to escape from an iron grip on his costume, he found himself pinned against the wall while he struggled. The second blow in less than a second sent stars across his vision, forcing him to continue his struggle based purely on reflex.
His spider legs were already out and so he had them lash out at the shape before he could even recognize it. To most outside observers, they would barely be able to register the individual motions of this fight so far. They’d probably attribute the sudden movement of his legs to reflex the moment he’d touched the wall, but even if Ned hadn’t had the space to form a conscious thought, this was still a dance playing out.
When those legs simply impacted the figure grabbing him and bounced off, Ned’s eyes widened in surprise and he reared a fist back for the next blow in this frantic, fast-paced brawl only to stop as his vision finally returned.
Thana Alsdottir was holding him a foot off the ground, a hand like carven stone pressing his collarbone into the alley wall while it gripped his costume.
This was the same alley he’d taken her to with the first trip to Fencer’s. That detail, plus the look in her eye told him everything he needed to know.
She’d found out that he’d… been less than honest with her.
---------------------------------
“You lied!” Thana held herself back from shouting but her voice, amplified by The Storm, still shook pebbles on the ground.
Her fury had threatened to consume her, even with all the techniques she’d learned over the thousands of years spent amongst mortals. Since her meeting with Ikor, she’d been forced to dwell in the clouds far from Victory lest her wrath inadvertently inflict harm upon those undeserving. Her oath further compelled her actions, which only incensed her more.
She knew it had been given with more alacrity than such binding words should be, but she’d forged it not just for the sake of winning over this knave, but because she herself had needed it. This unfamiliar city concealed her quarry and she knew that this pain and rage boiled within her simply looking upon it. No matter how hard she tried, it was all so fresh again, as though ten years had not passed. The actions she’d taken, putting that fiend who called himself Blood into the arms of the Arrestors at the urging of Mr. Wonder felt meaningless upon learning the man who murdered her love was here. Small things had helped, but only so far.
Clouds had roiled under her skin, laden with winds and electricity as they churned with anticipation to be set free. Her knuckles had ached, the bones underneath echoing the solution her broken heart needed to be set free. She’d seen faces in the windows as she flew through the city. The fiend’s… and her father’s.
Alsun’s blood flowed into his smile, the same one she imagined the masked man wearing before the blast consumed the apartment. Her knuckles kept stretching against her skin at the thought, remembering that moment.
You did what needed to be done then, those cracked teeth told her without the words of her father whistling through them. You must do what is needed here.
Those were the words that she’d wanted to lock away with binding words of her own. The ones that promised the same bloodshed.
She didn’t want that again. Alsun’s broken form was surrounded by piles of those who had flocked to protect him. She couldn’t remember a single name but knew every blank and hollow eye-socket in her deepest nightmares. Nightmares that only promises had kept at bay.
So she’d listened to the heroes of this city. To the civilians who spoke of them with awe and occasional annoyance. And even to the villains who whispered about them in hushed tones. She’d cast a net throughout the city with her search for someone worthy to make an oath. Something that she could hold herself to with the bindings of the divine. She needed to find something in this city to latch onto.
She’d briefly considered Terri, who she now knew as Evelyn, but… as much as she’d grown to enjoy her company in the guise of Emma, it was obvious the woman was a villain. One with some sort of moral code and one who made no secret of wishing to sway the demigoddess to her side. Their time together was nice, but not the kind of thing one swore binding oaths over.
Instead, she’d sought a hero. One who the masses said was true of heart. In truth, she could’ve sworn on anything, but the belief in heroism was what had swayed her to this path in the first place and she sought it as a bedrock. So she kept her ears open and…
No… in truth, she’d actually only listened to the counsel of one man. One simple story from a friend back in Orion about an odd hero who patrolled the City of Victory.
“He can be something of a handful… and a little prickly to be honest. But this Ned’s a good egg. One of my favorite up and comers,” her friend had told her when she’d asked of those he’d met on his travels.
So why then...?!
“Yes I did,” the false eyes proudly flickered to make his countenance one of satisfaction. “But you’re going to have to be more specific. Kinda comes with the territory of wearing a mask that I’m not the most honest person around.”
She growled at this man shaped sprite, “You told me Fencer knew nothing of value and sought only a fight. I have learned the man does not make promises lest he holds what he offers.”
The man she held simply shrugged, “I didn’t say it was impossible he knew something. Also I did promise that I would try to learn more when I came back.”
She sneered, “And yet you implied he was full of empty words. You knew he had something of note, didn’t you? You knew when you cast doubt on the veracity of his words that the truth was his offer was genuine, didn’t you?”
“I did.”
His casual tone almost forced Thana’s hand to throw him aside. Her arm trembled as she fought her own rage and the Storm’s as it roiled and seethed within her chest. The unworldly force felt the mortal’s defiance of its nature and sought to punish the hubris on instinct. Even though a hero of his stature would once have been known to the realms as a demigod in their own right, the Storm only knew him as mortal. Still, Thana remained in control, even though she herself boiled over at his defiance. The chains of the oath tightened on her skin as instinct drove her to smite the bastard in her clutches, driving down her rage to the level that she might loose its wrath with words rather than blood.
She opened her mouth and such hatred immediately fled from her lips, “You dare-?”
Ned abruptly kicked his legs off the wall and twisted his whole body.
The cloth she had been grabbing stretched as he angled himself to wedge his foot into where her shoulder met the neck, not as a kick but to find footing against the pauldron she wore. A mechanical leg swept behind her stance and pressed her leg forward like a lever. She was forced to stumble but for a moment. In the time between seconds, her fingers parted but inches.
It was enough.
The duplicitous man slipped free with a further twist of his nimble form. The motion let him pirouette away from her, using her own body as a mount for his acrobatic maneuver. Like the fey, he twisted from sight with the motions one might attribute to the wind, not man. Her surprise lasted but mere moments, but it was enough to allow for the man to loose two orbs of white silken nets. With less than heartbeats to spare, Thana threw herself aside to dodge the projectiles of webbing which sought to entrap her legs. Her dexterity saved her but ensured she finally lost sight of the her quarry.
“Fiend! You-” she raged as she came to rest, bringing up her arms in readiness as she attempted to locate the so-called hero. Her training caused her to surge forward, even without line of sight on her opponent, for to remain stationary against a ranged foe was to present an easy target.
“Fencer knows something but won’t tell,” Ned’s voice stopped her in her tracks. “With the League around, he’s tight-lipped.”
Her head whipped upwards to the point of origin of the voice. There she saw the man floating above, suspended by all four of the spindly limbs held outwards like the points of a compass. Even with the morn’s sun cresting the horizon, his masked face remained shadowed as it pointed down at her, none of the glowing eyes alit to betray his emotions.
Staring upwards at this figure, Thana was reminded of her days of youth when she’d climb the fence her fath- Alsun had warned her never to cross. She’d been out maybe the span of three bells before she’d come face to face with one of the monsters that called the forests beyond the palace’s walls home. It had leered down from her above like this man now did, its intentions equally unknown.
“He shall tell us,” she informed the hovering spider beast in the form of a man, refusing to let childhood cowardice color her words. Not when she was so close. “We can-”
“Hurt him? Break him? Do what you did to Blood’s minions?”
Memories flowed back into her. They were as hazy as those days had been. White and blue flashes of light peppered her view but in the afterimages between she saw bodies flying through the air as she struck out around her in blind fury. She bit her tongue, remembering the frail flesh yielding to the freshly returned divinity of her blows. She remembered the horrid cries of pain and inhuman sounds as men and women attempted to draw breath through pulverized throats and ragged chests.
She stared at the shadowed figure above her and wondered briefly if she’d been mistaken about all of this. Where she saw the memories of monsters in a man she’d judged to be a villain, from his vantage did he see the same? Was that not why the oath existed, regardless of his actions?
And yet, she could not accept this. She was immortal! Not some babe who needed caretakers to gently feed her falsehoods so they could handle the truths of the world! This man who literally and figuratively looked down upon her at this moment, regardless of what binding words she swore, was not her guardian or her gaoler.
“I will not harm him,” she affirmed her anchoring vow through gritted teeth. “But you have no right to hide the truth from me. I gave you my oath and you lied to my face.”
“I didn’t ask for it, but more to the point, if you knew where this person was, you’d not tell any of us about it, would you?” Thana spotted the minute tension in the legs holding him, preparing to move at a moment’s notice as he adjusted his body slightly.
Thana felt as if she clenced her jaw any tighter, her teeth were like to crack under the pressure, “So this about protecting the villain at the center of it all?”
“Only partly,” ArachNed admitted. “See, it was originally about making sure I didn’t point the loaded gun at someone knowing it was going to go off the moment I did, but now? Now I think I’m protecting more than that.”
Thana scoffed and rolled her eyes, “You seek to save me from my-”
“Why did you spend ten days in the hospital?”
Thana froze, arms still raised but now leaden.
He knows.
---------------------------------
Ned’s body was a mess of tension. His heart was thumping faster than it ever had in his entire life. There had maybe been three days total since the day he’d accidentally eaten the magic spider egg which gave him his powers that he’d been this scared for his life.
And yet he had to see this through. He had to keep poking at this goddess who wanted nothing more than to kill someone in his city in no doubt the most violent way imaginable. And the whole time, he had to pretend she wasn’t justified for it.
Ned had read the files on Marcus Lake as part of that entire sleepless night. Orion’s records didn’t have that much on him, but judging from the archaic phrasing of half of it, it was clear that most of it was Thana’s writing. It was heartbreaking and Ned had to stop himself multiple times from breaking out into sobs imagining the true extent of what had been taken that day.
The small moments that were incredibly unprofessional to write about, like his favorite foods or how they’d met with him helping her recycle electronics, or how he’d worked nightshifts while getting certified in different trades to make up for not getting a degree. All of these small personal moments, written about in the most personal of ways, began to form the shape of a simple man whose passing left a much larger hole in the world. And Ned didn’t know if he could forgive Stevens, or whatever he called himself, for what he’d taken. It had been something mundane and yet it had charmed a woman from the heavens from the sky. Ned had seen the future the blood-stained warrior had envisioned with this man as he saw her old dreams of being a craftswoman herself in the pages beginning to bloom.
The tragedy ate at his soul, reminding him why he fought to keep Victory safe and why he tried so hard to help even those flinging themselves down the dark paths of villainy. He wanted everyone to be able to have what those files promised. Even wanting the best for everyone, those stories, made into a tragedy by their ending, almost won him over to Thana’s anger.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
But… the details compelled him to look deeper. With only Thana’s testimony of the events as hard evidence, he began to notice some odd inconsistencies. Something about the more recent explosions he was now focused on didn’t seem to match the one that she described. And odder, Aegis recovered far quicker than she did.
Why did a demigoddess need to spend ten whole days in the hospital? Especially when she typically was in and out of most medical facilities in a day or two. The only exception to this, barring mythology, was a historical account that didn’t come from any hero records.
It came from the account following her father’s death.
Mr. Wonder had pulled her from the wreckage and gotten her aid and she’d spent almost a month in recovery, though allegedly she’d been physically recovered within a week and a half. Ned couldn’t dismiss that similarity.
What’s more, certain sections of the OC3002116 file were redacted under incredibly tight clearance. And records of Marquis Blood also omitted a lot of information. Heck, he hadn’t even been charged as accessory to hurting a hero for some reason. The court records weren’t hard to find and despite Thana being the one to bring him in, she was oddly absent from the trial. Not just that she wasn’t there to keep Blood from being splattered, it looked like the case had omitted her entirely, focusing instead on Blood’s older crimes and the apartment building’s destruction. Something big was missing… or was covered up.
Judging from her silence, it was almost certainly the latter.
“This man you’re chasing,” Ned spoke up, feeling his throat dry as parchment, “there’s more to him than just him killing your fiance, isn’t there? He did something else.”
He saw sparks flicker in her eyes when he dared to mention Lake’s death. But still she didn’t speak up or make any moves to attack. Oh, this wasn’t good. Ned really needed to back off. But he had to know. He had to figure this whole thing out.
“This man killed Dr. Maniacal ten years after almost killing you. That recovery is completely atypical of most heroes, and is pretty much unheard of for gods. And now you’re here… and so is the League.”
She still made no effort to reply immediately. The silence stretched through the alley between them, a gulf of only a dozen feet and yet something about this conversation made it feel like Ned was staring deep into an abyss where he knew something waited but didn’t know if it planned to lash out at him if he got too close.
He wondered if he was too close already. Already dead without knowing it.
He resolved to at least die informed. He opened his mouth to continue when she finally spoke up.
“He… You believe he’s trying to fight the League?”
Ned bit his lip. That was the million deck question, wasn’t it? Was this guy trying to bait out a fight with more of the bigwigs from the League? Judging from his research, the suspect didn’t seem too hot on taking League jobs but hardly anyone in Victory was. They paid less and often brought more heat, so you only tended to see people start acting like a toady if they either wanted a more permanent spot on the totem pole or they were looking for some reputation. Maybe you saw someone doing a lot of League work right before they came back with some upgrades, but honestly the perks were kind of garbage if you were content to stay in Victory.
So nothing in his history necessarily betrayed anything about him holding a grudge, and yet some of the files from Marquis Blood that weren’t covered in black highlighter didn’t exactly show a boss people would be happy to work for.
There was also the possibility this was inter-League wetwork. Someone could’ve swooped in to save Stevens after the OC3002116 incident and decided to put him to work here. This whole invasion could be another cover up while the true mastermind extracts him to have him kill again at a later point. There were too many unknowns here.
But while Ned couldn’t place it, something about this whole thing reeked of being personal. Ned had only crossed… the street without looking both ways twice before. And both times he’d done that as well as those funny videos from last night given him a certain impression.
“I think… there would’ve been ways to get your attention that didn’t involve all this,” Ned decided to go with. “If he was after Maniacal’s power then he’s already long gone. If he’s still here, then he has to know the League is coming.”
He didn’t bother to say whether or not he knew if the villain was still in Victory. Honestly, it probably didn’t matter if he confirmed or denied it. Even if the League’s presence wasn’t its own kind of endorsement, he doubted that Thana would let this go. The simple fact of knowing he was alive would drive her to comb this city to the bedrock to find whatever trace of him remained.
Thana lowered her arms and Ned felt the charge in the air recede.
---------------------------------
Thana thought it over.
She could find a way into Fencer’s domain and wrench him from wherever he hid. She could do whatever she liked outside the bounds of Victory and not violate her oath. She could bring the fight to the League itself and hope to draw out her fiance’s killer as she ruined whatever plot he had in mind. She could make ArachNed kneel and tell her everything he knew.
It’s what Alsun would do.
But it wasn’t what Warren would do.
She looked at this Ned and remembered his words about the hero. She tried to fit them to the man hovering above her who was more snakelike than most villains she’d crossed paths with. It took a moment but she saw the way they overlapped. He lied and told half truths. He thought himself above others and spurned allies. He worked with those clad in the black cloth of the cape as much as she’d heard he lectured others upon their lenience with the law.
And yet, he truly wished to protect even those who did not need or deserve it. She saw his weariness, a mortal who sought to do the duties of the gods. It insulted her and yet it impressed her in equal measure. He sought justice even if he forsook honor.
“I don’t wear a mask myself but I don’t blame anyone else who does,” Warren had told her when she’d asked about their compatriots. “You can’t trust anyone wearing a mask but… I try to trust the costume. I feel like this is the person they want to be as much as it’s an acknowledgment that they feel like they need to grow into it.”
As she saw the eyes light up above her and saw the face attempting to project confidence, she decided to make one more risk with this man. This two-faced, lying, egotistical man who dared to call himself a hero.
“If I promise to let you handle this your way, will you swear on the name of whatever you value most of all that you will call upon me when you act to bring him to justice?”
Ned’s eyes became serious, as serious as their exaggerated proportions could manage to be at the least.
“I… I give you my word this time. I’ll make sure you’re there when it’s time. I know you need this and I want to help you. I swear on this city.”
Thana wanted to believe his words so badly. And yet, between the voice of the Storm and her own pain, her mind was drowned by doubt. Thus she played her own trick.
“Okay,” she nodded. “I shall leave you to your devices for now. Instead, I shall fight the forces of the League.”
The eyes flickered to concern and she quickly spoke again, weaving her own web, “Calm thyself. I shall not wage war upon them nor shall I seek duels with those with whom my clashes would do damage to this fair city. But you need help and I have experience with these brigands. I shall help quell the tide so that you might focus on your pursuit in trust that you shall find the truth for us both.”
She saw him truly begin to relax, her words having swayed him. He failed to notice one thing:
The Stormdaughter swore no oath this time while he had made his own promise. It skirted the spirit of such agreements, but so had he. She would allow him his time to sleuth, but this was no true parting.
If he would work with those of the underworld, so would she. And she knew one helpful voice who might know how best to aid her. One who might know a path to take to find those who knew the arachnid’s ways better than any hero in this city.
As the two parted, Thana sought shelter from prying eyes to lay down her mantle and assume her other guise. Perhaps her friend Evelyn might know someone who could aid her in tracking the spider’s every move. Perhaps even lead her to one of those rogues known as the Evil Eight she’d learned about in her studies of her roguish “compatriot.”
She opened up her phone and selected one of the ten contacts entered into it. The dial tone lasted for what felt like hours as every ring seemed to portend a mistake with her plan. On the fifth ring though she heard the line connect.
“Hello?” Evelyn’s voice sounded breathless, prompting a moment of worry on Thana’s part.
“I hope this is a good time,” the Stormdaughter’s voice as Emma lacked any rumble or trace of the Storm. “I really need to talk with you about something important. I…”
She focused on the lingering feelings the conversation from before had stirred and pulled on the sadness that had been tempered in her breast. With a voice quivering on the verge of tears which very nearly threatened to free themselves from her eyes and travel her cheeks, she let herself plead into the cold plastic device, “I really need a friend to talk to.”
Many legends affirmed Thana’s ability for guile, and yet so many underestimated her. A pang of guilt plucked at her heart as she waged this skill to her advantage against Evelyn, but right now she needed something solid to latch onto for this mission. She needed to know she was making progress and it was not as though her friend was above such tactics herself. Perhaps she might even be impressed.
When she didn’t hear anything for a moment, she wondered if her deception had been discovered, only to hear whispered voices on the line.
“You’re sure? Really? You’re the best! I promise I’ll make this up to you! Okay, hand me my shirt, I think it’s somewhere over there,” she made out over the line, almost prompting laughter to spill from her lips as the words’ meaning hit her.
Sounds as though her quest for her paramour has ended up successful, Thana held back a laugh in time to hear Evelyn’s voice finally address her, “Right! I’m on my way! Shoot me an address and I’ll be there in a sec. Whatever it is, I’ll help you.”
Thana’s heart swelled and a smile graced her lips. It was odd to know she had such faith in one devoted to the life of villainy as she distrusted one who walked the path of heroism, but her life had faced more turbulent periods of confusion before and it had taught her to depend on friends when she needed them.
And besides, she could now get help and all the salacious details of Evelyn’s romantic ventures.
---------------------------------
Vandal winced again as her shoulder ached.
There weren’t any bruises but Over Seer’s “gentle” touches felt like they’d buried themselves deep in her muscle. The witch had been extremely half-hearted with the torturous punishment but that still meant Vandal felt sore all over.
Honestly, Seer hadn’t seemed too worked up over Vandal’s refusal to help Ikor out as much as she’d seemed to be upset that the information broker didn’t know anything about the guy who killed Maniacal.
If anyone knew anything about that, they weren’t fucking talking to Vandal so it wasn’t like it was her fault. Maniacal had been thorough when it came to locking down footage and scrying so that he controlled the view, so unless someone on site wanted to speak up, she had no way of knowing. Not that she wanted to know for this exact reason. This was the kind of secret that the League would beat out of you if you didn’t have the leverage with them to try and sell it.
At the very least, Seer’s questioning hadn’t gone deep enough to discover her plans. That was an extremely good thing because if she’d found out about those, the witch would’ve done far worse than the “light torture”. Vandal tapped her fingers on a desk nearby and wondered if she needed to hire some protection around here.
That was risky. News from Hawk was that Sun Light had fully drunk the Chill Drink and was onboard with trying to unify the heroes. She’d be spreading propaganda to her new teammates and the media attention that came with a high profile team swap like hers would get her message out even further, especially with the League here now.
No, she needed all the assets that she still had in her pocket in play ready to help out with the upcoming job. But there were still a couple of problems.
One: she was fairly sure she was being watched right now. They hadn’t left any obvious bugs she’d been able to pick up and a few sweeps of arcane detectors hadn’t picked up any scrying nearby, so she bet the League had some people watching nearby. There were probably other super powers that could keep an eye on her, but Over Seer seemed like the type who liked to flex how many spies she had.
That meant that sneaking away to contact Menace and the others would be difficult and she’d likely have only one shot. She’d need to have everything ironed out for the plan to go off in one fell swoop.
Two: the League presence here was not just accelerating the timetable, but it also meant that her previous plans risked playing into their hands too much. She needed to know about the League deployments here before she could do anything that would impact the heroes of this city or she risked upsetting the balance.
She needed to do what she did best, and find out more. That meant poking at some of her contacts to get a better view on what the League forces in the city actually were and how they were organized. If she could find a weak link, all the better, but she was on a tight timetable and couldn’t wait for someone to get disgruntled over a prolonged stay here. Either the heroes or the League could find Maniacal’s killer at any time and everything would come crashing down. Her plan couldn’t work if either side got a win like that.
A familiar knock interrupted her thoughts and she almost spilled her third cup of coffee for this morning. The previous two were abandoned at different parts of the small hideout, all within a few strides and with a finger or two of lukewarm liquid left in them. She set down her current cup and grabbed one of those that had failed to retain their warmth. Perhaps they would serve as a suitable projectile instead.
She crept to the doorway and used her power to spy on whoever was on the other end.
Once again, Ikor was there, but the man was holding something in front of him which she struggled to make out with the eye pointed at his back. She carefully moved the sigil through the air, futilely trying to see if his boss was with him.
“Hey, open up,” the walking slime called out, his voice only containing a scant hint of exasperation. “I got breakfast.”
She blinked, causing the eye to disappear. Cautiously she released the locks and cracked the door, “What do you want?”
“Thirty minutes of peace from the boss, so pretend I’m threatening you or some shit,” he huffed. “I got this from the place you like.”
“You don’t know what places I like,” she muttered while still letting the door open further.
“I had to hang around your dumpster while Blindfold Bitch was beating you up,” he pressed the bag through the gap. “I’d say I can figure it out with how many bags were in there.”
Her cheeks threatened to flare up for a second but she snatched the bag from his hands. Hairy’s. She usually only went for the fries, normally a little too fried in the morning to bother trying to grab their breakfast, but she’d heard good things about the biscuits. Sadly, she was still denied learning if they held up to the hype as the bag opened to reveal three orders of hashbrowns instead. That didn’t stop her hand from plundering those salty snacks with glee, but her disappointment remained.
Ikor squeezed through and dropped into a chair in the corner of the room, a tendril snaking out to offer her a cup of steaming coffee. She glared at it for a second before taking it from him. A phone materialized in his hand and he immediately began to ignore her as though he hadn’t just broken in.
“Are you going to be hovering over my shoulder?” she hissed before taking a sip. Fuck… this was pretty good actually.
“No, Razor Beast and Hangman were supposed to be watching you, but I swapped shifts,” he shrugged. “Needed a damn break after getting jumped by Stormdaughter last night.”
Vandal’s eyebrow raised, “Why’d she want you?”
“Not fucking surprised she’s in town?”
Vandal crossed her arms and tilted her head at him.
“Yeah, fucking figures you’d know. She’s after the same guy as us,” Ikor’s fingers started swiping rapidly on his screen before pausing. “Hey, how much does it cost to have you vet people on Con Nect?”
“5 thousand per detail,” Vandal replied on autopilot. “Wait, are you surfing dating profiles?”
The villain nodded but didn’t look her way, “Eh… fuck it, I’ll take a shot. Anyways, since we’re talking shop, you want anything?”
Vandal stood there for a moment, stunned, “Are you actually-?”
“Selling League info? Let’s see… Seer left my ass on read for weeks. Has me corralling a bunch of flunkies who think they’re fucking big shots just cause the actual fuckers with big dicks swung em around with enough force to temporarily scare off anyone who will bite back, and I’m gonna be the one they bitch to when they get the shiner they’ve earned ten times over. Oh, and when I got jumped by the fucking Stormdaughter, you wanna know what they said?”
Ikor put his phone down and leaned forward, “‘Next time, fight harder.’ The bitch throws lightning! I’m fucking made of 90% water! So yeah, throw some numbers at me and I’ll spill some fucking tea. I’ll give you a discount if it means that at least a dozen of the cheeky little fuckers they’ve got me babysitting get their teeth kicked in by the locals.”
Vandal had honestly expected to need to do a little bit of groundwork of her own for this, but as she observed the ooze man angrily whip his phone back up and begin scrolling it while waiting for her response, she smiled. She obviously didn’t trust Ikor, but if there was one thing she’d come to trust over the years on this job, it was just how petty and spiteful villains could be when they had a bad couple weeks.
Her fingers steepled, “I think I’ve got the perfect questions. Let’s see if I can’t put a very tempting price tag on them.”
1. Dimension Wallets are an item from Swordworld where one can carry around a pouch that opens into a pocket of dimensional space to store one’s treasure. Akin to the concept of "hammer space". While magical equivalents to this exist through large amount of convoluted workarounds, technological attempts to replicate their effects have officially never come to fruition. However, it is rumored that the hero, Slip Case, and his odd briefcase are the result of the Avalonian government's secret experiments to master subdimensional technologies.
