"So I had this crazy idea."

Vidya raised both eyebrows warily. Amber was sitting on the ground, blowing her nose. She didn't handle colds well: pills made her gag, liquid medicine made her gag, her nose turned into Niagara Falls, and her eyes ached, which meant she couldn't even enjoy TV on the school days she missed. She was doing better today than yesterday, but Niagara was still falling, and the garbage can couldn't keep up.

"I was thinking about Halloween," Amber continued, sticking a tissue into both nostrils and letting it hang there. "Wouldn't it be hilarious if you went as a balloon?"

Vidya sighed.

"Think about it!" Amber was cackling now. "You could float around with a rope tied around your waist, and I'd be the little girl holding on to it!"

"Little girl?" Vidya questioned. "Pennywise suits you better."

"Excuse me," Amber screeched loudly, the tissue flopping up as she spoke. "Do I look like a clown?"

"YES!"

But it wasn't Vidya who said it, it was Teddy, calling out from downstairs. Amber responded by pounding her fist on the floor.

"So," she said, sniffing. "I was kidding about the balloon. We don't wanna go around exposing you, or me."

Vidya just smiled. It was a cute idea, but come Halloween, they would be on opposite sides of the country, and she didn't want to think about that just yet. "Do you think you're going to school tomorrow?"

"If I can fall asleep at a reasonable time, maybe." Amber reached for the cough medicine, made a face, and swallowed a pill.

Vidya stood, shouldering her backpack. She still had some homework, a date with Jonah, and active call time to take care of, and hopefully, that would all go smoothly. "I should go. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Byeee," Amber said, her voice all nasally, and she winked suggestively. "Have fun on your date!"

Vidya shook her head. "Shut up."
_______________________

"They're meeting here?" Lady Marvel muttered.

The barn in front of her was actually kind of nice and not at all decrepit, but it was still a million times less classy than where she would expect the elite members of AMS to gather. Any of the state's extravagant hotels seemed more likely, but River had given cryptic hints about Eagle Eye's involvement with the secretive organization, and the deceased hero happened to be the new owner of this random property, so the situation made enough sense to be worth something.

AMS itself wasn't high up on the list of immediate concerns, but their ties to Eagle Eye meant that there was an alternate explanation for her death that couldn't be ruled out. Because was it the super-killer who'd gotten to her, or did AMS see a chance to get rid of an underperforming asset and kill her knowing that the blame would naturally fall on the perpetrator everyone was already looking for? They were clever enough to try, but they were humble enough to know that not everyone would fall for it, not right away, and that would explain their need for a meeting.

Lady Marvel walked around the building, putting her ear against the wall in several places. She heard nothing, but the barn could be bustling with noise that didn't make it through sound-proof walls. All the windows were boarded up, and there were no entrances other than the front and back doors, both locked. There would be no eavesdropping or sneaking in undetected: she'd have to barge in, incapacitate, and interrogate them afterward.

Lady Marvel prepared herself for a hailing of bullets, knives, and panicked curses in several languages and accents. It was the panic that annoyed her more than the attacks; she could ignore getting shot at, but having someone scream Ma che cazzo! in her ear was distracting. She took a deep breath and then ran through the door, the wood splintering inwards.

No bullets, no knives.

No curses in several languages and accents.

No people.

Lady Marvel blinked. AMS wasn't here, and neither was their fancy table with its fancy chairs, or the fancy nameplates written in a code only they understood. Instead, the barn was occupied by sparse piles of homely-looking things, junk that she'd never expected to find in a location of theirs.

Boots hit the ground behind her, and she glanced over her shoulder. Juggernaut stood in the broken doorway, leaning inside.

"You're late," Lady Marvel said, but it wasn't anything new. He'd been so busy that the missions they'd normally do together were now given to her alone, and if he ever did manage to assign something to himself, he was usually late.

"Sorry." He came inside, unimpressed by the interior of the barn. "They're not even here. There's not a single heartbeat hiding anywhere."

"Either River was completely wrong," she guessed, "or they rescheduled and relocated."

"And to think," he said tiredly, "I pushed back a press conference to come here." His sigh quickly dissolved into a laugh. "That's the worst part of all this—the niceties. I can't wait to catch the guy and be done with all these conferences and assurances."

Lady Marvel narrowed her eyes. His problem with the murders was the niceties—not the fact that people lost their lives, but the niceties. The unashamed flippancy bothered her, even though it made her a hypocrite. She couldn't claim to care about the dead, either...but at least she felt some sympathy.

"You really don't care about them, do you?" she said. "I bet you just looked at their bodies on the tables and laughed."

Juggernaut made a face as if he had a counterpoint. Instead, he walked in a straight line, stepping hard, checking if there were echoes of hollow space underneath the floorboards.

"Eagle Eye had this place for a reason," he said. "There has to be something."

So they looked around, being more careful than needed. No one would even care if they burned the place down, let alone if they knocked something over. Lady Marvel assumed that the junk was all Eagle Eye's or even AMS's things, moved in when the meeting was relocated, if it was ever meant to happen here at all. It was all left untouched and unmoved because Sara Evans had died, or else it might've ended up in her home or in their hands.

There were a lot of books. History, math, science; the kind of decorative literature that a rich guy would have on the shelves of his study. Coded annotations were scribbled across some of the pages, and Lady Marvel ripped those out to give to Michael. She found a photo album, flipped through a few old pages of Sara's childhood, and tossed it aside. There had to be something worthwhile, a sign that Eagle Eye was connected to AMS. A weapon would be good, but Lady Marvel would settle for an allegiance ring or manifesto. She would have to go back to River and help sift through rumors to find the time and location of the real meeting, and it would go smoother if she had something to show from this barn mishap. River hated it when things went sideways, and she was still angry about the warehouse incident.

Lady Marvel turned around to check if Juggernaut was having better luck. He stood with his head tilted to read the sideways spines of stacked books. His pager screen lit up with a message, and he glanced at it for a few seconds before ignoring it and letting it go dark.

"What's the message?" Lady Marvel asked.

"Nothing important."

She believed him and started flipping through loose pages on the floor when there was a loud, faraway crashing noise, a sound of screeching metal and sparks. She flinched—it sounded exactly like nails on a chalkboard—and ran to the doorway, unable to see anything but the dead vineyard hill that blocked the view.

"What was—"

"Train derailment," he said.

Lady Marvel whirled around to face him, sirens blaring in the distance. "Is that what the message was about?"

"Yes."

"And you didn't bother going to help, or to even respond to the alert?"

"They gave me a five-second warning," he snapped. "That's not enough time! That train had no chance, and neither do all the people who are inevitably going to get killed before we can do anything about it. It's the same shitshow as always."

Lady Marvel glared at him. She wasn't mad about the train; his excuse was valid, as was everything else he said. It was just so ironic to hear it this way, in the heat of an argument, coming from someone who was supposed to be the embodiment of the exact opposite.

"You're the leader of the Marvels," she said flatly, turning her back to him to keep looking through the junk. "Could you at least try to act like it sometimes?"

"Cause you'd do so much better."

Lady Marvel froze and turned around slowly. "That is not what I meant."

"Oh, I know," he said calmly, "but it's got me thinking. You know, as the leader of the Marvels, everything we do is my responsibility, including our mistakes. Especially our mistakes, because I don't care enough to do anything to prevent them." He shrugged, walking toward her. "Don't you think that, if I wanted to, I could threaten Flamethrower to be more careful? Don't you think I could force her to stop 'accidentally' killing people? I could do that, but I don't, because I honestly do not give a damn. Every casualty, every reckless mishap, every bit of collateral damage is my fault, and you know what? I don't lose any sleep over that."

They were face-to-face now, and Lady Marvel stared at him harshly, waiting.

"But what about you, Lady Marvel?" he asked quietly with a curious smile. "You're no saint, but you're undoubtedly a better person than I am. If you were in charge, would you be able to deal with that much blood on your hands? Or would you be willing to become the tyrannical maniac you'd have to be to keep the team in check?"

The very thought of it made her see red, and Lady Marvel's hands curled into fists. The answer was, had always been, and would always be an astounding no, for all the reasons he said and many more. She never wanted to be the leader. Ever.

"What," she said, her voice rising, "the hell is wrong with you?"

Juggernaut backed away and went back to looking.

"Why do you act like this?" she spat. "I know that getting your powers was an accident, but everything since then has been a choice, so what the hell is your problem? You chose to become a hero, and you chose to be here!"

He bit the inside of his cheek and mumbled, so low she almost didn't hear it, "Did I?"

Lady Marvel blinked. "What?"

"What?" he repeated, in a somewhat defensive way that made it hard to tell if he was joking.

"What did you just say?"

"I didn't say anything.".

Lady Marvel tilted her head, unable to figure out if he was messing with her or if she'd actually misheard him.

"We have twelve minutes before we have to go talk to the detectives," he said, gesturing around at the barn. "If we're going to find anything, we need to find it now."

Lady Marvel just nodded curtly, and they turned their backs to each other and kept searching without speaking. She took a moment to inhale slowly and shake her head, still processing the whiplash of all the twists in their mess of a conversation. She was angry, but also sad.

What happened to us? she thought bitterly for the hundredth time. What the hell happened?

I have had this chapter and the next two chapters planned for so, so long, and it feels good to finally get them out!

Any guess as to what AMS stands for, or what they do?