The warehouse had changed over the past few weeks. What used to be empty space now had proper training markers, padded landing zones, and mats arranged for exactly this kind of drill.
"Wall crawling first," Peter said, standing in the middle of the floor. "Then modulation. Same as always."
Gwen was already moving, walking up the east wall like it was flat ground, hands loose at her sides. Her adhesion held without a flicker of concentration on her face. She reached the ceiling, hung there for a second, then dropped back down and landed clean.
"Passive," she said. "I told you it stopped needing active thought."
"I remember." Peter turned to MJ. "Your turn."
MJ went up the same wall, slower, more deliberate. Halfway up she paused, adjusted her weight, then kept going. She reached the same point Gwen had and hung there a beat longer than necessary, testing it.
"Good," Peter said. "You're overthinking the grip less than last week."
"I'm trying." MJ dropped down and rolled her shoulders. "Can we do the strength drills? I want to see if I can carry the crate without turning it into toothpicks this time."
They ran through it. MJ lifted the training crate, careful and controlled, set it down without splintering the wood. Gwen ran timed reaction drills against a swinging pad, catching it mid-arc without breaking stride in her breathing.
By the end of an hour, both of them were sitting on the crash mat, drinking water, looking pleased with themselves in the specific way people look when a skill finally clicks.
MJ set her water bottle down. "Okay. Can I ask something?"
"Go ahead," Peter said.
"The swinging thing. Where you go from building to building." She gestured vaguely at the ceiling like it explained itself. "I want to try that."
Peter considered her for a moment. "That's different from anything you've done so far. Wall crawling and strength modulation come from your body directly. Swinging requires equipment."
Gwen sat up straighter. "Equipment. As in the shooters."
"As in the shooters." Peter walked over to a locked case against the far wall and opened it. Inside sat two compact devices, sleeker than what most people would picture if you said the word gadget, each one built to sit against the underside of a forearm. "I built these myself."
"Of course you did," Gwen leaned in over his shoulder to look, careful not to touch. "The fluid delivery system. Is that pressurized?"
"Pressurized cartridges. Each one holds enough fluid for about eighty full deployments before it needs replacing." Peter turned one of the shooters over in his hand. "The trigger is a double tap against the palm. I designed it that way so an accidental brush wouldn't fire it."
"What's the fluid made of?" Gwen asked. Her voice had picked up that particular quickness it got whenever something crossed into her actual interests. "Synthetic silk, obviously, based on tensile strength, but the cure time must be fast if you're using it mid swing."
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