My people met us as we entered the neighborhoods where my lair and the barracks we’d set up were.  Sierra and Charlotte were in the lead, the three ex-ABB members behind them.  The O’Daly clan stood at more of a distance, all either members of the family, friends or romantic partners.

Would that be the family of the other group of people that showed up in 12.8?

Other, smaller families filled in the gaps.  My ‘gang’ numbered nearly fifty people in total.

Damn, got some real growth here! Skitter’s crew is bigger than the Altruistic Borderline Bimbos were at the start of the story now.

“Holy crap,” Genesis said.

“It’s why we wanted to set up base here,”  Grue said.  “Skitter’s the most established of us.”

Makes sense to me!

“I’ve been focusing on structural repairs and building when I’m not helping my teammates,” Genesis said.  “I don’t have many threats to get rid of, and it was the best way for me to be productive.  And meanwhile you’re further than I expected to get in half a year.”

Wow.

And yeah, she’s been getting busy, alright.

A bit too busy, maybe, but I’m not going to deny that she’s done some good work here.

I couldn’t bring myself to feel proud.  “I guess I’m motivated.”

Oh come on, Taylor.

“Everything good?” Grue asked her.

“Good enough.  I’m going to keep this shape until Coil’s people can deliver my real body.  Then I’ll need to recuperate some.”

Hm, interesting. Does that mean she wouldn’t have been able to go with them on doggyback? Or was it just not worth the risk of being attacked?

“Sure.”

Bitch scowled at me.  Bastard, her puppy, stood beside her.  He had received the brunt of her power, and looked roughly as large as an adult great dane.

Not so little anymore, huh?

The features were different from her usual dogs.  The spikes had more symmetry to their arrangement, and the muscles looked less like tangles.

I suppose if her power is actually designed for use on wolves rather than dogs, it only makes sense that the results would be neater.

It tugged briefly on the chain that led from her hand to its collar, and she pulled back sharply.  It didn’t pull again, though it was easily powerful enough to knock her over.

No pulling on the leash while going for walkies!

Bitch made Bentley slow to a walk as she reached my territory.  It still took us a good thirty seconds to catch up.

Using my power, I signalled Sierra and Charlotte.  Grue, Bitch and I climbed down from our dogs and then led them forward.

Are they all going to be staying at the Hive until the nominations are over?

“Mannequin slipped by you once,” Grue said.  “You going to be able to keep an eye out?”

Quite a lot of eyes, perhaps.

“I had some ideas, but I’m running low on resources,” I said.  “Let me see what I can do.”

Ideas? Color me intrigued.

Genesis began to appear a short distance away, near Bitch.  A blurry, beige and yellow, vaguely human-shaped figure coalesced into being.  

Hi there!

So is her body still at Coil’s base, like with the Lake Heroic meeting?

The shape then sharpened into features and alter in hue until there was the figure of a teenage girl, vaguely cartoonish.  By the time we reached her, she looked indistinguishable from a regular girl.  

I like this visual.

She had auburn hair, freckles, and thick glasses.  A small smile touched her face as she stretched her arms and legs.

She sounds cute!

Bitch was well in the lead, and there was a kind of aggression to how she rode.  She pulled ahead, evading cars by only a couple of inches, forcing them to swerve, and she goaded Bentley faster with kicks and shouts.

What’s the rush?

We hadn’t raised the topic of Bitch and her nomination for the Nine.  I think the others hadn’t wanted to add tension and the possibility of argument or violence to the already complicated situation.

Huh. I think I’m going to count that as a bit of development for Grue, because I’m pretty sure a couple Arcs ago he would’ve been very quick to confront Bitch about the fact that she didn’t tell the rest about her nomination.

I know I hadn’t.  My last real interaction with Bitch was when we’d parted ways after the fight with Dragon.

Not exactly a positive one, no.

I’d told her we were even, but there had been some anger and hurt feelings on both sides.  I was the last person she wanted to have grilling her.

Especially since a part of why she’s acting like this is that anger and those hurt feelings.

Our canine mounts raced through the streets with impunity.

Oh hey, it’s been a while since the last dog-ride.

The glass that covered the roads, the lack of windows, windshields or working dashboards in the few cars that still ran all contributed to the glacial pace of traffic.

At least it’s still kinda moving?

There was little for the dogs to watch out for, no moving vehicles and few bystanders.

Never mind.

Every stride the dog took made the bag I was carrying bang against my hip and made every injury I had explode with pain.  I clenched my teeth and endured it.

Ouch.

There weren’t many other options.  I could hardly complain to Bitch.

Yeah, she wouldn’t take any of that.

Let’s get back to it!

Coil looked at Brian.

“I gave you a hard time about your having to take the same risks as the rest of us, back when you first joined, but I think you’ve done your share.  So long as you’re contributing,” Brian said.

Yep, looks like he’s fine with it.

Coil nodded. “I’ll see what we can prepare.”

Lisa smiled a little, using only the one side of her mouth.

I wonder if this change has anything to do with her injury, besides making her think about how frequently she gets injured. Maybe she feels her role as the manipulative “face” and speaker of the team has been hurt by it and she’d rather give that up and be the eyes.

■

I feel like the fact that we just cut off right here with the reminder of her mouth is a good sign that I’m right about that.

“Anything helps.”

“You think you could get your hands on some surveillance hardware?  Skitter’s working on some new costumes, and I was thinking we could have something like small cameras mounted on our masks or helmets.”

Hm. That didn’t go quite the way I was expecting.

Why exactly does she want this? Is she less aware of Imp than I thought, and wants this to be able to determine what’s going on, why her power keeps telling her about someone she doesn’t remember?

“I can inquire with my usual suppliers.  Why?”

“Well, we’ve got one teammate that’s sort of hard for the rest of you to keep track of, and I think it might help.

Alright, fair enough. I’m not sure they should do it while Shatterbird’s in town, but it’s not a bad idea.

And if nobody objects, I’m kind of wanting to take a less hands-on approach from here on out.  I’ve batted a pretty low percentage as far as injuries over the last few months of action… Glory Girl, Bakuda, Leviathan, now this incident with Jack.

Ah, yeah. Might want to become a pitcher instead at this rate.

If I had a means of communication and the gear to give me some eyes on the scene, I think I could be more useful.”

Oh! Now it makes sense.

She’s going back to her original idea of what she should be doing for the team. Grue might be a little more willing to let her do it this time.