Chapter 1: Unpleasant Surprises
Luna Hellsing, aka the junior superheroine Moonless, was in for quite a few surprises that Friday.
Unexpected surprises
The first came at lunch, when she texted her parents when are you picking me up for the mission. She, and the collection of misfits her parents had forced her to team up, was supposed to be hunting down a monster all the way out in Aslton State Forest. It wasn’t feasible to bike there from her school on the oustskirts of Tranquility City.
The reply came back, We’re heading back to Egypt this weekend. You should be able to find a ride with your team.
It wasn’t until the fourth or fifth time that she read it that Luna was able to wrap her head around the idea. She was being sent in to fight a monster unsupervised—at least, unsupervised beyond her team. A team that consisted of her, a barely reformed villain, a literal child, and a minotaur. And while the last was actually pretty heroic, he’d been brought to earth against his will less than a week ago.
And her parents were going to be in Egypt? On plane? As in, not traveling by Azurite’s portals?
Who the hell was going to come to her rescue if she needed it?
“Dakota supposedly hunts in that forest. I guess I’ll go see how she gets there.” In hindsight, it had been exceedingly silly not to get Dakota’s contact info at the Union last Wednesday. Fortunately, the freshman had lunch at the same time as Luna’s Friday free period, which let her just walk around looking for her.
Finding Dakota came with the next big surprise of the day. She was eating a bag lunch on one of the benches outside the side door. Alone. And the way the freshman quickly wiped her eyes when spying Luna suggested she might have been crying. “Oh.” Dakota’s upbeat cheer probably would have sounded genuine if Luna hadn’t just seen her crying. “I didn’t know you had lunch this period.”
“I’m supposed to be in study hall. Are you okay?”
Dakota flashed a smile. “I’m better than okay. I’m a super hero.” After a moment she deflated a little, and looking aside, she deadpanned, “I’m just a little surprised that doesn’t seem to matter to anyone.”
Luna looked the younger (and, frustratingly, slightly taller) woman up and down. She was a plain-looking, shy freshman wearing a too-large tee-shirt and stained jeans. The tee-shirt had a print of an anime girl in a very short skirt wielding a bow. The cheap screen-print was already starting to peel. Dakota’s hair was worn in twin braids that may have just been a Native American thing, but certainly wasn’t fashionable. She didn’t bother with makeup, and the less said of her giant, nerdy glasses, the better. Every part of that seemed like the sort of thing that would get mocked by the civilians here.
“We basically live in the super hero capital of the world. It’s really not that special.” It hadn’t been enough for Luna to avoid getting mocked for her cape, even if carrying around the shadows close to her was kind of important for the sophomore’s powers—not that she said that.
Dakota shrank down even more. “They like Shine Star.”
Luna rolled her eyes. “Shine Star is a glorified advertising mascot. She not part of the Justice Union, and barely even has powers.” When Dakota flinched at that, Luna hastily added (with what had to be the fakest smile in history), “Nothing as cool as Artemis’s trick arrows, right?”
That perked the freshman right up. “Yeah. I guess I do have a pretty cool super power now.” Then, slightly more somber, she added, “I just thought it would make more of a difference.”
“You’ve been stalking me for six months. Do I seem like miss popular?”
“But you’re so cool!” Dakota actually took Luna’s hands, and managed to put on a look of pure adoration. “You get to hang out with the Justice Union, like all the time.”
“Yeah.” Luna did her best to pull her hand free without being overly rude. “Did you ever think that I do that because the band geeks are mad at me because I keep missing big recitals to save the world?” Or at least get thrown into the Atlantic while trying. “Look, the kids at this school suck and we don’t need any of them.”
“Scions of Shadow forever.” Dakota sounded like she might have been joking at first. Luna still couldn’t believe that had ended up as their team name. “Oh, we need, like, a battle cry or catch phrase. Hmm.”
Luna pressed both her hands into her face. She could not keep up with this girl’s mood swings. “We really don’t. Did you know we’re going to be on our own tonight?”
“What? Yeah.” Dakota gave a slightly confused smile. “They said it was a C-class mission.”
“Usually, junior members get supervised on Cs,” Luna pointed out.
“Junior teams are allowed on Cs.” Dakota raised an eyebrow. “Oh, but I bet you were on a ton of Cs with your parents.” Then her eyes got really big. “Oh my god! Are you going on your first unsupervised mission tonight, too?”
Luna pinched the bridge of her nose. “Dakota, remember when you were following me, and I had to fight that giant snake?”
“Oh. I guess you weren’t supervised for that, huh?”
“Try to, you know, think, before you speak.”
“Hehe, good tip.” Dakota smiled like she was part of the joke, not the butt of it.
“Anyway. I just wanted to make sure you had a ride for tonight.”
“Oh, yeah.” Dakota glanced around, smiling like she had a big secret, before whispering, “Rorn is going to carry me!”
Staring in shock for a few seconds didn’t make that make any additional sense. “What, the minotaur?”
“Yeah, he’s staying with me and my brother, so I can just bike home, and then he can run the distance. He’s not as fast as a car, especially on, like, the freeway, but he can do the back roads almost-mostly as fast. We tried it out last night, and it was soo cool!”
It sounded pretty far from cool, but Luna didn’t say anything. She was too busy failing to wrap her head around the idea that the minotaur was staying with Dakota’s family. It probably had come up at the Union on Wednesday, but she’d definitely missed it.
Either way, it didn’t sound like something Luna wanted to catch a ride with. “Good,” she said. “I just wanted to make sure you had a ride.”
…
Walking back to class, Luna forced herself to accept that she was going to have to ask Pandora. Pandora, who had defended her supervillain father by throwing Luna into the Atlantic just over a month ago. When her parents had decided that she was the perfect candidate to give the barely ex-supervillain a friend “her age” last weekend, they’d said the older girl would be happy to show off her sports car. However, when Luna had gotten there (on the bus), Pandora had been quite hostile to the suggestion.
But if Pandora didn’t want her near the car, that would be a great way to show just how stupid this whole team idea was. She smiled when she sent the older teen the text.
It was perhaps the biggest surprise of the day when Pandora replied with the single word. Sure. It was the first time she’d seen Pandora text punctuation.
“What in darkness?” Luna asked, staring at her phone. That couldn’t be right. Pandora had suggested the plan that they deliberately sabotage their own team efforts (as much as possible without getting anyone hurt) as their best chance to break up this stupid team. She hated Luna as much as Luna hated her.
Staring at that single word, Luna realized she’d volunteered to be stuck in a car with Pandora for just over an hour. Actually twice that when the return trip was taken into account. With a sigh (and maybe a slight curse unbefitting of a proper Justice Union member), Luna texted her details of where to meet after she got food.
…
It turned out that the fact Pandora had agreed was somewhat less shocking than the car that picked her up.
Everything Luna knew about cars was derived from tv and movies, but even she could tell this was something that would cost probably as much as her parents’ house. On top of being a sports car that moved with unnecessary speed and loudly revving engines, it was a very definitely custom paint job, somewhere between pink and violet. Even more eye-catching was the fact that somehow LED strips had been added along the body, invoking the purple energy lines of the armor that was the Princess Aetherium costume.
Pandora pulled up to where she’d left Luna waiting (blocking three spots in process), and the passenger door opened with no apparent effort on Pandora’s part. “Get in, Hellsing,” the African girl sounded more pissed off than usual.
As soon as Luna sat on the car’s only passenger seat, the door slammed shut, and Pandora peeled out of the lot as if they were in a hurry.
“First, Hellsing, you are not allowed any commentary on my car. Daddy gave it to me, and I love it. Secondly, buckle up,” Pandora lectured without taking her eyes off the road. She was dressed as preppy as ever in a designer pink blouse and knee-length dark-purple skirt. She had the rich, spoiled, American accent you’d expect from someone dressed like that. Her hair was in and African braids.
“How?” There were in fact seat belts on the chair. Four of them, all of which ended with the tab that got inserted into the buckle part.
“It’s a standard five-point harness, Hellsing. The last piece might be on the floor.” Not only did Pandora make it sound like this was something that Luna was a fool for not knowing, she didn’t slow down. Luna only stayed fully in her seat as they slid out of the parking lot with quick use of shadow tendrils.
Even once she found the bottom piece and pulled it up, Luna found it a bit uncomfortable to get in. Apparently, it came up between the legs, and Luna was only barely able to get it into place over her skirt and petticoats with a little shoving with shadow tendrils. The identity of Luna’s parents meant she didn’t get to have separate civilian and cape identities, so she wore her costume everywhere. This included a black velvet cape, and as much frill and lace as she could get away with (which was admittedly not much). “Why do you even have seatbelts like—ooof.“
Pandora stopped very short at a red light. Then she proceeded to stare at Luna without saying anything. Just staring and staring. Anger and judgment were etched into her face. Luna glanced away several times, but Pandora didn’t relent. She stomped on the gas pedal a split second before the light turned green.
Luna wasn’t sure what the speed limit was on the roads here, but Pandora flew past it, taking the corners with what couldn’t have been a safe speed. Even so, the ride was smooth enough that the extra seatbelt seemed excessive.
“Second thing, Hellsing.” Pandora flashed her a brief, very annoyed look. “Omnimind monitors my text messages. I have to at least pretend I’m not actively sabotaging the team where she can see it.”
“Really?” Luna knew some of her classmate’s parents who did that sort of thing, but it didn’t exactly strike her as heroic behavior. Doubly so if she was willing to trust Pandora as the nominal leader of the Scions of Shadow.
“It’s like she’s suspicious of people who throw members of the Justice Union into the ocean in defense of alien invasion plots or something. Tight ass.”
Luna blinked several times. The words sounded like something of a joke, but Pandora’s face and voice remained locked in that sort of angry/annoyed mood.
“Are you alright?” Luna asked.
“I’m fine, Hellsing.” Pandora snapped, but thankfully didn’t take her eyes off the road. “It’s not like my boyfriend dumped me because I’m blowing him off to do this stupid cape shit.”
Luna hit the belt hard as Pandora allowed a car the right of way a stop sign demanded. “I’m sorry.” She wasn’t sure what else to say.
“I don’t want your pity, Hellsing.”
After a minute or two of rapidly moving but awkward silence, Luna asked, “So, uh, how long were you and, um, Chad together?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I think I last dumped him three weeks ago.”
“…What?”
“Yeah, it was a Tuesday. He was flirting with Sandra—which I do not tolerate in my boyfriends.”
“But… I thought he dumped you today?”
Pandora rolled her eyes without slowing or even leaving the lane despite the s-curve they were flying through. “Look at me, Hellsing. Do you expect someone this beautiful to stay single for three days, let alone three weeks?”
For a moment, Luna actually tried to wrap her head around that. But, given the number of surprises she’d had so far—before even venturing into the woods to fight some sort of otherworldly monster—she instead gave up.
It’s not like there was a point trying to understand Pandora “Smith” anyway.
“I’m going to listen to some music,” she said, pulling out her ear buds.
“That’s for the best, Hellsing.”
…
The April sun had started setting by the time they reached where they were going. It turned out there wasn’t exactly a proper parking lot for Aslton State Forest, but there was a bit of muddy field where Pandora could pull in next to an ordinary-looking pickup truck. While Pandora unpacked something from her unholy purple sports car’s trunk, Luna approached the truck.
There was a man in the driver’s seat, working on a small notebook computer. He had a strong resemblance to Dakota: the same warm-brown complexion and straight dark hair worn long. He even had a very similar face. He was dressed nothing like his sister, in a plain white button-down shirt, and he looked as bored as one would expect of a man looking at a spreadsheet. If Luna hadn’t known better, she might have assumed he was Dakota’s father, rather than her much older brother. She would have preferred not to know he was his sister’s legal guardian, but unfortunately, the freshman was severely lacking in both tact and discretion.
“Hello, Dr. Lyon?” she greeted him. He was a vet, not an MD, but that still meant he was a doctor.
“You must be Moonless,” he replied without looking up from his spreadsheet. “Dakota has told me a lot about you.”
“I’m sure,” Luna muttered. Fricking stalker.
“She admires you a great deal you know.” He did look up at that point. “She believes you’re a true hero, the sort that could save anyone.” He was maintaining a bored face well enough, but a little anxiety leaked into his voice.
Thinking back to how she’d seen her parents handle similar conversations, Luna forced herself to stand up straight. “That’s right, sir. I’ll make sure your daughter stays safe out there.”
He nodded, and then gave his attention back to his computer. Just in time for Pandora to arrive in the chrome and glowing pink armor of Princess Atherium. It left her face bare, and there were tractor/repulsor beams built into both the bulky gauntlets and greaves, all controlled by the older girl’s technopath brain implants.
“What are you doing here, Dr Lyon?” she demanded.
“I was substantially less confidant than Rorn that he could run all the way here and back in a reasonable time. Either way, I didn’t want to wait up for them.”
Pandora took a single deep breath, and her face smoothed over. With much less anger than she’d been carrying all night, she replied, “Very good, then, Dr Lyon. We’ll see about getting done as quickly as we can.”
“I appreciate that.”
It was extremely easy to find the other half of their ill-conceived team, wandering around the woods with overpowered flashlights they wouldn’t need for another twenty minutes or so. From the sound of it, they were apparently looking at mushrooms. Dakota’s all-too-annoying voice was prattling on even faster than usual, to Rorn’s apparent confusion.
It had only been two days, but Luna had forgotten just how big the minotaur was. Luna was short for her age, thus used to most people being significantly taller than her. But her chin was level with Rorn’s naval. He was also impossibly broad, probably wider across the shoulders than the three human girls on the team combined. He was easily the largest person she’d ever met. And she was friends with Arzan the Mighty.
“Oh, you’re here!” Dakota looked as ridiculous as she did excited. Her costume was clearly home-made, and she’d worn it—too-pale latex elf ears and all—for the school’s Halloween, when it had been a “Link” costume. Only instead of her regular, somewhat less than flattering glasses, she was wearing even less flattering (and slightly scratched) sports goggles in a blue plastic that clashed with the green elf suit.
“Told you they’d come.” Rorn shot the young “superhero” a smile that made the words sound a lot more sincere.
“I didn’t exactly have a choice,” Luna mumbled.
“Shut it, all of you,” Pandora snapped. She held up her phone, a map of the forest already open. “Here’s the plan. You can see, I’ve divided the forest into thirds. Moonless, you’ll head south. Son-of-Rore and Fletching, keep together and head north. I’ll take this central section.” As she spoke, the relevant portion of the forest blinked in different colors without any apparent effort on her part. One of the perks of being a technopath, Luna supposed.
“Are those drones?” Dakota asked, shielding her face like she was some sort of celebrity worried about the paparazzi.”
“Relax, Fletching, they’re not recording.” Pandora used Dakota’s hero alias. The trio of quad copters lifted off. Each was equipped with lights that seemed almost flimsy compared to what Daktoa and Rorn were carrying. “I want you to stay close to Son-of-Rore. I don’t want you getting eaten by this cat, and I don’t want him getting lost.”
“Why the hells would you assume I get lost?”
Pandora did what had to be a deliberately exaggerated double take. “Do you spend a lot of time hunting the grass you eat through dark forests at night, Son-of-Rore?”
He stepped closer to her, forcing Pandora to look up. She didn’t back down at all. “Listen, girl. I am an experienced monster hunter.”
“Fletching has been hunting in this exact forest for years. Do you trust her?” Pandora’s tone made the night seem colder.
Rorn’s gigantic bull’s nostrils flared, but he finally said, “Fine,” and backed off.
“I thought we’re all on the same team?”
“Shut it, Fletching.” Pandora didn’t even bother looking at Dakota. “Now,” she continued, her phone again changing in response to a techopathic command. “Because of the summoner’s spells, we don’t have any pictures of the cat we’re looking for, but this is the best approximation I could find on DuckDuckGo, so it will have to do.”
“Looks about right,” Rorn remarked, looking at the anime picture of the too-red, too-toothy tiger on the phone with some suspicion.
“Oh, it’s a Cheshire,” Dakota said. “Cool!”
Luna and Pandora raised their eyebrows at their younger colleague. “Say what, Fletching?”
“Oh, um, they got renamed after the Through the Looking Glass character,” Dakota stumbled, suddenly unsure under Pandora’s intense golden eyes. “They were a type of cryptid from England. A cat that could slip through both fae roads and underside, which made them really hard to track down. Organa, you know the witch that—”
“I know who Organa is, Fletching.”
“Right, right. Organa had one as, like, a familiar. Who stole things for her?”
“How big did you say this thing was, Moonless?” Pandora seemed a little skeptical.
“About here at the shoulder.” Luna held a hand a bit shy of three feet off the ground. “Bigger than a mundane wolf, but small by tiger standards.”
“Woah.” Dakota could have been a stock sound effect in a cheap film. “That’s so big.”
“It’s got nothing on me.” Rorn cocked his horned head. “Come on, let’s go.”
He had gone less than a step when Pandora corrected him, pointing. “Wrong way, Son-of-Rore. And Fletching needs her communicator.”
“Oh boy, oh boy.” Dakota was positively bouncing. “A real Omnimind earpiece. Can she hear me with it?”
“Hit the bottom button and you’ll be connected with a Justice Union volunteer dispatcher. But don’t do that unless it’s an emergency, Fletching.” Pandora turned to the sulky-looking minotaur. “Son-of-Rore, Omnimind is going to have to modify one of these to fit your ears. Until she does, stay close to Dakota.”
Chapter 2: Nothing Is Ever Simple
Luna Hellsing was at her most powerful at night.
Her powers were fueled by the shard of Grandmother Night within her—a remnant of the cultist plot that had birthed her, before her adoption by the Professors Hellsing. By the standards of the Justice Union, they were lesser things: control over shadows, night vision that would make the best ninja jealous, and the ability to briefly slip through the shadows of this world to Grandmother Night’s airless realm and back. She could be rendered nothing more than a particularly short, slender girl by a sufficiently powerful spotlight.
But now that the sun had well and truly set, and she was under the starlit sky, miles from the lights of civilization? She was at her peak.
She flew through the woods, dozens of shadow tendrils flying around her like the arms of an umbral octopus.
Tendrils reached forward, grabbing branch and trunk and pulling her forward with a speed even Pandora wouldn’t be able to match with her tractor and repulsors. She flung herself directly at one trunk, slipped Shadowside, plunged into the world of darkness, and reemerged on the other without even losing momentum. She laughed out loud.
As far as methods to find a single tiger in the woods, it probably wasn’t great. But after being blackmailed onto this team, subjected to Dakota’s fannish obsession and Pandora’s constant hostile judgment, it felt amazing to cut loose. As powerless as she’d been the past week, it felt amazing to be reminded she wasn’t powerless. She was Moonless, the Mistress of Shadow, capable of things very few other humans would ever enjoy.
She did keep half an eye out for the tiger, although she had little enough hope of finding it. Aslton State Forest covered thousands of acres, and it was some sort of fae creature. Even if she beat the incredibly long odds and actually stumbled across the thing, it was probably quite good at hiding. Most fey creatures were.
Still, she didn’t want it sneaking up on her unaware. That creature had not only far too many teeth, even tiger’s fangs weren’t supposed to be that big. Not something she wanted to run into alone, even on a night as dark as this.
Something in the corner of her eye caused her to slip Shadowside to kill her momentum. When she emerged, she caught herself from an overhead branch, and stared at what she saw.
There was metal in the woods.
“Nothing is ever simple,” she sighed, before activating the comm in her ear. “Moonless. I found something suspicious. Going to investigate. Over.”
“Princess Aetherium. Suspicious how, Moonless? Over.” Pandora sounded more annoyed than usual.
“Moonless. I’ll know after I investigate. Over.” Luna shook her head as she—cautiously—swung her way over to where the starlight was reflecting off something that wasn’t wood.
“Princess Aetherium. I’m waiting, Moonless. Over.”
“Moonless. I’m looking at some sort of pod.” Luna was keeping to the treetops, as much as she could. She’d had enough encounters with alien tech to know she didn’t want to touch it while alone and isolated. “Maybe eight feet tall, three feet wide. Metallic. It’s open, and there’s a humanoid impression. Tons of tubes and needles.”
“Fletching.” Dakota let out brief, excited squee. “Are there soft blue emergency lights in triplets inside and outside of the pod? Over.”
“Princess Aetherium. Wait until Moonless indicates she’s done, Fletching. Over.”
“Sorry—I mean, Fletching. Sorry. Over.”
Luna shook her head. “Moonless. I don’t see anything that looks like controls, or even thrusters on this thing. I think I do see the triple lights, big one in the middle, but they’re very faint. Over.”
The earpiece was silent just long enough for Dakota to have said a few exhilarated “Oh my God”s before it crackled to life with her needlessly excited voice. “Fletching. Do you think it’s one of those Narlean prison pods? Do we have an escaped alien prisoner in the woods we have to hunt down? Eeeeee!”
After a moment of silence, Luna put a finger to the talk icon and said, “Moonless. Are you done? Over.”
“Yes, I mean, Fletching. Yes. Over.”
Luna sighed. A Narlean. She’d thought they’d dealt with all of them last year. How had a pod been sitting in the woods this long without anyone either finding it, or the imprisoned alien inside breaking free?
“Princess Aetherium. Do not get close to the prison pod alone, Moonless. Everyone, rendezvous at the lake north of you. I am en route. Over.”
“Fletching. Which lake is that? Over.”
Luna briefly ground her teeth. “Moonless. Use the Omnimind Position—you still have a civilian cell phone, don’t you?” After a moment trying to figure out what to say, she simply added, “Over.”
She drew out her own phone—an Omnimind special—to try to figure out how to direct Fletching. She could see, in the Justice Union Team Tracker App, two nearby icons for Omnicomms. One moving towards the small lake from very near where they’d parked, the other much further north.
“Princess Aetherium. I’ve sent the GPS coordinates to your phone, Fletching. It’s just over a mile just east of due south of you. Over.”
Luna did a double take, before realizing her phone had a few bars of civilian cell service. She hadn’t expected it this far from civilization.
“Fletching. Coordinates received. Rorn and I are en route. Over.”
Chapter 3: Not what it seems
Pandora “Smith” had been expecting to spend the evening reading.
As far as missions went, this was the perfect chance to fail without putting anyone in danger. Aslton State Forest was a wildlife preserve for God’s sake. An extra predator probably would have been good for it, ecologically speaking.
She even brought a small paperback just in case Omnimind was monitoring her e-reader usage. Not that Pandora thought she was, but the super genius definitely had the tech to do so, considering she’d built Pandora’s phone.
Her only regret (besides the fact that Chad had decided to be an idiot about all this) was that she didn’t think to tell Luna this was the plan while they were in the car. That goody two-shoes would never think to deliberately fail a mission—even one as unimportant as this. It was an animal in the woods. No one was in real danger here, except the idiots venturing into the forest to hunt down the tiger. They were never going to get a more perfect mission to fail.
She couldn’t have said anything in front of the kid or the minotaur. They wanted to be on this team, and (for some unfathomable reason) wanted Moonless to be on it with them. If they knew Pandora was deliberately trying to sabotage that effort, well… It would certainly make Omnimind disappointed in her.
And, of course, she couldn’t exactly have clued Moonless in after the goody two-shoes took off. Omnimind absolutely was monitoring her texts, and it would have looked beyond weird to call when they both had an Omnicomm in their ears.
And now there was this alien crap.
This could have been a nice evening reading a novel to take her mind off Chad being a moron, but no. A Narlean prison pod. Because the miniature teleporting tiger wasn’t enough for one night.
Princess Aetherium didn’t much care for the forest. She could navigate faster in the city, where there were enough solid buildings to anchor tractor and repulsor beams to virtually fly. It was a bit harder to judge how exactly smaller things—like branches—would interact with her armor. A solid anchor, like on the tree’s trunk, could be as good as a building. But if she was only anchored to a branch—or worse—some leaves, they’d rip free of the tree and put her in an awkward spot. Chaining tractor and repulsor beams was less like flying, and more like getting to pick which way you were falling. Messing it up could get ugly.
So she walked, her way illuminated by the drones she’d brought along. Having extra eyes she could move around at will was slightly easier than hijacking one camera feed after another when moving around the city, but at least that was subtle. Here, the drone’s lights—required in the forest night—made it impossible to hide where she was looking. At least the tiger was unlikely to pick up on that fact.
Rorn and Fletching were still a ways out when she reached the GPS coordinates she’d sent to Fletching. According to the Justice Union tracker, she should be right on top of Moonless, but the goth teen was nowhere to be seen.
Princess Aetherium’s eyes turned this way and that, her drones spinning a bit more wildly, but there was still no sign of Moonless. Even the pond (why was this labeled a lake on the map?) was still and empty. If that incompetent child had managed to get herself captured or incapacitated already…
The armored heroine spun as a shadow dropped behind her. Her fists were ready, but it was just Moonless’s smirking face that emerged from the shadows. “Got you,” she said.
The older cape stared down into the younger’s smug, violet eyes. A drone noted that the branches above didn’t look secure enough for even the smaller hero to have been lurking there. “Any sign of the Narlean, Moonless?”
Moonless shrugged, walking a few steps to stand under studier boughs. Tendrils of darkness, thin in the relatively dim light of the drones, shot up to form a sort of swing for her to sit in. “Nothing to report, captain.”
“It’s ‘team leader’, Moonless. The Justice Union doesn’t have captains.”
Moonless just rolled her eyes.
“Lookout!” Dakota’s voice echoed across the water, a second before a splash.
Rorn had plunged into the shallows on the far side of the water, stopping by the time he’d gotten knee deep. The pond was small enough there was a decent chance the towering minotaur could have walked across the whole thing without getting submerged. Fletching was perched on his shoulder, her compound bow in one hand, the other holding onto the minotaur’s horn to keep in place. He was snarling something in a [1] language Pandora had never heard before.
“Stay there, son-of-Rore,” Princess Aetherium called. “We’ll come to you.” She nodded at Moonless, who nodded back before slinking away from the drones’ light.
A short running start, and a few well placed repulsors and tractors, let Princess Aetherium leap clear across the pond. By the time she landed softly, Rorn was back on dry land, Fletching and Moonless by his side.
“What’s going on?” Rorn demanded, shaking one hoof and then the other.
“I told you,” Fletching whined. “It’s aliens.”
“And I told you that didn’t make sense the first four times you said it!” Rorn snapped back.
Princess Aetherim moved one gauntleted hand across her face. “You have to keep it simple for him, Fletching. Son-of-Rore, it goes like this: a race of serpent people called the Narlean built a prison in the sky. Last year, something went wrong with the spells holding it up, and it exploded. They had enough warning to get into special little coffins called ‘pods’ to survive the explosion, one of which—because of complicated magical bullshit neither of us needs to understand—landed in these woods, letting its prisoner escape. Probably recently.”
“The Narleans don’t use magic,” Moonless began, but stopped when a finger was thrust at her face.
“We are keeping it simple for Son-of-Rore, Moonless. It is all magical bullshit to him.”
Rorn and Moonless both glared at her for a moment. The goth cape shrugged. A moment later, the minotaur crossed his arms, looked aside, and mumbled, “I hate that that explanation made more sense than anything else on this Earth so far.”
“Hey,” Dakota whined. “You said you liked my explanation of cartoons.”
“Yeah, but I got all that the first time,” Rorn protested.
“Both of you, shut up,” Princess Aetherium snapped. “We have an alien escape pod to investigate.”
…
Fletching and Moonless approached the pod carefully, one drone flying over their head and watching where they stepped. The older girl had a hand on the other’s shoulder, ready to pull the basically-civilian to safety if the situation called for it.
“Why are we back here?” Rorn was pacing back and forth irritably, not looking around like he’d been instructed.
“The Narleans practice a form of mind magic that can mess you up if they look you in the eye. We want to make sure they can’t do that to everyone at once.” And by “mind magic,” Princess Aetherium meant they were psychic.
“Mess up how?”
“Screw with what you see, read your memories, that sort of thing. A good hit to the spellcaster will disrupt anything of the mind magic they’ve got going on, which is why they’re quick to use their paralyzing venom. So stay vigilant, Son-of-Rore.”
“Venom, like snake venom?” Rore asked.
“Yes. I already said they’re snake-like, Son-of-Rore.”
The minotaur let out a low growl, muttering to himself in a decidedly non-English language. He was keeping his eyes on Fletching. That left looking for signs of an escaped alien criminal—and potentially the tiger they’d actually came out here to deal with—entirely to Princess Aetherium. The three drones did give her quite a field of view, but all she saw was flickering shadows.
Moonless and Fletching slid all the way up to the pod. “Awww… It’s empty,” the girl in green whined as she got close. A drone showed a space inside the escape pod that was far less generous than most coffins.
“Power indicator’s out.” Moonless poked at a panel in the raised roof with a cautiously extended shadow tendril.
“Tracks are pretty clear.” Fletching moved her overpowered flashlight over the ground. “Bit old though.”
Princess Aetherium piloted one of her drones over to where her junior teammate was indicating. It looked like any other bit of forest floor to her. “Where?” she asked. Her other two drones swung around looking for any sign of a Narlean.
“They’re right there, Princess. Even you should be able to see them.” Moonless walked forward more relaxed than she should have been.
Princess Aetherium gave the ground another once over, but found nothing. Then again, it wasn’t like she could see anything that indicated a trail where Moonless and Fletching had walked. Wilderness tracking hadn’t exactly been a life skill she’d ever thought she’d need.
Rorn lumbered after the other two girls, still muttering. His hooves, at least, left the occasional crushed plant.
Princess Aetherium followed more cautiously, straining to see anything amid the many identical trees. She had always been a city girl, but this wood was looking a lot more ominous than it had before finding the psychic alien’s escape pod. Her drones darted about, spinning this way and that.
All she saw was forest.
Her brow furrowed when she noticed something actually out of place. Moonless had wandered away from Fletching. Both girls had their eyes on the ground, following what should have been the same invisible trail.
“Where are you going, Moonless?”
Fletching jumped at the sound eyes jerking around. “Luna?” her voice was positively quivering.
Neither Rorn nor Luna reacted. Each continued ambling along in different directions.
“Are you ignoring me, Moonless?” Pandora demanded. That wasn’t a terrible ploy, as far as the plan to deliberately fail went. But no one ignored Pandora. “Moonless!” she shouted.
Luna spun, calling up several shadow tendrils in front of her.
But she hadn’t turned towards Princess Aetherium, and her face was contorted in confused.
“Lookout!” Rorn shouted. The behemoth minotaur lunged forward, impossibly fast for his massive size.
“Where are you going, Rorn?” Princess Aetherium demanded. The minotaur thundered toward a point off to Moonless’s left.
There was nothing there.
It was enough of a distraction that, even with her drones, Princess Aetherium didn’t see where the Narlean emerged from.
It was already plunging its fangs into Luna’s neck, biting clear through her stupid little cape.
Moonless didn’t react.
Narleans weren’t larger than humans in general, but this one had over six inches on Moonless. There was more human than snake in its face, but he had a cobra-like hood connecting to his upper back in lieu of hair. This one’s scales were as dark as the forest night, and his eyes, vertically slit and golden, were fixed on the charging minotaur. Twigs and leaves were all tangled up in its stained robes.
“Look away, Rorn!” Princess Aetherium charged forward.
“He’s-he’s not looking at it!” Fletching was staggering back, eyes fixed on their towering teammate.
Moonless still wasn’t moving, not reacting to the teeth digging into her, nor the scaled hands clinging to her shoulders. Her fighting stance was starting to droop. Her face only growing more confused.
What the hell was going on? The alien couldn’t be meeting her eyes from that position.
With her non-responsive teammate between her and her foe, Princess Aetherium only had one choice. She hopped, and locked a tractor beam on the smaller girl. Even with her armor, the older cape didn’t have that much mass on her teammate, and the two pulled towards each other.
Luna collapsed as she was pulled forward, the tractor not dialed strong enough to overwhelm gravity.
The Narlean released Luna as the nearly invisible beam pulled her away from him. He turned those golden eyes on the woman charging him.
Princess Aetherium closed her eyes. She could watch herself through the drones; those beautiful mindless machines.
The Narlean smiled with confidence and continued to stare.
His façade didn’t crack until Princess Aetherium was hopping over her collapsed teammate, fist drawn back.
“What?” The alien cursed as he dodged the first punch at the last instant. He wasn’t fast enough to dodge the follow up, aetherium-clad knuckles digging into his rib cage.
Princess Aetherium had overbalanced herself to get that hit in, and she hadn’t anticipated the tail. It whipped out, hitting her ankles. She rolled, moving away from alien and teammates alike.
“There you are!” Rorn bellowed. Then he charged, not towards the alien, but directly towards Fletching.
“Don’t look in his eyes, Son-of-Rore,” Princess Aetherium shouted as she came to her feet.
“H-he’s not!” Fletching dived out of the charging minotaur’s path just too late.
A meaty fist ripped through the air where the young hero had been standing, but his running stride hit her ankle hard enough to spin her all the way around before she hit the ground.
“Ahh!” Fletching wailed.
“How are you doing that?” Princess Aetherium demanded. She caught the alien with a tractor beam. This one was stronger than the one she’d used on Moonless, and the alien staggered back towards the armored heroine as the same force propelled her forward.
He recovered his footing too fast when Princess Aetherium dropped the tractor. Her fist plunged into his back, but his tail was whipping around, behind her knees.
It was his elbow that hit her, driven directly into her unarmored face.
Princess Aetherium hit the ground ass-first. She’d have a shiner from that one.
The alien limped away from her.
“There you are,” Rorn snarled. His eyes locked onto the alien’s feet, and he started forward. This time, he wasn’t rushing.
The Narlean glanced to Princess Aetherium getting herself back to her feet. He turned his gaze back to the minotaur.
“Oh no you don’t,” Rorn shouted, darting off to his left. The Narlean didn’t move.
There was a sickening sound as the minotaur ran into a tree face first, hard enough to crack the trunk.
He hit the ground hard and let out a moan.
“What the hell is going on?” Princess Aetherium demanded.
Between sobs, Fletching managed, “I think this is one of the Narleans who just needs to look at you. Not meet your eyes.”
Princess Aetherium’s eyes darted between the green-clad hero and the snake-like alien. “Since when can Narleans do that!?”
The cobra alien shot her another of those cocky smiles. “I’m special.” His English had a pronounced lisp.
The armored cape locked her own golden eyes on the snakes. She didn’t feel the slightest tickle in her mind, and drones confirmed he wasn’t moving.
“Not as special as me.” She locked a tractor beam on him, and watched the two of them rush towards each other through the mechanical eyes of her drones.
Chapter 4: Here kitty, ktty
Dakota Lyon was pretty sure her ankle was broken. Nothing had ever hurt as bad as when she tried to put a little weight on it. Nothing in her life.
She didn’t scream. She whimpered, sure, but that was much more heroic than screaming in pain. And Dakota was a hero, damn it. They’d given her an id card and everything.
So she heroically crawled over to where Rorn lay moaning on the ground. The minotaur had one hand on his face. “Rorn. Rorn, get up we need you. Eep!” He sprang to a sitting position, not quite knocking her back.
“What happened?”
“The alien can make you see things by looking at you. Pandora seems immune, but I don’t think she can take him by herself. He’s too fast.” The two looked over to where the aetherium-clad cape had been once again sent sprawling by the serpentine alien. He looked significantly worse for wear himself, limping away from her, holding one battered arm. But he was the one who was standing.
“What hit me, though?” Rorn was still rubbing his forehead between his horns.
“He used his vision-warping powers to trick you into running into a tree.” Dakota gestured at the partially splintered trunk. “That’s why you got to be careful. Just, you know, do that big loom thing. Make it so the Narlean can’t focus on the fight. I think that might be enough.”
The minotaur shot her a very dubious look.
“Come on, Rorn. We need you.”
Rorn squared his jaw. Then he stretched his neck, giving an almost concerning cracking sound. “Alright. I can do this.” Despite his bulk, he flipped up onto his feet like someone from one of a martial arts movie.
“Oy, snake boy,” he shouted, advancing towards the dark-scaled alien. “You’re going to regret trying to trick the undefeatable Rorn son of Rore.”
The Narlean turned to look at the advancing minotaur and bolted. He made it three steps, before Dakota blinked, and he was gone.
Not gone—once again trading blows with Pandora, back where he’d started.
“Fighting psychics is hard.” Dakota sat back. But her part was done. Her teammates should be able to handle it from here. Resting, she had little whimper about her throbbing ankle.
Then there came the growl behind her.
Dakota swallowed, and turned very slowly.
The fae tiger looked way bigger face-to-face than it had in her teammates’ description. With her sitting down, it was looking down on her, grinning through far, far too many fangs. The flashlight shining off to its side cast it in uncertain shadows. “N-n-nice kitty.”
The growl turned into more of a purr as the creature prowled towards her. Its tail flicked in excitement. Its eyes fixed on the small teenager.
“Y-y-you don’t want to e-eat me,” Dakota did her best to shuffle away from the creature, leaving her flashlight further behind. “I’m f-full of micro plastics, and, uh, not tasty. Like, at all.”
The oversized Cheshire purred louder. The number of fangs it was showing somehow increased.
Don’t panic! Don’t panic! Don’t panic! There were noises behind her, where her team was fighting, but she dared not take her eyes of the creature. You’re a cape now, Dakota. Do a superhero thing.
I have special arrows from Artemis. He bow wasn’t exactly at hand, but maybe one of the arrows—
Moving slowly, she reached for the arrows in the special holder on her back, feeling for the brail symbol that indicated the one with red plastic fletching. She pulled out the smoke-bomb arrow and held the button in the fletching that would arm it. “S-see? I’m on fire. You don’t want to eat fire, right?”
She held the arrow towards the fae monster. It was more of an offering than a threatening gesture. She wanted to glance at the arrow head to see if there was smoke, but she didn’t dare take her eye of the monster. She didn’t smell smoke. Why didn’t she smell smoke?
The Cheshire stalked closer, fanged grin growing larger.
Then it stopped. It sniffed the air.
Its fangs disappeared behind its muzzle and took another sniff.
“See? See?” Dakota gave a panicked smile, wiggling the arrow a little. “You don’t want to eat me.” There was the smoke; small tendrils of it seeping out from just behind the arrowhead.
The feline monster gave a large hiss, and then faded away. Its eyes and maw of snarling teeth lasted a whole second longer than anything.
Dakota let out a sigh of relief.
She had no clue where the monster was, but it wasn’t about to eat her in the next three seconds.
Hopefully.
Chapter 5: Monsters’ moves
Princess Aetherium was starting to get annoyed at Rorn.
Keeping the Narlean distracted had helped at first, but it had quickly sussed out the game. Now the minotaur was taking too long to turn when the clashes between herself and the alien moved. The ploy had let her get a few hits in, but the creature was proving tougher than she was expecting. A kick to her knee had left her limping.
She wasn’t sure what to do about the situation, though. A bespelled Rorn was a much larger danger to her than to this enemy.
Worse, she’d caught view of the Cheshire in one of her drones. Just barely, as it was fading away. She now needed to keep an eye on Luna, who lay paralyzed by the alien’s venom.
“You should surrender, Narlean.” Princess Atherium wiped blood from her split lip—no doubt ruining her make up while she was at it. “You’re outnumbered and out-maneuvered.”
“I already been convicted,” he hissed back, clutching at the side where she’d landed her most solid hit. “This is my best chance to get away than this.”
“Then why are you even still here, Narlean?” She raised a palm out. He staggered to one side, falling for the feint, but dodging aside too nimbly for her to land a hit. Stupid injured knee.
“I was hoping for a couple hostages.” His gaze flicked briefly back to where Rorn was looming closer. “I guess, I’ll have to settle for one.”
Rorn didn’t move as the alien darted towards him. Princess Aetherium tried to hit him with a tractor, but only knocked herself off balance when she missed.
The Narlean was six or so feet from Rorn when he spat. Twin jets of liquid sparkling in the lights of her drones. The minotaur didn’t even dodge.
He did scream when the venom hit his face. “My eyes,” he shouted, even as he collapsed to one knee. The sound of his grinding teeth was awful.
The alien was already rushing towards where Luna lay prone.
Princess Aetherium thrust one leg behind her, firing a powerful repulsor beam into a tree. It groaned under her weight as she shot forward.
Her angle was wrong. The alien was going to reach Luna first.
At the last moment he tripped, planting his face hard into the underbrush. Luna was barely within arm’s reach.
He rolled, eyes fixing on his ankles. Princess Aetherium was still recovering from her lunge, so she spun a drone to follow his gaze.
The shadow tendril binding the alien’s ankles dissolved under its electric light. Moonless could still control shadows while paralyzed!
The Narlean clutched at his throat as something pulled his robe back, choking him with its hem.
Something moving in the darkness behind Luna pulled Princess Aetherium’s eyes off the alien. The Cheshire was back, and getting ready to pounce on the paralyzed girl.
“Look out!” Princess Aetherium shouted. She braced herself, and hit the smaller girl with a powerful tractor beam. Luna tumbled up towards her, flopping limply into the older cape’s arms. The Narlean managed to pull himself free.
Clawed paws landed on the disturbed bit of undergrowth where Moonless’s body had just lain.
As fast as it landed, it was pouncing again.
Princess Aetherium didn’t have time to raise a hand for a repulsor. She didn’t have time for anything.
She rolled, eyes closed, even her drones turning away. All she could do was put her armored body between those claws and Luna’s vulnerable flesh. Breath held, she braced for impact.
It didn’t come.
Her drones were gone, but there was no impact.
Princess Aetherium opened her eyes and could make no sense of what she saw. There was darkness, scattered about above and below in shades of violet and ethereal rouge. The shadows had shapes, but she could make no sense of them as they passed through one another, not occluding as they should.
And then she was back in the woods, a fair bit closer to where Rorn had been kneeling.
The Narlean was gone, and the Cheshire was grappling with the larger minotaur, and seeming to have the better of it.
Her drones were back, pinging digital complaints about having to reconnect.
“What the hell?” she asked.
“Shadowside,” Moonless muttered weakly in her arms before coughing.
Right. Moonless could use her powers while paralyzed. Apparently. That would have been nice to know.
Rorn tumbled out on top of the creature, but bellowed as its maw found his neck and its hind legs tore against his torso. He pushed free, far less bloody than an ordinary human would be, but bleeding nonetheless. Princess Aetherium didn’t like the clumsy way he staggered back. That cow better not have given himself a concussion.
The Cheshire rolled, crouching for another pounce.
“Wait here.” She dropped Moonless to the ground with a decided lack of tenderness. When the tiger moved, so did she.
Her idea was to leap and catch the beast with a powerful tractor from both boots to give a sort of diving kick. She’d pulled it off in practice a ton of times.
She was not in the habit of practicing after going a few rounds with a skilled bare-knuckle boxer.
Most of the momentum the tractor built up in the short flight ended up going into the ground.
The Cheshire was pulled away from the injured minotaur, and did crash into her extended greaves, but with nowhere near the force Princess Aetherium had been hoping.
It yowled, but rolled free. And the princess lay stunned on her back.
Rorn moved before the cat could follow up, but he was slow, clumsy. The tiger leapt free.
The minotaur tossed his head, as if trying to clear it. Breathing heavy, he started walking.
The tiger followed suit, prowling with eyes on both Rorn and the slow-to-recover Princess Aetherium.
Beast and man-beast started to circle each other.
Then there was a pthp, and the Cheshire jumped straight up.
It landed, eyes wide with surprise. And collapsed. A green-fletched arrow stood upright from its rib cage.
Princess Aetherium and Rorn turned to where Fletching kneeled, her compound bow in hand.
The drones confirmed that the tiger lay dead, a small pool of blood growing around it.
Eyes wide behind her sports goggles, Dakota asked, “W-what? I-it’s not a person. It’s okay to kill it. R-right?”
“Just a nice shot I wasn’t expecting, is all.” Rorn sounded genuinely impressed.
Fletching blushed, and turned her face aside. “It was like, 20 feet, tops. I’ve hit deer from farther.”
“Son-of-Rore,” Princess Aetherium interrupted. “Break its neck. Just to be sure.” She turned to her youngest teammate. “Well done, Fletching.”
Chapter 6: Aftermath
Luna Hellsing still couldn’t move her limbs when they emerged from the forest. They’d put her in the coffin-like escape pod for transport. If it could cushion a humanoid from a fall from orbit, it could probably keep her safe from whiplash.
Rorn had carried the alien pod on one shoulder, while Pandora bridal-carried Dakota. On their first rest break, the former villain made a point of touching up her makeup. It made the split lip harder to see, but there was no hiding that shiner. She didn’t say anything, but her face made it clear she was unhappy with the result.
Dr. Lyon was alarmed when they emerged from the forest, and took next to no convincing to agree to drive the alien machine back to the Justice Union offices so Omnimind could give it a proper once over. He even became eager when the supergenius’s healing pods were brought up for Dakota’s ankle.
By the very late hour they arrived, Luna was able to walk, albeit a bit unsteadily. Dakota offered to support her before being reminded of her own ankle. She took a hot shower, texted her parents, and wrote up the after action report before crashing in one of the Union’s uncomfortable cots for the night. The rest of her team went into the injury tanks, which were scaled to accommodate the Mighty Arzan, and thus were no problem for even Rorn’s great bulk. It might have been a bit overkill for their small wounds, but the tanks weren’t otherwise being used tonight.
One of the Union’s volunteers brought a breakfast of fast food for them when they woke up. Dakota was ecstatic about the experience, for some reason. Telling her “It’s just a healing tank” had unlocked a large number of invasive questions Luna was doing her best to ignore. Pandora was bitter that the breathing mask that allowed one to sleep submerged in the healing ooze had prevented it from properly repairing her split lip, and was vocally annoyed about how much it was going to mess with her makeup.
Dakota and Pandora had come to breakfast in Union-provided robes. The young girl had switched out her sports googles for her overly-large glasses. Rorn had opted to just use a towel wrapped around his waist, continuing to refuse to wear a shirt. He took one sniff of the greasy breakfast sandwich, and angrily demanded if anyone remembered he couldn’t eat meat.
“I did,” Dakota said, before rummaging in her belt-pouches on the table besides her. She produced a fist-sized bale of hay, which looked more like a granola bar in Rorn’s oversized hand.
“You’re the best.” The minotaur gave her a thumbs up before tearing into the hay. When Luna caught herself staring, she turned back to her greasy sandwich, and mentioned the milk in the break room’s fridge.
Rorn was returning, drinking directly from a quart when Omnimind arrived. “Good morning, Scions of Shadow. I’ve read your reports.” The middle-aged Indian woman looked tired, but then again, she always looked tired.
“Already?” Dakota asked. “Did I do a good job? There weren’t that many—well, actually I just didn’t get a chance to read that many incident reports, so I had to—”
“Shut up, Lyon,” Pandora interrupted.
“Pandora Smith. Do not be rude.” Omnimind sounded like a weary caregiver who had dealt with the controlling young girl for years. Sounded about right for having known Pandora for the almost two months the adult heroine had.
“You mostly did a good job. I want to highlight a few things. Dakota?”
“Y-yes?” the young girl sounded worried.
“Excellent shooting. Artemis has confirmed that it was perfectly well aimed.”
“I did a good job as a super hero!?” Dakota sounded like she might wet herself.
“For your first mission,” Omnimind replied. She checked her tablet. “Pandora, Luna. By all accounts, the two of you saved each other’s lives last night. There was no reason to be so petty and hostile towards one another in your reports.”
“I can think of several, actually,” Luna muttered, but didn’t meet the super genius’s gaze.
“You see what I have to work with, Omnimind?” Pandora was giving Luna a glare out of the corner of her eye.
“I want to hear the two of you say, ‘thank you for saving my life.’” Omnimind looked between the two of them deadly seriously.
Pandora broke first. “Thanks for saving me, Hellsing.”
Luna rolled her eyes, but Omnimind fixed her with that patient look she had. One that reminded Luna that Omnimind was almost three times her age, and could wait far longer than the young girl. The pale youth mumbled something that would be easy to interpret as a “Thanks.”
“Omnimind said I was a good super hero,” Dakota whispered quite loudly to herself. Or possibly to Rorn.
“Moving on,” the adult cape continued. “There’s the matter of Skess, the Narlean. I don’t want you children trying to hunt him down.”
“What, why not? You said—” Dakota trailed off when Omnimind raised a hand.
“Pandora’s cyborg mind notwithstanding, the three of you proved very vulnerable to his psychic misdirection. There are members of the league with much more training—and much better technology—who are more suited to this task. For now, I want you to try to rest and focus on your studies.”
“Aww,” Dakota whined.
“Finally, there’s the matter of the Cheshire’s body. I wish you had brought it back here for examining. There may be clues in it to help us figure out how Rorn came to be here, and how we can send him home.”
“Aw shit,” the minotaur swore. “I didn’t think of that.”
“We could only carry so much, son-of-Rore.”
“There is one implication that should be obvious, and bears mentioning,” Omnimind continued. “Most summons, even summons of physical creatures, don’t leave bodies.” She paused for dramatic effect.
“Meaning…?” Rorn asked the silence.
“Meaning that you’re as mortal here as the rest of us. Death will not send you home, and there’s a high probability that whatever fate normally awaits the souls of your kind after death will not be in store for you here.”
“Oh.” He put his breakfast of milk and hay down on the table. “I see.”
“Don’t worry, big guy.” Dakota put one tiny hand on the minotaur’s massive bicep. “We weren’t going to let you die anyway.”
He covered her hand with his own massive one. “Thanks, Legolas Girl.”
“That is not her name!”