By the way, before I go:

Happy Norwegian Constitution Day!

“I love you dad,” I said, then I backed away a step.

“Stay,” he said.  “Please.”

This poor man.

I’m so sorry, Danny. Taylor can’t stay. Skitter has to go.

I shook my head.

I stepped back once again, and then hopped down from the back of the ambulance, turning away.

“Taylor!”

Here we are again.

Always like this, now.  Always walking away, knowing how much it hurt him.  I blinked more tears out of my eyes.

“You make sure he’s alright,” I ordered the paramedic, ignoring another of my father’s shouts.

The man nodded.

:’|

“I can tell him we aren’t allowing ride-alongs, just in case we need more bodies in the back.”

That would be a nice white lie.

I like this guy.

“Thank you.”

My power buzzed at the edge of my consciousness as I turned my back on the scene.

“Hey. Hey, listen. Skitter. Talk to us.”

Fuck all of this.  Fuck the Nine.  Fuck Shatterbird.  Fuck Jack.  Fuck Leviathan.  Fuck Coil.  Fuck Hookwolf.

Fuck Kaiser too, just for old times’ sake.

Fuck me, most of all.

And yeah, that’s about how I expected that to end.

He nodded once.  “More specifically, your teammates sent us.  They’d hoped we would pick you up and drive you here, but we weren’t able to find you, and we were delayed because we had to take safety measures first.”

Ahh, fair enough!

Not gonna lie, though, I really liked my idea of them being early because of Taylor’s/Sierra’s warning.

He looked towards the van.  I realized he was talking about the removal of the glass.

Yeah, I figured.

Relief surged through me, and I felt tears welling up.

That relief proved short-lived.

What now?

“Our employer feels there’s very little you’ll be able to do with your father here, and quite a bit you could do elsewhere.

Oh fuck off, Coil.

He did say he understands if you want to prioritize your family.”

Sure, but did he also tell you to put that super passive-agressive emphasis on “employer”?

My eyes widened in understanding.  Coil wanted me to attend to my territory, now, in this moment of crisis.  “He wants me to leave my dad?”

While pretending it’s up to you, yes.

It might as well have been a rhetorical question.  The paramedic didn’t respond.  I felt my heart sink.

“We’ll give him the best care we can,” he said.

Thank you.

You seem like a good enough guy. It’s just your employer who’s a dick in sheep’s clothing. I hope you didn’t take too much flak from fans for the message he had you deliver.

I turned and climbed into the ambulance.  My dad was gingerly dabbing at one of his eyes with a wet cloth.  I was pretty sure he didn’t see me.

Time to dramatically put the mask back on?

I bent over him and kissed him on the corner of his forehead, in a spot where the blood didn’t cover his face.

Aw, that’s sweet.

Y’know, besides all the blood. That’s salty-sweet, and faintly metallic.

He snapped his head up to look at me.  The white of one of his eyes had turned crimson, the green of his iris pale in the midst of it.

H’eye there.

“Can I ride along?” I asked one, the second they were done.

That would be a good way to soothe the paranoia.

And also to take us, the readers, to the hospital to see more consequences of the Shattering.

He looked at me, then grabbed something large, black and irregularly shaped from a pocket beneath the stretcher.  Holding it in one hand, he put one hand on my shoulder and led me a short distance away.  My heart rate tripled.

Um.

Ummm.

My gut was telling me they weren’t normal paramedics, and this was the moment I found out just how.

“Here,” he pressed a bundle into my hands.  It was large, bulky, and there were hard bits beneath the cloth.  “You don’t want to leave this behind.”

…Is it her mask?

Where did she put that again… she didn’t say, but it seems she might’ve dropped it outside the back door, or right inside it.

I peeked at the contents of the bundle, then swallowed hard.  It was my mask and the back sheath of my armor with the stuff inside.

Yep.

I like the implication that the paramedic is totally cool with this and helping to keep her secret. They’re probably trained as such, since this sort of situation probably happens from time to time.

In my haste, I’d torn them off and left them where they fell.

“You’re with Coil?” I asked.  I felt a quiet horror at the realization that Coil would now know who my dad was, and who I was by proxy.

It might be the case, but I think what I just said works too.

Of course, if I’m onto something, there might be differences in how they’re supposed to treat heroes and villains, but no one can be expected to recognize every mask or armor piece and identify whether or not the wearer is a villain. That’s not the paramedic’s job.

I felt like a machine, clumsy, almost emotionless, as I led them out of the house.  There were two other ambulances parked in places I could see.  None had windshields, mirrors or headlights.

As in they’ve been shattered or they’ve been removed in advance?

The explosion had blown out the flashing lights and whatever system had handled the sirens.

Maybe some circuitry in there?

It didn’t fit.  The timing of this, their preparedness.

Except it does. Thanks to you.

But if you don’t think that through, it is possible to land on the conclusion that they’re disguised Slaughterhouse subordinates come to kidnap Danny, or something.

But they didn’t look like any members of the Nine I knew.  I could see one of the paramedics down the street – she was black.  So it wasn’t the Chosen, either.  Merchants wouldn’t be this organized or devious.

Yeah, the Merchants are just a mess in general.

Coil’s actually worth considering if you’re going down this route. It wouldn’t be the first time his soldiers used paramedic vehicles as a form of disguise.

I reminded myself of where my knife was, in case I needed to draw it at a moment’s notice.

The two paramedics began loading my dad into the back.

I can’t blame Taylor for paranoia right now. She’s been through a lot of stress in the last 45 minutes, and at first glance, the convenient timing of the paramedics does seem suspicious.

Quietly, aiming each footstep to avoid the worst patches of broken glass, I stepped from my bedroom, my knife held low and ready.

Two paramedics were working together to shift my dad onto a stretcher.  I hurried to put the knife away.

Nice 🙂

One noticed me.  “Miss?  You’re alright?”

“I’m fine.”

“Miss Alright lives two doors down the street.”

“This your dad?”

“Yeah.”

“We’re going to take him to the hospital.  Mind making sure our way out is clear?  Maybe open the front door for us?”

“Okay.”

Sounds good.

As long as they’re real paramedics, of course, but Occam’s razor is in full effect right here. There’s no reason for them not to be real paramedics, I’m just infected by Taylor’s justified paranoia.

…I was going to comment on how the only suspicious thing was how fast they got here after the Shattering, but thinking through it a bit, I think it’s actually thanks to Taylor. Taylor asked Sierra to warn the hospital. The hospital took it seriously enough to not just do what they could for the existing patients, but preemptively send out paramedic teams to get an early start on helping the victims, and prepare the emergency rooms for the mass arrivals. Many lives may be getting saved even outside the hospital by the early warning they got because Sierra happened to be there when Taylor called.

Floorboards creaked as they ascended the stairs.

Rude.

“Hello?” one of them called out.  I tensed.  I didn’t recognize the voice.  They were right by my dad’s bedroom.  I heard my dad respond and swore under my breath.

I guess they’re not going for stealth, at least. Good sign.

My knife was still strapped in against the back of my costume, which dangled around my knees.  I bent down and drew it from beneath my sweatshirt.

Hopefully she won’t need it, but who knows.

Voices.  One of them murmured something, and my dad replied.  I couldn’t make out anything in terms of the words or the tone of what they were saying.

“lorem ipsum dolor sit amet”

“uhuh”

“Okay,” he said.  “I’ll need my sandals, downstairs.”

I was using my power to find them by the time I was standing again.  I found something else.  There were people in our kitchen.

…

Now what is this. PRT? Or did some S9 member(s) decide to follow Skitter for some reason?

The Slaughterhouse Nine?  Had they followed me here?

My dad was unable to see, thanks to the blood.  I drew my bugs together into a cluster, hid them in the folds of my costume, which I had tied around my waist.  I crossed the hall to my room and found a pair of loose-fitting cargo pants from when I’d had a bit of a belly and a wider waistband.

I suppose slimming down a little might’ve been a result of the hero training. Maybe.

I zipped up the pants and tied a sweatshirt around my waist to hide the rest of my costume.  I could sense them approach.  One of them waved at a fly that flew too close to their head.  Both were men.

So it’s not two of the S9 members from the encounter earlier, then. Jack was the only man among them.

I think PRT or medics is much more likely than S9, but I don’t fully trust it. Who else could it be? Chosen or something? I don’t see why the Chosen would care about entering this house immediately after the Shattering, though, and not everyone was aware that it was coming, so most people wouldn’t enter to seek shelter in-between Skitter running in there.

…Skitter running in there. If they’re PRT, they might be after her, having been following her since she heard the sirens.

“Can you move your toes?”

There was a pause.  “Yes.”

Ah, good. 🙂 Let’s hope it extends to the rest of the legs. I don’t know if the reverse of what I just described can happen, but it wouldn’t surprise me all that much.

I breathed a sigh of relief.  “Then the next biggest issue is possible internal bleeding.  We need to get you to a hospital.”

Ah, yes, the hospitals. They’re in for a busy night, that’s for sure.

Especially since a lot of their equipment – both for management and for actual medical procedures – is going to be broken now.

“They hit the entire city?”

“I think so,” I told him.  No use letting on exactly how much I knew.  It would only cause the both of us more distress in the long run.

Perhaps. Perhaps not.

Alright, fine, it’s pretty likely. It’s distress I wouldn’t mind reading about though.

“The hospitals will be overcrowded.”

“Yeah.  But not going isn’t an option.”

Not a good one. But if you go, Danny will probably be low priority.