Fluff

Chapter Sixty - Finally, Things Go Wrong

It was strange, but she was almost happy when things went wrong.

They had relocated to the gas station on the edge of the city. The same one that they had robbed on entering the Endgame for the first time. It wasn't the ideal place to hide, but it was right on the edge of the Endgame, with open and clear sightlines deeper into the city. If they had to retreat, they could back up into the woods next to Saint Arie, and maybe even return to the home that they had taken over for a few days just beyond the edge of the Endgame.

If the Endgame hadn't stretched out that far, yet. She wasn't sure. It had been a good way from the edge, but they had last checked a few days ago, and the Endgame's expansion had been speeding up.

The gas station wasn't going to be a comfortable place to stay in, but it was fine. The ticker was running down. If they stayed here, then by the time early evening rolled around, the Endgame would be done.

That was, if they didn't lose the Orbject.

With the HFR locked up investigating something big on the far end of the city--she could see the plumes of smoke in the distance now. There were a few minuscule specs that she could only barely see that had to be distant heroes flying around the scene.

The waiting was getting to her, and so when an HRF van came up and parked across the street from the gas station and someone in a costume jumped out, she was almost relieved.

"Girls!" Emily snapped. "Gear up. We have trouble."

The first choice was simple. Stay and fight, or run? The Endgame itself seemed to push its players towards a sort of cat and mouse game, where stealth and getting away from the grasp of the seeking heroes was the better solution, but...

Eily focused for a moment, and a prompt appeared in the corner of her vision

You have the Orbject

Time until Victory: 3 Hours, 19 Minutes

So close. If they just ran for the next three hours and change, they'd probably win. But she wasn't sure if she wanted that. The idea was further complicated when there were no reinforcements showing up. Two more people exited the van, and she recognized them both.

Iron Chains, the villain that had once run around a corner of Eauclaire and had caused a fair bit of trouble for her and her sisters, one that they had captured with the help of Glamazon.

And Glamazon herself. Jezebelle. The pretty young woman that went to the same school as Emily herself, whom she had worked with.

The other wasn't someone she knew or remembered. A tallish woman, in a rather nondescript outfit. She had a modern superhero mask on, and the usual rather skintight outfit on with a jacket thrown over it.

Emily's sisters scattered through the gas station for a moment, then returned and formed up behind the door with some gear in hand. Aurora had a concerningly large axe she had found somewhere in the back, and Maple had the finished thing she had been working on ever since she arrived. Emily was a little concerned that it might be a flamethrower. The position of the plastic gas tanks and the bicycle pump she had wrangled together hinted at that, at least. Trinity was armed with four handfuls of half-eaten candy bars stolen from the station's candy rack.

For some reason, she wasn't that nervous. Maybe it was because there were only three opponents and she knew, deep down, that her sisters could take on at least two of them with relative ease.

They had beaten Iron Chains before. Sure, it had been a little touch and go, but they had managed it. Glamazon wasn't someone they had defeated, but she knew how the young woman's powers worked.

"He can control chains," Emily said. He had a bunch of chains wrapped around himself already, as part of his costume. Some of them looked like larger, tougher chains, but he had a lot of smaller ones wrapped around his arms and legs. She imagined that once uncoiled, those would be pretty long.

"And the two woman?" Aurora asked.

"We only met Glamazon," Emily said with a nod towards the girl in question. Jezebelle had a pinkish costume on, the form-fitting sort that Emily would rather die than be caught wearing. It didn't expose any skin, but it was tight enough in some spots that it didn't need to. "She can create balls of light. When they detonate they grab your attention."

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Athena leaned forward, squinting. "The middle one has mind powers," she said.

Emily felt herself straighten. "She does?"

"Yeah. Can't tell what they are, but I think they need contact? Probably. Might be able to work from afar, but I bet they're a lot weaker."

Emily nodded. "No one meet her eyes. Trinity, keep one of yourself away, if you see us acting weird, let us know."

The racoon girl wasn't immune to that kind of power, but some testing (and bullying from) Athena had confirmed that some mental powers were only a third as strong on her when aimed at just one of her bodies. Plus, if line of sight or touch was needed, touching all three of her bodies was tricky.

"Okay!" Trinity said with a grin. "I can do that!"

"Thanks," Emily replied. She licked her lips, then straightened her costume, which was... not doing so well. It had been a few days since she had changed out of it, and it had started as a costume for theater shows, not something meant to last through multiple runs across a city and it was definitely not meant to be worn for days on end, or slept in. She had done what she could to keep it somewhat clean, but there were some inevitable stains. "Okay, let's go," she said.

Pushing the door of the gas station open, Emily stepped out and started to walk forwards.

She was able to stand tall, to walk with a level of certainty that... well, she was surprised that she actually felt any amount of certainty at all.

It was strange, but she didn't feel as nervous and afraid as maybe she should have.

Her sisters fanned out behind her. Aurora and Athena at her side, one of Trinity and Teddy further back. Maple hung back, standing a few steps behind Emily while lugging along her makeshift flamethrower and a bandoleer filled with other dangerous implements.

Emily stopped, and her sisters did the same.

There was maybe ten metres between her and the heroes. She eyed them, then focused on the neck of the one in the middle, not wanting to meet her eyes directly. "T-to what do we owe the honours?" she asked, then cursed herself in her mind for stuttering.

The woman smiled. "Quite the lineup," she said. "Ah, but we're not here to fight. My name is Obscure, and I have a proposition."

"You do?" Emily asked.

"You do?" Glamazon asked at the same time.

Emily looked up, actually meeting Jezebelle's eyes. The woman seemed conflicted. Emily was not an expert at reading body language. Actually, she'd rate herself as very much the opposite of an expert in that regard. Still, she felt like Glamazon was standing as though she wasn't sure if the people standing next to her were friends. It was something about the set of her shoulders, about the way her feet were positioned.

"We do!" the lady, Obscure, said. "You have the Orbject. You're about to win. If we steal it, then it'll take several days before we win in turn, which... honestly, I've grown tired of Saint Arie. The food here is lacking and the people are... well, non-existent, I suppose."

"It's a little rough," Emily admitted. "Can you get to the point?"

Oh, wow, she wouldn't have dared say anything like that before. Standing in front of her sisters though, pressured her into at least acting the part.

Obscure's smile went a little wooden, and Emily noticed her glancing over all of her sisters. It probably wasn't intimidating if she only saw them as a gaggle of kids, but she had to know that they were all super-powered kids.

"Fine. I want to join your team."

"What?" Glamazon asked.

Obscure shrugged. "You took out my last one. We were pretty close to winning, too. I had the HRF properly distracted. But I can't blame you for playing the game. In any case, I want this Endgame's power, and I'm not willing to wait another week while hiding from the HRF. So, that's my proposition. You let me and my two friends here join you, or we fight. Win-win, or Win-lose."

Emily leaned back a little on her heels and was about to ask some questions when Glamazon broke in.

"What are you talking about? They're villains! Wait... holy crap, you're a villain too?"

Did she not know? What even was going on here?

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