Super Sales on Super Heroes

Chapter 30 - The Bait -

This was a risk. A risk to come to a location he’d ordered someone killed at. A risk to step outside in public where he was attacked every time he’d done so. A risk to go to something that he’d called and made arrangements for the previous day, giving his enemies time to prepare. A risk to go make demands of a department that didn’t care a whisker about him or his people.

Yet here he was, sitting in the lobby of the government agency that seemed hellbent on screwing him over.

Victoria was with him, of course, along with Andrea and a number of Others, but that was it.

Everyone else was busy trying to scrounge up material, capital, or favors to get them through this hardship. They’d only allowed him two companions to accompany him anyways, so any more would have to wait in the lobby.

Felix was dressed up in one of his nicer suits. Andrea looked as if Lily had dressed her, as she was striking and modest at the same time. A blood red blouse, a black jacket, and black pencil skirt.

Victoria had chosen something more mundane. A suit jacket, slacks, button-up shirt, and ballistic vest.

That and her very real, very high-end sword hanging from her hip.

No one had attempted to take it from her, though Andrea’s handgun had been confiscated.

After getting a pat-down and being asked what their business was and who they were here to see, they were promptly told to wait. They sat them down in the lobby right there without another word or direction.

That was an hour ago.

“Can we go home? You smell great, and every time your eyes fall on me, I can smell your need,” Andrea said, laying her head on his shoulder.

Victoria snorted at that, shifting from one foot to the other. She hadn’t relaxed her guard, and seemed as tightly wound as she’d ever been.

“No, we need to stay and make sure this gets taken care of. You heard what was said at the meeting. No more questions about that; I’d rather not discuss our business out in the open. Who knows what’s being recorded.”

“Fine. I’ll be good. Lily told me that when I’m good you’re supposed to reward me.

“Oh! That reminds me, how’d the date go? Lily seemed really happy this morning.”

Felix felt his lips curl into a smile. “We decided to postpone it till this evening because I couldn’t get a reservation.”

“Huh? Then why was she happy?” Andrea asked, her tail sliding up behind him to curl around his hip.

“Because he’s taking it seriously,” Victoria answered. “He didn’t want to just take her out, he wanted to take her to a nice restaurant.”

“Oh. Hm. You can make pancakes with me and then we’ll mate in our bed. That’d make me happy,” Andrea said, pressing up closer to his side.

“I’m all for that, but I think maybe right now isn’t the best place to talk about it. Or cling so closely to me. It’s pleasant but distracting.”

“What if we started making out? Do you think they’d want to get rid of us if we started making a scene?”

Felix felt the sweat pop out on his brow, his skin heating up several degrees.

“I don’t think that’d be wise,” Victoria said critically. “How could you protect him at the same time? They disallowed your Others in here, remember? I need you helping me here.”

“That’s no fun. Besides, when I said it, Felix got really excited. I could practically hear his heartrate speed up, and the scent was strong.”

“Really? That strong?” Victoria asked.

“Maybe he wants you to watch. Oh! Or maybe he wants you to join? Not sure. We should ask Lily. She’ll know what to think of this.”

“Uhhhh, I think that—”

At that moment, a man in a suit opened the interior lobby door and held it open. “Mr. Campbell?”

Standing up happily, Felix left the two women behind with the speed of his escape.

Andrea and Victoria scrambled to catch up with him as he dodged past the crony and into the hallway beyond.

“This way, please.”

Felix didn’t bother to respond as he followed the man down the hallway. They wouldn’t have anything to say to him that would be worthwhile anyways. And if they did, they certainly wouldn’t tell him prior to his meeting with what he assumed would be their boss. Or at least someone higher up in the corporate ladder.

People who fetch guests in the lobby don’t typically have a lot to add at this point.

They were led to a glass door, which the man opened for them. “Mr. Chirk will be with you shortly. Have a seat.”

Felix dropped into a chair and rested his left ankle on his right knee. “More waiting. Goodie. It’s a shame we can’t bill them for our time. This’d be a hell of a lucrative trip.”

Andrea shrugged her shoulders, wandering over to a window. Her head turned one way, then the other, peering out of the glass. Then she held a hand up to her ear.

“This is Pancake, request street actual check in. Pancake actual is in south side of building, floor two, window. Confirm overwatch,” she said.

Felix watched her back as she easily slipped into her role of Myriad. He could vaguely hear responses from the Others, but nothing concrete.

Victoria was busy searching the room, looking for anything out of place that could be a problem. Even going so far as to open the desk drawers looking for weapons.

“Pancake receives, maintain overwatch on this position.”

Andrea turned around and looked to Victoria while folding her hands behind her back. “All is well and accounted for. Can you confirm the room is clear?”

Victoria popped open an electrical device she pulled out of her tactical vest. Thumbing the side of it, she looked down to what he assumed was a display.

“Listening devices, nothing outside expectations. Room is clear,” Victoria said, closing the device up. She walked to the door and took up a position there.

“Good work.” Andrea turned to Felix and gave him a grin. “Room clear, street is covered.”

Felix gave her a small smile and felt weird about the entire thing. He knew their precautions were necessary considering the number of attempts on his life, but they still made him feel strange.

He still felt like Felix, the fast food manager. Felix, the lonely man who barely made enough at his dead-end job.

Now I’m Felix, the one with twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week bodyguards who sweep and clear buildings that I’ll be entering.

“Thanks, Andrea. Hopefully we can get this taken care of and get moving. I’m looking forward to not fearing payroll every day.

“Costs keep rising, even if we can’t get a hold of our accounts. This whole thing is fucking ridiculous.”

Felix shifted, slouching into his chair.

“Agreed, but we do what we must.”

Felix opened his mouth to retort when the door opened behind them. An older man in a dark suit walked in. His eyes snapped to Victoria, whose hand was resting on the sword at her side, then to Andrea, whose hand had dipped into her jacket.

Felix wouldn’t have been surprised if Andrea had managed to slip a holdout pistol through security.

“I see. Mr. Campbell?” asked the older man, looking to Felix.

“That’d be me. I’ll cut to the chase,” Felix said, getting to his feet. “My accounts have been frozen for longer than the statute al—”

At that moment, his phone went off. Pausing long enough to rotate his wrist, he glanced at the linked screen.

Eva Adelpha.

“I’m sorry, this might be important,” Felix apologized. Tapping the screen, he fished his phone out of his suit pocket and held it up to his ear.

“Eva wha—”

“The school is under attack! We’r—”

As abruptly as she’d started talking, the phone went dead.

Feeling his heartbeat speed up, he dropped the phone to his waist. He quickly thumbed through the security screen and pulled up his contacts. Tapping Ioana’s line, he held the phone back up to his ear.

“Mr. Campbell, if you ca—”

“Hush,” Victoria commanded at the man, stepping between Mr. Chirk and Felix.

“Ioana,” came the strong voice of his War Maiden.

“Eva called me, said there was an attack on the school.”

“What? Give me a second.”

“Now see here. Mr. Campbell, if you can’t give me your attention this moment, you can leave.”

Felix’s eyes tracked back to Mr. Chirk. They’d kept him waiting for a long time.

Long enough that Felix had gotten angry. Long enough that the anger had turned into a cold, quiet rage. Long enough that he’d been tempted to send Wraith in and clear out the entire agency.

“I mean it. You can leave and we can schedule an appointment at another time. I believe my calendar is open in two weeks. Until then, nothing will change with you or your accounts.”

Felix blinked. That was quite a threat. It’d put them well outside the point that they’d more than likely become insolvent.

“We’ve got confirmation,” Ioana said in his ear. “There’s an attack going on alright. I’m sending multiple squads and all four Wardens. I’d appreciate it if you could suit up and join us. Having you there should cut through red tape since you own the school.”

“Well?” Mr. Chirk asked.

Felix blinked, his thoughts grinding to an immediate halt.

Because there was no need to debate the choice.

Guardian indeed.

“Apparently my weapon of choice is a pen. You’ll be hearing from my lawyers, Mr. Chirk. Mr. Smith tried to blackmail me and my people, then held our accounts hostage. I do have proof of it.

“I plan on taking this up with Skipper. I hope you’re ready to get your entire organization cracked open.”

Dismissing the man with a flick of his free hand, he turned his head to the side to focus on the call.

Victoria, taking his intention as something else, shoved the older man out of his own office, and shut the door.

“I’ll be there. Send me a Telemedic to pick us up. We’ll have the Others bring the cars back.”

Only minutes after having received the call, everyone was on site. The Telemedics had earned their keep several times over today.

Felix would need to increase their capacity and give them some combat training. That and increase the number of them.

All over the school, his people were swarming the grounds.

Squads were actively working to clear the entire school. Each squad was made up of twelve people. Each one of those squads were hand assembled to form their teams. They were filled with both mundanes carrying amped-up gear and supers to provide force multipliers.

On top of that very deadly force, the four Wardens were released. They were being utilized separately of each other. The long-range models were used to clear open areas that could be a killing field. The Shield versions were being sent into the close-quarters area to clear any combatants that could be hiding and waiting in ambush.

After their arrival, it was obvious the school was in lockdown. Students and teachers were huddling in their classrooms. The classrooms that would have had students from Legion, however, were conspicuously empty.

Ioana and her team moved as only trained professionals could.

Having been given a huge budget and open recruiting was clearly paying off.

Training rooms, equipment, extensive mental conditioning through HR, the best in medical care.

Ioana’s people had been showered in everything that could and would make them lethal, deadly, and balanced mentally.

Those soldiers, as if they could be called anything else, were clad in dark black tactical gear from head to toe. Armed with high-end weaponry, both prototypes from Felicia and White’s lab, and standard armory issue. Equipped with spell-powered gear built by Lily and her corps of magicians.

They were a force that could probably stand toe to toe with actual special forces, and win.

Even if they fell, providing they’d signed the appropriate form, they would rise again for the next battle. Wiser, having gained experience most paid for with their life and were unable to act on.

At least that mountain of money was worth it.

Felix tried to marshal his thoughts and mind back to the situation. He was standing there in his powered armor like a daydreaming fool.

Around him, his people worked.

And they really were his people. Someone had been building him a team to function around him in the field.

A command team.

Those people had assembled as soon as word had spread that he’d be taking the field. Bodyguards, techs, Telemedics, and supers who would be useful for communications.

They’d put together an instant communications hub and headquarters for him in two minutes of arrival.

He’d have to check in to see who had set this up for him. It was incredibly effective, and he felt like he was tied into the whole operation even without being there.

Kit, who wasn’t far away, was acting as if it was completely normal and expected. Making her the prime suspect.

He was watching as a Warden began its approach on the library building. It was a massive stone-faced thing that looked as if it had been a truly large endowment from a wealthy contributor.

Probably to buy the silence of the school as well as entry for the child of a well-known super.

Or a delinquent.

As the Warden made its way across the field towards the building, the tension mounted. This would be a defensible area, for both students to find shelter, and for a hostile force to make home.

When the Warden reached the halfway point, a missile flared to life from an upper window.

In a second, that missile closed the distance and exploded into the Warden. A ball of flame went up around the figure, the camera feed giving way to static and red glare.

Two seconds later and the Warden was visible again. Around it, a blue glowing shell flickered.

The Warden angled itself backwards and engaged the jump jets on its legs and fired, sending it rocketing back the way it had come.

As it flew, the Warden spun around, bringing its railgun up to its shoulder. It lined up a shot, and fired. Having fired, it finished its spin, putting its back to the building.

The massive round lit the air on fire as it boomed out. The slug went through the window the heavy explosive had come from.

Switching from the Warden’s camera to an aerial drone, Felix flipped over to its heat camera.

All around the interior of the window and ground was the bright red of heat. Splattered liberally in every direction, the Warden had landed their shot, and blown apart the combatant.

“Enemy down,” reported a tech over the comms. The Warden who had been engaged on came to a graceful landing behind a building.

“Damn good shot,” Felix muttered.

“Thank you, sir,” came back the immediate response.

He hadn’t meant to congratulate the soldier, but whatever.

It really was a great shot.

The other long-range Warden was moving to the other side of the building now to set up a crossfire. The two Shield Wardens continued to clear and search.

Half of the deployed squads broke off and began to cordon off the library.

Curiously, one squad broke away and was making their way back towards the landing area.

Routing his helmet’s feed to a drone in that area, he found the reason.

Crates had been dropped in by Telemedics after the area was secured. Telemedics could carry quite a bit with them, but the original power had been built around the measurements of humans.

The crates themselves looked as if they’d been designed to maximize what a Telemedic could bring with them.

There was a squad watching over ground zero and those crates, but there was no indication of what was in those crates.

Turning his focus back to the library, the Wardens were watching for heat signals in the windows. They weren’t cleared to fire yet, as they couldn’t ID those targets, but that wouldn’t be the case for much longer.

Part of each squad was assigned an electronics warfare and reconnaissance member.

A number of small drones were being launched, both into the air and on the ground.

Making sure his voice wouldn’t carry, and that his comms were on silent, Felix cleared his throat.

“I’m glad to see that constant training preparation is paying off. Remind me to approve whatever Ioana wants after this.”

He meant it, too. This was smooth. He couldn’t deny they were reacting to the enemy movements, but this was a planned reaction. Planned reactive movements.

“You already did approve everything she asked for. I’m still surprised you approved the armored cars,” Victoria said, watching one of the monitors.

Felix cast his mind back. Now that he was thinking about it, he couldn’t remember not approving anything Ioana asked for.

Everything had been drawn up with plans, expectations, and costs that had seemed acceptable at the time.

“Armored cars,” Felix said slowly.

One of the techs directed a camera to the roadway entry. There sat six armored cars, blocking traffic on both sides of the street. Their turrets were pointed down those open streets.

They were painted a dark black, with white lettering and a logo on the side.

He didn’t need to read what it said. There would be only one thing that would be written there.

A serial number, a garage loading bay, maybe even what unit it belonged to. Above all that, though, it’d say one word.

Legion.

“This’ll be on the news for sure,” Andrea said, clapping her hands together. “Can we go do an interview? I always see the after stuff on the news when I visit somewhere, never during.

“I promise not to mention that I’m your personal secretary and that we’re sleeping together.”

After a moment, Andrea tilted her head to the side, looking at him.

“Do you think they like pancakes?”