53 - [Investigative Casting Call]

“Investigative Episodes are usually how superheroes start Episodes. Most of the time, the villain is the one starting stuff.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.” Fursona sprawled across the chaise lounge, and I thanked Fang Swee’s power for giving me that particular piece of furniture in my secret base. “But not always.”

“Right, not always. Sometimes, villains need a solution before they start something. So heroes can start up Investigative Episodes. They’re usually Shorts that lead into more full-blown Episodes, and they’re different in that unless a hero starts fighting or does something obvious, the villains don’t get a [Casting Call],” I said. I’d used Investigative Episodes against Peter several times, like when I’d tried to hunt down his lair. Honestly, they were a pain in the ass; I didn’t have the powers to do them right, so they just ended up being frustrating.

“So if Sara-N-Dipity and the boys can’t get to the bottom of it, why involve TUSSA in the hunt?”

I finished adjusting my build again to make sure I had [Inkling] equipped. Surely I wouldn’t need [Flickerform] for an Investigative Episode, right? Then I shrugged. "We’ll have to find out. Ikenga’s powers should be enough for any investigation, and Sara’s built for it exclusively. Remember what Springlock and Milo said at the barbecue?”

“Yeah.” With a stretch, Fursona picked themselves up off the lounge. “It’s 12:15. You done?”

“Almost. What do you think Iron Fist and Tearjerker could be up to?” For a moment, [Card Curio] stood out as a power I’d like to have. It’d be an excellent backup to [Inkling], or something more active to help us figure things out. But I didn’t have a Tarot deck, so I couldn’t do any readings. And there wasn’t time to buy one before the meeting.

“No idea,” Fursona said. “Knowing Monologue, it’s probably something stupid like getting his grades changed again.”

“Or poisoning all the pizza in the cafeteria so people get stuck in the bathroom for their afternoon classes.”

“Hey, that sounds serious, not stupid!”

“It sounds like something my ex would do.” I grabbed Tails and flopped her onto my shoulder. “Let’s go.”

◄▼►

“Thank you all for coming,” Ikenga said from the slightly-larger seat at the head of the oval conference table. “As I said in the email, the SSS is up to something.”

“The SSS is always up to something,” Milo said, watching Springlock’s hands. “They’re supervillains without frontal lobes. All they do is get up to something.”

The TUSSA-Cave was under the Gordon Lecture Hall Building—in fact, its entrance was right next door to where I had Post-Launch Day History. The main room had all the bells and whistles—and smell—of a good bar; A pool table, a few ancient-looking but well-maintained arcade machines, and a jukebox that was, sadly, silent. A few taps sat behind a counter, unused, and a massive fridge was filled with soft drinks no one was drinking. We weren’t here to celebrate anything.

We were here to listen to Ikenga.

“Yes, yes, they’re always up to something. Monologue always has a little plan he’s working on,” Ikenga said. He furrowed his brow, glaring. “But this one’s different. He doesn’t seem to be involved, at least not directly. I’ll let Sara take it from here.”

Sara-N-Dipity stood up in her suit and pulled out a clicker. She flicked it, and a slideshow started on a big TV. I groaned. So did half the other heroes, but she ignored us. “Alright, here it is. Me and the boys were out on a Short near Almond Street when I got a [Hunch]. It said with 78% certainty that something was going down two blocks over. So I left the boys to finish the Episode—Dark Girl Anima was about done anyways, and I went to check it out.

“Iron Fist and Tearjerker were talking about ‘the plan’ when I got there, but I calculated only an 8% chance of them spilling the beans, so I followed them until they split up, then I headed back to the boys.” She pointed at the map on her slideshow. “Almond Street is up in the Poudre District, which is Mutual Assistance League and 3V1L territory, so the SSS shouldn’t have been up there at all.”

She clicked her button. “The boys had mopped up Anima, but she didn’t know much or wasn’t talking. So we’re out of leads since we can’t just catch Lady Lockless and make her squeal.”

“Why not?” Fursona asked. “Lady Lockless is a talker. She’d probably tell you everything.”

“That’s villain shit, ‘Roo. We don’t kidnap and interrogate,” Sara said, staring. Fursona didn’t look embarrassed, but then again, they were a fursuit kangaroo.

“Thanks, Sara,” Ikenga said. He waited until she sat down. “It was lucky that—“

“It’s not…sorry.”

“Let me rephrase. Sara, Punch, and Grapple did us a great service by uncovering this ‘plan’ of TUSSA’s. Now we need to figure out what, exactly, it is. To that end, I’m starting an Investigative Episode effective immediately. Please accept if you can help.”

[Investigative Casting Call]

[Investigative Episode: What’s the Plan, Man? - PG]

[Role: Amateur Sleuth! Do you accept the role? (Yes/No)]

[Role Focus: Cunning > Drama]

I nodded at Fursona and accepted the [Investigative Casting Call]. It wasn’t my idea of a great time. I’d hated these so much against Peter, but with this many heroes, someone would probably solve it before us, and we’d be on the shortlist for the follow-up Episode. Hero-started Episodes almost always ended up as hero wins.

[What’s the Plan, Man?: Act One in Progress]

“The first team is Hephaestus, Springlock, Milo, and myself. We’re the core four, so we’ll cover where we think the SSS has its most recent lair, near the football field. Sara and the boys are on off-campus duty because they’re the most likely to get lucky.” Ikenga ignored Sara’s glare and kept talking. He assigned two more teams before finally getting to Fursona and me.

“You’ll be on campus patrol. Most of the time, the SSS villains don’t run around in costume, but you have a class or two with villains, right?”

I nodded.

“Wonderful. They’re mostly little leaguers, so someone might let something slip accidentally, especially if they’ve been brought in as a trial for something big. Sometimes braggarts are the best informants.”

The teams asked questions about their areas of responsibility, the odds of finding something—Sara helped answer most of those—and how to report their findings back to TUSSA. Ikenga got everyone’s number and started a group chat, which I wasn’t thrilled about. And then the meeting was over.

Fursona walked to the TUSSA-Cave’s rec room and stood in front of a Ms. Pac-Man machine. The ghosts started wabble-wabbling around the maze as they moved the joystick back and forth. “Mom used to know a lot about these games. I played them on my laptop, but the actual machines are really neat. So, how are we gonna bust up the SSS’s plan?”

“Well, it’s Sunday in the middle of the afternoon.” I watched Fursona eat a blinking blue ghost, then run from its friends as they turned back to normal. “I think we both go to whatever class we have before Superpower Ethics and keep our ears open. Maybe we’ll hear something. We’ll meet in SE and see if Gourmet or Theseus spill anything. They won’t, but Ikenga and Sara should have it wrapped up by then.”

“Hmmmm.” Fursona went silent and maneuvered their Ms. Pac-Man away from the incoming ghosts. When they finally cornered and ate their character, they turned to me. “You’re putting a lot of faith in Ikenga and Sara-N-Dipity, but they need our help, or they wouldn’t have put out an all-hands Episode, right?”

“Right.”

“So we need to do our best, right?”

“Look, I don’t know what else we can do. This kind of thing isn’t my specialty. I searched for Professor Panic’s lair for months, even with an Investigative Episode, and I couldn’t find it. If the minor league heroes haven’t figured out by noon tomorrow, we’ll devise another plan, okay?”

“Okay.” Fursona pushed away from the machine with a sigh. “I don’t have the skills for it either, but we need to try, that’s all. I’ll see you tomorrow, Understudy.”

◄▼►

“Hey, Dad. Hey, Mom. Has anything weird happened in Riverside?” I asked. After Peter…after the break-up…I’d started video-chatting with Mom and Dad every Sunday night before showering. It was turning into a nice tradition, at least when Mom had the day off. I’d lie on my bed and talk, and they sat around the kitchen table.

Mom wrinkled her brow, thinking. “No, Anika. It’s been quiet. A few Ronin heroes showed up and fought a Scythe Tooth, but other than that, nothing much. I had a couple of days off in a row this week, which was relaxing.” She took a drag from her cigarette.

“Now that you mention it, Claire, Professor Panic hasn’t done anything obvious in two…no, three…weeks.”

“He’s probably up to something big. He’s done this before,” I said. “Like when he was working on—“

“That set of power armor, huh?” Dad asked.

“Uh, yeah.” My parents knew everything about what I’d done as Magical Girl Understudy. They knew things Peter didn’t know. Hell, they probably knew things Rocko didn’t know. And I still hadn’t figured out how they’d learned so much about me.

“How are classes, Anika?” Mom asked. "Are you going to history again?”

“Yes, Mom, I am going to Post-Launch Day North American History again.” I rolled my eyes. “They’re going well except for math. I’m meeting with Su-Bin tomorrow after history and before biology to go over multi-variable equations again, but I didn’t get them in high school, and I won’t get them now.”

“Sure you will, Dot. I’m shocked Peter didn’t teach you how to do it, though,” Dad said.

“Oh, he tried. He tried. We had a Short about it, so he never tried to teach me after that. How’s he been?”

“Haven’t seen him,” Dad said. “I think he’s avoiding me. Can’t imagine why?”

“Har har.”

Mom and Dad talked a lot about Christmas Break and their plans. If the Man vs. Nature ended, they’d pick me up just after my ‘Biology’ final on Friday. I still hadn’t told them I wasn’t in Biology. If not, we’d video call and stuff. They urged me to make a plan; after all, Christmas was only a month and a half away, and I wouldn’t want to be alone. They were right, but Bianca’s parents didn’t live in town either. Maybe I could have Christmas at Su-Bin’s place? Were we close enough to ask?

When we finally said our goodbyes and I closed the video chat window, it was close to ten, and I hadn’t touched my Post-Launch Day reading for tomorrow. I rolled out of bed and threw myself onto the couch, where my textbook sat.

Chapter Thirteen: Implications of the First Power War for the Yorkston-Columbia Megapolitan Area

After the First Power War ended, the Yorkston-Columbia Megapolis was in jeopardy. Liege Lord’s battle with Doombringer had leveled much of Manhattan Island’s infrastructure, the fighting elsewhere had left vast swaths of the city damaged, and though the Ilneat studios each worked for offered to pay for the rebuild, the Ilnean government chose not to intervene as they had after Launch Day.

The city may have been in jeopardy, but I was drifting off. Professor Ellen Suarez, whoever she was, was not a very interesting writer.

With near-infinite funding but no silver bullet solution, the Yorkston and Columbia governments embarked on the largest construction project in human history; a complete rebuild of Manhattan Island from the sea floor up, along with a complete rebuild of the crippled road systems in North Yorkston. Properly funded by the Ilneat studios and with both Powered and Unpowered labor in abundance, the project started on…

I yawned. The clock said 10:26. I’d been reading this page for thirty minutes, over and over, without realizing it.

Nope.

I took off my clothes and hopped in the shower. Teaching Assistant Smith could teach me the importance of the Yorkston-Columbia Megaplex’s construction project. The steam and the industrially clean soap-bar smell filled the bathroom as I mentally ran through Gourmet, Theseus, Flare, The Crumb, and all of tomorrow’s potential informants.

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