Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In his freshman year of high school, Robert had to read the Odyssey. 

It… wasn’t bad, as far as classics go. He’d been more preoccupied with AP physics and pre-calc, with the connections he could draw between vague textbook hypotheticals and the sleek titanium realities of the mech suit crouched in the garage. On the odd evening his dad was home for dinner, Homer led to one-word answers; engineering led to conversations. 

So, the Odyssey – it was just okay. 

But in spite of his distracted attention, somewhere along the way an idea wriggled into his mangled ear that never really wriggled back out again. It was nestled in a long lesson about sensory language in the ancient Greek world, about the striking lack of the word “blue” in the entire epic poem and the implications for how humans across time and space perceive hues and tones. Robert couldn’t really recall the rest of the lecture after that, but the color thing, well… if not at the dinner table, then at least in the privacy of his own mind, he could admit it was kind of intriguing. He’d think about it every so often, after that – even made it into a bit of game, staring out the living room window down the vacant driveway at the yawning  suburban-shadow-hue; quietly crook up his mouth at the crinkling in Chase’s pocket, the sound of twinkie-wrapper-hue; the more he looked over the years, the easier it was to play, like building his own dumb little catalogue of mental paint swatches.

He had just about forgotten whatever the original Homeric phrase was by the time he sat in the mech suit after his father’s funeral, shaking hands clasped around the astral pulse. He could feel the odd, biting thrum of it against his palms, light scattering fitfully through his fingers from the writhing helix inside. He sat and stared until his eyes hurt, until twisting azure snakes coiled behind his eyelids, open or closed. 

Then he breathed slowly through his nose, slotted the pulse into the reactor chamber, and twisted, watching as electric blue bled through the light strips of the control panel. His skin prickled with the sub-audible hum of energy powering up the mech from the inside, bathing every surface in a cool glow. A faint scent of ozone permeated the cockpit.

Hero-hue, he thought, grim for all of two seconds; then he huffed at his own theatrics, flipped a series of motion protocols, and rocketed off into the night. 

*****

“-chaman Blue. Mechaman Blue?” 

Robert shook himself, beating down the wince he felt threatening to tighten his eyes against the glare of camera lights. A thrumming migraine pressed against his brain like a drag net on a thrashing animal, and he blearily scanned the dim outlines in the conference hall for the source of the voice. 

“Over here. Charles Kingsley, South Bay Signal.” 

A middle-aged man with tinted glasses raised his notepad, and Robert nodded in his direction.

“Why didn’t Shroud just kill you while you were laid up? Would’ve been easy pickings.”

Robert blinked, distantly amused at the blatantly inflammatory question. “Shroud wanted the astral pulse, and he wanted the mech suit out of commission. He got both. I’m not sure I mattered that much.” 

It wasn’t hard for him to admit; not the second half, anyway. He was still desperately searching for the astral pulse in a wider and wider radius from where he crash-landed months ago, but nobody here needed to know that. 

“Right. Mechaman Blue doesn’t matter that much. Which leads me to my next question…”

Wonder why he keeps using the epithet, Robert thought, warily registering the shit-eating smirk on the reporter’s face. 

“Most heroes avenge their family. You did the opposite: you killed their legacy. Mechaman Prime, Mechaman Astral…”

Ah. Question answered. 

“...How disappointed would they be if they were here right now? Your father, your grandfather, they must be rolling over in their graves.”

Robert briefly entertained the idea of stepping off the stage to give the man exactly what he was asking for – stupid games and stupid prizes, all that. After the whole exploding in the sky thing, his own body was admittedly not in ideal operating condition, but as long as he didn’t move his arms or torso too much, he could envision an efficient enough combination to down him. Headbutt, heel kick…

His head throbbed again, and Robert clenched his teeth. 

Maybe no headbutting today. 

“I think he’d be proud,” he answered instead, the lie easy enough on his tongue. He’d at least mean this next part. “Knowing I tried my best. Being Mechaman – protecting my community – was the greatest honor I’ll ever have. Now, I have to live knowing that. Thank you for coming.”

He strode off the stage, focusing on walking without a wobble and ignoring the twist in his gut at the dissatisfied murmurs behind him. He rounded the curtain and started toward the corridor to the exit, passing a timid-looking PA who pointed at her wrist. 

“Just a reminder that you’ve, uh, you’ve got 15 minutes til we re-open the hall. Sorry,” she said softly, like she was afraid of upsetting him. It was standard practice at these things – keep the press locked in their pen long enough to give heroes the chance to change back into civilian attire and get a little ways away. Fifteen minutes was certainly on the shorter end of standard, but Robert didn’t really plan to change, anyway; pulling off his mask and pulling on his jacket was about all he could muster without his bad arm making everything an annoying tangle. 

“Got it. Thank you.”

He tried for a reassuring smile. It seemed to work well enough, though there was a sympathetic look in her eye that Robert tried not to notice as she scuttled off, giving him some semblance of privacy. Robert awkwardly shrugged on his bomber over the sling, sighing as the cowl came off and relieved a sliver of pressure on his head. He stuffed it in his pocket as he stepped out into the cool night air, walking quickly in a direction that was less bright and populated than the community thoroughfare. He figured he could bum around a bit, take the long way back to his apartment just in case the fifteen minutes wasn’t quite enough to curb the more motivated gossip-chasers from sniffing after him. It was all probably useless precaution, anyway; he knew with a kind of blunt pragmatism that Mechaman had fallen (literally and figuratively) from public grace. If the very slim silver lining was less fuss about finding out his identity, then hey, he’d take it. 

The tinkling of broken glass brought his thoughts and his steps up short. His head jerked in the direction of the sound against his will, mood souring further. Sure enough, there was a painfully conspicuous group of figures hauling flatscreens through a shattered storefront down the road. They weren’t even trying to be covert. Robert didn’t know balaclavas were sold in such eye-stinging colors. 

He groaned under his breath, stiff fingers twisting in the fabric of his mask bunched into his pocket. His wrist throbbed in protest at the simple motion. He didn’t give a damn about flatscreens, really, did he? 

But it was a hollow protest – it always was, with those kinds of justification games. The TVs, the goods, the stuff wasn’t the problem, not unless a business was really on its last legs. No, the problem was the old couple upstairs who came tottering down to check on the noise; the young family next door with the baby who startled awake, crying; the cat that spooked and ran out into the road. It was the fragile lives that always seemed to find themselves in the cross-fire, the neighborhood that got caught with its pants down and kicked in the crotch for it. 

And even if this wasn’t his neighborhood – Robert Robertson’s neighborhood – it was still Mechaman’s neighborhood. 

Robert scowled as he shucked off his jacket and dropped it on the curb, yanking his mask back onto his head. The burglars didn’t notice as he started marching down the road; they did, however, notice a rotund stray dog coming down the opposite corner, a rotund stray dog that began barking shrilly when one of the burglars swung a crowbar toward it. 

“Dude, what the hell are you –”

“It’s not my fault, thing just ran up on me –”

“Will one of you just, take care of it, just shut it the fuck up –”

Robert sprinted on atrophied legs as the one with the crowbar swung again, clipping the dog in the ear this time. It yelped, stumbling back, and Robert’s chest twisted as he closed distance. 

“Hey!” 

The colored balaclavas – there were five that Robert could count now – stopped and turned toward him. The little dog skittered off into the darkness. Robert watched it go from the corner of his eye.

“Who the fuck is this asshole?”

He could imagine the picture he painted all too easily. He sighed, gesturing to himself with his good arm in exaggerated aplomb. 

“Mechaman, if you can believe it. And I hate to ask, but could you just – not do this right now? Maybe just put the stuff back, and we can all call it a day?”

The guy with the crowbar and the orange balaclava sneered. Or Robert thought he was sneering, based on the vague topography of his mouth and cheeks under the obnoxious mask. 

“You’re not Mechaman. That’s Mechaman,” he gestured toward one of the still plugged-in flatscreens in the broken storefront, conveniently playing a news reel of the mechsuit exploding. Robert grimaced at the image and the idiocy, both. 

“I don’t wanna make you feel bad, but: that’s the suit. There’s a guy inside: that’s me. Kinda why they call me Mechaman, y’know, because I’m the man that pilots the – uh, okay,” he stopped as Green Balaclava lunged at him from another direction. He dodged the clumsy grab, but Orange Balaclava pushed forward next, waving the crowbar. 

“I don’t care who you are, you’re already beat to shit,” he jeered, prodding at the strap on Robert’s sling, “and it’s obvious which side every punch would be coming from–”

Fuck, Robert thought emphatically as he darted his bad arm out of the sling, bracing for the consequences. It was as good as an explicit invitation, and he had to take any opening he could get with odds as bad as these. The punch connected – Robert had a millisecond of satisfaction as he watched the chump get laid out cold, not too bad for post-coma noodle arms – before pain ripped up his arm in a fiery wave. He felt the fracture in his left forearm crack wider in the same moment his shoulder popped from the socket. But he carried through the momentum, spinning on his heel so that his better arm could swing on Red Balaclava. 

He landed a few more good hits before all four remaining came at him, exploiting the opening on his left side to double him over. He fought to stay on his feet – this would be over fast if they got him on the ground – but a kick to the chest sent him down harder than it should’ve, knocking the wind out of him in an awful, choking rattle. On instinct he raised his arms, partially blocking the rain of blows as his mind raced and his lungs spasmed. 

Were some of his ribs still broken? Or was it his sternum? He couldn’t clearly remember all of the details on his discharge paperwork. He’d just wanted out of the hospital at that point. Just wanted to assess the damage on the suit. Just wanted to find the astral pulse. Just wanted to – 

There was another crash of glass. Robert’s vision had gone spotty, but he managed to suck in a gasp of air, and some of the blackness receded. He could mostly see as the skittle squad got peeled off and tossed, one by one, by a darting shadow in the air. That shadow coalesced into a serene and stately figure that drifted to the ground in front of him. 

“That last guy I threw – he landed on the roof, right?”

*****

Blonde Blazer was… she was… Well, she was a hero, through and through. That much was entirely evident. 

Whatever else was going on was a lot less evident. 

Robert swirled his ice, pretending that even lifting the glass didn’t make the connective tissue in his arm creak like moldy rope. If his head was foggy before, it was swimming now, and the ambient, scrambling pain signals zinging along every nerve ending didn’t help sharpen his thoughts. He could tell Blazer was a good person; he could also tell she was angling for something, though he was absolutely baffled on what. As much of an ego boost as it would be, he doubted it was just… him. In spite of the venue, the signals, the “propositional” phrasing, it wasn’t coalescing into that kind of a picture. And, while he would genuinely be having a nice (if confusing) time under any other circumstance, he was really hoping she’d get to the point sooner rather than later, before he collapsed in a gross crippled mess on the sticky bar floor. He was getting accustomed to reaching new lows, but even for him –

“Hey, Bitch!”

Robert frowned. Something was a little familiar about that voice; he tried to unthink that thought. 

“I’m talking to you, bitch.” 

The bartender squinted hard at Robert. Robert, who was delaying turning around for as long as possible. He sighed, squared his aching shoulders, and slowly twisted on the bar stool. 

“Alright, just so you know, I only turned around because someone yelled, not because I’m a…” 

Ah. 

Ah. 

He may have spoken too soon about new lows. 

Three people slowly approached from across the bar, each alarmingly unique, but Robert’s eyes fixed on the man in the center. It was hard not to – he was, first of all, enormous, teetering on the edge of the human scale that Robert could sometimes forget in the grandiosity of heroes and villains. But he didn’t look supernatural, he just looked…big, tall, strong in that way that Robert had secretly always envied for the simple truth that there were many, many scraps it could’ve made a vital difference in. The bite of that practical envy was dulled a bit by the garish way it was flaunted: the man was in a suit that almost reminded Robert of something from Cirque du Soleil, all skin-tight, shimmering fabric with bursts of red and orange and a V-neck that showed a lot more than neck. The wrap-around sunglasses didn’t even look that ridiculous. 

Infuriatingly, he managed to be beautiful, like a Monet in an Ikea frame is beautiful. He had changed very little in the years since Robert first encountered him, at least physically. Robert couldn’t say the same. 

“Don’t you watch the news? This is a superhero bar.” 

Well, it was pretty clear where this was going. Robert suppressed the desire to slam his own head into the countertop, though his addled brain snagged on the edge of that sentence. 

He understood what the man was implying about Mechaman, but – this was a superhero bar.

So what was Flambae, of all people, doing here? 

“Are you really gonna act like you don’t remember me?” 

Robert realized too late that he hadn’t responded. Still, he hesitated on what to say next, trying in vain to connect his thoughts with any amount of clarity. As he puzzled over what to say, mind flooding with every errant detail of their brief but memorable encounter, his eyes darted down to Flambae’s hand without his volition. He hadn’t – actually been entirely sure, all those years ago, the fight ended abruptly and the arrest was fast. But he’d told EMS to try to administer first aid, that maybe they could be re-attached – 

His empty stomach clenched at the two smooth stumps where Flambae’s right pinky and ring finger should be. 

“Sorry.” 

“I control the fire, and the flame, and my skin does not burn. I – what?”

Robert probably should’ve been more concerned about the way Flambae’s hands were fully engulfed in fire, now, and getting menacingly closer to his face. But he could still see the outline of Flambae’s marred hand through the flames. He felt his own mouth tense, and a strange, disproportionate bitterness washed through him. It wasn’t… only guilt about Flamabae, he didn’t think, tying a lead knot in his chest. There was failure, too: imperfection, glaring and unignorable, a clumsy case wrap that led to clumsy consequences for the rest of someone’s life. 

But that wasn’t right, either. It was too close to – too close to how disappointed would they be right now, too close to you’ve got fifteen minutes, sorry, too close to you’re already beat to shit. Robert barely knew Flambae, but he doubted the man wanted the indignity of pity – or anything remotely resembling it – which made it essentially impossible to apologize. He’d probably prefer a fight. A rematch. A momentous reclaiming of whatever pride he thought Mechaman stole. 

But Mechaman was benched, and Robert was too tired to sort this out. 

“I – uh, sorry. I never knew how that ended up. I’m not sorry for booking you, but – I’m sorry for that. For your hand, Flambae.” 

Flambae’s hand-torches didn’t go out. If anything, they flared brighter, but Robert looked up at the man’s face, not flinching back from the furious, bewildered stare he found there. He resolutely held his gaze as Flambae’s glare roved over his still expression, darted between his eyes, swept over the muscles in his jaw and mouth, a wildfire hellbent on smoking out lies. Flambae’s lip curled around his clenched teeth, and he leaned forward into Robert’s face.

Robert felt his eyes go dry and gritty with the heat radiating in the small space. They were close enough that he could watch a curious shift in the shade of Flambae’s irises, flickering yellow-red-yellow like a guttering flame. Flambae’s snarl twisted down into the beginnings of a frown, and the gradation in his eyes shimmered as he flicked his eyes all around Robert’s face again, a crease growing in his brow. Robert felt something shift, and had the sudden impulse to lean away, to pull his cowl further down, to do something, because somehow something unplaceable was going sideways –

“You –”

“Oh boy, sorry about taking so long, I – Flambae?!” 

Flambae reared up and away, narrowly missing swiping his still-flaming hand across Robert’s jaw. Blonde Blazer was there in an instant, holding Flambae’s wrist with a hard light in her eye. 

“Flambae,” she repeated in a steely voice, and Robert didn’t have time to try to intuit how these two people were connected, because whatever the dynamic was, Blazer clearly had the wrong idea of what was happening. “After the last incident, you are this close to suspension. I shouldn’t have to remind you how generous the contract is with the conditions of your –”

“I didn’t fucking touch Mecha-dick –”

“HR will be hearing about this first thing tomorrow, and don’t think I don’t see you two slinking off, Coupé and Punch-Up, I –”

“Blazer, wait.” 

Four superpowered people froze in their tracks to look back at Robert. He rubbed a hand across his eyes, resisting the urge to groan at his own superability to end up in progressively more absurd situations. 

“He's telling the truth. He didn’t swing on me, we were just… catching up,” Robert trailed off lamely. Blazer arched a brow at Flambae; Flambae’s hands went out with a funny little wheeze. He shook off Blazer’s grip, and scoffed in Robert’s direction. 

“You heard the bitch. We were catching up,” he pitched his voice up mockingly, though he didn’t quite make eye contact with Robert, turning on his heel to stalk toward his companions at the door. Blazer looked ready to go after them, but Robert lightly shook his head, grinning a little sheepishly when she planted her fists on her hips and raised both brows at him. 

“Ya’ll are gonna have to leave,” the bartender piped up, giving Robert a stink-eye and shrugging apologetically at Blazer. She sighed. 

“Well, I guess that was as good a segue as any to what I really wanted to ask you, tonight. Got any gas left for one more stop?”

No, Robert did not. “Yeah,” Robert said, and Blazer spirited him off to a billboard, gave him a surprise VR proficiency test, and offered him a deal to scrape together the ashes of his life, one last time. 

*****

It was two a.m., he was dead on his feet, and Robert was wandering around the park near the burgled appliance store. 

“C’mere,” he called out in a raspy voice that hurt to force from his throat, straining his ears for any sounds in response. “C’mere, boy. I won’t hurt ya.”

He stumbled a little, hissing when his shoulder checked against something unseen. A tree, probably. But a quiet scrabbling noise pulled his attention from the new onslaught of throbbing, and he focused his senses as hard as he could to pinpoint the source. Reaching blindly in the closest proximity he could guess, he was rewarded by his fingertips brushing against something soft. 

Soft, warm, and slightly shaky as it wiggled under his hand. Robert tried to gentle the stroke of his own aching fingers, and the soft warmth drew steadily closer until it was pressed against his shins. With a strained grunt, Robert wrapped his protesting arms around the dense little dog, hoisting it as best as he could. 

“You’re kinda beefy,” he muttered. A wet nose poked against his cheek.

Chapter Text

Robert sighed at his reflection in the mirror. 

It was Friday morning – two days since the most atypical job interview he’d ever experienced – and most of the facial bruises he’d gotten were fading to a watery yellow that wasn’t too noticeable if you didn’t get that close. 

He rotated his shoulders experimentally. Since Blazer fixed the dislocation, he’d swapped his sling for a compression wrap on his forearm that laid mostly flat beneath his left sleeve. Not the sturdiest form of medical care for healing bones, but he wanted the range of motion, so he’d just have to be careful not to bump it on things. His torso was still mottled with livid purples and blues (just-got-jumped-hue?), smearing along pre-existing scar tissue in a mildly stomach-turning way; he zipped over those gingerly. At least it gave him a renewed appreciation for how covering the Mechaman jumpsuit was. 

Unlike some supersuits… 

Robert’s mind flashed against his will to the slinky thing a certain ex-con was wearing that night. Fighting in something so exposed was certainly a choice. Then again, from what Robert could tell (and he had, intentionally or not, gotten an eyeful), maybe that choice was backed up by proportionate skill. Reluctantly, he had to admit that the guy had nary a blemish anywhere… besides the obvious one that Robert gave him. 

He shook his head slightly, hurriedly dissipating the image. That night had given him a lot to chew on, and Flambae wasn’t even in the top five, but, well. Once he’d squared away most of the considerations he needed to make to accept he was just going to have to throw himself at the mercy of Blazer’s offer, he’d googled a few things, clicked on some sponsored SDN links, and started to see the foggy outline of context for how Blazer and Flambae had interacted. 

Though any identifying details were redacted online, Robert would bet money that Flambae was part of SDN’s tastefully publicized “Phoenix Program”, a rehabilitation-slash-equal employment hybrid that was taking on anonymized villains who’d turned a new leaf. The anonymous part was questionable when the given ex-villain was about as subtle as a lighthouse – a lighthouse that had caught fire – but even so, something about the idea eased the gnawing that had sprung up in the pit of Robert’s stomach in the bar.

It’s not like the guy had gone through some kind of baptismal transformation, or whatever; his personality still seemed to come with a healthy helping of asshole. But… somewhere, at some point, he had opted into the program. Not only that, but in his off-duty hours, he was spending his time in a hero joint. Blazer had seemed surprised to see him there. So even if he was swaggering and posturing and yelling about bitches, what did it really say, for a man with a story like his to choose to stand in a place like that?

A light jingling sound cut through Robert’s thoughts, and he looked down at the source: a little dog – his little dog – wiggling his whole black-and-white butt as he stared hopefully up at Robert, new collar flashing in the light coming in from the veranda. The engraved name sent golden oscillations of “BEEF” flickering all over the empty walls as he wagged, tongue lolling. He’d eaten and gone out for the morning, and didn’t seem to be asking for anything but attention. Robert’s expression softened as he crouched down. 

“Doesn’t mean he won’t try to light me up the next time he sees me,” Robert said conversationally, petting over Beef’s back. That was the other thing that he was vaguely concerned about. It didn’t really feel like they’d reached any sort of, uh, resolution in that interaction, and if they were going to be working in the same place, it didn’t bode well for future Robert’s odds of getting roasted like a pig on a spit. Without the mech, he wasn’t especially resistant to immolation.

SDN is a huge network. We’ll be in entirely different positions. Even if we’re sometimes in the same building, there’s no guarantee we’ll ever run into each other. 

He huffed through his nose, picking at a loose thread on the cuff of his sleeve. It’d be way less of a risk if he wasn’t suited up. But Blazer knew who he was – both sides of who he was – and had chosen to approach him as Mechaman, so Mechaman was the one she wanted to hire, right?

Robert scratched behind Beef’s ears, glanced over at his full water dish, then stood, ignoring the twinge in his ribs. “I’ll ask about bringing you with me next time,” he promised. Beef sneezed in response. 

*****

Sometimes, Robert miscalculated. 

In fairness to himself, the universe seemed to take sadistic pleasure in skewing statistical likelihoods whenever he was involved. 

He was sat in SDN’s lobby, helping a very sweet and very damp young man with his tie, when his scalp prickled with the foreboding sense of bad universe statistics. He glanced away from the moist kid – Waterboy, his apt moniker – and his eyes widened at the silhouette coming through the glass doors. 

Well, shit. 

Instinctively, he ducked down, hands still wrapped in the slippery tie. Waterboy stuttered something that didn’t quite make it past the rushing in Robert’s ears. From around the gangly wet figure in front of him, Robert watched as Flambae strode through the entrance – still just as flamboyant and irritatingly imposing under office lighting as dim bar fixtures – walking with purpose toward the hall on the opposite side of the lobby. He didn’t turn his head to either side, chin raised in cocky confidence. Without being entirely aware of what he was doing, Robert scooted surreptitiously in a half circle around Waterboy, keeping the partial cover until he only saw the back of Flambae’s slicked ponytail. When even that disappeared from view, Robert exhaled. 

“O-oh! Now that you– now that your face is, is aside of my face, I see that I – that I know you! You’re Mechaman. But you’re dead, I thought.”

Robert abruptly came back to himself, loosening the tension he’d accidentally put on the tie. Waterboy’s neck had bowed toward him to accommodate it, but he didn’t seem bothered as he straightened back up, blue eyes widening behind his foggy goggles. Robert cleared his throat, neatly knotting the soaked fabric at the juncture of the wetsuit and starched collar. Was this kid wearing a button-up shirt under his swimwear?

“Just on the inside,” Robert joked, releasing Waterboy with a small pat on the shoulder. His animated eyes were still darting around Robert’s jumpsuit, and he furrowed his brow slightly. 

“You, uh… look sma– different, in person.” 

As soon as he said it, he immediately paled, screwing his eyes shut in regret. There was not a hint of ire in his voice, and it wouldn’t be the first time someone brought it up. The corner of Robert’s mouth lifted. Quirks and leaks aside, he was endearing.  

“I hope your interview goes well,” Robert said sincerely, tactfully sidestepping the comment. Before the kid could respond, another voice, strong and bright, rang through the lobby. 

“Wasn’t sure you’d show up. Can I borrow you?” 

Robert stood to greet Blonde Blazer as Waterboy erupted in stammering admiration. She gestured for Robert to follow, and Robert gave his drippy acquaintance one last encouraging nod before he caught up to Blazer’s stride. She was walking surprisingly quickly, ushering him into an empty conference room and closing off the blinds with swift efficiency. 

“Take your clothes off,” she said calmly, slinging a backpack off of her shoulder. 

“Uh, what’s happening right now…?”

Blazer was pulling articles of clothing out of the bag. “We don’t want too many people knowing you’re Mechaman. A lot of our dispatchers are former heroes, but we’ve had incidents in the past – it seemed like that night at the bar was already verging on one – so it’s better if you keep your identity a secret.” 

Robert nodded slowly, understanding and mild embarrassment creeping in. So it had been foolish to come in his suit. Still, this made a lot more sense, and was a tidy fix to… certain fire-based problems. Blazer tossed him a blue shirt that was a size too big, and slacks that were, thankfully, about right. 

“Get dressed. I have somebody you need to meet.” 

Robert accepted them with a bemused expression. He glanced around the room and back at Blazer, who blinked expectantly. 

Alright then, he inwardly shrugged, shuffling to the corner for a place to drop his things. He unbuckled his tactical belt and started on the suit zipper, sliding it down unceremoniously. Blazer’s expression didn’t change until he started pulling the suit off of his shoulders, intentionally keeping his movements smooth in spite of the awkward twinges of pain it evoked. 

“Oh, sorry, should I turn around? Or, um, yeah, of course I’ll turn around…” 

So saying, she decidedly did not turn around, face flustered, and Robert huffed a small laugh as he turned, instead. “Whatever’s fine,” he said, and it was – he had what might be an overly-clinical view of his own body, based very little in aesthetics and very much in operative potential. It was a kind of ‘good, better, best’ situation; best had been out of reach since waking up in the hospital with half his muscle mass gone and nerve endings like ground meat, but at least his mobility was fairly normal. He was just irritated by the setbacks getting kicked around had on things – irritated with the limitations he was impatient to push back to standard – and he suppressed a hiss as something in his spine throbbed in the motion of pulling up his slacks. 

“Remind me to pay you back for the clothes,” he said over his shoulder, mostly just for something to say. He caught Blazer’s expression out of the corner of his eye, and felt his stomach sink with the way it was vacillating between sheepish interest and startled concern, gaze wandering over his bare skin. Her eyes flicked to his, and she quickly spun on her heel. 

“Don’t worry about that, it’s company comped,” she said to the door. “And, well – I’ve also been meaning to say, I’m sorry for the way that I conducted myself the other night. I know it probably came across as confusing. It was a mistake; a complicated mistake. I can explain the complications… later…” 

She trailed off, and Robert raised his eyebrows slightly, pausing in getting dressed as he processed the nuances of his new boss. 

“You’re refreshingly decent,” he said, voice light enough to pass as benign ribbing. “But there’s really nothing to apologize for. It was a nice night. Nothing weird happened. Well, nothing beyond a street rescue and a corporate recruitment.”

He turned around to shrug as he started on the buttons of the loose shirt. Blazer turned back, as well, and Robert glimpsed something that looked puzzlingly like disappointment before she grinned at him. 

“I’d like to keep things professional,” she agreed, tone similarly teasing, though her grin wilted slightly at what she could see through Robert’s still-open shirt. “Um, are you –”

“Right, that’s why you brought me to this conference room to strip down in front of you. Profesh,” he interrupted a little too quickly, tossing his jumpsuit to the side. Both of them froze as the fabric halted several feet above from the surface of the chair, like someone had hit the pause button on it midair. 

The hovering jumpsuit rose, bobbing hurriedly toward the door, and Blazer narrowed her eyes. “Are you serious,” she muttered, and something that sounded significantly meatier than bunched clothes thunked against the glass. 

“Ugh. Who locks a conference room,” a new voice groaned, and a crumpled form materialized under the jumpsuit. Blazer glared down at the slight figure on the floor, and Robert’s jumping pulse slowed as he rapidly made mental room for yet another anomaly. The scowling woman squinted up at them, looking from Blazer to Robert, then yanked an inhaler out of her pocket and puffed it aggressively. 

“So you two fuck, or what,” she asked brazenly, shifting into a sitting position. She ran a hand through the layers of her short hair, watching Robert with the keen expression of someone accustomed to catching people out. Robert cocked an unimpressed brow. 

“No professional lines were crossed,” he deadpanned. 

She smirked, undeterred. “Okay, so just like grinding, clothes on stuff –”

“Visi, knock it off,” Blazer cut in, waving a hand for emphasis and plowing on before anyone could speak again. “Robert, this is Invisigal. She’s part of the Phoenix Program…” 

Robert looked at the sharp woman – Invisigal – with new interest as Blazer spoke more about the program. He’d been curious, reading about the Phoenix Program online. But his only point of reference had been Flambae, and even that was intuition, not confirmation. What kind of story did she have? Did everyone in the program work together, or were they divided out, balanced against combinations of heroes with less sordid pasts? Would that lead to more or less tension in the ranks?

“...and this is Robert. He’ll be your team’s new dispatcher.”

Robert refocused with that. He glanced at Blazer in muted surprise. 

“A washed-up, curb-stomped superhero with no powers. Can’t wait.” 

Her eyes were back on Robert, baiting a flinch. Robert didn’t give it to her. 

“His identity, all of this, is staying between us,” Blazer emphasized. “He’s still Mechaman, but that can’t get out. If it does, I’ll know who it came from.”

“You think I want to tell people our dispatcher’s a fucking loser?” 

Blazer was the one to wince at that, gaze sliding over to Robert like she was waiting for him to burst into tears. That wouldn’t do. 

“I’m just here to help,” Robert said evenly, watching Blazer’s shoulders relax and Invisigal’s shoulders cinch. “You have the chance to turn things around, bring some good into the world. I’ll do my best to support you in whatever way possible.” 

It felt like a premature declaration, even to Robert’s ears, but there wasn’t much else he could say – he was ten minutes into onboarding. Invisigal scoffed, muttering insults as she flicked open the door lock and pushed through, melting from view as they swung shut.  

“We have a weekly ranking for the heroes at the company…” Blazer murmured,

“...And she’s at the bottom,” Robert guessed. 

“She called herself Invisabitch before. But she's a good egg, deep down; we’re trying to rebrand her.” 

What is it with villains and the word ‘bitch’, Robert wondered privately. He lifted a noncommittal shoulder, turning his attention back to finishing the buttons on his shirt. 

“Like I said, I’ll try to help.” 

*****

Robert followed Blazer dutifully through the rest of the office walkthrough, then got startled all over again by another dispatcher – a large, cheerful man named Royd – breezily calling out his hero identity in the bathroom. At least this time the information wasn’t leaked, but officially given: apparently Royd would be spearheading the covert efforts to get the Mechsuit back in usable order.

The idea made his spirits lift as he walked toward the room Blazer had instructed they meet next. While he would’ve appreciated a more explicit heads up about who was in the know and who wasn’t, he was relieved and a little stunned by how quickly it seemed Blazer was making good on her promise. It was hard not to feel… cautious, watchful for the other shoe to drop. But no matter which way he turned it over in his mind, it really did seem like the only strings attached were the forthright conditions of doing this job. 

But can the mechsuit really be fixed?

Royd seemed to think so, but he hadn’t seen it yet. It’s not that Robert doubted the guy really was an expert. Even in their brief interaction, he could read it in the way his warm eyes moved, the tell-tale micromotions of an engineer scanning a mental blueprint. But it wasn’t just a mechanical issue, or even a resource issue, not with SDN money. It was the power issue – the astral pulse issue. 

In spite of what he’d told the press the other day, Robert didn’t think Shroud had it. If it was in his hands, Robert would know by now – hell, all of L.A. would know by now. He’d implied otherwise on the off chance that Shroud cared to see his interview, watching from whatever shadowy corner he was lurking. He couldn’t hide that the Mechsuit was unusable, but he didn’t want the villain to know that he hadn’t given up on relocating the pulse first. 

Robert had gone out again in his sweats, late last night, hushing Beef on the pillow that served as his dog bed when the loyal creature made an effort to stir. He was six miles out in every direction, now, painstakingly searching each square meter of the vacant field and surrounding area where the mechsuit had crashed, senses strained for the faintest evidence of what might’ve happened to the pulse. He’d gone home just as light was beginning to creep over the horizon, disappointed for the umpteenth time. 

He could swear that he could… that he could almost feel it, or the afterimage of it, somehow, somewhere, like a faint tether behind his sternum. He was increasingly certain it wasn’t anywhere near the crash zone. But at the same time, he didn’t know how else he could logically look, if not through ruling out. 

But maybe it was the wrong approach. Maybe he really did just need to let the original go, and try to bet on the hope that with enough time, manpower, and corporate investment, it could be recreated. That with Royd, and Blazer, and SDN –

“Holy shit. Who’s this freckle-faced fuck.” 

His feet had carried him into the dim records room, and an elderly black man was climbing down a ladder and marching towards him. 

“How are ya,” the diminutive man gruffed, and before Robert could react, bafflingly strong arms wrapped around his neck and yanked him down into a rough hug. Without the benefit of a warning, Robert couldn’t tamp down the wince, aches and pains flaring with the unintentional manhandling. Somehow the smaller man seemed to notice; the hug got marginally more gentle. 

“That’s an aggressive way to greet someone,” Robert murmured, giving the man an uncertain pat on the back. Through his own befuddlement, something about him was registering as familiar. 

“Look at this skinny latte prick. You’re bones, kid.” 

Robert didn’t have a response to that – was that the fourth random comment on his physique, today? No, he was pretty sure Royd threw something small in, too. Fifth, then. 

“You here to whip these assholes into shape, or what?” 

“That’s the idea,” a voice Robert recognized as Blazer said from behind him. Robert pulled back from the hug, scanning the old man’s face almost apologetically. 

Do I know him? I do know him, don’t I? 

“I’m sorry,” Robert said, seeing no way forward but honesty, “but how do we know each other?”

Something like hurt deepened the wrinkles around the man’s gray eyes, and he lightly jostled Robert’s upper arm. Those gray eyes dipped to the compression wrap further down the same arm, and Robert mentally kicked himself for rolling up the uniform shirtsleeves. They were just too long. He braced himself for more unsolicited compassion. 

“Why’re you all tense? It’s a hug, not a handjob. Lighten up.” 

Robert couldn’t stop his own surprised snort at the fiery retort. “Be that as it may,” he said, face relaxing into a more genuine smile, “I’m still confused.” 

“Oh, right. ‘Cause I’m old as shit. How ‘bout this?” 

The man turned in profile, lifted both his arms to point behind him, and –

“...Track Star? Holy shit,” Robert breathed, starting forward to resume the hug with infinitely more enthusiasm. His heart had done something complicated when Blazer mentioned the man’s recommendation, but somehow he didn’t think they’d actually get to meet up, to work together. He’d intended to reach out… well, many times, but in regards to this, he had planned on seeing how the first week went before calling up the man to thank him for the job and apologize for the long radio silence. 

But what the fuck happened to him?

Bewilderment, alarm, and the simple, shocking warmth of reconnection continued to run circles in Robert’s stomach, exhilarating and queasy in turns. He laughed breathlessly as Chase squashed him close again, almost imperceptibly more careful than the first embrace. “Yeah, you little fucker,” he grunted, and the humor didn’t cover the raw note in his voice. Robert’s eyes watered, and he squeezed a little tighter. “Why are you accepting hugs from old men you don’t know? Oh, and hey, they call me Chase around here, so keep it… y’know.” 

“Sure, yeah,” Robert said, coughing to cover the effort of pushing down whatever nameless thing welled up his chest and throat. He grinned at Chase as he pulled back. “Chase.”

Chase was smiling, too, chuckling as he shook his head. “It’s been what, ten, fifteen years?” 

“Has it really been that long?” Blazer asked, taking a step forward from where she’d been respectfully hanging back at the doorway. Chase nodded to her, then tossed his head back at Robert. 

“Yeah, I reached out to this little pissant when his dad passed. Then he got to duckin’ me like he owed me money.”

Robert saw through the joke for the reprimand it was. He looked down at Chase seriously. 

“I’m sorry. I really am. I was… in a weird place.”

Chase glared back up at him, then huffed, clapping a hand on his shoulder. His less-injured shoulder, Robert didn’t fail to notice. 

“I understand, kid. It was tough on all of us, so I can’t imagine what you went through.” 

Robert wanted to pull away from the softness of Chase’s gaze. He also wanted to lean back into him, to apologize several more times, to explain, to understand… to really and truly catch up with someone who, for all the world, felt like the closest thing to family he had left. Even if it was estranged family; family he had estranged. 

But, they were at work, in the records room, with his superpowered boss awkwardly standing between them. Robert cleared his throat, searching for a way to ask for the information he was missing without departing from the blithe tone Chase had set. 

“Yeah, so, what’s up? You gonna tell me why you look like black Einstein?” 

Chase chuckled, shuffling past him to grab a disk from a shelf lined with cases of them. 

“Fucker. It’s the powers. I could move fifty times faster than the average person, but I was aging fifty times faster, too. I didn’t realize until it was too late. Nowadays I’m moving slower than frozen piss to keep the ole ticker from poppin’ on me.”

Oh.

Robert fought to keep his own face from crumpling. Despite it being clear that he wanted to, Chase wasn’t babying him – never had, even when he was his babysitter. He was fond, but he was intentional, coarseness belying how attentively he refused to injure Robert’s ego with misplaced tenderness. 

He’d almost forgotten that about the man. Funny, when he’d raised Robert to be just the same. 

“I had no idea,” Robert said, swallowing down the and I’m so goddamn sorry that wanted to follow after. Chase smiled crookedly at him, waving the disc he’d procured. 

“Yeah, yeah, enough of this feelings shit. Let’s review your team of losers.”

Chapter Text

Robert’s finger hovered over the mic button. 

A map of Torrance was on the screen, along with a tidy row of the eight ex-villian profiles he’d been tasked with salvaging from termination as of – he glanced at the pixelated clock in the corner of the screen – six-and-a-half minutes ago. 

He’d recognized four of them in the records room: Invisigal, the snarky peeping tom from earlier this morning; Coupé and Punch-Up, the two bizarrely complementary companions that had been at the hero bar with Flambae; and of course, the archnemesis of Smokey the Bear himself, in all his smoldering glory. 

…Aaaand I’m his dispatcher. The Phoenix Program dispatcher. 

So maybe there had been more of an angle to Blazer’s proposition than he’d thought. He couldn’t decide if he was flattered or exasperated by the challenge she’d sprung on him; he couldn’t decide what he thought about any of this, really. And then there was the entirely separate, impossible-to-process impact of what had happened to Chase, at some indefinable point in the years (years!) Robert had been dodging him like a coward –

Nope. Not the time. 

Robert switched on his comms. 

“Hey, team. This is your dispatcher, Robert Robertson. I’m starting my first shift –”

Laughter erupted from the channel, followed by a cacophony of cross-talk Robert could immediately tell was going to be the bane of his foreseeable existence. He squinted at the dots on each profile that flashed to indicate when someone was speaking, trying to parse out which voice went with which face. Given the entire premise of the program, Robert could understand the safety precautions of jumping in without a meet-and-greet, but the whole "work together, sight unseen” thing was already shaping up to be an issue. 

“Tell me that’s not your real fuckin’ name,” a vibrant woman’s voice – Prism, got it – wheezed, followed by two simultaneous exclamations Robert couldn’t quite make out in full. One was a sedate voice Robert didn’t recognize – Sonar? The bat guy – and the other was a voice Robert was starting to recognize, much to his own chagrin. 

“– on your first day. You stuttering, or just have two of the same name, bitch?” 

The accented voice jeered, low and mocking. Robert ignored the dull sting that managed to produce, mildly impressed Flambae had somehow pressed on an old, raw nerve. Robert didn’t have his own name, in the suit or out of it. The most he got to himself was a subtitle; out of the mech, he didn’t even have that. 

It had… been a minute, since he’d been in civilian mode long enough for someone to dredge that up. He wrinkled his nose. 

“Can we clear the channel, please? There’s a lot of overlapping –”

“I saw him in his underwear, and he’s covered in these weird bruises. Though I could be into it.” 

That’ll be Invisigal. The declaration made Prism cackle, which set off a new round of back-and-forths. 

“Again, please clear the channel –” 

“We get it, you’re emo,” a voice with a low timbre murmured, and Robert mentally catalogued Coupé even as he grit his teeth, readying to say –

“–Shut the FUCK up, and let me remind you that these calls are fucking monitored,” Chase’s voice growled abruptly. Robert looked over at the cubicle wall in surprise, though he was unable to see the man now shouting a creative string of expletives through the line. 

Chase can access this channel? Or… maybe it’s just to keep an eye on me this shift. The idea was both a comfort and an embarrassment. 

“...so you keep the line clear before we send your stupid fucking asses back to whatever stupid fucking cell we pulled you out of. Alright?”

The feed finally went silent, and Robert grimaced. 

The effort to help him was appreciated, but Chase playing referee didn’t do much to shore up whatever tenuous respect the Z-team presumably had for… well, anything, Robert least of all. He also didn’t think he imagined the sudden coolness evoked by the ‘fucking cell we pulled you out of’ line. 

He let another beat pass, taking the opportunity to look carefully at each of the eight photos on the virtual roster. They were strangers – preternatural, dangerous, legally-convicted strangers – and yet, the tense stillness in the channel reminded Robert of the park he’d ended up in two nights ago. Of reaching out; of brushing against something that shook when he touched it. 

“We’re all feeling each other out, today,” Robert said quietly into the mic. “And if, by the end of the shift, you all feel like I’m the wrong person to dispatch you, I invite you to let management know. You’re the heroes, here,” he quirked his mouth, 

“I’m just some guy.” 

*****

For the first several hours, dispatching went relatively smoothly. 

Chase didn’t jump back in after the first time, but occasionally typed Robert messages in an admin chat about protocols as they came up; Galen, a senior dispatcher with superhearing on the other side of the office, also emailed him a handbook and some onboarding paperwork. Robert skimmed through what he could between coordinating assignments, raising his eyebrows at some of the policies tucked into the fine print. SDN had a staggering amount of remote access to subscriber networks… and Robert wasn’t above stretching that access a little more, if it helped smooth the way. 

And ‘smoothing the way’ was the whole name of the game. It strained his focus, at first – juggling the calls, estimating the timing, inferring the team’s skillsets alone and in combination – but after several requests were successfully completed with less and less grumbling on the line, Robert found himself humming under his breath, surprised and pleased with the rhythm of the work. It wasn’t identical, but parallel to the skills he might use in Mechaman missions, and it felt like stretching a sore muscle he’d been itching to put back in motion. 

It was also astonishingly easy to be interested in the Z-team. They were colorful, to say the least, with streaks of defiance and obstinance Robert took pains to consider, person-by-person. Golem, Punch-Up, and Malevola were generally quite cooperative; Prism, Coupé, and Sonar had strong personalities, but earnest work ethic; and Invisigal and Flambae, well… 

There was no denying those two were just as skilled as the rest. Moreso, in certain areas. But they each seemed particularly resentful of being leashed in any way, real or imagined. It made him wonder about what kind of approach the Z-team’s previous dispatchers took. It can’t have been particularly effective, since Robert was only the latest in a string of replacements. And according to some of the idle chatter on the comms, his immediate predecessor had their car lit on fire for their trouble. 

At least I don’t own a car. 

Robert drummed his fingers on the mousepad, watching the team’s icons drift along the routes he’d directed. Punch-Up’s icon dipped into a bar just down the road to resolve a fight that had broken out, and he suddenly piped up in the joint channel,

“D’ya know who we saw at the bar the other night? Mechaman!”

Uh-oh. 

“And he sent Flambae running with his tail between his legs,” Coupé added wryly. Robert could practically feel Flambae bristling through the headset. 

“Okay, first of all, that little bitch didn’t send me running anywhere, I was distracted by –” 

“Oh yeah? What was your read on this Mechaman?” Invisigal interrupted, voice dripping with irony Robert knew was all for his own ears. He wanted to groan. Didn’t seem like she was planning on being too gracious about knowing his secret. 

“Washed up. Drinking alone. A robot guy without his robot, I guess,” Punch-Up answered thoughtfully, and ouch, but also – pretty accurate, minus the ‘alone’ part. Blazer had been in the bathroom. Robert opened his mouth to try and head off the dangerous topic, but Sonar chose that moment to jump in. 

“So, wait, Flambae got scared off by Mechaman with no mech? Kinda pathetic, bro; being spooked by just, like… mmman… Man-Man, the Normal Man –” 

“All of you, shut up,” Flambae hissed, and even through the distortion of the speaker Robert could hear the sound of something pop, like the snap of dry kindling. 

After a pregnant pause, Malevola chimed in with Sonar, and the two of them derailed into a new aside about how funny it was that villains ran the whole gamut of titles, but heroes tended to have “-man” as part of theirs; and how, besides being misogynistic, they all sounded idiotic if you cut that suffix out…

Robert was only halfway listening as he watched Flambae’s icon emerge from the SDN building and start moving swiftly up the street, despite not being timed out of his rest block. He clicked the second channel button on his headset, switching to a solo feed. 

“Flambae, you’re off-route,” he said, a note of warning in his voice. Flambae’s movement didn’t waver; his mic didn’t unmute, either. Robert narrowed his eyes as the rogue icon finally came to a halt in the middle of a park three blocks north of SDN. 

“Flambae,” Robert tried again, a reprimand on the tip of his tongue, but –

– but he had just been thinking about how well that had likely worked out in the past. And he had a feeling he was also on some kind of unseen clock, here; that he either found a way to reach this man, or consequences would follow, and keep on following. 

Turned out Flambae was a pain in his ass, no matter what kind of mask Robert was wearing. He rubbed a hand over his eyes, and tried again. 

“...You were right about my name, y’know.”

It felt like talking into the void. Robert waited in the dead air, eyes riveted to Flambae’s stationary icon. 

“...What the fuck?” 

Flambae’s mic crackled back to life. The kindling-sound was going steadily in the background; Robert wondered if it meant Flambae was on fire. Hopefully nothing else is. 

“I have two of the same name,” Robert continued conversationally, smothering his own twinge of discomfort with nonchalance. “Actually, it’s worse than that. I’m Robert Robertson the third. Made me feel real special growing up.” 

Flambae didn’t immediately respond, though the quiet roar was assurance that he hadn’t silenced the line. Robert leaned back in his chair, letting his eyes slip briefly closed. He should be watching the whole map, not just Flambae; closing his eyes was even more of a no-no. But he’d hear an alert if a call came in. 

“My grandpa was ‘Bobby’, my dad was ‘Robbie’... and I was ‘Robert’, because I wanted to be taken seriously.” He shook his head ruefully, though he knew Flambae couldn’t see. 

“That’s what I’d tell people, anyways. But it was more that… well, I didn’t have much of a say in it to begin with. Sucks, not to have a say in things.” 

Still no response; it seemed like the roar had gotten marginally quieter, but it could’ve just as easily been Robert’s imagination. He reopened his eyes, holding back a sigh. So much for that, he thought, preparing to walk it back to more familiar ground.

“There’s still ‘Bert’ up for grabs,” he said next, draping sarcasm over his tone as easily as dust cloth over furniture, “though it’s a little too muppety –”

“I didn’t want to light anything in the building on fire,” Flambae ground out, harsh and a little stilted. Robert paused. 

“I know I’m not supposed to leave on break, okay? It’s not – I don’t – I can control fire when it’s on me,” he grated, like Robert was personally dragging the words out of his throat, one at a time, “but after it’s left me, I can’t.” 

He huffed a breath, and the roaring in the background swelled and died with his exhale, dipping below what Robert could detect through the comms. “So I go, I don’t fucking know, somewhere else. More open. Fucking happy now?”

Robert blinked at the icon in the park, perspective quietly rearranging. The timer on Flambae’s break had nearly run down.  

“That’s… reasonable,” he answered, tilting his head. “More than. And now that I know,” he clicked around the dispatching interface, trying to see if there were customizations for adjusting the length or frequency of breaks. It didn’t look like something that could be manually toggled, but he could just hack into it if Blazer didn’t give him an administrative override.  

“Just give me a heads up, going forward, whenever you need to –”

“If you say ‘cool off’, I don’t care if we’re not supposed to meet, I will find your shitty little cubicle and melt your keyboard to the desk –”

“– manage your own time,” Robert finished primly, scribbling himself a note to ask for the override later. “Because I’m your dispatcher, not your handler. Alright?” 

There was nothing in the background of Flambae’s audio but the faint sounds of birds and traffic, now. His icon, changing color to repopulate in the available roster, started moving slowly back down the street to SDN. 

“Fine. Bitch,” he muttered into the mic. 

“Better than Bert,” Robert responded with faux brightness. A soft, unfamiliar sound curled into his ear, and holy shit, he’s got a surprisingly nice laugh –

A new request sounded, along with a recorded message that was just a jumble of crashing and groaning. Robert’s attention snapped to the alert hovering over a business called Granny’s Donuts. That sound byte did not bode well, and several of the team were already dispatched or still returning. But Flambae was fairly close. 

“Wait, Flambae; sorry, but could you –”

“Granny’s? I got this,” Invisigal chirped, icon speeding down the street before Robert could approve the dispatch. He fumbled to switch the line back to the group channel. 

“Invisigal, hold on a second –” 

“Aren’t you banned?” Golem said cautiously. 

“Yeah, and I gotta get unbanned. Seriously, I got this one, I’ll be so fine –  uh… Actually. Could I get eyes down here?” 

Her tone shifted from blithe to uncertain as her icon arrived at the address before Robert could get a word in edgewise. He bit back a moan of frustration, rapidly re-evaluating the next best move as he worked to override the layers of security on the store’s camera feed through a backdoor IP. 

“Robert.” 

His fingers twitched on the keys, startled by the sound of his own name in Flambae’s mouth. It was just… bare, devoid of any mockery, yet it sounded so much more pointed than an insult. Not mean, but – sharp, like there was a fine edge on every letter. 

“Yes?”

“Do you still want me to go?”

He finally got the cameras online. Invisigal was squatting next to an old man collapsed on the ground on the otherwise deserted sales floor. Switching visual feeds, he saw a man with two crackling electric gauntlets in the kitchen – packing a lot of heat for robbing a donut store – and Robert’s stomach twisted at the augments peppering his body, emitting a dull red light even through the grainy picture. 

Red Ring. Here?

There was no way Shroud had any use for whatever was in the safe this guy was melting open; just a goon on a private spree, then. Even so, Ringers were no joke, and Invisigal’s skills were more in mobility and stealth than combat. His eyes flicked back to the map. Flambae was just around the corner from the shop, but he had stopped, the icon hovering in its tracks. 

Waiting for my cue, Robert realized. In spite of the situation, a spark of warmth flickered in his chest.

“It’s the Red Ring. Just one guy, but he looks nasty. You sure you’re up for it?”

“Don’t piss me off with stupid questions,” Flambae scoffed, and Robert could picture the derisive toss of his head with concerning clarity. “Just tell me to stay or go already. Sassy little asshole.” But his icon still didn’t move without the explicit go-ahead, and Robert crooked a brow, mouth twitching up. 

Suddenly someone’s a good boy. 

He filed that thought efficiently away, and clicked Flambae’s dispatch button. “Invisigal, Flambae’s coming in behind you,” he said by way of answer, ignoring Invisigal’s affronted huff in favor of being pleased with how quickly Flambae’s icon resumed its movement. 

“Both of you, the perp’s in the kitchen, trying to get into the safe. He’s armed with electric gauntlets and several unknown augments. There’s two countertops and an oil fryer back there partially blocking his view through the porthole in the door, plus the display case you both can see,” he listed off, glancing between the two images and making a composite floorplan in his head. 

“Invisigal, prioritize making sure Granny is breathing and stable; as long as his spine seems fine and you can do so quietly, drag him around the register and put him in recovery position. EMS is about nine minutes away, but they’ll hold if we haven’t secured the scene. Flambae, humor another stupid question: does your fire resistance carry over to electrical attacks?” 

“What’re you– I’m not a fucking pokemon –”

“Sounds like a no. So don’t get hit.” As Robert spoke, his hands continued flying over the keyboard, searching for any other remote functions he might be able to patch into. Sprinklers? Was that anything?

“You’re tall enough that a shadow might reach through the porthole to the back, so crouch when you enter the building. Don’t stand again until you can hug the left wall to get behind the kitchen door. Perp shouldn’t be able to see you. Invisigal, does Granny have a pulse –”

Robert’s eyes flicked back to the sales floor, and he froze mid-sentence. Granny was in exactly the same position he’d collapsed, and Invisigal was nowhere to be seen.

“Invisigal,” Robert hissed, gaze darting around both video feeds. His eyes strained to find any sign of her, knowing she was likely moving unseen. “Do not attempt to engage alone –”

Seemingly of its own accord, the door to the kitchen swung lightly – just wide enough for a small-statured person to fit through – and in the second video feed, the Ringer’s face jolted to the side. He wheeled around immediately, firing off a gauntlet in a knee-jerk reaction. A ball of electricity tore through the sales area and crashed through the glass storefront as the Ringer was knocked in the side of the head by an unseen force. He grunted, grabbing blindly at the air as he stumbled through the kitchen door with a curled hand held in front of him. Invisigal materialized beneath it as they crashed into the register, one of the man’s arms pinning her to the counter with the other raised.

"Found you, Invisibitch," the villain huffed, pressing down on her windpipe. Robert's jaw clenched at Invisigal’s answering wheeze of pain, heart pounding at the growing brightness of the Ringer’s free gauntlet as he aimed it down at her. 

Shit, shit, shit. 

“Invisigal, I’m going to trigger the sprinklers to try to short circuit the gauntlet,” Robert barked out, mind racing, “but the water will be conductive to stray sparks, so get ready to roll off of the counter as fast as you –”

A darting figure and a flare of fiery light interrupted the camera’s field of vision, and through the surround sound of two Z-team audio feeds, Robert heard the Ringer yelp, spouting garbled curses.

“Nice bracelets, motherfucker.”

Robert exhaled, lifting his finger from the activation button. Flambae. 

Almost lazily, Flambae flicked his wrist to make another eye-watering tongue of flame spout from his palm, and it curled around the Ringer’s raised gauntlet, heating the metal and the flesh beneath. The Ringer howled, jerking his arm frantically to loosen the superheated weapon. Invisigal took the opportunity to break his hold, though something fell away from her tossing head – her earpiece – as she squirmed away, melting back out of view as soon as she was free. The hot gauntlet clattered off, sparking as it bounced over the countertop and rolled across the ground. Holding his smoking arm close to his body, the Ringer ducked around the side of the display case, firing an electric blast at Flambae with the remaining gauntlet on his other arm. Flambae dodged, smirking as he raised his three-fingered hand –

And a ball of electricity shot between them from a different direction, blasting drywall into a dusty cloud on the opposite wall. Flambae and the Ringer stumbled apart, turning to look at the new source. 

“Nobody fucks Granny! …Fucks with Granny!!!”

The little old man had the damaged, sparking gauntlet hefted in both his hands, swinging wildly between Flambae and the Ringer. Flambae lifted his hands in a pacifying gesture; the Ringer aimed his own gauntlet right back at Granny. 

Robert ground his teeth. Fan-fucking-tastic. 

It was looking next to impossible to get everybody out of this in one piece. He couldn’t reach Invisigal without the earpiece, and Flambae could probably only get the jump on one person before the other one fired. Prioritize disarming the Ringer? Prioritize disarming Granny? Either way, this isn’t pretty –

And another errant thought, useless, pathetic, and too fast for Robert to reel back, 

I should be the one down there –

“...The sprinklers. It was a good idea, earlier.”

Robert’s breath caught. It was Flambae’s voice, barely above a whisper. He was still standing calmly, hands raised, forgotten for the moment by the two people waving electric death at each other. Robert shook himself; despite knowing his own voice was only a murmur in the other man’s earpiece, he whispered back.  

“The conductivity –”

“– Will only be a thing for this Red Ring fuck. I almost cooked the one Granny’s holding; it’ll just go out.” 

Robert blinked, finding surprisingly little fault with that logic. “What about you two? Won’t you lose access to your powers if you get wet? And I don’t know where Invisigal is, if she’s close enough to get shocked –”

“She’s not,” Flambae interrupted again, oddly certain. “And for me – it’s fine. You can end it more cleanly than I ca–  than it will end, otherwise. So turn them on.”

Robert furrowed his brow. Strange selflessness aside, how could Flambae know where an invisible woman was? But both gauntlets were starting to glow, again, crackling from blue to white in the hands of Granny and the Ringer, and unless Robert wanted a shoot-out – 

Flambae’s eyes darted up to the camera in the corner; up through the feed, where Robert was watching. He dipped his chin. 

Robert hit the button.

Chapter Text

Everyone made it out fine. 

Both gauntlets shorted out under the sprinklers; the less-cooked one on the Ringer’s wrist fritzed, conveniently zapping the villain into unconsciousness, but neither Flambae nor Invisigal were close enough to catch any stray currents. Granny’s gauntlet just quietly gave up the ghost. He was still carted out by EMS since he’d suffered a blow to the head during the initial break-in; but it didn’t seem like he was going to sue SDN for anything, since the only real property damage was one windowpane and one wall, and Granny was mostly responsible for the wall. 

They even arrested the Ringer: Lightningstruck, the title that came up in the police database at intake. Just as a chump acting alone – Shroud was better than letting anything like this lead sticky little trails back to the organization – but still. 

Robert exhaled, shoulders slumping as he relaxed muscles that really shouldn’t have been tensed in the first place. His healing arm had gone numb from how awkwardly he’d been leaning over the desk, and he tried to carefully stretch it out, grimacing at the unpleasant rush of blood back to his veins. The team was chattering spiritedly over the comms, smaller missions wrapping successfully for the day, though Flambae and Invisigal were still logged off for the standard debrief with local law enforcement. Hopefully the latter had found her earpiece. Robert squinted blearily at a chat alert from Chase, headache creeping up behind his temples. 

Close out the shift, kid. Nearly time anyway. Blazer wants to chat before the day’s over, and don’t think I didn’t notice you skipped lunch. 

Robert swallowed around his dry throat, and clicked into the joint channel. 

“Nice shift, everyone. I’ve got to close a little early for a meeting; but seriously, well done. We didn’t drop one call.” 

He hoped the sincerity overpowered any fatigue in his voice. They had done well – all of them – and they deserved to know it as well as he did. His mouth crooked at the loud and overlapping responses he got, various exclamations of agreement and teasing. Some of it was still a little backhanded, a little sullen; but it was lightyears better than the tension just earlier that morning, and Robert was encouraged by the progress. 

“Not such a bad go of it, yourself,” Punch-Up quipped brightly, “though there’s still a pool goin’ on how soon you’ll quit.”

“You directed us passably,” Coupé agreed in a monotone – or at least, Robert took it as an agreement – which Golem followed up with a simple, “Mm. Wasn’t bad.” 

“You flatter me,” Robert responded dryly, starting to save and exit out of the various open panes on his desktop. 

“Eh, doesn’t mean it was good, Rob-Bob. Shoulda let me talk with Vanderstank more.” 

That got a laugh from Robert. “Duly noted, Sonar. I’ll keep you in mind if there’s more help requests for Vanderstank events.”

“Boy, don’t ‘duly note’ anything that bat says,” Prism scolded, “or he’ll come in on Monday with a Vander-manifesto, and that’ll be on you to deal with.”

“...Will you deal with it?”

“Hm?”

Robert paused in the closing protocols, ears pricking at the subtle tone in Malevola’s voice. 

“Will you deal with the Vander-manifesto on Monday,” she repeated, and there it was again, almost too-casual, too intentionally careless. The whole channel seemed to quiet down – nobody was logging off, for whatever reason – and Robert furrowed his brow. What were they all waiting for? And why had they all paused to hear his –

Oh. 

The team couldn’t see, so he didn’t have to fight it down; a smile broke out over his face. 

“Yes,” Robert answered firmly. 

“I’m coming back on Monday. Talk to you all then.”

*****

The reel on the vending machine needed a little oil. It made a concerning grating noise as it struggled to accept the bill Robert fed it, spitting it out for a third time.

Chase forced the cash in his hand and shooed him off to the breakroom for ‘a snack before the meeting’, but Robert was considering just abandoning the effort as a lost cause. If the machine was that determined not to fork over any of its goods, then so be it –

“Hey.”

Robert flinched as Invisigal materialized next to the side of the machine, in the same moment that a pack of twinkies finally thudded into the bottom receptacle. She snickered as he bent to fish them out. 

“What kind of superhero flinches?”

He leveled her with an unimpressed expression, carrying the twinkies over to the rickety plastic table. She scoffed, following on his heels to slouch in the chair across from him. 

“Relax, I didn’t say which superhero. Nobody’s here, anyways.” 

“I’d still appreciate if you'd refrain from bringing it up. At least one person in the building has superhearing,” he responded, trying not to let his tone get short. He still hadn’t managed to find an in with Invisigal, today. A way to bridge the blatant lack of trust, to dig out some kind of basic foundation he felt he could work with; a foundation he felt the beginnings of with the rest of the team. He knew it was too early to get frustrated, but the stakes for success weren’t just ‘company harmony’: it was the safety of people’s lives. 

And the way things had gone at Granny’s – well, they certainly could’ve gone a lot worse, but the margin of avoiding disaster was far narrower than Robert would’ve liked. 

Invisigal rolled her eyes. “Don’t be such a tightwad. The only guy you’d have to worry about busting your identity is the flaming asshole you landed in jail. Is it true you cut his fingers off? I think I heard him saying something to Prism, once. That’s kinda twisted, even if he deserves –”

“–He doesn’t,” Robert cut her off, tone much harder. “And even if he did at some point, he’s here now, and so are you. What I did back then wasn’t some kind of act of righteous judgement, it was just a consequence of – of clumsiness, of carelessness. The kind of carelessness he saved you from, today, so maybe cool it on bagging on your teammates, okay?”

“What the fuck are you talking about? I aced that mission –”

“Flambae aced that mission. What you did was dangerous, and directly against my instructions.” 

Invisigal’s eyes narrowed, storm clouds gathering in her expression. “Sorry for risking customer satisfaction,” she hissed, rising from her seat to loom over the table. Robert shook his head, feeling the way it rattled his headache into a full-blown migraine. 

“I’m not talking about property, or even Granny, Invisigal; the person who was closest to getting seriously hurt was you –”

“Oh, like you care,” she spat, voice growing in volume as she kicked back her chair. “Like you could care, about any of us. Sanctimonious little bitch, up in your air traffic control tower –” 

“Invisigal –”

“Shut up.”

She blipped out of visible existence, and the door to the breakroom slammed. Robert let out a strained exhale, slumping back in his chair. He lifted a hand to scrub over his eyes, and –

And he felt the whoosh of something hurtling towards his face. Blindly, he twitched his head back, but his reflexes were too sluggish to totally dodge the blow. An invisible fist clipped him in the jaw, jerking his head to the side and disorienting him enough that he couldn’t quite rally for the second attempt –

“Shit, Visi, give it fuckin’ rest.”

The back of a large hand nudged Robert’s face as it blocked the impact of Invisigal’s punch. A large, very warm hand. 

Robert blinked up in surprise at… Flambae, standing next to his chair as casual as anything, right hand on his hip and left hand curled slightly outwards from where it rested against Robert’s cheek. Invisigal materialized a moment later, and if Robert was surprised, she looked stunned, snatching her fist back from where it had landed in the cup of Flambae’s palm. 

She stared at the tall man for a second longer, pale-faced; then without another word, turned and bolted from the room. 

“...How’d you know where she was?”

It wasn’t the first thing Robert wanted to say, but it was the first thing out of his mouth. It pulled the recent memory of their mission exchange – Flambae’s certainty that Invisigal wasn’t in shock range – freshly to mind, and he squinted at the man’s angular face like he could unravel the secret if he looked hard enough. 

Flambae dropped his arm, leaving a tingle on Robert’s skin like he’d just come in from the sun. He shook out his left hand, chuckling a little under his breath.

“Got a pretty good punch,” he huffed, turning to face Robert more directly. As he did, he blinked his eyes with a strange amount of force, looking up to the ceiling as if there was something he was trying to clear from his vision. Watching closely, Robert noticed an unusual sheen to them, like the play of firelight on a windowpane. It was completely unnatural, and somehow, it also struck Robert as familiar. 

“Uh, are your eyes… okay…?”

“Heat vision,” Flambae answered proudly, still blinking like he’d got sand blown in his face, “Lets me read thermal signatures. Pretty fuckin’ cool, no? But it’s – ugh – a bitch to use, so I –”

His gaze drifted down to Robert as his eyelids continued to flutter, and he froze. 

Robert froze, too. It was an eerie gaze to be pinned with, flickering red and gold. It triggered something primal, something deep in his hindbrain ever-wary of the gleam of eyes in darkness – of the teeth that glinting light promised. It was the kind of signal that would scare a prey animal; the kind that would provoke another predator. 

Robert was not a prey animal. 

But that wasn’t the important thing right now, and he shoved the feeling haphazardly to the side in favor of scrambling to document the microexpressions swirling over Flambae’s face. Something was playing out, there – some flood of feeling Robert strained to comprehend. 

…But it flared out like a comet, and the only afterimage he could catch was a kind of dismay fading into uncertainty. The flickering over Flambae’s irises snuffed out, leaving behind a clear amber, and he frowned down at Robert. 

“...You sick, or something?”

Robert cocked his head in fresh confusion; unfortunately, the motion sent zings of pain around his temple, and he became aware of a new ache climbing up his jaw from where he’d just been socked. He straightened in his chair, trying to iron out whatever rumples in his posture Flambae might have seen. 

“Just a headache. It’s fine.”

“Hm,” Flambae hummed through his nose, gaze – regular gaze, this time – drifting around Robert with unabashed judgement. It lingered on the wrap on his arm, the notch in his ear, the bags under his eyes; then it halted on the stinging half of his jaw, and something in his bearing lost its tension. 

“You’ve got a bruise forming, you know,” he said almost accusingly, tapping the side of his own face. “What you get for picking fights you can’t win, you damn normie. Look like a dog that got ran over.” 

You don’t know the half of it, Robert thought. But he chuckled, shrugging a shoulder. “You’re not wrong,” he replied. “But I think you saved me a bloody nose. So, uh, thanks for swooping in.”

“Swooping in is what I do,” Flambae said haughtily, puffing out his (ample) chest to look down his nose at Robert; but before Robert could figure out a delicate way to humor his theatrics, his imperious expression broke, and Flambae winked. 

Robert let out a startled laugh. “Seems like it is. You did a great job out there today, by the way. How’d debriefing go with the police?”

To his ongoing surprise, Flambae hooked the chair Invisigal had kicked away with his ankle, sliding it forward to drape himself across it on the other side of the table. He leaned back, tilting the seat onto two legs as he flopped one arm over the plastic backing. It reminded Robert of a tiger; of some kind of big cat, languidly stretching on its side. It was a look Robert struggled to compute on the man – too relaxed, too easy – and he realized with a pang that it was simply because Flambae had no reason not to behave this way in front of him. 

This him. Robert Robertson. 

I guess it’s the first time we’ve met. 

He steered hastily away from that line of thinking, reaching for his forgotten twinkie pack to have something to do with his hands. 

“Cops can suck it,” Flambae groused, waving a hand emphatically, “but it was fine. Straightforward. I was more distracted by being all damp and shit.”

Robert winced, nodding reluctantly. “Yeah. Sorry about that. The sprinkler solution wasn’t exactly… elegant.”

“But it worked,” Flambae shot back, tilting his head as he cocked a small grin at Robert. “Because of clever little Bertie – little Birdie, chirping in my ear. Even if he got too flustered to remember what to do on his own.” 

Robert did not fumble the wrapper on the twinkies. He shot a glare at Flambae, ripping the plastic with more force than necessary and biting into one of the saccharine-sweet cakes. Flambae’s grin widened, and Robert could almost see the next round of goading words forming on his lips –

“Robert, where are ya? Our meeting’s starting.”

Chase poked his head into the breakroom, brow furrowing ominously when he saw Flambae. He looked over to Robert, expression probing, and Robert gave a minute shrug. This is fine, he tried to communicate. At least, I think it is. 

Chase folded his arms, jerking his head to the hall behind him. Robert shoved the rest of the first twinkie in his mouth, looked down at the second one still in the plastic, and slid it across the table. 

“For the special boy. Congratulations on a good mission,” he said flatly, and Flambae tilted his whole upper body away in cartoonish disgust, scowl fixed on the offending cake. 

“I don’t want your fucking bunker rations –”

“Have a good weekend,” Robert said over his shoulder. As the door swung shut behind him, he caught the muttered end of something, squeezed onto the tail end of affronted complaints.

“...See you around, Birdie.”

*****

“What happened to your face?”

Robert’s hummed noncommittally at Blazer’s pointed question. 

“I ran into something.”

“Jaw-first?”

“Yep,” Robert answered, choosing not to react to Chase’s scoff in his periphery. Blazer quirked a brow, but left it alone. 

“Well, we’re here to assess Robert’s first shift, which – all things considered – I thought went pretty good. I was watching on the monitor,” she smiled, and Robert felt a small wave of belated mortification. “I don’t think the Z-team has ever had a better shift than that.”

“Besides Invisigal mucking up the Granny situation,” Chase griped. Blazer dipped her head. 

“...Besides that. But the situation still resolved well, and even with Visi,” her smile softened, “I’ve seen worse. I know it’s hard to see sometimes, but she’s got a lot of promise, I know it.”

“I don’t think she’s gonna make it. Not sure any of them will,” Chase said bluntly, glancing at Robert. “No offense, kid. You did great, but: you’ve been handed a pack of duds. And I’m not so sure they’re worth the skills you’re packing. Think it’s a loss to SDN, really, putting you with them.” He looked back to Blazer, and the way their mouths tensed as their eyes connected made a small light bulb go off in Robert’s head.

They’ve talked about this before. Blazer wants me handling the Z-team. Chase doesn’t. 

It rearranged some of the inferences in Robert’s mind about the premise of this job. He knew Chase had suggested his name to Blazer; knew with equal certainty that he must’ve done so purely with Robert’s well-being in mind. Probably saw the Mechaman crash on the news, read the splash articles about the hero going bankrupt, the mech suit irreparable. 

Even further back, when Robert was still comatose: he probably heard that Mechaman died. 

Grief and guilt, cold and piercing in turns, beat against their ironclad cages in Robert’s chest. He didn’t have to imagine what Chase felt like, then; he’d also had to bear the news of Mechaman’s death, once upon a time. But that Mechaman… that Mechaman never came back. 

Chase just wants me somewhere safe, and somewhere safe isn’t with the Phoenix Program. 

If he’d been told that frankly before today’s shift, Robert might have agreed. He wasn’t exactly in an A-game era of his life. If there was a world where he could be assigned to a regular team of hum-drum heroes, lump along on a decent paycheck, and have the backing of SDN’s resources to fix the mech while he slogged through the stupidly slow process of pulling himself back together, well. It would be the safest, sanest, and kindest thing anybody had ever tried to give him. He’d even bet Blazer would acquiesce, if he just stayed quiet and let Chase keep wearing her down. 

“...I’m not expecting a miracle. The bar is very low with this group,” Blazer was saying. 

“It’s under the fuckin’ ground, is what it is,” Chase snorted, jabbing a finger down in emphasis, “and a waste of time, regardless. You could put all the care in the world into that team, and they’d turn and spit in your face.”

Oh, like you care. Like you could care, about any of us. 

Invisigal’s furious words echoed in his head. The conviction in Blazer’s eyes dimmed.

Robert took a deep breath. 

Sorry, Chase. 

“If you want the bar to go up,” he said, looking resolutely forward so that he didn’t have to see the consternation blooming in Chase’s expression as he spoke, “you need to start treating the Z-team like what they are.”

Blazer turned from Chase, gaze assessing. “Which is?”

“People.” 

He thought about the slow progression over the shift, today; about nicknames, about full names, about Robert. Do you still want me to go?

“...Not pet projects,” he tipped his head apologetically to Blazer, “and not punching bags.” He flicked an eye over to Chase, who just glared back at him.

He thought about the team, the careful not-question about his return on Monday. 

“They’re not all villain anymore, but they’re not all hero quite yet, either. Nothing’s going to move the needle if we only handle them with kid gloves or brass knuckles.”

He thought about the fist on his jaw, and the warmth on his cheek. 

“I think we need to be around each other,” Robert continued, “Not just through the comms. We need to have in-person, regular meetings. I need them to see that I’m all in and to match that energy. To respect me, even if I don’t have powers; and to know that I respect them, regardless of what they’ve done with theirs in the past. And I need you,” he looked at both Chase and Blazer, making the implicit plural apparent, “to trust me to be able to handle it.” 

His words hung in the late afternoon glow of Blazer’s office. Blazer looked at Chase, and Chase looked at Robert. Slowly, the scowl melted from the old man's face, replaced with a kind of long-suffering resignation. 

“So much for tough love,” he muttered, elbowing Robert in the side. Both jabs were gentle. Blazer beamed at them, nodding decisively as she stood. 

“We’ll do it your way, then. Monday, we’ll get them all in a room, and introduce them to their new –”

“–Den mother?” Chase said peevishly. Blazer shot him a look. 

“Team leader,” she finished, “and maybe the last hope they’ve got.”

*****

Robert walked out with Chase and Blazer, watching in bemusement as Phenomaman (whose whole vibe was even larger-than-life than his billboard suggested) swooped the latter away to… Tokyo… leaving the two men standing awkwardly in the parking lot. 

It was the first time they’d been alone all day. Robert’s migraine had not ebbed, but he tried to marshal his thoughts through it, to find whatever the right words were to communicate the sprawling enormity of everything he should say to Chase. Robert opened his mouth –

“Did that circus clown hit you?”

Robert shut his mouth. “...What?”

Chase thrust a finger towards Robert’s face, stopping short of poking it. “Don’t play dumb. That might work on Blazer, but not on me. I send you to the breakroom, and ten minutes later I find you there with that volcanic spandex asshole and a purple jaw.” 

Robert hurriedly waved a hand. “No, that’s not – Flambae didn’t hit me.”

“Then who did?”

Robert looked down, ostensibly to adjust the strap on his backpack. “It’s really not important.” 

“I don’t want you in a room with them, Robert. I don’t want you with that team at all, and I know you know that, or that you figured it out by the time we were in that meeting, you manipulative little shit –”

“In case it isn’t obvious, I’m in my thirties, now. I can handle myself –”

“I know,” Chase bit out, throwing his hands up in the air. “You think I haven’t seen you get into scraps? You think as fast and you fight as hard as a rabid little weasel. Always did, even when you were all of ten fuckin’ years old. That’s not the problem. The problem is that you don’t have the heart of one,” he sighed, voice lowering like he was talking to himself. “You and your goddamn heart.”

Robert didn’t know what to say to that. He glanced to the horizon, orange dipping into red. Beef would be getting hungry, soon. 

“...It’s not gonna be that bad. I’ve got this – I promise.”

Chase looked up at him for a long moment; then he heaved another sigh. “I know, I know,” he muttered, shuffling around in his pockets and fishing out a set of keys to wave at Robert. “Give you a lift?”

“I live close,” Robert responded. After a brief hesitation, he reached out and squeezed the older man on the shoulder. 

“Thanks, Chase. I mean it.”

Chase rolled his eyes. “Can’t take an easy option if it bites you in the butt,” he said, but the creases around his eyes softened as he strolled off to a Corolla in the corner of the lot. 

“Have a good weekend, kid.”

“Mm-hm. Have a good one.”

*****

After feeding and taking Beef out for a long walk, Robert stood at the threshold of his door, wavering. 

He wanted to return to the field – to keep widening the search radius for the astral pulse. It was a constant itch under his skin, easier to ignore in the light of day and the accompanying distractions. Despite his own attempts at reasoning through its futility now that SDN was helping him with the mech… here, now, in the silence and the solitude of his thoughts – he wanted to go back out. 

But. 

He’d brought home a stack of files from the office: hard copies of the digital profiles Blazer and Chase had debriefed him with, plus more that they hadn’t been able to get through in his crash-course introduction. Each member of the Z-team was there – bios, photos, legal case notes, you name it – collated into a fat pile of papers on the floor of Robert’s apartment. The only information the files lacked were legal names; if Robert's anonymity was being protected, he'd prefer to operate in kind. He'd asked Chase to black them out with sharpie before he tucked them away in his backpack. 

And now he had the weekend before they were all scheduled to meet. A weekend to learn, to understand, to strategize. He could push it off for tomorrow or Sunday, but he also needed to get the disassembled mech ready for transport to SDN…

He glanced over the haphazardly placed profiles. From the very topmost file, a set of amber eyes looked back.

Robert’s fingers eased off the doorknob, and he turned back indoors.

Chapter Text

Robert dreamed in shades of blue. 

It was a… murky blue, a deepsea-hue, that surrounded him, thicker and darker than the sky over L.A. could ever be. It engulfed him like an ocean without the relief of weightlessness. He could feel every gram of his own mass, pulling at his bones, dragging at his soft tissue, lining his atoms with lead – a weight so profound and inarguable that it never crossed his mind to struggle. Robert stayed still. 

He stayed still, and somewhere, there were voices. Forlorn voices, desperate voices, tired voices – he related to the last most easily, but strained to catch each one of them, to catch any one of them, frustrated when none of his efforts gave shape to the shifting, sighing words. He wasn’t sure if his eyes were open or closed – wasn’t sure if he could control them one way or another, anyway – but gradually, gradually, a pale light grew, brightening the navy darkness by imperceptible degrees. The light was sapphire, electric, a shade Robert could never mistake, and as it seeped into the space around him the voices seemed to swell in proportionate urgency. A thrumming started up – a pounding, really, a thumping –

– And a wet sensation on his ankle, followed by a tentative bark.

Robert sucked in an involuntary gasp as his head jerked forward from the position he’d been in, pain flaring along the strained vertebrae in his neck. Beef licked his ankle again, then skittered across the tile toward the front door, which was presently being knocked with enough exuberance to rattle the drywall. 

“Robert, hey! You in there, brah?”

Royd. 

…What time is it?

Robert scrambled to stand, nearly tipping over the chair he’d been sleeping in. “Coming,” he rasped, stumbling toward the door and barely remembering to give himself a once-over – sweatshirt, boxers, good enough – as he swung it open. 

“There he is! Was beginning to – whoa. You good, man? Lookin’ like Monday shat you out, wrong way,” Royd said, managing to sound both cheerful and concerned as he peered down at Robert, filling the entirety of his doorframe. Robert rubbed a rough hand over his face, battling to dispel the unsettled exhaustion still slowing his thoughts. 

“Yeah. Good. Fine,” he said, which Royd just shook his head at, dark hair rustling around his shoulders. 

“Sure, sure. And is it real ‘good-fine’ if I come in, then? Takin’ the mechsuit to SDN today. Got the box truck downstairs,” he stuck a thumb over his shoulder down the apartment hall, and Robert hastily stood to the side, beckoning the mountainous man in. 

“Of course, sorry. Give me a minute to get changed and feed the dog. Then I can help...” 

So started Robert’s morning, hurrying around his own apartment to get ready for work as Royd serenely carried bits of the mech to and fro, chattering easily as he did. Besides a few embarrassing (if deserved) comments about the state of his living situation – This the kind of place you see when the detective kicks the door in. Serial killer shit. Where you even sleep, man? – Robert found it surprisingly pleasant, and an effective means to banish any lingering restlessness from his mind. He jumped in to help with the hauling as swiftly as he could, though Royd halved the amount of trips required to begin with. 

“How you even get all this in your apartment,” Royd grunted, tossing the mostly-intact leg of the mech into the truck’s cargo hold with a clang that set Robert’s teeth on edge. 

“I brought out the tools, took it apart, and carried it back in small pieces,” he answered, carefully sliding a cardboard box of rolled schematics and more delicate wiring in with the rest. 

“And how long that take you?”

“Three – no, four days.” 

Royd crooked a thick brow at him, dusting off his hands. “Four days? Saw the video. This thing crashed outside city limits. You don’t have a car,” he looked Robert over, the incredulity in his expression growing. “And weren’t you in a coma?”

“Only for a month or two,” Robert muttered, wiping his own hands on the thighs of his pants. He halted when he noticed Royd’s stare. 

“What?”

“You lolo,” he breathed, breaking into a cheeky grin. “Can respect it, though. And it was all still out there?”

“Minus the astral pulse… the battery. I’m still looking,” Robert admitted, dissatisfaction tightening his jaw. Royd clapped a heavy hand on his shoulder. 

“No worries, brah. With or without it, we gon’ fix you right up.” 

*****

Robert walked into the office with more optimism than he’d felt in months. 

He had Beef along in a cardboard box – Blazer had given the go-ahead in a weekend email exchange – and although the soreness in his spine and the omnipresent ache in his head were… well, there, nothing else felt that bad. His arm had even started to improve, though he couldn’t lose the wrap quite yet. More importantly, seeing Royd’s obscenely well outfitted workshop-slash-lab and having the opportunity to really talk with the man as they transported the mech had tipped Robert’s view of his competence from hopeful inference to delighted certainty. 

The realist in him still had doubts about the odds of fixing the mech without its unique source of power; but that same realist could admit that, out of anyone who might be able to figure out a workaround, Royd seemed impossibly high on the list. 

As Robert reached his desk, gently placing Beef’s box on a filing cabinet to tug out the dog’s pillow, he heard a yawn from the cubicle beside him. 

“That you, Robert? Heads up, Blazer asked if you could – ohhh, who’s this little guy?”

The older man’s voice swung to a comical pitch as he leaned over the cubicle divider, reaching out longingly. Robert suppressed a smile as he finished tucking the pillow between his desk and the divider, then lifted Beef out to bundle him into Chase’s arms. 

“His name’s Beef,” Robert said proudly, ruffling the little creature’s ears as Chase cooed at him. Beef wiggled happily at the attention, drooling on them both. “Do you mind helping me keep an eye out? I feel bad leaving him home alone, but I don’t want anything happening to him here, either.”

“I’d let everyone in this place rot in hell – including you – before anything happens to this dog,” Chase pledged solemnly, holding Beef close to his chest. Robert laughed as Beef licked the side of Chase’s face, undermining his serious expression, and pointed between the pillow and the cardboard box. 

“I appreciate it. This is his bed, and there’s other stuff for him in there,” he said, before remembering the first half of Chase’s initial sentence. “Were you saying something about Blazer?”

“Oh, yeah. She’s waiting for you in her office, if you’ve got a bit of time before shift start. He’s got a widdle time, doesn’t he?…”

Chase resumed babbling down at Beef, who had every appearance of listening attentively, and Robert snorted as he left them to it. He made his way down the hall, poking his head into the cracked door of the largest office. 

“Morning. You wanted to see me?”

“Robert, yes! Come on in.” 

Blazer rose from her desk, striding over to close the door behind him. Her movements and bearing were as put-together as ever, but as she drew closer, Robert saw shadows under her eyes that weren’t quite disguised by the hero mask. 

“Rough weekend?”

“Hm? Oh,” Blazer swept a hand under one eye self-consciously. “I… yeah. Kinda broke up with Phenomaman.” 

She looked at Robert with an expression he couldn’t quite parse; if nothing else, it was expectant. Uncertain of the best response, he frowned in sympathy.

“That sort of thing is tough, no matter the circumstance. Hope you’re both doing okay.”

“I’m in better shape than he is,” Blazer sighed, and seemed to shake herself. “Anyways, that’s not why I called you in here. I was thinking about it over the weekend, and I decided that I’m going to cut someone from the Z-team. Or rather, you are.” 

Robert’s good mood evaporated. 

“Sorry?”

“You and Chase were right,” she went on, lacing her fingers together. “They’re not pet projects, and I’ve been handling them like they’re fragile little teacups instead of capable employees – employees that deserve responsibility, and the consequences that come with it. We need to show that we take them seriously.”

“By threatening their job security?” 

And probation conditions, he mentally tacked on, though he felt it unwise to draw attention to at this particular moment. Blazer’s mouth turned down, but the light in her eyes was stubborn. 

“You think it’s a bad idea?”

Robert hesitated, struggling to keep any agitation from leaking through his composure. Blazer was clearly ready to run with the idea, and seemed to have the best of intentions behind it, though he was chagrined by the creative liberties she’d taken with his words from Friday. Nevertheless, she was the seasoned head of this regional branch of SDN, and Robert was a second-day pity hire. He wet his lips. 

“I think,” he said carefully, “that the message you’re trying to send is sound, but the means of sending it is a little… nuclear. Can we discuss it again once the team and I have gotten the chance to meet and work together a bit more?”

Just let me buy some time. 

But, no dice; the stubbornness in Blazer’s expression grew. “I’m afraid I already told them that the lowest performer on the leaderboard will be cut at the end of the day,” she said firmly, “though I also gave you scheduling access to conference rooms B and C. You can call an introductory meeting whenever you see fit this week; I think it’s an excellent idea, actually.” 

The cast of her face lost some of its edge, and she smiled tentatively at Robert. “I know you’re going to be great for this team, Robert. But I also think that I’ve been letting them languish for too long, and it’s high time to shake things up.”

Robert didn’t respond, scrounging around for any possible compromise but coming up empty. Blazer looked up at the clock on the wall, then nodded apologetically to the door. 

“It’s starting time. We’ll talk again at closing.”

*****

All of the tension Robert had fought to whittle down on Friday was back in full force. 

He stared at the virtual roster, chewing his lip. The morning started forebodingly, with Coupé finding a way to lock Sonar to a weight rack in SDN’s gym – and in spite of Robert’s own encouragements not to focus on the leaderboard ultimatum, things continued to go downhill from there. Team members refused to go on missions, or jumped onto missions Robert didn’t assign; requests that seemed suspiciously ill-suited to someone’s skills came in at just the wrong time; and there was such a preponderance of mid-dispatch ‘accidents’ involving one person or another getting pushed or stuck or otherwise waylaid that Robert wanted to smack his head into the desk. 

They were still managing to more or less keep up with calls, but there was none of the burgeoning camaraderie Robert saw the first glimmers of last week. If the Z-team was a wary animal sniffing at his hand then, it was a resentful one gnawing on it, now, and Robert couldn’t even find it in himself to blame them. 

Prism swore over the comms as a gaggle of her music groupies – conveniently tipped on her whereabouts – swarmed into her path, cutting off the route to her mission. Robert tangled a hand in his hair as he clicked into the joint channel. 

“Everyone, I understand the stress you’re under, but sabotaging each other isn’t going to guarantee your spot on the team. Your performance is evaluated on your own successes, not other people’s failures –”

“This is bullshit,” Malevola snapped, “judgy bullshit.” 

“Easy for you to say,” Coupé hissed suddenly, although Robert wasn’t sure Malevola’s comment was intended for the group at large. “You’re second from the top. I’m tied at second-to-last with Ratwings, barely above Invisibitch –”

“Ohhh. Is that why you locked me up this morning –”

“You wanna say that to my face, swan princess –”

Robert tipped his face into his hands with a groan, just as a new alert came in. He gave up on interrupting the cascade of bickering, reading through the request with a frown. It was another burglary – at a pharmacy this time, though the culprit was already fleeing the scene – and the perp was described as having some kind of magnetism ability enhanced by glowing red augments. 

What’s with the Red Ring and petty theft, recently?

In another stroke of deja vu, Flambae was the closest free token on the map. Robert selected his profile and hit the solo feed, feeling an odd indecision about speaking.

“...Wanna get that one, Flambae?”

No mic response. After a beat, he got the notification that Flambae accepted the dispatch in the system, and his icon began moving steadily for the scene. The weight in Robert’s chest sunk lower, disappointed by the obvious stonewalling. The fiery man had been quiet all morning – conspicuously quiet – and hadn’t participated in any of the sabotage attempts, although Robert supposed he didn’t need to. He was at the top of the Z-team section of the leaderboard, which meant his position was as good as secure, regardless of what happened today. 

Still, Robert had thought that they had maybe started to understand each other last week. That out of everyone on the team, Flambae might be able to infer that none of this was Robert’s idea or preference. But why would that be the case, really? Why would any of them give him the benefit of the doubt when their jobs and their freedom were on the line –

“Invisigal,” Robert said abruptly, interrupting his own train of thought as he watched her icon speed around the other side of the block from where Flambae was headed, “what are you doing?”

“Not getting cut. Like you said, the way to win this leaderboard game is not to lose.”

“That isn’t what I said.”

Robert clicked around for any CCTV in the area, patching into a security camera that had a poor but present angle on the alleyway Invisigal was skulking in. He watched her wrap a thick chain around the rim of a dumpster, lacing it back across the stretch of grimy cobblestone to crouch behind a shadowed corner.

“Invisigal, whatever you’re planning, please consider that –”

The newest Ringer came racing around the opposite end of the alley, Flambae hot on his heels. The former cleared the chain on the ground without issue, but just as Flambae seemed close to snatching at the villain's arm, the chain pulled taut, catching Flambae at the ankles and sending him sprawling. Invisigal jumped up with a cackle, the escaped Ringer entirely forgotten. Flambae rounded on her, shoulders igniting in a blaze as he sprung back to his feet.

“Fucker,” Flambae roared, and Invisigal’s eyes widened as she leapt back, scrambling up a nearby fire escape to get distance and cover as he shot off haphazard plumes of flame in her direction. Robert hastily clicked back into the solo feed with Flambae, stumbling over his words as he tried to deescalate the situation before someone got barbecued. 

“Flambae, hey, I – hold on a second –”

“Shut up,” Flambae thundered, “Shut up, shut up, I don’t need the HR script from a bitch-ass bootlicker. Rooting around for a bad apple like you wouldn't toss the whole fucking lot –”

He sent another blast at Invisigal, missing by such a broad margin that a calmer part of Robert wondered just how genuinely he was trying to hit her, but the fire escape creaked as the flimsy metal warped under the heat. 

“I know,” Robert said, and he did, and god did he want to scream, “I know, alright? It wasn’t my idea to cut someone. I’m going to do something about it if I can, I just haven’t figured out how to –”

Toss the whole fucking lot. 

"...Wait."

Robert stopped, a thought rapidly coalescing in his mind. 

“Wait, Flambae, I think you got it.” 

Something in his tone must have changed; the flames crackling along Flambae’s upper body didn’t go out, but they dimmed along his outstretched hand – stayed, for the moment. 

“Fucking explain,” the man growled flatly in Robert’s ear, patience as thin and irritated as a salted papercut. Robert’s mouth twisted, hyperaware of the possibility of being monitored. Calls recorded for training purposes – did that apply to solo channels, too?

“I will,” Robert promised, pushing all of the credulity he could muster into the two words, “but I’m going to call an in-person meeting for the whole team. Now, before we go into the afternoon shift. I got permission to, anyways, and it’ll be… easier, to explain to you that way.” 

Robert swallowed, studying the tension in the other man’s profile over the camera feed, the sharp planes of his face limned in brilliant orange.

“Can you trust me on this?”

Flambae’s lips drew back from his teeth in a snarl. But slowly, slowly, the flames shrunk to the barest surface of his skin; then they disappeared, vaporizing into wisps of smoke that curled languidly away from his body. Invisigal – up at the highest point of the stairs, now – poked her head over the railing to peer cautiously down. 

“...Shit if I know. Just call it.” 

 Robert exhaled, flipping the joint switch on his headset without preamble. 

“All Z-team, back to base and in conference room C in twenty minutes.”

*****

“Chase, I need a favor. Actually, make that two.” 

Chase peered over the divider, expression immediately suspicious. 

“Boy, I can smell the mischief on you. What's your skinny little ass scheming, now?”

“First,” Robert said, lowering his voice as he glanced around the office. Galen would be able to hear him, but… he’d be able to hear everything he planned to say in the conference room, as well, so Robert would just have to hedge on superhearing coming with a healthy helping of super-minding-one’s-business. 

“I’m meeting with the Z-team shortly. In conference room C. It’s not reserved for anything else for the next two hours, and we’ll be out well before then, but: could you maybe make sure that nobody in particular comes by?”

That Blazer doesn’t come by. He could tell by the way Chase’s frown deepened that he understood the unspoken addendum. 

“Second,” Robert hastened to add before the older man could start protesting, “about the leaderboard. Just out of curiosity, do you know what algorithm determines how mission scores are weighted, and if that system is viewable for dispatchers?”

Chase’s eyes narrowed. “You can see it, but you can't edit it. It takes in data from multiple feeds – the press, city policy, judicial records; hell, even trending tags on social media – that are completely separate from SDN jurisdiction.”

Robert nodded. “View-only is fine. I just want to get a sense of the… math.” 

Chase gave him a leery eye, huffing through his nose. 

“Sure you do,” he said dubiously, but his head disappeared behind the divider again as he sat down and began clacking on his keyboard. “I’ll send you the link.”

Robert smiled, rapping his knuckles quietly against the cubicle wall. 

“I owe you one,” he said, “and the conference room…?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Chase muttered, “I’ll keep an eye out. But this means I get Beef-napping privileges whenever I want them.”

“Granted," Robert responded, swiftly clicking what Chase messaged him and scrolling through the endless history of live updates on the raw mission scores, scribbling some things down on a notepad. He glanced back at the leaderboard, jotting down a few more lines at the end of his cramped notes, then stood from his desk. 

“Be right back.”

He ambled as casually as he could down the dark hall to the conference room on the far end, heart rate picking up a bit when he saw vaguely familiar shapes already gathered behind the frosted glass. As he pushed open the door, a small swell of voices greeted his ears, startlingly sharp without the condenser of a headset.  

“Wasting our time –”

“As if we had nothin’ better to do –”

“Hey,” Robert greeted plainly, and the room quieted as eight faces turned toward him. It was them – all of them, the entire team – not in pixelated boxes on his screen, but in living and breathing flesh (or… clay), sprawled and leaning on various ill-suited surfaces like they all disdained containment. Robert looked slowly around, sighing internally at the various expressions of hostility and misgiving that glared back at him. He didn’t miss the way certain eyes darted, either; the up and down, the assessment, the dismissive eye rolls and subtle sneers. Even Invisigal, who already had plenty of encounters to see and judge Robert, grimaced at him, flipping him the finger when their eyes connected. 

Nice to meet you all, too. 

His gaze landed last on the stone-faced man kicking up his feet at the far end of the table. He gave a little nod to Flambae. The other man didn’t so much as twitch.

Robert squared his shoulders, pressing his weight into his heels as he spoke to a room about as friendly as a box of rusty knives. 

“Alright, so,” he began, glancing down at his notepad, “this is normally the part where I’d give you a little introduction, a little pep talk, carrot-and-stick, so on and so forth,” he shrugged a shoulder, tapping the pencil in his hand in a restless pattern against his leg. 

“But we honestly don’t have the time, so I’m going to save that for another day. To boil it down: I’m not interested in cutting you – not one of you – so I’m not going to. But the only way that’s possible is if we all go in on this, or we let someone crash and burn.”

The constriction in the room somehow crystallized further, tightening into something breathless, but Robert didn’t pay it any mind as he went on. 

“The leaderboard rankings,” he continued, voice quick but unwavering, “are weighted based on multiple interacting factors. It’s mostly what you’d expect, though the exact numbers aren’t intuitive. But I should be able to calculate them by hand for the missions that come up this afternoon, and as long as we’re a little lucky, and a lot strategic,” he gestured with his notepad. 

“I think we can match all of your scores by the end of the day. Because if you’re all ranked exactly the same,” he found his gaze drifting back to Flambae, whose cool expression was starting to melt into something that loosened the knots around Robert’s ribs, 

“They can’t toss the whole fucking lot.” 

Shocked silence hung in the room for a moment. Unexpectedly, Golem was the one to pipe up first. 

“How do you know,” he said in his slow, meditative way, “that they won’t fire all of us?”

“It’d be a PR nightmare. Not the flaming death of the Phoenix that SDN wants,” Robert said, mouth hitching up at the low chuckles that received. “More importantly: Blonde Blazer doesn’t actually want this team to go down. She thinks the cut is a way to strengthen it; I think we can make a counter-argument.”

“How can you be so sure you’ll be able to match us up? Our ranks are in order, but our scores are spread all over the map.” 

Prism followed up next, and Robert pointed at her with a nod. 

“You’re not wrong, and that’s where the luck and strategy come in. Some of it will just be the random odds of what requests we get in, but Invisigal, Coupé, and Sonar will take priority on any high-profile missions that pack the most points. Collaborative priority, until we need to fine-tune it,” he emphasized, squinting at Invisigal before bringing his gaze back to Prism, “while you and Golem can handle more mid-range missions. Malevola and Punch-Up have high enough scores that we only want them on the lightest lift tasks – helping clients move, rescuing cats from trees, that kind of thing – and Flambae,”

Robert cast an appraising look down the table, folding his arms.

“As the cap we’re all trying to match, I’d ask you to abstain from missions this shift, and lay low here at SDN. We can claim that you’ve been injured. It’s the choice with the steepest risk as well as the greatest investment of faith. The willingness to wait – to believe the team will stop at your side, and not one point further.”

Flambae’s eyes were riveted to him, clear and focused. Robert met his gaze steadily, relief at the frank contact overcoming any trepidation he might otherwise feel. 

Can you trust me on this? 

Malevola coughed pointedly, and Robert snapped his gaze to her. She raised a brow that was a touch too knowing, then smiled at him, yellow eyes flashing with a gleam both warm and sinister. 

“I’m in,” she said simply, propping an arm on her upright sword. 

“As am I,” Coupé added. 

“No duh,” said Sonar. 

“Down,” said Golem. 

Prism gave Robert six holographic thumbs up. Invisigal nodded reticently, sticking out her tongue at the end. 

“Pretty sure you could lose your job if this goes poorly, lad,” said Punch-Up gently, and Robert gave him a tired smile. 

“Then I guess that means we’re all in the same boat.”

The table turned to look back at Flambae. 

“...Fuckin’ fine,” the man said, holding Robert's eyes as he leaned forward, a slow-spreading grin on his lips.

“Let’s follow our sneaky little bird.”

Chapter Text

Everyone filed out of the conference room – some with rough pats or light jabs somewhere on Robert’s person, which he took as largely positive gestures – leaving only Flambae and himself on opposite ends of the table. 

Robert blinked, suddenly aware that, beyond keeping the man out of the field, he didn’t exactly… have a plan for what to do with him here. 

“Uh,” Robert began intelligently, rubbing the back of his neck, “Thanks. For agreeing to this. And, about earlier today –”

“– My bad.”

The muttered words were hard to catch, and Flambae seemed extraordinarily interested in the pattern of the table laminate, by the way he was staring down at it. Robert quirked a brow. 

“I’m not sure I –”

“I said my fucking bad,” Flambae interrupted impatiently, eyes snapping back up to Robert. “I might’ve – I misjudged you, okay? You’re not a bootlicker. Not if you’re gonna pull this stunt,” a corner of his mouth twitched up as he stood, “you might still be a bitch-ass, though. Who knows.” 

Robert huffed in mock affront, though he found himself fighting down a smile. “Wow. I’m wounded.”

“No, I am,” Flambae said, rounding the table and coming to a stop in front of Robert to wave at himself vaguely. “Apparently. That’s why I have to stay at SDN, right? So, what, should I go down to the med bay?”

Robert slowly tilted his head, considering this new problem. “Not unless we actually rough you up. Otherwise we’re just inviting suspicion.”

Flambae looked down at Robert with a smirk. He curled his broad shoulders and tilted his face lower, looming over Robert as if to emphasize their size difference. “Think you could rough me up?”

“No comment,” Robert deadpanned, smothering some twinge in his gut that did not need to be examined. 

“I need to get back to my desk – and you can join me there, if you want – but let’s get our stories straight. Whatever happened to you can’t be so bad that you need serious medical care, but it’s gotta be impactful enough that you can’t effectively complete missions. Something to do with your powers,” he looked Flambae up and down, gaze snagging on his hands.

…Ah. 

Time to aggressively compartmentalize. 

Robert tried to wipe his mind of any past context, and gestured in the general direction of Flambae’s wrists. 

“Your hands. Are they necessary to direct your flames?”

Something in Flambae’s expression went still. They were close enough that Robert could watch a subtle crease draw a line between his brows, like he’d been given a puzzle he didn’t want to solve. His eyes flitted between Robert’s almost questioningly before a sneer slid over his face, unambiguous and forceful. 

He straightened up, away from Robert, and wiggled his eight fingers goadingly. 

“Why? Do I need to lose more bits of ‘em?”

Absolutely not. 

Robert’s jaw clenched at the joke, but he forced himself to chuckle, turning his attention to his own forearm. He untucked the end of the compression bandage there, unwrapping it with practiced ease. 

“We just need to make it look like they’re temporarily out of commission,” he paused, using his teeth to help tear the bandage roughly in half. It was an awkward motion that also required both of his hands, and he tamped down on a flinch at the way his now-destabilized arm throbbed. Flambae spluttered, taking a half-step towards him. 

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Making two wraps. For your two injured hands,” Robert responded matter-of-factly, taken aback by the sudden alarm in Flambae’s voice. “I’m not going to actually do anything to your hands, Flambae –” 

“Not that,” the man hissed, looking just as surprised and consternated as Robert. “That – you – can’t we just get new bandages downstairs?”

Robert brushed off the idea with a shake of his head. “Like I said, interacting with the medical staff is going to draw attention we don’t want. Even if it’s just for supplies, they’d want to know why, what happened, to whom: intake, records, you know the drill. So give it here,” Robert reached for Flambae’s left wrist, palm up, keeping one strip of fabric handy and draping the other over the back of a chair. 

With apparent reluctance, Flambae acquiesced, thrusting his hand begrudgingly into Robert’s. It reminded him of a large, unruly dog forced to do the ‘shake’ trick – an observation Robert kept to himself as he started wrapping the man’s palm as clinically as possible, ignoring the inhuman warmth and too-human texture of his calloused skin. 

“What about your arm?”

“What about it?”

Flambae’s fingers twitched where they were splayed over the heel of Robert’s palm. “You know what I mean. You weren’t wearing this raggedy-ass thing as a fashion statement. Is it sprained, or what?”

“It’s broken. Now the other one,” Robert secured the end of the wrap neatly, satisfied with his handiwork, then released the limb in favor of beckoning for the next. When Flambae didn’t immediately comply, Robert looked up. “If you’re having second thoughts about this part of the plan, we can –”

“What the fuck do you mean, it’s broken,” Flambae breathed. Now he sounded angry, of all things. And he’s still not giving me the other hand, Robert thought with bewildered annoyance.  

“Since fucking when? Shouldn’t it be in a, a fuckin’ cast, or whatever the fuck? Not this fuckin’ toilet paper,” Flambae’s voice climbed in volume and agitation, and he shook his now-wrapped left hand like it was damning evidence.

Robert put his hands on his hips, irritation growing in kind. “It’s a perfectly good, CVS compression wrap, first of all,” he said not-at-all defensively. “And second of all, my arm’s already healing up fine, alright? The initial break was over a month ago. I re-fractured it a little last week, but now it’s –”

“Last WEEK –”

“Flambae, I swear to god,” Robert snapped, bristling to his full height as he lost patience with the nonsensical topic. How did they even start talking about this? 

“Sorry I didn’t realize you had a doctorate in osteology, but now is not the time, okay? We have a team to wrangle into a conga line next to you, and one shift to do it in. Now give me your other hand.”

Robert put out his own palm like he was demanding ransom, frowning sternly. Flambae’s expression was a caricature of incensed shock, and he looked for all the world like he was ready to throttle Robert; but after another prolonged moment of glaring at one another, he finally obeyed. 

“Thank you,” Robert huffed, gentling his touch as he started on Flambae’s right hand. His skin was even warmer, now; hot enough to be a high fever in a regular man. It left a paradoxically cold sensation at every point that Robert’s fingers shifted or drew away, the sudden presence and absence of heat confusing his own nerve endings. 

But in spite of the sullen rigidity evident in the rest of Flambae’s posture, his hand was lax under Robert’s handling, bending or draping pliantly with however he moved it to angle each wind of the wrap. Whatever irksome feelings Robert had left died out entirely as he brushed his thumb along the outer edge of Flambae’s knuckles, barely ghosting over the tip of what remained of his ring finger. He tucked in the bandage, staring down at three loosely-curled digits. 

“...Right. Okay,” he said, voice rougher than intended, distantly realizing they’d lapsed into silence. He smoothed over the tidy bandage one last time, then let go of Flambae’s hand as he cleared his throat of its strange tightness. 

*****

“What’s this fucker doing here.”

Chase poked his eyes over the divider, squinting. Robert had dragged over a chair from an unused cubicle, parking it next to his own at the cramped desk. Flambae dithered behind him like a twitchy child in the principal’s office, though he stiffened up at Chase’s barbed question. Before he could respond, Robert waved in a dismissive gesture. 

“He hurt his hands,” Robert said airily, “Invisigal tripped him in the last sabotage attempt. Nasty road rash all over his palms. Didn’t want to just send him home, and figured it might be a good team-building exercise for him to see this side of things.” 

Robert slid his heel back, tapping it against Flambae’s toes. He couldn’t see his face, but he felt the way the other man shifted his weight, as well as the slight gust of a sigh against the back of his neck. 

“...Yeah. Drowning in excitement over here,” Flambae drawled, and Chase’s squint became an eye roll. 

“Didn’t realize it was bring-your-matchstick-to-work day,” the old man grumbled, but he sunk back down into his chair. Robert did the same, gesturing with his chin at the empty seat. Flambae plunked down into it, and as he did so, was rewarded by Beef popping his head out from under Robert’s desk, trundling over to sniff at Flambae’s custom boots. 

The wheels on Flambae’s chair squeaked as he scooted back. 

“What is that?” 

“My beautiful son. So watch how you speak to him,” Robert answered tonelessly, not looking away from the monitor as he booted up the dispatching interface. “There’s treats in the box if you want to give him one.”

He tore off the top sheet of scoring notes from his notepad, pinning it to the fabric backing of the cubicle so that he could reference it easily and still have free paper to work with. He put on his headset… then hesitated, skating his gaze over to Flambae. 

To his surprise, the man was leaning over Beef’s cardboard box. He made a soft noise of triumph as he found the nearly empty bag of dog treats, fishing one out to pinch between his fingers. Robert continued to watch Flambae out of the corner of his eye as he rummaged through his own desk drawers, hands finding a smaller set of headphones and a two-ended attachment. He hooked the latter up to the side of the computer while Flambae curled over in his seat, folding his torso to his knees. His tied-back hair draped over one shoulder as he offered the treat to the little animal on the ground. 

Beef was practically vibrating with excitement, front paws scrambling on Flambae’s shins until he managed to snap it up. Flambae smiled, and Robert’s fingers fumbled with the cables, clattering them on the desk. 

Flambae looked back over at him, guileless expression fading to one of more familiar mockery. “Is tying knots in your electronics part of being a dispatcher?”

“As much as you all make me want to, no,” Robert answered, refocusing on the task of fitting the two headset jacks into the splitter. He offered the smaller headphones to Flambae, who raised his eyebrows quizzically. 

“This set has a shittier mic,” Robert said with a note of apology in his voice, “but at least you’ll be patched in. This close to the computer, I think there’d be feedback and a delay on your earpiece. I’d rather you have it in real time.”

“...Oh,” Flambae responded, slowly accepting them. He glanced up at Robert without saying anything further, then removed his hero’s earpiece, replacing it with the dispatching headphones. Robert nodded at him. Then he turned to the screen, drew in a breath, and clicked into the joint channel. 

“Alright, team. Who wants to go gambling?”

*****

Adrenaline sang in Robert’s veins as he worked through the afternoon shift. 

It was certainly more technically challenging. The already limited time available between receiving a request alert and dispatching the optimal combination of team members drained away twice as quickly with the calculations he had to run, teammate-by-teammate and call-by-call. Even with his notes and the logging database Chase had sent him, Robert found himself having to do a fair amount of estimating on the fly, as there wasn’t always perfect precedent for the scoring weight of a given mission.

And it was particularly difficult to gauge with novel or mixed elements – help an old lady cross the street? Reliably less than three points. The old lady pulls a gun on oncoming traffic? Well, who called it in, and is it considered a hostage situation if the closest car has a city official in the back? What are their public approval ratings? – which resulted in the sheets of scratch paper littering Robert’s desk quickly multiplying. 

But fortune was also on their side. There was a steady spectrum of calls coming in, including more Red Ring activity that helped tighten the team’s point discrepancies, buoyed along all the more by the astounding new level of cooperation between team members. It wasn’t just recovering the ground they’d lost from the morning, it was better; better than Friday, better than Robert could have hoped for in weeks of working together, let alone a few days. As the gaps between everyone’s rankings continued to steadily shrink, the coordination got smoother, the precision sharper, the resolutions cleaner. 

Even Invisigal was playing more or less nicely – the disparity between her, Coupé, and Sonar had dwindled down to nothing, and all three of them were only one good mission away from coming up even. 

Robert glanced up at the clock in the corner of the screen – just over an hour left in the shift – letting out a tense breath as he took a moment to flex his fingers. Between the regular frenetic typing and additional frenetic scribbling, his hands were cramping up. He shook them out distractedly, then winced at the dull ripple of pain the careless motion sent up his arm. 

“Stop doing that.” 

A bandaged hand snatched his left wrist in a loose clasp, halting further movement. Robert just managed not to startle, looking over at Flambae with pursed lips. 

“I’m just shaking out my hands.”

“And rattling around your shitty bones. Dumbass,” Flambae rejoined, though he kept his voice low, pitched beneath the ambient sounds of the office space. He didn’t release his hold on Robert, tugging the arm downwards until it rested against Robert’s thigh under the desk. Robert expected him to withdraw, then; but instead, the bandaged hand slid up his forearm, stopping to settle over the healing fracture point. 

Robert opened his mouth to say… something, a chastisement or a joke, but the only thing that came out was a quiet, punched-out exhale as warmth pulsed in a handprint over his arm. It seeped through the fabric wrapping Flambae’s palm, through the battered layers of Robert’s sore muscles and connective tissue, and Robert had to intentionally tense his shoulders to keep himself from shuddering. Not from pain, but from the relief of it; the respite, however localized or brief. 

He felt Flambae’s gaze like a physical weight, and he fought to re-steady his breathing. Those eyes had been on him all afternoon, tucked into the background of his buzzing awareness. Although Robert had given him the extra headset, Flambae chimed in only seldomly. He seemed bizarrely content just to watch, and Robert didn’t have enough spare attention to say exactly what part of the spectacle captured the man’s scrutiny. He occasionally handed Robert things – fresh paper, sharper pencils, circled values that came or went with mission relevance – or muttered the updated scores on the leaderboard right around those moments Robert was thinking of craning his head back to check. 

In spite of the ‘team-building’ excuse he’d fed Chase, Robert kept expecting the man to tire of sitting there, squished next to him in the spare chair; but he never got up and left. He wondered if maybe worry kept him close, the fear that the team would overshoot his point maximum while he was benched. Yet he didn’t seem particularly anxious –

“...sarha postaki. Fuckin’ popsicle,” Flambae said under his breath, lips whispering over the shape of a language Robert didn’t understand and was likely not meant to hear. He blinked, immediately curious, though his ability to coherently inquire was being pleasantly sapped by the steady heat weaving up the left side of his body. 

“...Mmwhat?”

Flambae’s thumb and pointer finger tapped idly on the inner and outer lines of Robert’s arm. His fingertips left little pink ovals on Robert’s skin, just shy of burning. 

“Your temperature’s not normal, Birdie,” Flambae murmured, and although his tone was light, the furrow in his brow was not. He glowered down at Robert’s arm, looking… confused, and troubled, and strangely bitter, like it had popped off of Robert’s body and done Flambae some kind of grave offense when he wasn’t looking. 

“Uh, well,” Robert said, rallying back some of his rationality, “I hate to break it to you, but I’m pretty sure you’re the one with the abnormal body heat. What with,” he used his right hand to awkwardly gesture across his chest at Flambae, since his left remained trapped under the desk, “your whole deal.” 

“No,” Flambae answered with an acerbic certainty that surprised him. “That’s not what I –”

An alert rang through the dispatching interface, and both men turned to the screen. Robert lifted his hands to the keyboard as Flambae’s grip dropped away, closing his mouth on whatever he’d been about to say. 

Robert swiftly opened the request, delight and concern mingling over what he read. 

“Active robbery at Green Hills on Western Avenue… suspected member of the Red Ring, sixth known offense with elevated warrant…” his eyes scanned through the message as he searched up additional details in a new window.

“...Powers of magnetism. ‘Heavy Metal’ is his moniker, according to the updated profile. Same guy who got away from the pharmacy this morning. This – this could be it.” Robert glanced down at his list of crossed-out and rewritten scores for the team. 

“Malevola and Punch-Up matched you forty minutes ago. Prism and Golem should be good once they’re back from the mission they’re currently on. And the last three,” Robert flipped the list over as he scribbled his umpteenth line of numbers of the day, looking between the information on the screen and the paper as he averaged. “...Yeah. Yeah, this’ll do it. By the skin of our teeth, too.”

He looked at Flambae excitedly; but the other man was frowning at the screen.

“A robbery, at Green Hills on Western?”

“Mm-hm,” Robert clicked around, promptly assigning Invisigal, Coupé, and Sonar to the request, “know anything about it?”

Flambae made a low sound of displeasure in his chest. 

“It’s a cemetery.”

*****

The camera angles were a lot worse in the wide outdoor space. Evening hadn’t come, but it was on its way, headstones casting shadows like dark fingers clawing at the dusky yellow lawns. The dispatched heroes were approaching separately at Robert’s behest, creeping between manicured greenery and marble features as they triangulated around the last known area of Heavy Metal’s sighting. 

“I still don’t get it,” Sonar was saying over the comms, “what kind of profit margin does graverobbing have, in this day and age? Besides, like, spooky street cred.”

“Maybe he’s, y’know, into it,” Invisigal suggested, “a necro –”

“It’s the collector’s black market,” Coupé spoke over her with total surety. “We’re in the superhero section of memorials. Scraps of capes, moldy masks, buttons off of costumes – you’d be surprised what the real fanatics want… and the price they’re willing to pay for it –” 

“Guys,” Robert interrupted, watching their grainy figures closely as he grimaced at the morbid conjectures. “I agree, this one is weird. But let’s save the chit-chat until we can ask him ourselves, okay? Preferably while he’s in custody. You’re getting close enough that I’d like if –”

Robert cut himself off, catching the flicker of something around the middle of the picture. 

“Find cover and slow down,” he said sharply. To the credit of all three, they did: Sonar stopped behind a tree, Coupé crouched at the base of a stone angel, and Invisigal, well, went invisible. 

“Sonar.”

“Whaddup, Bobby Boy.”

“Not to be insensitive, but: can you echolocate? Quietly?”

Sonar hummed. “I mean, how quiet are we talkin’? I kinda have to yell, but it’s a little yell –”

“Then we’ll skip that for now, thank you,” Robert said hastily, eyes still glued to where he’d seen motion. Was that shadow a little wobbly? Or maybe it – yes, there –

“The crypt. Tan sandstone with the silver arch, next to the Celtic cross. Its gate is moving.” 

Robert zoomed in the camera as much as he could, watching the iron gate on the crypt swing sluggishly open, seemingly without any outside influence. He thought briefly of Invisigal, but the motion was too smooth for unseen hands, almost mechanically steady. 

“I think he’s opening it with magnetism,” Robert said. “I’d bet he’ll come up from inside, but it’s also possible he’s somewhere further away, depending on the range of his ability. Watch out for metal objects, all of you. Coupé, keep a good hold on your knives,” he scanned over the cluttered layout.

“Sonar and Coupé, can you circle around the sides? Be ready to grab and pin him as soon as he emerges. We want to knock him out if we can, since we don’t know if the magnetism is instrumented or innate. Invisigal, I’m sorry to say it,” Robert’s roving eyes honed in on a large lion sculpture roughly in front of the gate as the first two heroes moved to follow his instructions, “but I want you behind the lion in the front, and ready to run interference if the other two can’t jump him right away.”

Invisigal gasped in a breath as she rematerialized behind the lion, scowling. “God, why am I always the distraction?”

“You know the answer to that. Nobody can see you coming.”

Almost nobody, Robert amended internally, flicking his gaze to the man sitting at his side. Flambae was back to mute observation, impassive save for the slight tilt of his shoulders towards the screen. But, no, that wasn’t entirely true – there was more to his posture, a subtle tension humming through the lines of his body that Robert took in with a pang of recognition. It was like a runner poised for the starting gun; a hunting hound straining for the horn. 

A hero wanting to help. 

“Hey,” Robert said quietly, pulling the mic down past his chin to nudge his elbow into Flambae’s side. “Click into the feed and tell them anything you remember about this guy. You almost had him in the alleyway this morning.” 

Flambae jerked at Robert’s prodding. “What? There isn’t anything to say. He was just a, just some idiot guy, totally –”

Robert darted his hand for the side of Flambae’s face, cupping his ear to hit the joint button on the man’s headset as he spoke. 

“–unremarkable,” Flambae’s eyes widened when he realized what Robert had done, then narrowed to glare daggers at him, emoting silent accusations as he reluctantly continued into the live mic.

“Except for the augment patterns running up his arms, he’s just… average. Stupidly average. Like, I’m fuckin’ surprised he’s in the Red Ring, kind of average,” Flambae folded his arms, the motion doing something to the topography of his shoulders and chest that Robert refused to get distracted by.

“And… maybe that’s why he keeps getting away, actually. Plus a lot of the valuable shit that he steals literally sticks to him.”

Robert’s grin was smug. 

“Pretty useful intel. Also sounds like points in favor of his ability being innate,” he tacked on emphatically, “No extra tech?”

Flambae rolled his eyes at him, but nodded in confirmation, voicing it for the channel. “No extra tech.”

“Great. Then we for sure go for knock-out,” Robert directed this back to the three on the ground, “since we can’t disarm him of anything external. Everyone in position?”

“Ready,” Coupé said, all deadly confidence. 

“Set,” Sonar added, voice distorting as his silhouette rippled into something more monstrous on the camera feed. 

Invisigal scoffed into the mic at the tee-up. But the crypt gate finally hit the limits of its hinges, entrance a wide-open maw as a shadowy figure approached from deep within. She puffed on her inhaler.

“Fiiine… let’s go.”

Chapter Text

Heavy Metal stepped out from the open mausoleum, and things started moving very quickly.

Two of those quick things were Sonar and Coupé: in impressive synchronization, they swerved around each side of the crypt, pincering the newly-emerged Ringer between them. 

Unfortunately, two more quick figures – unadorned by any augments – rushed out from the dark entrance behind their leader, intercepting the ambush before it could fully land. Heavy Metal let out a furious shout of surprise as one of Sonar’s clawed fists glanced the side of his head, but he didn’t go down. Stumbling forward with a large case under one arm, he raised the other, palm outwards. His augment patterns began to glow a brighter red as he wheeled around to face the two heroes now grappling with the unpowered thugs. The toadies were swinging out with wooden baseball bats, making up in chaos what they lacked in grace, and doing a lamentably good job at causing a diversion. 

Robert swore under his breath, ducking his face closer to the screen at the unexpected complication. The lackey engaging Coupé seemed to be more on the defense, keeping strategic distance while goading her into attacks. He was short and light on his feet, dodging knives and embedding a few others in his bat as they sliced at him. The other lackey seemed far more brash; Sonar flapped his monstrous wings to boost himself backwards as one wild swing nearly caught the underside of his jaw. 

“Hey, hitting a bat with another bat has gotta be problematic,” he reproached as he narrowly avoided another swing. “And what’s up with those, anyways? Is the Red Ring recruiting from the little league now?”

“I know accomplices weren’t reported in the crime alert, but don’t let them distract you. Heavy Metal still needs to go down first, and it looks like he’s getting ready to put his name to use,” Robert said briskly, staring at the Ringer with mounting concern. As Flambae had described, the villain was strangely plain – medium height, medium build, medium everything else – and if his arms had been covered, Robert wouldn’t look twice at the man. 

As it was, Robert wasn’t going to look away from him. Heavy Metal’s outstretched hand flexed, and Robert tracked the direction of the gesture to a steel plaque mounted to an obelisk behind Sonar that began to judder as its screws popped loose. 

“Sonar, duck,” Robert barked, and the enormous bat complied, flattening his ungainly form to the ground as the plaque ripped from its mounting and spun through the air where a furry neck was moments before. As it did, a dislodged iron cross and two flimsy fencing stakes joined it from partway across the lawn. Heavy Metal calmly stepped to the side as the whole collection went whizzing past him, clattering into the foliage beyond. 

He can’t target only one object. Not if they’re close together. 

“They’re using wooden weapons so they don’t accidentally get pulled out of their hands,” Robert muttered into the comms, voicing his thoughts in real time as he tapped his fingers in a rapid rhythm on his desk. 

“When he activates his ability, anything metallic in range comes along. We can use that. Sonar, Coupé, at the next opportunity you can, I want you to disengage with the lackeys and get airborne. Each of you grab a blunt metal object on the way. Invisigal, that distraction would be real good right about –”

Robert was interrupted by a strangled grunt as Heavy Metal doubled over at the waist, legs turning inwards in the universal kneed-in-the-balls position, although there was not anyone else (visible) in the vicinity. He waved his right hand in a loose circle around himself – still not releasing the case under his left arm, Robert noticed with divided interest – and several smaller metallic grave decorations came humming towards him from all directions, at a tempered enough weight and speed to bounce harmlessly off of his body from every angle but one.

The villain looked triumphantly to the single wire flower holder that smacked against an unseen obstacle, and turned his hand and his attention toward it. 

“That’s your cue, you two,” Robert prompted. “It looks like he can control the intensity of magnetism, if not precisely what it attracts, but he’ll go for another hard pull on something big to try to get Invisigal. If you can swoop through the pull and release another object that gets dragged in when he’s not expecting it, I think we can knock him out that way –”

“Get off of me, you imbecile,” Coupé hissed, and Robert yanked his attention back to her. It appeared as though she’d tried to follow instructions; she was halfway in the air, but the lackey she’d been fighting had tossed aside his bat in favor of jumping up to wrap his arms around her leg. Her wings flapped and strained against the dead weight, leg kicking as she tried to shake the goon off, but he held fast. 

“Coupé –”

“I got it,” Sonar hummed, stretching out his own wings and rushing forward abruptly, effectively clotheslining both lackeys and releasing Coupé from the hold. She shot up into the air as the two goons latched onto Sonar, instead. He shook his shoulders, falling into a tumbling wrestle with them on the ground. Coupé hovered indecisively overhead. 

“Should I –”

“Follow Captain Bob’s orders,” Sonar said breezily, screeching with a kind of earsplitting laugh as he rolled ears-over-tail with the goons. “I’ll school these sandlot suckers.” 

“That’s cute and all, but I could use some back up, assholes!” 

Invisigal’s voice yelped over the comms as she blipped in and out of sight, skirting metal objects of various sizes and shapes as Heavy Metal tried to catch her in the drag. Coupé darted through the air towards her, then halted again, looking down at her own hands. 

“I don’t – I didn’t have time to grab anything –”

“Aren’t you a fucking assassin?” Invisigal hissed into her mic, diving behind a row of stone pillars as a metal statue of Saint Francis smashed the endmost pillar into pieces. “Just fly by and let go of all your knives on his next pull. Now, before he notices you. Pincushion this fucker –”

“Hold on,” Robert said, clenching his hands. He was dimly aware of Flambae shifting beside him, but didn’t look away from the screen. “Flip them. Pommel first. It’s still gonna knock him out.”

Invisigal made a guttural sound of frustration as another pillar was smashed, Heavy Metal knocking them down at random in his hunt for her. 

“Seriously? Again with the goody-goody bullshit,” she snarled, enough raw vitriol dripping from her tone that Robert knew it wasn’t about the knives; not only. 

“Listen, I don’t know what kind of sugar-coated, boy scout wet dream you were raised on, but out here in the real world, sometimes people have to fucking die. And sometimes, some of us,” her voice slid sideways into something jagged, “are good at making them die. Villains born with villain powers do villain shit, even when it's in favor of the good guys. It’s just – it’s fucking destiny. Not that you would know.”

Robert’s knuckles blanched white. Blood roared in his ears. Something unnamed, something old, something bottomless and glacial and full of aching teeth reared its head in his chest.

He took a measured breath, and he did not let it speak. 

“You’re right. Sometimes people have to die.”

Robert’s voice was calm.

“Sometimes they have to live, as well; live with what’s been done, to them and by them. But I think destiny, with or without powers,” he let his gaze unfocus, finding and counting each glowing pixel on the screen, “is just a piss-poor excuse to not take responsibility.”

His eyes drifted over the orderly splotches of colored dots that made up the images of his dispatched team.

“If you really want my opinion, the only thing that separates heroes and villains is accepting this disadvantage: a hero has to think about the aftermath. A villain doesn’t.”

Another muffled crash; another pillar down. Robert brought his focus back. 

“So, Coupé – will you flip your daggers for me?”

There was a rustle of wings over the comms. Wordlessly, Coupé swooped low to the ground like a diving hawk. She twirled her blades so the points perched between her fingertips, and as she passed behind Invisigal’s hiding spot and between the gaps in the pillars, she twisted on her side, releasing them to the magnetic pull. They flew as straight and true as arrows. 

“Call me Coop.”

Six blunt handles thunked in quick succession against Heavy Metal’s temples as he fell backwards, out cold. 

*****

It wasn’t a perfect wrap. 

Sonar incapacitated one of the lackeys, but the other – the smaller, agile one that had initially gone after Coupé... after Coop – managed to wriggle away, sprinting for the case that Heavy Metal finally dropped as he was knocked unconscious. The goon scooped it up and ran for the woods bordering the cemetery, and although Coop and Invisigal attempted to run him down, they lost him in the trees. 

Heavy Metal and Lackey #2, though: they were processing for custody now. The unexpected additions and subsequent imperfections averaged out to no additional points beyond arresting Heavy Metal alone, which was at least a blessing for their rank-rigging game. 

Sonar, Coop, and Invisigal logged off for the police debrief. Robert slid the headset off to set it on the desk, shaking his head slightly as he let the sensory input of the office bleed back into his awareness. It was late in the day, and pretty quiet; Chase’s things weren’t packed, but he also wasn’t sitting at his desk, judging by the silence from his side of the cubicle. Robert rocked back into his chair with a ragged exhale. 

“You… really did it.”

Robert rolled his head to the side without moving much else. He’d nearly forgotten about Flambae. 

“If by ‘it’, you mean the weirdest algebra quiz of my life, then yeah,” Robert murmured tiredly, closing his stinging eyes. “Otherwise, you all did it.” 

When the other man didn’t respond, Robert cracked his eyes back open. Flambae was just… looking at him, gaze moving slowly along Robert’s slumped body and up to his face. When their eyes met, Robert arched a sarcastic brow. But Flambae didn’t break away or speak – he just tilted his head to one side. 

Robert didn’t know what to make of it. He fished for soupy words in his thoroughly stewed brain, but Flambae chose the moment to finally continue. 

“You were clenching your hands again,” he said flatly, dipping his eyes down to the offending appendages resting in Robert’s lap. “Pretty hard, just now.” 

Robert made a sound between a sigh and an exasperated laugh. “I’ll remind you that it’s my arm that’s goofed up, not my hands.”

Flambae wrinkled his nose.

“Don't ever say 'goofed' again. And the whole thing’s connected, you reckless bitch,” Flambae retorted, though it lacked any real heat. He looked to his own hands, fiddling with the bandages to try to feel out where Robert had tucked in the ends. 

“But it's over, right? So I can give your shitty rags back –”

“Robert? I’d like to see you in my office. Now, please.”

Blazer’s voice resonated across the dispatch floor. She stood impassively at the end of the hallway to the row of offices: not moving to cross the open grid of cubicles, but not turning to go back down the hall, either. Robert straightened in his chair. 

“I think you’d better keep them on. Until you’re back home,” he said under his breath to Flambae, leaning forward like he was busy tidying his desk. “Tell the team congrats and that I’m sorry I missed closing. And hand off Beef to Chase if you see him?” 

Flambae gave a subtle nod, and Robert shot him a brief smile. Then he stood, turning on his heel to face his boss. 

“I’m coming.”

*****

“All eight members of the Z-team are ranked at exactly 106 points.” 

“...Pretty miraculous,” Robert responded lightly. 

“It’s impossible. Especially in one day.”

Blazer’s expression was placid, but her eyes were ice. Robert had the decorum to look down, shoulders dropping. 

“Look,” he began quietly, “I don’t mean to be flippant. And I didn’t intend to overstep. But I –”

“Why didn’t you just tell me what you were planning on doing? We could have had a conversation.”

Her voice slipped into something more fragile; more personal. Robert bit back the stronger protests he had for that. He was spent, but he couldn’t afford to drop the ball now. Not after everything he’d asked of the team. 

“I think I could say the same,” he said as gently as he was able, looking up to catch Blazer’s eyes. “It didn’t exactly feel like a conversation this morning. I’m glad you were thinking about the team last weekend, Blazer. I really am. But it was hard to come in today and be faced with a sudden ultimatum that I just… I couldn’t agree with.”

“You couldn’t, could you,” Blazer murmured, and there was a new note of caution in her voice as she watched Robert. 

“You’re different than I thought you’d be,” she continued, bringing a hand up to prop her chin on her palm. “I knew a bit from Chase, of course. But mostly, I heard about you the way everyone else did – through the news. Mechaman, bastion of lawful good,” she smiled a little, though her gaze was still distant. “Straightforward. Just. Appealing to the masses.”

Which Mechaman. 

Robert snorted softly. Legacies aside, it felt like a funny little photo negative of the tense mission exchange he'd just had. Too spineless for Invisigal; too much spine for Blazer. 

“Sorry to disappoint. My own PR aside, I swear I’m not out to wreck SDN’s.”

Blazer regained some of her professional presence. Her posture ironed out as she sighed. 

“Robert – you know that companies exist for a reason, right?” 

Robert blinked, confused at the sudden left turn. “I… yes?”

Blazer shook her head slightly. “I know it might sound like more corporate-speak, but I just want you to understand. SDN, the Superhero Dispatching Network: it is a real network, connecting people all over the state, the country, and to a lesser extent for now – the world. Having standards and regulations in place for something so massive, that serves so many people… it’s necessary,” she went on, voice growing in passion. 

“And I’m glad you’re here with the Z-team – truly and genuinely – but no matter what happens with them, they’re a drop in an ocean, while the world is a desert of need.”

She looked at him rapturously, and Robert chewed on his response. Truthfully, in the same way that Blazer had held a certain vision of Mechaman before hiring him, Robert had his own preconceived notions of SDN’s marketing image and mission before taking the job. Notions that were not easily eroded, even now; even beholden as he was, in every possible way. And while Blazer continued to demonstrate nothing but altruistic motivations – albeit with some surprising inconsistencies in application – he couldn’t help but think that her metaphor was unintentionally apt.

No desert was watered by an ocean. And no river, lake, or stream, however small or muddy, was meaningless to the communities that needed them. 

But they would go in circles if they weren’t careful. Robert recentered the matter at hand, its conclusion still unclear, and a possible point of leverage popped into his head: intuition based off of a few fleeting moments of Blazer’s selective slack. 

“Invisigal would have been last, today.”

Blazer’s expression clouded. “What?”

Robert nodded somewhat apologetically. “She was behind by the widest margin. If the team hadn’t agreed to cooperate, there was no way she could’ve caught up.” 

Blazer looked away, tucking a golden lock behind her ear. “Visi is, well, y’know. She’s Visi. I’m sure we could’ve figured something out. Maybe remedial work. Or one-on-one, to get her back on track –”

“We did figure something out,” Robert said firmly, pushing his point now that he had an in. “And not only did she catch up to second-to-last: second, third, seventh-to-last, they don’t exist anymore. Some of them jumped by 30 to 40 points, Blazer. I might’ve been watching the numbers, putting the pieces on the board, but they,” Robert swept his arm out to the hall and the leaderboard beyond.

“They did that honestly. That team earned every single point, fair and square. You can’t tell me that doesn’t make the Phoenix Program – and all of SDN by extension – look good.”

It was the winning blow. Blazer stared across the desk at him, face a mixture of startled, chagrined, and grudgingly amused. 

“I… suppose so,” she conceded, and Robert felt a little dizzy as more cortisol seeped out of his nervous system. 

“Cool,” he responded, stupidly but earnestly, running a hand through his unkempt hair. “And we’re going to keep it up, if you’ll allow it, so: are we alright here? No cuts?” 

She laughed a little at that. If her gaze was still wary, then at least she was nodding. 

“No cuts. But I want to know we can follow up with each other, going forward. There’s some other things I’d like you to work on that I’ll be in touch with over email; and let’s check in again at the end of the week.” 

“Sounds good.”

She gave him one last once-over, then stood, walking to the door to let Robert out.

“...Okay then. Have a good night, Robert.”

*****

Robert walked back out to the office bullpen. 

The space was dim, now. The sun had set, the other dispatchers had all cleared out, and the only sound Robert could hear was the distant drone of vacuuming somewhere in the conference rooms. 

As he approached his desk, he noticed two pieces of paper – one on a blue sticky note from Chase’s stationary, and another from a torn-off corner of his own discarded calculations. He’d left his phone here, and the worn device as well as a plastic bag he didn’t recognize was set on top of the latter paper, mostly obscuring its writing from view. He picked up the sticky note, first. 

You promised, so I’m cashing in on my Beef privileges ASAP, you little fucker. I’ll bring him back in the morning. I’d ask what kind of kibble he likes but I know your ass feeds him whatever you both can sniff out. Will call if anything happens. 

The even, stern letters got cramped near the bottom, and Robert flipped it over to see if Chase had added anything else. 

That mouthy Yankee candle told me what you did. Call me if you got fired. 

- Chase

Robert chuckled through his nose, tucking the note into his shirt pocket. He turned next to the clutter of items on the torn scratch paper, sliding his cracked phone to the side to read sharp and slanted handwriting that he didn’t recognize. 

Chase has your dog, it began bluntly, and Robert’s mouth lifted at the corners at the (correctly) guessed prioritization of topics. Team is fine but wants to know what happened in the meeting. Text me and I’ll tell them. 

Robert’s eyes widened slightly at the string of numbers that followed. He wasn’t sure why it surprised him – there was still a small chance they’d all lost their jobs, after all, so it was a practical enough concern – but something about the frank request still wormed a warm thread under his ribcage. But there was still another line of writing, skirting under the smeared edge of Robert’s formulas to fit. 

Put the brace ON. 

- F

Robert cocked his head, finally shifting his attention to the plastic shopping bag. He crinkled it open, holding it from the bottom to shake its contents onto the desk: a coiled bandage in new packaging, and a tan, elbow-length wrist brace with a loop to secure over one’s thumb. 

Robert picked it up, testing the bend of it in his hands. It seemed to be made out of thin neoprene, with flexible fiberglass inserts running along the seams. It wasn’t bulky or covered in velcro, the way Robert vaguely remembered these things to be. After a brief moment of hesitation, he slipped his hand into it, and it slid into place along his forearm like a second skin. 

He flexed his fingers. It wasn’t as – it was different, from the, ah, targeted application of heat he’d gotten that afternoon. 

But it was still… nice. Nicer than the ACE wrap, he could privately admit. 

He picked up the bag to give it another shake; no receipt fell out. Resisting the impulse to immediately peel the brace back off, he picked up his phone, first sending off a quick text to Chase – Thanks for watching Beef. Not fired – then he keyed in the new number written on his scratch paper, making a conscious effort not to overthink anything. 

Summary of the meeting: no cuts. BB wasn’t thrilled but we’re all good. 

To his mild dismay, a text bubble immediately appeared, popping in and out of view as the person on the other end typed, paused, and typed again. Robert watched the screen apprehensively as the bubble disappeared again, then laughed as his own text got stamped with a fire emoji reaction. 

Fuck yeah tellin the team now

More vacillating bubble appearances. Robert pulled his thumbs away, content to wait. 

Everyone blowing up the chat but 

This was accompanied by a screenshot. There were messages from various Z-teamers, but they were mostly overwhelmed by a spamming of stickman GIFs from Sonar, in assorted throes of flailing, tumbling around white space, or puking. 

Robert squinted at them. 

Seems… positive? Also

He hesitated, glancing at his own left hand. 

You didn’t have to get me a brace. Let me know what I owe you. 

No prolonged text bubbles this time. The response was instantaneous. 

Did you fuckin put it on 

Robert

Pics or it didnt happen 

Robert re-read his own name a few times like it was a foreign language, then reluctantly opened his camera app, putting up his middle finger as he snapped a picture of just his outstretched arm. 

Woooow

A row of return middle finger emojis. 

Did you take this on a microwave 

Robert rolled his eyes. His phone wasn't that old. Before he could respond, another text came in. 

Go home now. 

Robert huffed. 

How do you know I’m not?

Another swift rejoinder. 

You just took a picture, and I got real familiar with that desk today. Dumb bird

I’ll see you tomorrow

Robert paused. He didn’t type or retype anything – no thoughtful bubbles from his end of the chat – but after a moment, he sent one last response. 

Thanks, Flambae. See you tomorrow.

Chapter Text

The next several days were exponentially calmer; or as calm as it seemed possible to be, around the Torrance branch. 

The team greeted him boisterously on Tuesday. As soon as Robert’s profile went live on the virtual interface, bedlam exploded in his ears, a commotion of sound that had him pulling the earpieces slightly away from his head with a good-natured wince. It was impossible to make out much of anything from the clamor of voices, but the tone was a celebratory one, and Robert responded in kind. 

“Alright, alright. Okay, you guys,” he managed to get in edgewise, in the breaths between one firecracker of exclamations and the next. “As it seems you’re all aware, your… teamwork,” he paused meaningfully, trying to inject enough cautionary implication into the word. They were back on the comms, after all. 

The voices died down attentively, and Robert continued. 

“...paid off, yesterday. Nobody’s getting cut.”

“Just to triple-check, Mr. Roberto Robertoson – that includes you, right?” 

“Yes, Prism,” Robert’s mouth curved, “That includes me. And I’m proud of you all,” this elicited a chorus of groans and a mutter of Thanks, Dad from an indeterminate source that Robert serenely ignored,

“But we’ve sent a certain kind of message; planted a banner in the ground. Now we have to back it up, and show that yesterday wasn’t a fluke. I think meeting up was a step in the right direction, and I’d like to make that a regular Monday thing. I also want everyone to know that you’re welcome to come see me for any other concerns,” 

Robert’s eyes wandered to the extra headset he’d forgotten to disconnect from his monitor. 

“So, feel free to stop by my desk if it’s something that can’t be resolved over the channel. I’m in the southwest corner of the dispatching floor. Sound good?”

Murmurs and hums of agreement. Robert rolled his neck from side to side, opening the dispatching map. 

“Great. Then let’s get cracking on our sophomore album.”

*****

To his surprise, two Z-teamers responded to his invitation later that same day. 

Even more surprising, it was Punch-Up and Malevola: a duo he didn’t particularly picture as close, though their pre-rigged rankings had been similar. They sauntered up to his desk during lunch, Malevola taking slightly shorter strides so that Punch-Up could keep pace. 

“Hello,” Robert said, putting down his mug of stale coffee when they just stared down – and up – at him expectantly. 

“You’re wearing it,” Malevola said, pointing at Robert’s arm with a pleased little smirk. Robert followed the line of her sharp nail to the brace on his wrist. 

“...I am,” he responded, nonplussed. He brushed aside the childish urge to hide his arm from view. How did Malevola know about the –

“Lavaboy asked for a favor last night. Faster than a round trip to the drug store when you can just do this,” she went on, twirling her fingers languidly. A small, swirling portal blossomed open with the motion, and she reached through, pulling out two items that she passed down to Punch-Up. 

“So we asked for compensation. Intel, y’see. What would a scrappy little dispatcher be wantin’?” The diminutive man followed up with an emphatic shake of the objects. They rattled like maracas, and Robert looked between the man’s meaty hands: a bottle of ibuprofen in one, and a container of dog treats in the other. 

As if on cue, Beef came scrambling around the side of the cubicle divider, roused from the (new) dog bed Chase had primly arranged in his own cubicle. The dog raced over to Punch-Up at the tantalizing sound, and the man hollered in only partially-joking distress, holding his arms high to try to keep them out of reach. Although Beef had little to work with in the height department, he’d found a proportionate opponent, and Robert had no choice but to accept as Punch-Up shoved the items into his hands to keep them from falling to the maw of the beast. 

He looked down at them, torn between a smile and a frown. 

“Flambae told you to get these?”

“No, we coerced him into giving us hints about what you’d like,” Malevola corrected, crouching to scratch behind Beef’s ears and cooing as he flopped to his side for belly rubs. 

“They’re from me and Punch, not him. Disappointed?”

“I – no,” Robert amended, carefully setting the gifts on the far reaches of his desk. “Thank you both. But you really didn’t have to.”

The unspoken And why did you? hovered in the air, and Robert watched with consternation as Malevola and Punch-Up exchanged a look. 

“Coop… she likes this job. She might not say it, bein’ a lady of mystery and all, but: it’s a good fit for her. And she – she told us a bit of what you said. About destiny and heroes and such.”

Punch-Up wasn’t looking at Robert. He ran his fingers along his mustache, curling the ends idly. Robert cocked his head at the ambiguous statement. Before he could reply, Malevola chimed in.

“Sonar, too. Though the way he retells stories is more about, mm, vibes, than accuracy,” she grinned a little, still scratching gently along Beef’s side. “He was scared about the cut, mate. We all were.”

…Not only for yourselves. Apparently. 

“I see.”

He did. More nuance to the team dynamics shifted into place in Robert’s head, and some of the uncomfortable tension in his chest over the gift-giving relaxed. He folded his arms in thought, and Beef rolled onto his feet, shaking himself out as he looked forlornly up at Robert. 

With a sigh, he reached to open the new container of treats. Malevola stood back up.

“Have more than coffee when you take those, lad,” Punch-Up gruffed, gesturing with his chin to the bottle of pills as he turned away. Malevola’s pointed tail prodded his elbow, above the sleeve of neoprene. 

“And keep that on," she added, corners of her lips curling. “Or a hothead’s gonna get ya.”

*****

Wednesday was also fairly uneventful, with a few small exceptions. 

One technically happened before the start of work. Robert walked up to the building, absently glancing around the parking lot when Beef tugged the leash in an unexpected direction, then stopped dead in his tracks as he did a double-take. 

There was a huge man sprawled atop a dented car in the corner of the lot, like he’d smashed into it falling from the sky. 

Instinct had Robert sprinting over, even as recognition flooded quickly in. They’d only interacted once in passing; but once was memorable enough, especially with the constant visual reminders on every advertising medium in the building. He slowed once he reached the front bumper of the partially-flattened vehicle, lifting a hesitant hand. 

“Um... Phenomaman? You okay, big guy?” 

At the sound of his name, the other man (or: man-shaped alien) sat up with enough speed to generate a powerful gust of wind, and Robert spent the next fifteen minutes having the most awkward post-breakup pep talk he could ever recall being a part of. He was uncertain of his own success – though he at least talked the desolate hero out of snuffing out the sun, so that was something – but the utterly downtrodden way Phenomaman lumbered off had Robert frowning as he entered SDN’s front doors. 

He didn’t know the full extent of Phenomaman’s abilities: only that they were staggering, spanned more than one category, and made him the SDN poster child for the entire western states, not just L.A. And yet, he’d been fired from the downtown branch the moment he underperformed. 

From either a sympathetic or a systematic perspective, it bothered Robert. All of that immense potential, stymied by the lack of mundane support. Did SDN have programs for this? Mental health resources, or… even some kind of, of interstellar immigration counseling, maybe. Half of Phenomaman’s aggrieved confusion seemed more to do with never having had human foibles explained to him in the first place –

“Oh, h-hel- Good morning! Me– mister, uh, R…Robert. Did you know that you’re bleeding?”

Robert shook himself from his thoughts, attention recaptured by another somewhat-familiar face. 

“...Waterboy,” he remembered, smiling as the tall young man nodded vigorously, sending splatters in a small radius of the floor with the motion. “Good to see you.”

Robert looked him up and down, smile dimming slightly as he took in the industrial mop and bucket. 

“What are you up to?”

Waterboy pointed at his chest, where a smeared name tag was holding on for dear life to the saturated fabric of his wetsuit. 

“I’m SDN’s newest her– he– helpful… janitor,” he answered brightly, though Robert didn’t miss the way his shoulders sagged a little further by the end of the sentence. “A-and, um, I… did you hear what I said, a second – a minute ago?”

He swung his finger from his own chest to Robert’s, and Robert looked down. 

“Ah.” 

Some of the glass from the crushed windshield under Phenomaman had gotten embedded in his chest: likely when the superhero had swung into a sitting position. Little circles of red were spreading across the fabric of his work shirt. 

Robert tried to pull it gingerly away from his skin to minimize the stains. 

“...Shoot. I’d better take care of this before it makes a bigger mess. But I’m glad you’re working here; catch up with you next time?” 

He nodded to ensure his own promise as he walked quickly towards the bathrooms. Waterboy just gave him a little wave, watching him go with wide blue eyes. Preoccupied as he was, it didn’t occur to Robert that they had never technically met. 

*****

“Hey, Chase – what exactly is your job position?”

Gray eyes popped over the cubicle divider like an alligator surfacing from the water. 

“What’d you spill on your shirt, kid?”

Robert waved his hand, ignoring the question to add more onto his own. 

“I mean, I don’t hear you doing much dispatching over there. Do you have a team? Or are you kinda like Galen, where it’s more admin?”

An alert pinged in a new group messaging channel with both Robert and Chase included. 

I also sub for dispatchers wherever there’s gaps. And do the audits. 

It was from Galen, who didn’t turn from where he was sitting at his monitor half a floor away. Robert typed a response – Nice. Jack of all trades. –  then turned back to Chase expectantly. Chase sighed, straightening up a little taller to rest his elbows on the divider. 

“I’m not as high up the ladder, but it’s similar enough. Our branch shrunk a bit since they divided up the districts to accommodate the growing neighborhoods. I used to have a consistent team, but they got split up; so I float between shifts when it’s needed, and do a shitload of paperwork when it’s not,” Chase raised a bushy eyebrow. 

“Where’s this coming from?” 

Robert looked off to one side. 

“Well,” he said slowly, choosing his words. “Earlier, I… ran into a couple of acquaintances. Dyed-in-the-wool heroes, even if they’re not employed that way right now. I know my position is with the Z-team, and I’m glad of it,” he disregarded Chase’s skeptical snort, “but it just got me thinking. If they had the opportunity to restart a team – even a small one, for a smaller district – I know a pretty qualified guy.”

“Pretty qualified, huh,” Chase said, shaking his head disbelievingly. “Rob, the obvious and impeccable exception of Beef aside, you won’t be foisting any more of your strays on me. I still have half a mind to convince Blazer to pull the plug on the Phoenix Program, all your white boy wiles be damned. You should be lying low right now, anyways.”

Even as he scolded Robert, his eyes took on a reluctantly considering light. 

“...But,” he grumbled, with the same faux-harshness Robert knew from childhood preceded a secret concession. 

“Who are they? If they really are good, I could bring it up to Blazer, since she talks about filling the ranks back out sometimes. Maybe. If the opportunity arises.” 

Robert held back a smile. 

“I’ll email what I know about their info.”

*****

Thursday afternoon, Robert got two of his own emails. The first was from Blazer.

Hi Robert, 

Hope your week’s going well! Like I mentioned during our last meeting, I wanted to ask for your help on something. Since it seems like you’ve got a knack for the programming side of things, I’d like you to review some of our recent call histories – especially those with a video component. 

There’s been a gradual increase in Red Ring activity in Torrance over the last few months, and theft in particular seems to have become an issue. If there’s information in those logs that could help us safeguard subscriber assets more efficiently, it’d do a lot for the branch. 

It’s lower-priority than dispatching, so work on it as you have time. I’ll share the files with you shortly. 

Thanks,

Blonde Blazer

Robert started drafting a response immediately, interest piqued. It had been on his mind, as well. The Z-team had responded to another Ringer burglary during the morning shift, though it was just a group of unpowered teens and twenty-somethings looting the mall: bottom-of-the-rung chumps like the batters from Monday. 

But it was strange; Robert was intimately familiar with tracking Ringer activity in the past, and the patterns – or lack of patterns – just didn’t line up with anything he’d seen before. Even if they were motivated by different aims, he was as interested as Blazer in mining for more information. 

Sending off his affirmative, Robert opened the next email. 

Hey man, mechsuit repairs are coming along. About ready to start testing the first proto-pulse. Lemme know next time you got a minute before or after a shift to come by the lab, yeah? We gonna resurrect Mechaman. 

Royd

Robert grinned, suddenly more awake than three cups of coffee had managed to make him all day. 

Can you do tomorrow before shift start? 

*****

Early Friday morning, he was back in the cockpit. 

It was still fairly skeletal – the whole suit was, only assembled enough for the practical minimum of testing the new energy source – but even so, a sensation almost like vertigo swelled through Robert as he strapped himself in. His lungs felt both expansive and tight, like there was too much and too little air at once. It’d been months: months without this, without this hull, without this machine, without this body that felt more familiar than his own flesh. But the last time he was in here –

“Proto-Pulse Test 1. Monitors running. Pilot ready?”

Robert sucked in a breath. Hands on the controls, he clicked the feed to answer Royd, who looked on from a bank of screens lined behind reinforced glass. 

“Pilot ready. Powering on.”

He threaded the powerbank into the reactor and turned it. The strange feeling in his chest intensified as a dull blue light spidered out in a circle from the source, slowly illuminating the space around him.

That’s – a different shade, than it was before –

“Levels steady. Begin motion protocols.”

Royd’s voice came again through the speakers, solemn in a way Robert hadn’t yet heard in their short acquaintance. He shook his own head. 

Focus.

“Simple locomotion,” he replied, gingerly maneuvering the yokes to test the reach and responsiveness of each mechanized limb. The motions were smooth – familiar – and Royd gave him a thumbs-up through the glass. 

Encouraged, Robert flipped the next attenuated power switch. The mech hummed around him. 

“Complex locomotion.”

He let himself relax into it, muscle memory taking over as he pushed, pulled, and swept his hands over the various sticks, switches, and interfaces surrounding him, tension diminishing as he felt the boundary between his physical input and the robotic outcomes blur. He crouched into a boxing position, running through a set of stances with fluid ease. He felt… uncoiled, unhindered, like he’d been suddenly sprung from too-tight clothing into something that properly fit. 

And like well-fitting clothing, it had gone through some recent tailoring. There were small changes he could sense in the way Royd had been rebuilding each component. But they were good ones, clever ones, little upgrades that Robert took in stride. 

Just as he was starting to breathe easy, his left shoulder – the mech’s left shoulder – locked up. A stray spark drifted down from the reactor chamber, and the lights started to sputter. 

“Shit, Robert, can you power down? There’s a surge happening. I’m gonna –”

The mech seized as its gears ground together in shrieking discordance, unresponsive to any switch flipping. Robert grabbed for the powerbank, wrenching it hard when it refused to give. The mech fell backwards as he gave it another vicious twist, yanking out the proto-pulse to cut off the power supply. 

He tightened his jaw as the impact to the ground rattled his teeth, clutching the fractured pulse to his chest. The vibrations in the splintering tube of glass died out against his palm, bitingly cold. 

The pressurized hatch swung open as Royd craned his head inside. He had a fire extinguisher in one hand, extending the other out to Robert with a shaken expression. 

“I’m so sorry,” he rumbled, dark eyes soft with distress. “You alright?”

“Mmyep. All good,” Robert forced a smile, pushing past the twinges along his spine. He unbuckled from the seat to accept Royd’s hand. The strong grip hauled him out, and the same large hand patted Robert on the shoulder almost timidly.

“We’ll get there, Mechaman,” he said, but there was an undercurrent of stress in his tone that wasn’t there before. Robert tilted his head up at him. 

“Royd,” he started gently, “I’m not much of an engineer, but I kinda grew up patching that thing together,” he gestured his thumb back to the collapsed mech. 

“And I can already tell how much better it is, even at this stage. The fine-motor torque you added to the finger joints? I could pick the petals off a flower,” he pinched his own fingertips together, and Royd’s bowed frame uncurled a little. 

“You noticed?”

“Oh, I noticed,” Robert laughed, “and I know you know your stuff, better than any Mechaman who’s ever meched. The issue isn’t you. It’s this,” he put out the hand still holding the damaged prototype. 

“The one thing my father didn’t leave schematics for. It’s not like I was gonna crack the original open to figure out how it ticked. I didn’t have a place like this to analyze it with, either. It’s always been a big question mark – one I failed to answer when I still had the chance. And now… here we are.”

Robert let the broken battery roll from side to side in his palm. Royd shifted on his feet, drawing in a slow breath. 

“To be real, brah,” he said haltingly, “I don’t think your dad made that. Met him one time: Mechaman Astral.” 

Robert gaped up at him.

“You did?”

“Breaking into RadioShack,” Royd chuckled, “Long story. He arrest me, other things happen, I end up here. My own mini-Phoenix Program,” he cocked his weight to one hip. “But we talk tech for a while before he bring me in. He a good gearhead, but no lab rat,” his nostalgic expression grew serious as he looked down at Robert’s open hand. 

“To be really real, man? That pulse, and the power suck on your suit – it don’t make sense. The thing itself don’t make sense. I go backwards, I go forwards,” Royd drew his hands together in the air, extending his fingers away and pulling them back in like he was stretching and compressing clay. “Start from suit, start from core. Tryna figure out how it exist. What reaction? What material? But I can’t –”

“Finally found you, thank fuck. Why didn’t someone say this shit’s in the basement.”

Where there was air before, there was Invisigal, next, standing offset between Royd and Robert as she braced her hands on her knees to catch her breath. Robert took an abortive step back, and Invisigal smirked as she straightened. 

“What, did I startle you again? Don’t get too excited, Blazer just sent me to –”

The words died on her lips as her gaze landed on the mechsuit. An odd pallor fell over her face as she stared at it. 

“Now you’re the one who shouldn’t be surprised,” Robert said, raising his eyebrows at the strange reaction. “You already knew about the whole Mechaman th–”

“I didn’t know you were repairing it already,” she snapped, still watching the motionless mech like it was a specter of something. She swept her eyes back to Robert, and seemed to rally back some of her attitude. “You ever jerk off in there? Or maybe I should ask how often. Bet the controls are all sticky.”

“Eugh, Visi. I gotta work on those controls.”

Royd shook his head in disgust. Robert’s mouth thinned, but he refrained from taking the bait. Invisigal had been… subdued, all week, ever since they had successfully avoided the cut on Monday. There had been far fewer clapbacks over the channel, and she remained surprisingly cooperative on missions, especially when paired with the calm and steady presence of Golem. There was a natural point drift as they resumed regular dispatching, but she wasn’t lagging any more than the rest. 

Robert wasn’t sure if he would call it progress – she seemed to be avoiding him in the building, though it could just as easily be the uncoordinated nature of the work they did – but a part of him suspected she was still thinking about their impromptu confrontation during the Heavy Metal mission. If she needed time on that, he was happy to give it to her. 

“...You said Blazer wanted me?”

He sidestepped her goading question altogether, and she curled her lip. 

“Well, don’t flatter yourself. I don’t know if she wants you,” Invisigal jeered, “but she said you two were scheduled to check in sometime today. She’s got back-to-back meetings, but said she’d be in the breakroom at the end of the day if you wanted to find her then.” 

Robert pulled his phone from his pocket, suddenly worried about how long he’d been in the lab. Sure enough, he had minutes to get back upstairs for the morning shift. 

“Right, I forgot. Glad she caught you. And thanks for the heads up,” he said, briefly glimpsing Invisigal’s surprised reaction to the gratitude as he turned to Royd. 

“I gotta go, but we’ll talk more soon?”

Royd smiled, his easy manner settling back into place. “For sure. Will let you know when it’s time for the next test – not givin’ up yet.”

He extended his fist, which Robert bumped with his own as he sped toward the stairs. 

*****

Near the end of the last shift, Punch-Up piped into the joint channel. 

“We headin’ to the pub after work? Robbo’s treat.” 

Robert opened his mouth – it wasn’t… actually a bad idea, morale-wise, even if his thin wallet was being volunteered – but Flambae responded before he had the chance to agree. 

“I can’t. My niece has a dance recital.” 

“Aw, party pooper,” Sonar moaned. Prism tsked at the complaint.

“We can do it another night, Batbrain. This man’s serious ‘bout them recitals.”

…He is?

Robert hadn’t seen much of Flambae this week, either – though he was marginally more confident that in this case it really was due to coincidence, not avoidance. The few times they caught each other in passing, Flambae paused long enough to say some kind of gruff hello, usually accompanied by a covert glance down. 

Each time, Robert was still wearing the arm brace; and each time, a little stiffness seemed to trickle out of Flambae’s posture, though none of the brief words they exchanged ever made mention of it.

A niece. With dance recitals. 

Robert processed the information intently, even as he turned on his mic. “How about next Friday, or the week after? We can figure out what’s good for everyone later. I’ll back Punch-Up’s generous offer.” 

Raucous approval. Robert hummed, closing out the day’s work as he prepared to head to the breakroom. He peered around as he entered – didn’t look like Blazer had arrived yet – but Waterboy was there, wiping down the counters with earnest vigor. 

“Hey, kid,” Robert greeted, pouring out the last of the cold coffee from the machine and rinsing the carafe. “How’s it going?”

“Rob – Robert! Hi!” 

Waterboy stood to attention like Robert had summoned him on roll call. His eyes flicked around anxiously behind his goggles, snagging somewhere below Robert’s neck, and his moist brow furrowed. 

“Your… your shirt,” he said, pointing close to the second button down. “It s-stained that day, huh?” 

Robert looked down at the area, sighing. He’d stitched up the subtle holes and dabbed hydrogen peroxide over the blood, which usually worked pretty well for the Mechaman jumpsuit; but there were still faint pink splotches spattered across the light uniform fabric. 

“Yeah, I kinda don’t have another one,” he said sheepishly. Waterboy waved his hands in a nearly comical Don’t worry! gesture.

“Th-that’s okay! We have – SDN has more, has better stain supplies in, in the closet. I’ll be right back!” 

“Oh, no, it’s really fine –”

Waterboy dashed out of the room, and Robert trailed off. Shrugging to himself, he sat down at the table. He was waiting for Blazer, anyways –

“Hey! Sorry for the wait.” 

…or not. He glanced up to give his welcome, but stopped short, surprised at what he saw. 

Blazer was in a floor-length gown, form-fitting and shoulderless, with a deep slit up one leg. It was the same color as her hero mask; she fiddled with a small bunch in the fabric as he looked at her. 

“SDN’s having this dinner, um, gala thing in a few hours,” she said hurriedly, “Radiant Valor: A Night of Triumph.”

Robert tried not to make a face at the blatantly propagandized title. He was apparently unsuccessful, as Blazer laughed at whatever she saw. She crossed the room, sweeping the skirted portion of the dress gracefully to the side to sit across from Robert. 

“I know, I know. But I have to make an appearance. I was supposed to go with Phenomaman, but I – don’t think he’ll be making it,” she frowned slightly. “Which is going to generate some weird attention. A lot of keen eyes looking for flaws.” 

“Well… there aren’t any,” Robert responded uncertainly. It was the objective truth, but Blazer seemed to glow a little, until they were interrupted by a scoff near the vending machine. 

For the second time that day, Invisigal materialized from the ether, leaning against the machine and scowling at Robert. 

“Seriously? There aren’t any? I came to watch because I thought it might be funny, but dude, your game is pathetic. She looks like a goddess,” Invisigal stomped over, grabbing Robert by the shoulder with one hand and gesturing aggressively across the table at Blazer with the other, “And that’s the best you’ve got?”

“I thought it was nice,” Blazer said, not batting an eye at Invisigal’s sudden appearance. The two women looked at each other with a potent energy wholly bewildering to Robert, but Blazer broke away to focus back on him.

“Anyways, I was going to ask: tonight, after the gala, would you be –” 

“I f-found it! And I looked – I double-checked, it should w-work on blood. Probably.” 

Waterboy came skidding back in, beelining for Robert like a man on a mission and completely disregarding the two other people in the room. He brandished a neon spray bottle with an alarming number of caution labels plastered across the side as he leaned close, taking hold of the fabric of Robert’s shirt in one slippery glove and yanking his torso forward in the process. Robert tried to discreetly pull back, leery of the spray. The cuts on his chest didn’t particularly bother him, but they were still healing, and whatever was in the bottle was going to sting like hell if it soaked through to his skin. 

“Blood?” Blazer said. 

“Waterboy –” Robert started. 

“What the fuck,” A fifth voice interjected, and Robert felt that pretty much summed it up. 

All eyes turned to the doorway, where a tall, familiar, and slightly smoking man was bristling at the threshold. 

Robert wasn’t sure what kind of picture they were painting in the moment, but as Flambae’s gaze roved from Blazer in her eveningwear, to Invisigal’s grip on his shoulder, to the hand spreading a growing wet patch across Robert’s chest as it pulled at his shirt, he doubted it was one that could be succinctly explained. When blazing eyes finally made contact with his own, Robert tried to silently emote the simplest possible message he could manage: 

Help?

“Um… tonight,” Blazer attempted to restart, evidently determined to plow forward. She glanced dubiously at the spray bottle in Waterboy’s grasp as she resumed. 

“Like I said, after the gala. Do you have any other –”

“He’s coming to my niece’s recital. Put those fuck-ass chemicals away,” Flambae interrupted. He crossed to the table in a few long strides, swiping the bottle from Waterboy’s hands and tossing it on the table. Robert felt a little bad for the way it made the latter deflate, even as he breathed a private sigh of relief. Invisigal pulled her hand from his shoulder, as well, backing away with wary eyes on Flambae. 

“You are?”

Blazer, again; the question was directed at Robert. She was watching him searchingly, eyes flicking between Robert and Flambae. 

“...Yeah,” Robert agreed as smoothly as he could, mind racing as he straightened his half-drenched shirt. “She, um, helped with dogsitting sometimes – before I reconnected with Chase – and started inviting me to some of her performances. Good kid.” 

He was lying through his teeth – he didn’t even know if Flambae’s niece was old enough to dogsit, and he hadn’t had Beef that long, regardless – but the other man nodded like it was obvious, glaring down at Robert. 

“She’s a great kid. Your dog’s lucky,” he growled. Blazer tilted her head. 

“And… you didn’t know about the relation, before?”

Robert knew she was doing the mental math on Mechaman’s arrest of Flambae, and he tried to think through how flimsy the excuse may or may not appear from her perspective. But it wasn’t impossible, right? They were all in the same general area of the South Bay. It was just a –

“Small world,” Flambae answered, and it was his irritated tone that really sold it. “We just figured it out today. Fucking stupid, having my boss there,” he tossed his head back, “but Gabina chooses her own audience.” 

Blazer’s probing look receded into something more resigned. She leaned back in her chair, smoothing out her dress. 

“Well then, good luck to all of us this evening,” she said graciously, though her gaze drifted back over to Robert. “And, maybe next time –”

“We’re gonna be late,” Flambae groused, reaching forward to grasp Robert’s right arm. He expected to be jerked from his chair; but the hold was surprisingly gentle, if burningly warm. He was pulled to his feet and tugged toward the door with firm efficiency. As it swung closed behind them, he heard the scrape of the chair he’d vacated, and Invisigal’s muffled voice. 

“Well, I’m gonna watch Typecast 2, tonight. You seen it?...”

Flambae toted Robert down the hall til they rounded a corner, completely out of earshot. Then he spun around, dropping Robert’s arm as he loomed over him. 

“The fuck was all that about –”

“– Thank you,” Robert said simultaneously, and they both paused, lapsing into silence. Flambae huffed, mouth twisting like he was biting back something. But it seemed he lost the struggle, more words tumbling from him like the hiss from a steaming kettle. 

“You should, fucking – you should come,” he blustered, furrowing his brow at Robert almost threateningly. “To the recital. For real.”

Robert stiffened, taken aback. “I didn’t – I wouldn’t invade your personal life like that. And I know you were just giving me an out. You don’t have to –”

“You made me wear those fucking bandages,” Flambae cut in, spreading his hands wide as if Robert needed the reminder, “all fucking afternoon, on Monday. Just in case someone asked. Just in case the lie needed proving. So just in case,”

He poked Robert in the sternum, finger sizzling against the damp fabric as he let it rest there. 

“Come to my niece’s damn recital.” 

Robert knew when he’d been beat. He held up his hands. 

“Alright,” he acquiesced, carefully overlooking the way the warmth seemed to jump through his shirt and seep into his chest. 

“I’ll come.”