Lisa took a deep breath, and pressed the ring bell of the small, slightly rundown home. Even after meeting Taylor several times and getting to know the young, heroic, awkward teenager behind the terrifying shadow-wielding cape, it still felt weird that this was the home of Lasombra, currently the most sought cape in the world.
Getting here from the Undersiders' base had been something of a challenge. The streets were packed with partying people, and there were almost no buses running, what with the national holiday which had just been declared by the White House once someone on the President's cabinet had realized there was no point trying to force people to get to work today.
Once she'd told the news to the rest of the Undersiders, they'd been torn between fleeing the city, joining the festivities, or joining her to, as Regent had put it, 'swear their undying fealty to the new King of Darkness'.
She'd managed to convince them that their reasons for staying in the city under Lasombra's protection were still valid, and that they probably didn't want to risk pissing off the cape who'd just sent the Simurgh to Hell (according to the most popular theory on PHO anyway) by exposing his civilian identity to the entire team instead of just Lisa.
A tall, balding man wearing glasses opened the door and squinted at her suspiciously. Lisa had to look up to meet his gaze, plastering her most inoffensive smile on her face. So that was where Taylor had gotten her height from, she thought, right before her power started going off :
Barely slept last night; is running on coffee and sheer stubbornness. Has been struggling with depression for years. Depression caused by death of Taylor's mother. Knows Taylor is Lasombra. Revelation still recent. Learned it last night. Learned it as a result of the Simurgh's death. Is very protective of daughter. Feels like he's failed her. Determined not to fail again. Feelings of guilt caused him to Trigger –
She winced, expecting a headache as her power started to go on a tangent, but … nope, nothing beyond the normal strain warning her not to over-exert herself or risk a standard Thinker headache. Huh. It seemed Danny Hebert didn't share his daughter's anti-Thinker effect.
And it also seemed that he was a better father than her own, even if he'd missed his daughter's own Trigger event.
"Hello, Mister Hebert !" she said cheerfully. "My name is Lisa. I'm one of Taylor's friends from her part-time job, and after last night, I wanted to check on her, see how she's doing."
Not the most subtle way of saying 'I know your daughter is Lasombra and I am worried about her after she took down the Simurgh', but judging by the sudden darkening of the older man's expression, the message had been received.
"I see. Taylor ?" He called out without taking his eyes off Lisa. "It's Lisa from work. Can she come in ?"
"Oh ! Yeah, yeah, it's fine, Dad !" came the reply from inside the house.
Well, at least Taylor was alive and awake. That was one weight off Lisa's mind.
"Come on in, then," said Mister Hebert, moving out of the doorway and gesturing for her.
Taylor was sitting at the dinner table, still in her PJs. Lisa consciously suppressed her power, and looked her over using her own brain only. She looked pale and exhausted, but otherwise alright, and was picking at the remnants of an omelet.
"I see you're already eating. That's good, but you should save some space in your stomach, because I brought cake !" Lisa said, brandishing the box.
"Oh ?" asked Taylor. "What kind ?"
"Let me show you," Lisa said dramatically, putting the box on the table before opening it to reveal its contents.
The cake was a huge construction, made of a truly sinful amount of chocolate, with the words 'HAPPY ZIZ DEATHDAY' written in strawberry sauce atop it. The slightly distorted letters betrayed the fact that the pastry chef who had written them had done so while still suffering from the effects of spending the night celebrating before dragging himself to his shop to open in time for the rush of previously-dieting customers looking to mark the death of the Simurgh by having a cheat day.
"That's a lot of cake for three of us," Mister Hebert remarked, while Taylor stared at the dessert with wide eyes.
"Everything else was sold out," Lisa shrugged. "The shops that are open are making absolute bank right now, with everyone buying food and drinks to celebrate. Add to that the message on top, and I couldn't help myself."
"Well, I suppose killing an Endbringer is worth some cake," said Danny. "Let me get some plates out."
"So … Taylor, you're fine ?" Lisa asked. "I was worried after seeing the news."
"Well, 'fine' might be pushing it," the dark-haired teenager replied around a mouthful of cake. She swallowed, and continued : "but I'm alright for now, and I will recover fully eventually."
"Alright. I suppose congratulations are in order, then. I admit that I'm still a bit shocked that someone I knew killed an Endbringer."
"How do you think I feel ?" Taylor riposted. "And it wasn't just me. I had help."
"Yes, but from what I could put together from the PHO posts, it was you who made it possible in the first place, and you still did the bulk of the work."
"I know I couldn't have done it alone, Lisa," Taylor sighed. "If not for … Blue Knight, I think his name was. If not for him standing between the Simurgh and my projection, I don't think I'd have achieved anything except shorten the time before it left."
Interesting. Taylor was using 'it' to describe the Simurgh, whereas most people had called the Hopekiller a 'she', on account of her obvious feminine features. Lisa kept her power from trying to figure out what that meant – she didn't want to get a migraine now.
"So," she said as casually as she could, "I should tell you that I figured out Mister Hebert is a recent Trigger."
Both Heberts froze at her declaration, though it was only the father who glared at Lisa suspiciously.
"How can you possibly know that ?" he asked accusingly.
"I'm Tattletale of the Undersiders," she replied. "Figuring things out is my whole shtick."
"She's a Thinker, Dad," Taylor cut in. "It's how she deduced I was Lasombra. Apparently, while my power blocks direct use of Thinker powers on me, they can still be used to piece together the clues."
"Oh. Then, are you supposed to tell me that ?" Danny asked, raising an eyebrow. "I thought civilian identities were a big deal."
"I already told Taylor," she shrugged. "Also, since I figured out you're a parahuman, it's less awkward all around."
And she didn't want to give the cape who'd killed an Endbringer ANY reason to be pissed off at her.
Taylor isn't a parahuman. Taylor is Lasombra. Taylor isn't Lasombra –
Fuck. She'd been doing so well ! It was almost like her power wanted to look at Taylor, even though it never went well. Once again, Lisa forced her power away from that chain of reasoning, and its attention instead landed back on Danny –
Knows Taylor isn't a parahuman. Knows real source of Taylor's powers. Knows the source of his own powers. Has information on the source of all para –
Suddenly, her power shut down, and she couldn't help but scream as a sudden spike of agony bore into her skull. It wasn't like whenever she overused her power, or even when she'd tried to use it directly on Taylor or Lasombra and hit the Stranger effect protecting them; it was just pain, sudden and inescapable.
"Lisa ?!" She heard Taylor say, alarmed. "Lisa, what's wrong ?"
"P-power," she moaned. "Headache. My-my bag. Painkillers …"
She stayed on her chair, shaking with pain, hands pressed against her temples until someone pressed a glass of water against her mouth. Forcing her eyes open, she saw Danny holding a glass in one hand and a pill in the other – just one, not nearly enough, but then he was a reasonable man and didn't want her to overdose on painkillers. She snatched both and downed the pill.
"Let's get you to Taylor's room," said Danny softly, half-carrying her up, Taylor picking up her other side. "We'll close the blinds so you're in the dark until it passes; we can talk more once you've recovered."
Moments later, she was laying on a bed, in a room with the windows mercifully obscured, and Taylor and her dad left her with another glass of water – which she used to drink another two pills the moment they were gone. Soon, the headache went from agonizing to merely torturous.
What the fuck was that ?!
Inside the temporary quarantine zone, Canberra was partying, as was the entire rest of the world.
Villains and heroes who had been clashing in the streets of their home cities mere days prior laughed together as they toasted each other. Restaurant owners had opened their doors after leaving the shelters, giving away food for free out of sheer relief and delirious happiness at the death of the Simurgh and their own salvation.
It was fortunate the quarantine was keeping paparazzi away and the locals had other things on their minds, because Alexandria had witnessed more than a few new couples slip away from the festivities to celebrate in a more intimate manner. Still, she was pretty certain that by the time the checks for Simurgh influence were over and the capes were allowed to return to their home towns, there'd be a lot of drama waiting to happen.
But she couldn't bring herself to care much about it right now. Rebecca had forgotten just how much the Endbringers had taken from them. No, she corrected herself : she hadn't forgotten, she couldn't forget. But she'd … repressed it. Yes, that was it. She'd forced herself not to think about it, for the sake of her own sanity.
She was hardly alone in this, she knew. Suicide rates had been steadily climbing worldwide since the day of Behemoth's first attack, and nothing the heroes did could put a definite stop to it. There were still people who remembered a world without the constant threat of the city-destroying horrors, but for most humans on Earth-Bet, this was simply the way things were : an endless downward spiral, civilization circling the drain with everyone's best efforts doing little more than delay the inevitable.
But now, a miracle had happened. The Simurgh, most feared of the Endbringers, was dead. There wasn't any video footage of it happening due to Lasombra's Stranger effect, but there were plenty of witnesses, from the capes who'd gathered for the fight to the civilians who hadn't made it to the shelters in time.
Internet access around Canberra had been cut off when the Simurgh had descended, as was standard procedure, but it'd been restored after the battle's end, and the news of the victory had spread like wildfire all across the world. At first, people had refused to believe it, believing it to be another plot by the False Angel, until images of the Simurgh's severed head had been released to the public in order to quell conspiracy theories that every single cape involved, including the whole Triumvirate, had become puppets of the Simurgh.
For now, following the last of the selfies they'd authorized as a mix of a reward for the capes who'd joined the fight and propaganda coup, the head of the Simurgh was being kept under lock and key. Once the quarantine dropped and the parahumans were allowed to leave, it would be sent to the highest security vault the various world powers could find : while the idea of studying the corpse of an Endbringer had countless scientists salivating, nobody wanted to take any risk with the remnants of the Hopekiller.
From what Alexandria understood, there'd been some conflict about just who should take possession of the head, but someone (with, she suspected, Contessa's prompting) had idly mentioned the possibility of the Simurgh somehow turning her own death into a ploy to damage international relations as one final fuck-you to the human race, and everyone had agreed to not let any dispute escalate, if only because their respective populations would drag them out of office and tear them to shreds in the street if word of it got out.
Still, despite the wave of joy and optimism that was spreading across the globe, Rebecca still had duties to perform, which was why she was flying above Canberra, toward the caped silhouette that had hovered at an altitude of several hundred meters for the last hour or so.
"David," she stopped her flight next to the other member of the Triumvirate. "What's wrong ?"
"Rebecca ? Oh, sorry," replied Eidolon absent-mindedly. "I've just been … watching. Listening. And thinking. We have been fighting the Endbringers for so long, and we never achieved anything other than forcing them to escape, but now …"
He sighed.
"I thought I had to be the one to deal with them," he continued. "It made sense, right ? I'm the strongest cape Cauldron has ever created, the strongest in the entire world." He didn't mention the Enemy, who wasn't a cape at all. "But when we killed her … Rebecca, for all his power, Lasombra didn't do it on his own. He contributed the most, yes, and he provided the opportunity, but all on his own, I don't think he could have pushed the Simurgh through. Or maybe he could have," Eidolon shrugged, "and I'm just projecting my own feelings of inadequacy on him. Still, it's making me think about how ridiculously arrogant of me it was to think that I could somehow solve all of our problems single-handedly, just because of my power."
"You're being unusually introspective tonight," Alexandria said carefully.
"If not now, then when ?" he asked rhetorically. "Now that we've finished with the clean-up, there is nothing else to do. You know how rare it is for us to have time to simply think."
She did know. As Alexandria and Rebecca Costa-Brown, she had to manage her time very carefully, and as the Protectorate's most powerful and polyvalent hero, Eidolon was constantly on the move, following leads from the PRT or Contessa to deal with threats before they became problems. The only reason they were still here was because breaching the quarantine would do more harm than whatever good they could achieve in the little time saved this way.
"Come," she said eventually. "I'm afraid your time off is over. We have a meeting we need to get to."
The two of them flew down into one of the buildings which had been converted into temporary housing for the capes trapped in Canberra, and reserved for the personal use of the Triumvirate.
"Door," she said once they were out of view, and they stepped through the hole in space, leaving not just Canberra, but Earth-Bet itself behind them.
The leaders of Cauldron met in their base of operation, on an otherwise empty Earth. The compound had been built in the eighties, using the work of numerous Tinkers, and been constantly improved since. The room where they met was one of dozens of identical others in the compound : white walls, white floor, glass ceiling.
They didn't have much time. They never had much time, but especially now, all of them had urgent duties elsewhere : it was only the use of Doormaker's power to cut down on travel time that made this meeting possible in the first place.
The Number Man typing on a computer, handling the myriad duties which were required to keep the patchwork economy of Earth-Bet running at something approaching a sustainable rate. Nobody remarked on it. If he felt he had anything to bring to the conversation, he would speak up; everybody knew that he could follow the meeting while working at the same time.
Contessa and Doctor Mother were already present as well, and they greeted David and Rebecca with a nod. Legend was the last one to arrive through another of Doormaker's portals. He looked exhausted but jubilant.
"We are all here," said Doctor Mother. "You all know why we're here, so let's get to it right away. The Simurgh. You can confirm that she is dead ?"
"I watched an Australian villain try and fail to bounce her head off the ground when it was his turn for a selfie with it," chuckled Legend. "And when it was her turn, Mouse Protector made a Marie Antoinette joke that, in hindsight, was in appallingly bad taste yet still made everyone watching laugh themselves sick. Yes, Doctor, I'm pretty sure she's dead."
"Decapitation might not be enough to kill the Simurgh," Doctor Mother pointed out. "We know very little about the physiology of the Endbringers."
"No, she is dead," Legend replied, shaking his head. "Trust me on this. That gate she went through … there is no coming back from it. I don't know how to explain it, but I just know it. Don't you agree, David, Rebecca ?"
Eidolon and Alexandria both nodded. They had both witnessed the black portal Lasombra had opened, and while neither of them could explain it either despite their Thinker powers, they both knew, on some deep, instinctive level, that the Simurgh couldn't have survived wherever it was Lasombra had cast her.
Alexandria tried very hard not to think of the word 'Hell', which several of the capes who'd participated in the final battle against the Hopekiller had used. As someone who had performed countless morally dubious acts in the pursuit of Mankind's survival, she didn't want to think that any religion was correct – not because of the fate it implied for her own soul, but because the idea that God had allowed the last decades of horror and hopelessness to happen was utterly repellent to her.
"When Lasombra opened that Gate, I saw … things, on the other side," Eidolon said slowly. "I still have no idea what they are, but I know that there's no way the Simurgh survived once she passed through."
"Alright, since you were the ones there, I will take you word for it," Doctor Mother conceded. "But if we assume that the Simurgh is dead, that leaves the question of what happened to the rest of her body – specifically, if Lasombra can recover it somehow, and what he intends to do with it if he can. Which leads us to our next point : we need to make contact with him, as soon as possible."
"I tried to path the quickest way to speak with Lasombra the moment I got the news of what had happened," said Contessa, stating the obvious solution they'd all been thinking of. "It didn't work."
"Like with Scion, Eidolon and the Endbringers ?" asked Rebecca, frowning as she considered the implications of that.
"Not quite," the strongest Thinker in existence (not just the strongest human Thinker, now that the Simurgh was dead) shook her head. "It's difficult to describe, but in their case, it's like there's a wall that blocks me from seeing the Path. In Lasombra's case, it's like there's nothing at all."
"Considering that Lasombra was able to spoof the Simurgh's precog, that's not too surprising," said Legend. "We knew her own precognition could work around Contessa's, beyond her being a blind spot. Lasombra's anti-Thinker ability extending to Path to Victory makes sense in that context."
"I have a feeling Lasombra's powers don't come from the same source as ours," said Eidolon. "What I saw inside that Gate … it felt different from what the agents are capable of. Not just in scale, but in nature."
There was a pause as they all considered Eidolon's words. Even now, despite all the years of studying the corpse of the Entity from which they extracted the elements used to create Cauldron vials, they still knew painfully little about the species of the Enemy.
"There is the possibility that Lasombra is another of Scion's kind," Rebecca said. "When I met him after the battle, he said something that implied he wasn't human. However, he also mentioned that he'd been wounded in the fight, maybe from pushing himself too far. If Lasombra, like Scion, is a projection of an Entity used to interact with our world, he shouldn't have suffered from the strain."
"Why not ?" asked the Number Man, without raising his gaze from his work. "Scion may never have shown signs of strain even while engaging the Endbringers, but he's never killed them, either. Whatever Lasombra used to create the gate may be an ability that's hard to use even for them."
"The way he spoke … Scion has never talked since telling us his name," said Rebecca. "In the short time he's been active, Lasombra has already spoken more than him by a large margin. Honesty, we have no way of knowing one way or the other. We need more data."
"We should bring Chevalier in on this," said Legend. "See what his sight tells him about Lasombra."
Chevalier's power allowed him to perceive the agents of other parahumans, gaining some knowledge of their own powers and Trigger events in the process. He wasn't part of Cauldron, being a natural Trigger rather than an induced one, but the organization trusted him as much as they trusted anyone who wasn't in the inner circle.
"First, we need to find Lasombra and meet him in a setting that allows for proper communication," said Doctor Mother. "That means contacting him 'out of costume', but if he's immune to even Contessa's power, that's going to be difficult. We're going to need to rely on mundane investigation."
"Are we sure we want to do that ?" asked Legend, looking troubled. "He might take it poorly, and we definitely don't want to turn him against us."
"He hasn't made contact with the Protectorate despite repeated offers from Armsmaster and every other hero who met him," replied Rebecca, pulling up the reports on the subject she'd read from her eidetic memory. "He's been willing to entrust the aftermath of his interventions to the authorities, and he gave us the head of the Simurgh, so clearly he isn't hostile to us, or at least doesn't want to give that impression for one reason or another."
"We should expect everyone to be looking for Lasombra," said Legend. "Increasing the hero presence in Brockton Bay is what will be expected of us, if only to keep the city safe from the villains who may converge on it with the goal of gaining the glory of killing Lasombra. Not that I expect anyone to succeed," he added with a wry smile, "but we need to look out for the civilians who may be caught in the crossfire."
"I should be on standby while we investigate, just in case he does turn hostile," said Eidolon. "I … I don't think he will, but we should still follow protocol for a potential S-Class threat."
"We'll coordinate with the local PRT," decided Rebecca. "One member of the Triumvirate should be in the Bay at all times, ready to deploy to meet Lasombra once he reappears. We'll start with a soft approach, trying to convince them to meet us on his own terms. If that doesn't work, then we'll consider other options."
"That's softer than the approach you usually recommend," Doctor Mother noted.
"The Simurgh just died," she replied with a rare smile. "I'd rather avoid us fucking things up by ruining the closest thing to a silver bullet we've ever gotten out of paranoia."
The corridors of the Fallen hidden base were full of the sound of screams.
That much wasn't anything new. All too often, the unbelievers needed to be taught the truth in order to join the fold. Mama's powers gave her a great many ways to make people suffer without killing them, and she was well-practiced in using every single one of them.
Today, however, the suffering of the unbelievers wasn't paving the way to their eventual illumination; it was merely there to allow the leader of the Mathers branch of the Fallen to vent her apoplectic fury. Which was her right as the servant of the gods, of course, but her son worried that she might be letting herself go too far this time.
"Mama," said Valefor during a brief decrease in the intensity of the screaming, brought not by release, but sheer exhaustion. "You need to stop, or they aren't going to be of any use."
"These infidels dare to claim they killed the Great Angel," Mama Mathers hissed.
"I know, Mama. I know," said Valefor in a calming tone of voice. "But they are only blindly repeating the lies they have been told. They need to suffer for it, yes, but isn't it more important to chastise those who dare speak those lies in the first place ?"
There was a moment of silence, broken only by the whimpers of Mama's victims.
"You're right," Mama took a deep breath. "Such a good child you are, Valefor, always looking out for me. Venting my anger on these fools won't solve anything. We must go to the source of this blasphemy."
"The cape whom they claim killed the Simurgh, Lasombra, is well-known as a resident of the city of Brockton Bay, on the East Coast," Valefor offered.
"Hmm. Very well. Gather the faithful," Mama ordered. "We are going to Brockton Bay, and we will teach that cesspool of the city the price of defying the holy Endbringers. Then, once the arch-heretic Lasombra has watched his precious city brought low around him, he too will be taught the ultimate lesson."
"Yes, Mama," Valefor replied obediently.
The Teeth's base of operation in the Boston area had once been a mall, before poor economic conditions had led to its closure and the general abandonment of the surrounding area – an exodus that had been completed when the gang had moved in and the locals had quite wisely decided to leave before the roving band of cannibals went hunting for them.
Now, the building had been remade into a lair for the handful of capes and dozens of unpowered thugs who had gathered around the Butcher. It was, unsurprisingly, an absolute cesspit of filth, drugs, alcohol, and loot, and the quarters of the Butcher were the most dangerous part of it all.
On average, the Teeth were content to let whatever cape currently wore the mantle of Butcher do whatever they wanted, and follow them into battle whenever the voices in their head got too loud to ignore. Right now, however, one member of the gang was nervously making his way toward the workshop which had been requisitioned for the supervillain's use, having drawn the short straw.
"Uh, Butcher ?" he called out tentatively.
"What !" barked Quarrel without turning away from the workbench on which her bow was currently disassembled.
"The others are asking if we're we still going to the Bay ?" he asked.
"Course we are !" roared the Butcher, abandoning her work to face her lackey, who forced himself not to recoil (showing weakness was marginally more likely to get him killed than not showing 'proper respect'). "Now that those Empire fucks are in the ground, it's time for us to go back to our roots and take back our fucking city !"
"It's just, boss, have you read the news ? Brockton Bay's the home turf of that new cape, Lasombra, who's all over PHO lately. There's going to be a lot of heroes in the city trying to find him. And Lasombra took out the Simurgh. The Simurgh, boss !"
"So what ? Either I kill him, or he kills me and becomes me. Either way, the Butcher wins, because the Butcher always wins !"
Quarrel laughed, a demented, disjointed sound that made the Teeth member shudder as he made his way out of the room, and followed him as he went back to tell the others the plan was still on.
"Well, well, well," said Jack Slash, reading the newspaper he had picked up from the motel's lobby. "Isn't that interesting."
The news that the Simurgh was dead was a big surprise, but not so much as the fact that it'd been done by a newcomer to the cape scene. Oh, the Protectorate was doing its best to prop up the contributions of the Triumvirate, but if they'd been able to actually fight the Endbringers they'd have done that years ago. It was obvious this Lasombra fellow was the one who had done the heavy lifting.
He toyed with the idea of travelling to Brockton Bay and having a conversation with Lasombra, to show him that he was wasting his time coddling the masses and would be much happier indulging his darker (heh) instincts and rampaging at will. Already the sheep were hailing him as a savior; how much horror would it cause when Jack stripped him of his delusions of heroism and turned him into another mad monster let loose upon the world ? And since Lasombra had apparently moved from Brockton Bay to Australia with his own power, nobody on this world would feel safe ever again.
Oh yes, the prospect sounded very appealing to Jack. At the same time, however, the Protectorate was sure to be out in force in the region. Lasombra had disappeared right after killing the Simurgh, and the cape didn't have a formal relationship with the heroes. So it was likely there'd be at least one member of the Triumvirate in the city, with a lot of support, all of them looking for Lasombra. That would make it difficult for his crew to operate discreetly and find Lasombra themselves.
No, Jack decided. Better to let others feed themselves into the wood-chipper first : he'd no doubt there would be plenty of would-be challengers headed toward Lasombra at this very moment. He would stay clear of Brockton Bay himself, but only for now. Once the situation settled down, and he had Alan hack into a few governmental databases for information, he would reconsider his options.
In the meantime, though, the Slaughterhouse Nine would need to work twice as hard to keep the sheep from growing too optimistic and forgetting their place in the world. With a smile, he tossed the newspaper back on the table and got up. Time to see if the others had finished their game of hide-and-seek with the motel's previous occupants, and if Bonesaw was done setting up her field laboratory.
AN : After looking it up and asking the readers on SB, I've decided that, at the time of this chapter's events, the Slaughterhouse Nine haven't gotten around to capturing Mouse Protector and fusing her to Ravager in order to create Murder Rat. I think it makes sense timeline-wise, and more importantly, it creates the possibility of Lasombra interacting with MP, which isn't something I realized this story needs until now.
I am trying to be as generous with my presentation of Cauldron as I can, despite their many, many, MANY mistakes and fuck-ups. Like many Worm elements of this fic, I'm taking inspiration from the various stories by Fabius Maximus. Still, I must admit it is deeply satisfying to have them milling about trying to figure out what's going on with Lasombra. If they sound out of character, I'm blaming it on the rather unique circumstances of the Simurgh's recent death.
What's that ? That sounds like an excuse to keep throwing curveballs at them so I can keep writing them however I want while also fucking with some of the most morally questionable characters in the history of fiction ? I don't know what you are talking about.
Fun fact : Contessa tried to use PtV immediately after the Simurgh died. Meaning she used it while Taylor and Danny were in the Abyss. I thought I would point that out, just in case you missed that minor, unimportant detail.
Next chapter, Lasombra gets back to work, and the PRT and Protectorate finally gets to sit down and have a chat with the Endkiller ... kind of. You will see what I mean.
As always, I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter, and look forward to your thoughts and comments.