“Carol… Ah yes, Brandish.   Well, I suspect either Dragon was manipulating you, or your father was manipulating Dragon in an effort to get a message to you.”

Hm, perhaps. But why? So Amy would know who her dad was?

“A message.”

“That he’s there, that he exists.  Perhaps he sought to ensure he wasn’t forgotten by his child.  He was an old-fashioned individual, so it makes sense that he’d seek immortality through his progeny.”

Fair enough.

Bonesaw piped up.  “That’s stupid.  Why do something like that when someone like me could make you immortal for real?”

I mean, he is stuck in the Birdcage for the foreseeable future.

I’m still not sure he’ll be there forever, but I’ve become less adamant about that whole theory with time.

“Shush, now.  Finish sewing yourself up while Amelia and I talk.”

“Okay,” Bonesaw said.  Her voice overlapped with Panacea saying, “Stop saying that.  It’s not my name.”

I don’t think that’s helping, Amy.

“Isn’t it?”

It’s no more her name than yours is Bob, if she doesn’t want it to be.

There was another silence.

“You’re your father’s daughter.  Both of you are bound up in rules you’ve imposed on yourselves.  His rules defined his demeanor, the boundaries he worked within, the goals he sought to achieve and how he achieved them.  They were his armor as much as his power was.  I would guess your rules are your weakness.

This is coming from a man who is very much Chaotic Evil.

Rather than focus you, they leave you in free fall, nothing to grasp on to except your sister there, and we both know how that has turned out.”

I suppose they would know about that mess. The Nine had Cherish around for a while after their falling out.

Sister.  I made a mental note of that.  There were four people in that room.

Yep. I’m not entirely convinced Victoria, even in her diminished state, isn’t going to get a good punch in before this is over. But against whom? Bonesaw would be my first guess.

“Guys and girls aren’t that different.”

“Aren’t we?  Look at our group.  Regent and I are going on the offensive.  I’ve got Aisha and I making constant, coordinated attacks against enemies in my territory, terrorizing groups with attacks from the cover of my darkness, or from someone they can’t even remember fighting.

Regent’s got a squad of Coil’s soldiers with him, and he’s tracking and kidnapping the leaders of enemy groups and gangs, using his power to control them and then having them sabotage their own operations, or start fights with other groups that leave both almost totally wiped out.  Then he cleans up the mess.”

Ohh, so that’s how he got those people he had in Interlude 11g! Maybe.

“And us girls?”

“Lisa’s running the shelter, and she says she’s doing it to get more info, but I think she doesn’t mind how it connects her to the community there, either.  You, too, are almost nurturing in how you’re treating the people in your territory.

Yeah, I suppose that’s true.

And Rachel you could argue doesn’t count because she’s Rachel.

Or, hell, you could even claim she’s nurturing too, but to her dogs.

And you’re acting like you’re getting that aspiring superhero thing out of your system.  Or entrenched deeper into it.  I can’t tell.”

It really could go either way right now, but I think it’s closer to the latter. I do think Taylor is striking a sort of balance these days – she’s unapologetically on the villains’ side, but her main objective in everything she does is still helping. She’s a villain on one axis but a hero on the other, and I think most people would say the latter is the one that counts.

“I-” she started.  She stopped when I raised one hand.

“Don’t say anything until I explain it.  I’ll forget what I want to say if I get distracted.  You’re going to work for me.

😀

And every doubt and possibility that just made you tense up at that idea?  It’s not going to happen.  You’ll be safe.  Safer than you were before.  You won’t have to do anything illegal unless you’re willing.”

Sounds great!

“I’d still be helping you, I’d be helping a criminal, indirectly.”

That is true. Maybe it’s worth telling Charlotte about your methods and goals?

“You would.  But I think you’d be surprised at my approach.  I’m not looking to hurt innocents.  I’m not pushing hard drugs, I’m not demanding protection money.”

“Then what are you doing?”

Much the same thing the heroes are supposed to do, but in illegal ways. Chaotic good in a nutshell.

Why did that line of thinking sound so familiar?

…hm. ABB… Bakuda. This was a large part of her reason for her attack on the Undersiders, wasn’t it?

It dawned on me: Bakuda.  She’d said something similar when she’d been doing her monologue and pretending to be the new leader of the ABB.

Bingo.

Well, that was disquieting.

Still, my reasons were different.

Different alignments, different deeper goals, but on a more shallow level you are absolutely doing similar things for the same reason: Attacking someone to maintain control of a territory by intimidating your other enemies.

I wanted to protect my people.  Bakuda hadn’t been motivated by an interest in anyone but herself.

But yes, this contrast is an excellent showcase of chaotic good versus chaotic evil.