Capítulo 2517: 100
Chapter 100: Interlude 10-f: Mild Mannered Mouse
Interlude 10.f: Mild Mannered Mouse
"Dry your tears and banish your fears, everyone! The Mouse is in the hizzy-tizzy-izzy-ouse!"
A moment of long silence greeted her, and Mouse Protector held her pose, arm raised triumphantly, legs spread, one hand on her hip, mouth pulled into a bright grin. Her signature pose, the one that all of her fans brought pictures of to get autographed.
And then, they all groaned. Faces fell into hands. Her audience looked at her only out of the corner of their eyes, like they were embarrassed just by being in the same room as her.
Not unusual at all, either. Her fans loved the ham and cheese she dished out, but just about every other cape she'd ever met hated it or hated her, because they were all a bunch of sticks in the mud who took everything way too seriously, and duh, no wonder the life expectancy of the average cape was pretty depressing just thinking about. When you took life too seriously, no one got out alive.
"Come on, you bunch of Grumpy Guses! The world's favorite superhero has decided to come and brighten your day! The least you could do is smile!"
The others sized each other up with considering glances, side long looks and shifty eyes, like they were a bunch of teenagers having a long, silent debate about whose turn it was to step up and talk to their crazy, crotchety old grandma, and they couldn't come to an agreement which one of them it would be.
Even Assault, her usual partner in crime who hammed it up with her on the rare occasion she visited, looked like he'd rather be anywhere else at all.
Good grief. When had all of these pro heroes become so dour? You'd think she was trying to drag them to go skydiving, and most of them wouldn't even break a leg if their parachute failed. Well, half of them wouldn't. A third? The point was that they were treating her like she was asking them to do something completely ridiculous instead of just giving her a smile and a pity laugh.
Finally, it seemed Gallant had elected himself to represent them, and he turned to her from his spot at their sad little table to offer her…well, underneath that helmet, it was probably a smile.
"It's…good to see you, Mouse Protector," he said in a friendly, well-meaning voice. Diplomatic, that was the term. The kind of voice you used when you were trying not to offend someone, but were really asking them to please go away.
The others (Aegis, Triumph, Velocity, Assault, Battery, and Dauntless) murmured a half-hearted agreement.
"Boo! Hiss!" said Mouse Protector. She jerked her thumb downwards, like Nero at the Coliseum. "You guys can do better than that! Where's the Protectorate spirit? Back when I was a Ward, I had way more gumption than you guys! Go team!"
The group glanced around at each other again, half like they had no idea what they were supposed to be doing (the young'uns who had just graduated to the Protectorate in the past few years and hadn't met her before) and half like they weren't getting paid enough for this (the old guard who had been around long enough for one of her sporadic visits). Mouse Protector suddenly felt incredibly old, even though she hadn't even hit thirty, yet.
Nope! No time to get down in the dumps. She was still in the prime of her life, the springtime of her youth. She wasn't some old fuddy duddy looking back and reminiscing about how things were back when she was young, talking about all the new-fangled technology and the whippersnappers running around with their smartphones and mp3 players.
"Ugh." Mouse Protector sagged dramatically, letting her arms fall limply towards her knees. "So depressing, so depressing. This is why I never joined the Protectorate after I left the Wards. It's like everyone forgets how to have fun once you become an 'official' superhero." She shot back up. "You need to let loose and live a little! You'll burn out like a raisin in the sun if you can't find a little fun in your job!"
After a hesitant moment of silence, Assault started, "Isn't a raisin what happens after a grape gets dried out —"
Mouse Protector pointed a finger at him imperiously. "I won't accept any lip from you, mister hero! There's no room in this team for a pendant…a pardon…a-a, um, parsley…"
She stumbled over the word theatrically, waiting for one of them to pick up on the bait. She didn't have to wait long.
"Pedantic?" Gallant offered.
Mouse Protector's finger swung over to him. "For that thing, yes! We have a mission, men — and woman — and there's no time to get bogged down in the seaman-ticks!"
Another pause. Gallant broke it again. "Um, do you mean semantics?"
"Those, too!"
The group glanced at each other, again, half confused and looking for what they were supposed to do and the other half exasperated. Not good enough. Her job wasn't finished until they were all scratching their heads and trying to figure out what she was going on about.
"And what mission do you have to get around to today, Mouse Protector?" a familiar voice asked from behind her, amused.
Mouse Protector spun around, grinning broadly. "Em-n-ems! Oh, how I've missed you!"
She flung her arms wide and threw herself at her oldest friend, who ducked under her hug and let her stumble and trip to the floor. The familiar steps to an old routine, only they weren't teenagers anymore and the eyes that crinkled back at her were more shadowed and creased from many sleepless nights than they had been back then.
"Fiddlesticks," she said, crossing her arms with an exaggerated pout. "Foiled again."
"What trouble are you trying to drag the Protectorate into this time?" asked Miss Militia.
"Oh, you know me." Mouse Protector sprang back up to her feet, grinning again. "Mischief of the highest order. Only the very best kind of trouble will do for the Mouse Protector."
"You realize, of course," Miss Militia drawled, "that Legend isn't here to bail you out if you tie-dye all of the PRT uniforms, again."
"They never proved that was me!" Mouse Protector protested.
One brown eyebrow rose. "You still had the dye packs hidden under your bunk. I was there when they dragged them out and shouted at you for your unprofessionalism."
"Lies!" shouted Mouse Protector. "Lies and slander!"
"You admitted it —"
"I was framed!" she wailed. "Framed, I tell you! Framed! Reed was the one who did it! He stuffed all those packets under my bed to shift suspicion off of him! I'm blameless!"
"Your hands still had the stains from the dye," said Miss Militia, cruelly taking humor in her suffering. For shame, Em-n-ems, with your schadenfreude. For shame.
Mouse Protector crossed her arms and shoved her nose into the air. "I maintain my innocence. I plead the Fifth."
Miss Militia chuckled.
"You said that back then, too. It didn't get you out of trouble then, either."
No, it definitely hadn't. It had been funny to watch, though, seeing the local PRT commander's face turn so many interesting shades of purple. She hadn't known some of them were even humanly possible, back then.
But it had done its job and gotten most of the old team to laugh, or at least smile.
Miss Militia sighed. "It's good to see you, Mouse Protector," she said wistfully.
Mouse Protector hid a smile of her own. "Oh, is it? Gee, I wouldn't know. I haven't seen you in years, and you're acting like it was yesterday?"
A muscle in Miss Militia's cheek jumped. "Mouse…"
"You don't call, you don't visit, you don't even send a postcard with 'wishing you were here'—"
"Mouse."
"Why, if you settled down and had a kid, I wouldn't find out until some snot-nosed brat showed up calling me Auntie M —"
"Mouse."
"For shame, Em-n-ems. No, you don't even deserve to be called after chocolate. For shame, Skittles. For shame."
Under her breath, Miss Militia said, "Melanie."
Mouse Protector gasped dramatically and stumbled back, clutching at her chest. "Em-n-ems!" she rasped weakly. "You used the M word! My one, true weakness!" She pressed the back of one hand to her helmet, where her forehead would be. "Oh, I'm feeling faint! Gooey, even! I'm melting! Melting! Oh, what a world, what a world! Oh, what a world!"
Miss Militia sighed. "You haven't changed a bit."
Mouse Protector grinned and let her arms drop. "It's been too long, girlfriend."
This time, when she went in for a hug, Miss Militia let her. She even hugged her back, the trooper.
Mouse Protector might have held on for a little longer than necessary. She might have squeezed her friend a little harder than she needed to. Somewhere in there, she might have taken a deep, shuddering breath to help keep a lid on the swirling nostalgia and longing and half a dozen other emotions that threatened to break free.
But anyone who saw any of that was obviously imagining things. Obviously. She was Mouse Protector, after all. Protector of cheese and purveyor of ham, sworn enemy to all things drab and dour. She didn't do serious and solemn unless she was being forced into it.
After she stepped back and let go, she jerked her head at the rest of the group, who mostly just looked confused. "What say we ditch the old fuddy duddies and go paint the town red, like old times, huh?"
Miss Militia just arced one eyebrow again. "You realize the only one of them who's older than me is probably Dauntless?"
"P-shaw!" Mouse Protector waved it off. "Details, sister! Details!"
"And you're only a few years younger than me."
"That is a dirty, rotten lie, and I won't stand for it!"
So, naturally, she plopped down on the floor and sat.
Miss Militia looked down at her, eyebrow still raised, eyes crinkling with her smile. Mouse Protector was actually kind of jealous, if she was honest. Being able to emote so well with just your eyes and brow was a top tier skill, no joke; it was why the part of the face most official heroes left open was the mouth area, so everyone could see the most important part of their expressions.
The others watched her, confused, while the young'uns looked at their seniors like they weren't sure whether or not they should laugh. Of course they were supposed to laugh. It was funny, it was meant to be funny. Ninety percent of everything she did was aimed towards humor in some way, shape, or form.
Because if she didn't make fun of it all, she'd be locking herself in her room and sobbing herself to sleep.
Nope! More depressing thoughts, and she refused to entertain them. Begone! Begone! Back, I say! Back to the pit with you!
Gallant glanced in her direction, and she felt the electric jolt as their eyes met through his helmet and her visor, like she'd suddenly been stripped naked. So she did the only thing she could do and wielded her petulance like a weapon to jerk her head away from his.
"Mouse," began Miss Militia.
"Nope!" Mouse Protector shook her head.
"Mouse…"
"Nuh-uh! You called me old! I'm not going to forgive you until you agree to take the day off so we can reminisce about the old days and talk about what a handful your kids are!" She jutted her chin out mulishly. "That's what old ladies do, after all."
Finally, Miss Militia sighed and shook her head.
"Okay," she said. "I'll put a call in with Piggot and take a personal day. We can spend the rest of the day together, reminiscing about the old days and talking about what a handful my kids are. Okay?"
Mouse Protector shot to her feet and swept her up into a hug. "You're the best, Em-n-ems!"
She swung her friend around a few times, then set her down back on her feet. "I'll wait for you at the front entrance, okay? Bring a change of civvies and we'll get ready at my hotel room! We'll have loads of fun, you'll see!"
Miss Militia shook her head again, but Mouse Protector turned to the rest of the group and gave them a grin and a cheeky wave. "It was nice to meet all of you whippersnappers! Make sure you have the proper greeting prepared, next time! Mouse Protector, out! Peace!"
And then she teleported out.
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
"You know," Hannah said as they stepped out of the hotel Melanie was staying at about an hour later, "I didn't think to ask about it before, but how did you get onto the Rig? I didn't think your markers lasted that long."
Melanie shrugged. "They don't. I just asked Miss Piggy for permission to visit an old friend."
Hannah groaned. "I've told you to stop calling her that. Bad enough my Wards still do it, I don't need you encouraging them, too."
"You did," Melanie replied smugly, "I just don't care."
Hannah shook her head, letting out a short breath through her nostrils. "That always was the biggest problem you had, back then," she said wistfully. "You just didn't care about all of the rules and regulations. I don't know how the Triumvirate put up with your mouth, sometimes."
"With great patience," Melanie said with a grin. "Although I'm pretty sure Eidolon thought about strangling me, sometimes."
"Not the others?"
Melanie shrugged.
"Alexandria's too pragmatic. Legend's too polite. Was. Were. Whatever. You know what I mean. And Hero…"
Too late, Melanie realized she'd brought the mood down by mentioning the Protectorate's first great tragedy, the one that had ended what the talking heads on TV called the Golden Age of superheroes.
"…was the one laughing with me, once the stuckups left the room," she finished lamely.
They fell into a moment of silence. Melanie wondered if Hannah felt the same way as she did, like the so-called Inaugural Wards Team had just fallen apart after Hero died. He really had been the heart of the team, and no one had really been able to fill the void. No one had really tried, either.
"Is that why you decided to leave?" asked Hannah. "Because you didn't care for the rules and regulations?"
Melanie glanced around. There wasn't anyone nearby enough to eavesdrop, but better safe than sorry, right?
"Let's not talk about that here," she said. "We can do that later, when we have a little privacy."
"Fair enough," said Hannah. "So? Where to, first?"
Melanie laughed. "What're you asking me for? I'm just visiting! You're the one who lives here."
Hannah chuckled, too.
"Okay. So what do you want to do, first?"
Melanie's stomach rumbled. Hannah glanced at her, and she laughed a little awkwardly to cover her embarrassment. "Ahahaha… Maybe get some lunch? I didn't have time to eat before I got on my flight to come visit, so I'm kinda famished."
Hannah nodded.
"Okay," she said. "I know this pretty decent place on the Boardwalk, just opened up a few months ago. Italian might be a little on the heavy side for lunch, but their pasta dishes are to die for."
Melanie's stomach rumbled again. She grinned. "It looks like we've come to an agreement, then! Or you and my stomach have, at least."
They made their way to the nearby parking lot, chatting about inanities all the while, and came upon Hannah's beast of a motorcycle. Melanie turned to her friend with a grin. "You know, I forgot to ask last time, but you do have your license for this thing, right?"
Hannah snorted. "Of course I do."
"And this thing's certifications are all up to date, right?" asked Melanie.
"Updated a month ago."
She eyed the thing dubiously. "I dunno. This thing still looks like too much for a poor, old woman like me. Why, I might just break a hip!"
Hannah tossed her the spare helmet, and she caught it effortlessly. Sometimes, the perks that came with her power were really awesome. "Just put your helmet on, Auntie M."
Melanie grinned. "My, Hannah. You really know how to get a girl's motor running, don't you?"
Hannah's only reply was to turn on her beast and rev the motor. Melanie clambored astride it and sat down behind her, wrapping her arms around her friend's waist. "Just so you know," she said over the thing's rumbling growl, "this isn't my first time, but I haven't done this for a while, so I might be a little —"
Hannah's beast jerked into motion, and whatever Melanie had been about to say was lost to its roar as they pulled out of the parking lot and started on down the road.
A ten or so minute ride later, they were pulling up on the Boardwalk and had to slow to a crawl; the crowd of pedestrians parted in front of them, but no one gave them a second glance.
Well. Except for the horny bachelors who sent them some appreciative looks when they thought Melanie wasn't looking. Good to know that she could still turn a few heads when she went past. Next time she went for a ride with Hannah, she'd have to buy a leather catsuit and see what they thought of that.
The Mouse Protector ain't an old maid just yet! Hahaha!
"You know," Melanie said when they climbed off the thing in a specially cordoned parking space, "this place is in a lot better shape than I thought it would be."
"What do you mean?" asked Hannah.
"Well." Melanie looked around. "I mean, wasn't this destroyed by Leviathan, last year? I guess I thought it would take longer to fix it."
Hannah's brow furrowed and a complicated expression stretched across her face. "It probably would have," she admitted, "if it was fixed normally."
"Normally?"
As opposed to…what? Had Eidolon dropped out of the sky and pulled some power out of his ass to make it good as new?
Hannah shook her head. "Later," she promised. "Lunch first."
Melanie's stomach rumbled again, as though to remind her, yes, she was still hungry, why was she outside dicking around when she could be filling her belly with warm, delicious food?
"Lunch first," she agreed.
Hannah led her into a small restaurant with something simple for a name — written in italics with neon lights, and Melanie had never been good with italics — a quaint, little place that was so small it had to have outdoor seating, too. By looks alone, it was completely and utterly forgettable.
Hannah turned out to be right, though. Their pasta was to die for. Melanie wasn't sure she hadn't, by the time it was all said and done and time to pay the bill. Hannah, bless her, was the one who covered it.
After lunch, they made a quick stop for desert at a nearby ice cream parlor and settled down at a sort of observation deck situated to give a good view of the bay. Two years ago, during her last visit, Melanie wouldn't have figured it worth bothering; with the bay clogged up by all of those sunken ships, what was there to look at, except a depressing graveyard where so many hopes and dreams had been buried?
Now, though… Now, the bay was empty and glistening, and in the distance, a vast castle jutted upwards towards the sky, brickwork gleaming white in the midday sun. When the clouds shifted just so, a trace of gold gleamed from among the white, and when the wind caught the banner just right, it was like something straight out of Lord of the Rings.
"So," said Hannah once their ice cream was finished.
"So," Melanie echoed.
"We were talking about why you left," said Hannah.
Melanie shrugged. "I don't think it's that big of a deal. I mean, I guess that was it? The rules and regulations stuff. You know? They were always trying to tell me how to act, what to say, what to dress like, how to stand, how to talk, how to do this and that. I think if they could have, they would've tried telling me how to piss."
"It's not that bad," said Hannah.
"Maybe it isn't," Melanie agreed. "Maybe I was just overreacting. Maybe I was still just a kid and I was thinking like a kid when I decided to go independent rather than sticking with the Wards and the Protectorate. But I don't think I could be the kind of hero I am now if I had stayed with it. I'd have so many people telling me what I could and couldn't do, and everyone else but me would get a say in my costume and how I acted out in public."
Just about the only thing she could see the PR chuckleheads letting her keep was her name, and even then, more because of the legacy than because they thought it was a good and proper name. Everything else? They'd probably make her get rid of it. The jokes, the puns, the fun, and the ham and cheese. Because it wasn't professional.
"I guess…the Protectorate is just too serious, maybe," said Melanie. "I wouldn't be me if I couldn't be me, you know? And I think the Protectorate would always be telling me I had to be someone else, so I just didn't want to be bogged down with all of that."
In order for Mouse Protector to be Mouse Protector, she had to be Mouse Protector, and that meant no one telling her she couldn't spank villains with her usual ham. They'd be telling her she had to be a proper hero, all serious and dour, with bright, spangly colors and a patriotic motto, and…and that just felt suffocating.
"I'm not so sure about that," said Hannah. "I think…you've become too iconic, these days, for them to just toss it all out and make you start over. Maybe things would've been different back then, but you're too entrenched, now."
Melanie hummed. "Mm. Then maybe I just don't like taking orders. Me and authority don't get along too well, you know?"
Hannah chuckled.
"Now, that, I can believe. You always were the one getting in trouble with the adults, back then."
What else was there to say? Melanie had always been a bit of a rebel. She was too wild to be tamed, and she refused to be anyone's kept mouse. For Justice cannot be caged! Only channeled!
Oh, that sounded like a good one, she'd have to remember it.
"Anyway, what brought this up?" Melanie asked. "You've had ten years to ask, why'd you wait until now?"
Hannah didn't answer right away. When Melanie glanced over, she was staring out at the bay. At the castle.
"I guess," Hannah said at length, "Armsmaster leaving last year… It made me wonder if your reasons were anything like his."
"Yeah, I heard about that. It was all over the news for a week. What was that all about?"
The newscasters had all been very vague, and as the PRT was wont to do, they'd been incredibly tightlipped about what had happened. PHO had taken the story and run, though, with all sorts of crazy theories and tinfoil hat ideas. Melanie was pretty confident none of those was right.
"Director Tagg wasn't…being entirely reasonable," said Hannah. "I'm not entirely sure about the extent of it, but… Apparently, he pushed a little too far trying to punish Armsmaster for a judgement call he made. Armsmaster resigned immediately afterwards and joined up with her."
She jutted her chin towards the castle in the distance. Melanie eyed it, kind of surprised.
"Really?"
"Really. They've been seen together gallivanting across the countryside, when she isn't tagging along with one of her other teammates."
"I mean, I'd heard that she was putting her own team together," Melanie hedged. "But it was mostly rumors and stuff. I wasn't sure how much of it was even true."
"Apparently, it's invite only," said Hannah. "I know Armsmaster, Vista, and Clockblocker all joined up with her, and Tattletale and Panacea were basically a given, since they're her friends, but all of the people who try and visit the castle to apply walk away empty handed."
Melanie blinked.
"People try and go to the castle to join up with her super action squad?"
"There's been a line of independents from across the country trying to join since last summer," Hannah said sourly. "Even a few Wards and Protectorate heroes who decided they liked her better. Or maybe they just wanted a piece of the Endslayer's fame. Who knows."
Melanie snorted. "Bet that goes over real well with her." She looked at the castle and tried to imagine a tall girl in purple and gold staring back. It was too far to see her even if she was. "So, what's she like, anyway? You can't really tell with the internet, but folks who say they've met her say she's kinda intense."
"Intense." Hannah sounded like she was trying the word out. "Yes, I guess that's a good word for her. Determined is another one. Once she sets her mind to something, she doesn't let anything stop her. Even when maybe she should." She sighed. "I can't say I knew her all that well. If I'm being honest with you, Melanie, she scared me."
It startled a laugh out of Melanie. "You? Scared of a fifteen-year-old?"
"A fifteen-year-old with enough power to conquer a country and who might just convince herself she needed to do it," said Hannah. "She took the city, Mel. Walled the whole place off for hours and I'm not sure we could've done anything about it if she decided she wanted to keep it that way."
"I mean, I guess?" Melanie couldn't really say she understood. But then, she hadn't been there, and she'd never been to one of the Simurgh Containment Zones; impenetrable walls going up around a city was probably much scarier when it was happening to your city. "But, like, they're not there anymore, right? And she hasn't put them up since?"
"Because she hasn't had any reason to, yet," Hannah replied bitterly. "There were a few who tried to muscle their way in on things after the Empire got taken down, but she turned them all out within the week. They were all small timers, though. How long before someone like the Butcher gets it into their head to take a shot?"
"Didn't she take out the Slaughterhouse Nine? Whoever wants to go head to head with her, I'll wish them luck…and deliver their eulogy when it's all over."
Hannah sighed. "I don't know, Mel. Maybe I am being a little paranoid about it, but… I've seen what she could become, if she doesn't have anyone to keep her grounded. Maybe it was only a glimpse and maybe I only saw the very surface. But if anyone or anything pushes her that far, again…I'm afraid that the earnest, awkward heroine I met that night in April will just cease to exist."
And what was Melanie supposed to say to that? What could she say? That it would all be okay? Things would turn out alright, because they always had? None of that was true. Hadn't been true, ever since that fateful day when the Siberian ripped Hero in half and tore a hole in the idea of superheroes itself.
And even if that had never happened and things were still sunshine and rainbows — relatively speaking — all she knew about the girl everyone was calling Hopebringer and Endslayer was a few soundbites from her interview after Leviathan's death and whatever tidbits she could gather from the people online who said they'd met her and probably actually hadn't. How could she possibly tell her friend that a complete stranger wasn't going to flip out and go psycho killer on everyone?
A shrill beep derailed her train of thought (Ha! Gonna keep that one in my back pocket, too!) and Hannah retrieved her cellphone to read the caller ID. She grimaced.
"I have to take this," she said to Melanie. Melanie shrugged.
"Go ahead."
Hannah stood up and walked away, far enough to be out of earshot, and answered her phone. It left Melanie alone with her thoughts.
Things had gotten so crazy, the last year or so. So many big names kept disappearing from the board. Sure, maybe the Empire Eighty Eight hadn't exactly been the hugest, but they were one of the most famous and most coherent Neonazi groups in America. All of a sudden, they were rounded up and their mooks disbanding into smaller, disjointed groups. Before that, it was the Azn Bad Boys (what a silly, juvenile name; she would have loved to get a chance to mock them for it), and later, it was the Fallen and the Slaughterhouse Nine.
In the middle of all of that, Leviathan was gone, and suddenly, the Endbringers weren't so invincible anymore.
The world was starting to change, or at least America's little corner of it, and Melanie wasn't sure what to think.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw someone take a seat at her bench, and she glanced over. A teenage girl with a wide mouth, big, green eyes, and long dark hair sat next to her and blinked back through a pair of round framed glasses.
"Hello," said the girl.
Melanie offered her a smile. "Hi."
"Sorry, was this seat taken?" the girl asked. "You just looked kinda lonely, so…"
Melanie looked over at Hannah, but Hannah was deep in conversation on her phone, back turned as she talked to whoever was on the other end. She shook her head and gave the glasses girl another smile. "No. My friend over there is just on the phone and I'm waiting for her to finish up, that's all."
"Oh."
The girl settled down and relaxed. They fell into a companionable silence for a few moments, and Melanie took her eyes off the girl to gaze back out at the bay.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" the girl asked suddenly.
"The castle?"
"The castle, too, but I mean the bay," said the girl. "I'm…not sure how long you've lived here —"
"Oh, I don't," Melanie told her. "But I've visited before. My friend is the one who lives here, I'm just dropping in to say hi."
The girl nodded. "Well, then you've seen the Boat Graveyard, right?"
"Back when there was one, yeah."
"I think…a lot of people saw it as a metaphor for the city," said the girl. "A mass grave filled with the festering corpses of past glories, and dreams buried in a shallow grave. But now…" She smiled a little smile. "The bay is clean and clear. The gangs are gone, or at least any meaningful form of them is, and the people of this city have a fresh start. A clean slate, to try and build off of. And in the distance…"
"Paradise?" Melanie quipped wryly.
The girl flushed. "Well, I mean, it's easy to think that way, isn't it? The castle is very beautiful. I think the city even has a few viewing stations set up so you can get a better look at it, if you want."
"I guess so." Kind of crazy to think of it, really. "Say, have you ever met her?"
"Her?"
"You know, Apocrypha."
The girl smiled a little. "I guess you could say that, yeah. I've met her once or twice."
"What did you think?"
"Well, she's a hero, isn't she?" said the girl.
"A hero, huh?" Melanie had been hearing a lot of that. But not everything online was accurate, and not everyone was singing her praises. "I hear she's gotten herself tangled up in some pretty crazy stuff. Have you heard about the Mathers trial?"
"Who hasn't?" the girl asked wryly.
"From what I hear, Apocrypha took her powers away, because she was too dangerous to let loose otherwise."
"Yeah, that's right."
"And then a month later, she Mastered that druggie cape into getting rehab."
"Well, I mean, should she not have?" the girl hedged.
"I dunno, sounds kinda shifty to me," said Melanie. "I mean, if all you've got is a Master power, I guess you have to make do with it, you know? But she's supposed to be some super awesome Trump with a gazillion powers. Why Master that druggie if she could've just bundled her up and dropped her off at the nearest rehab center instead? And if she could Master the druggie, why not Mama Mathers?"
The million dollar question, huh? Why was one okay, but the other wasn't? Melanie wasn't afraid to admit that Master powers scared her — they scared a lot of people — but she wasn't sure whether you could really say it was okay to use them to reform some of the nastier supervillains. Because once you started brainwashing the villains, how long before it became okay to brainwash everyone?
"I think," the girl said slowly, "there's a difference between mercy and compassion."
Mercy and compassion?
"How do you mean?" asked Melanie.
"What happened to Mama Mathers was mercy," the girl explained. "Apocrypha could have killed her, or crippled her, or even rewrote her brain and Mastered her into being a good person. She didn't. Instead, she took away her powers so she couldn't hurt anyone with them ever again and gave her over to the law to decide what her punishment should be."
"And the druggie cape?" Melanie prompted.
"Compassion," answered the girl. "Squealer — the druggie cape — had nowhere left to go and no one to turn to. She didn't have many options left, and most of them were just more bad choices. They'd all lead her back to more drugs and more self-destruction. The only one she was going to keep hurting was herself. What Apocrypha did was break the cycle of her self-destruction so she could move on and save herself. She just used a Master power to give Squealer the nudge needed to start putting her life back together."
Mercy and compassion, huh… Maybe there was something of a point, there. A thin line, but then wasn't that how superheroes tended to be? Melanie had gotten good at knocking her rogue's gallery around without doing anything permanent, but there were plenty of heroes who strode closer to the line of vigilantism than heroism.
Might not be quite the same thing. But every power could be used for good or evil, when it came down to it, and sometimes the line between one and the other was just who it was used on.
"And the Slaughterhouse Nine?" asked Melanie. "She killed all of them, didn't she?"
The girl's mouth quirked and she cocked an eyebrow. "Are you really trying to argue that the Slaughterhouse Nine should've been spared when most of them had kill counts in the triple digits?"
When you put it that way… "No, I guess not."
"Besides," the girl went on, "I hear they never found either Bonesaw or Burnscar. Maybe she stripped them of their powers and sent them off to an asylum for therapy."
"And maybe Eidolon shits rainbows," said Melanie. The girl laughed.
"Well, who knows," she said slyly. "If I ever get the chance, maybe I'll ask him, see what he says. There's got to be a power for that, right?"
Melanie laughed, now, too. Oh man, what she wouldn't give for a chance to see the look on Eidolon's face if he ever got asked that question. And imagining Eidolon up on a billboard, holding up a hand and giving a thumbs up, a rainbow stretching behind him, captioned with, There's a power for that! God, just imagining it was enough to send her into a fresh bout of giggles.
When she came down from her fit and managed to get herself back together, she took a deep breath and asked, "So I guess you think she's doing a good job, then?"
The girl shrugged. "I don't know if I'm the right person to answer that," she admitted. "I think she's trying her best, and maybe things don't always work out perfectly, but it's the trying that matters, you know? Being able to keep going and stick to your guns. Doing what you know is right even when a bunch of people try to tell you it's wrong."
"Some people would call that a loose cannon." Melanie would know. That term had been tossed in her direction often enough for her to be intimately familiar with it.
"Way back when, we called those heroes," the girl replied.
She sighed and started to stand, smoothing out the wrinkles in her pants. "But these days, it's not enough to just be one by yourself. In the old days, the world was so much smaller, so one man could go gallivanting through the countryside and solve all the problems along his way. Now? You need a team, a bunch of people who think like you do and believe what you do and are willing to stand next to you, and I think, without her team, even Apocrypha would be only half the hero she could be."
Something squirmed in Melanie's gut.
"Not everyone can be lucky enough to find a bunch of people like them."
"Then you just have to keep looking."
The girl reached up and pulled her glasses off, and Melanie's eyes went wide as she suddenly realized exactly who she'd been talking to all this time.
"And once you find them," said Apocrypha, green eyes staring straight into Melanie's soul, "let them know that they don't have to walk through hell alone."
She glanced over in Hannah's direction, and Melanie couldn't stop herself from looking, too, at her friend who was still talking into her phone, completely and totally unaware that the superhero they'd been discussing so hotly was less than thirty feet away. When she turned back a second later, Apocrypha was gone.
But sitting next to her on her bench was a small, innocuous little charm, made of gold, with a swirling wave pattern etched into the surface. On the other side were three, simple letters:
C S O
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
NOTES
Extra long chapter ahoy!
So originally, I tried to imagine Mouse Protector as a grown up Radical Edward. The problem is, my editor has never watched Cowboy Bebop, which made it rather difficult to ask him to keep track and make sure I managed it.
MP was kinda in limbo. I tried to find a good timeline for her time in the Wards and her death and even which city she might have been in, but Mouse seems to be one of those minor characters who inexplicably became far more popular in the fandom than Wildbow ever expected. A lot of the details about her are just unknown.
For some reason, I had it in my head she worked out of Boston, but when I think about it, that can't be right at all. In any case, her encounter with the Nine got butterflied away, so she gets to live. And wreak holy havoc on the Protectorate ENE's sanity.
Special thanks to all my Patrons who have stayed with me this far, through all the rocky moments and dry stretches. You guys are the best.
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