She took a second to switch into her White Witch persona. I really did miss the brown eyes, but she was also smoking hot with white blonde hair and that outfit. When I wondered if she’d wear it for me in the bedroom, I pushed that all out of my head. So not the thing to be thinking of on a mission.

  We piled into the vans, and we headed out. The government building was on the northern side of the city, so we had to cross virtually the whole thing, and with traffic it took a while. It was maybe twenty minutes later when we pulled into the industrial park.

  The park was a typical industrial park, machine shops, corporate mail centers, manufacturing, glass makers, things like that. Our two electric vans made a left, when the other two vans went right, and we made a quick right after that, and went in the same direction on two separate blocks. The only reason I knew that, was we were only about fifty yards apart, and my scanners could still pick up Tina and Carol.

  The last week had made me accustomed to it, the sixth sense thing, it felt almost normal at that point, and the bright reactor sized presence of Alyssa was just comforting.

  When we pulled over, I sighed.

  “I don’t feel them. I can feel Tina and Carol in the other van, on the street, past the back of the machine shop. Are we sure they’re there?”

  Rose said, “Perhaps it’s just an underground entrance or tunnel that leads to where they really are. We’ve observed the ingress and egress of many ex-heroes at this location.”

  Nate nodded in agreement, he must be using his scanner too, “We go in, maybe your scanner enchantment is being blocked.”

  No, not likely. My scanner was my one enchantment that actually used meta-energy. At least, until I built the last resort weapon Alyssa wanted me to have it was. Point being, I didn’t believe there was anything in this universe that could block it. The aliens that wielded the technology and energy most called magic probably could, but no one else on Earth as far as I knew could harness or use the energy directly, not like I could.

  Still, I kept that to myself, no need to let the government know the extent of my true abilities.

  We piled out, and with a concerted thought, I was covered in inky shadow for the moment it took for my clothes to swap with my armor. The tactical unit moved forward with a professionalism that made me feel self-conscious, as Alyssa and I just strolled along toward the back door. I was alert, but there were no other supers around, so I wasn’t exactly tense.

  One of the soldiers pulled the door open, and then moved in with rifles raised, with the two of us in the middle. It was a large warehouse sized room, with several machines to grind and even create custom metal parts for just about anything I’d imagine.

  It was also completely empty, on a midmorning Wednesday. That seemed wrong, and it was somewhat of an indication Jenna and Rose were right.

  Nate said, “Spread out, find that secret entrance.”

  White Witch said, “Allow me, Nate,” and she started to cast a spell. It was one of the shorter ones, just a couple of Latin phrases taking four or five seconds.

  My goodness, she was so sexy.

  Yeah, head in the game Daniel.

  Light burst from her, a swirling light that roved over the entire room, until it settled and coalesced over a lathe.

  Carol stalked over to it in a graceful way, and started to look for a lever or switch, some indication on how to open it. After a few seconds, she just used her super strength and pushed it to the side. The screech of metal on the cement floor was loud.

  Still, below the large lathe was an opening in the floor.

  Carol said, “No ladder, and it looks deep. No doubt they either fly or jump up and down, do you guys have rope?”

  Yeah, the human tactical team wasn’t going to be able to go any farther without it. At least, not without our help. Nate and Carina had it covered, as they made hand signals and two of them rushed forward, and secured the end of a zip line to the large lathe.

  Nate said, “You four go down, we’ll follow after your report, and keep this hole covered.”

  Alyssa cast her flight spell, she was already shielded, but hadn’t thought she’d need the former on this mission.

  Right. We walked forward, and then floated down the hole, it did go down a very long way.

  “We’re about sixty feet down, and we’re at the head of a long tunnel, about six feet wide, can’t see the other end of it from here.”

  We heard all the orders over the ear pieces, an enchantment in my case, and the rest of them started coming down. Carol just jumped of course, and she had Tina in her arms. Tina was closer to a squishy human like I was, without my enchantments of flight, inertial dampening, and stasis along with the shields, anyway.

  Her shield only defended from energy and psychic attack, and she depended on her voice for supers that punched, since those usually didn’t have shields to stop her hypnotically entrancing voice it worked out.

  It was maybe three minutes later when we started down the tunnel, us four in the lead. I couldn’t imagine they didn’t know we were on our way at this point, and I hoped they didn’t have a backdoor escape exit, but them having one of those was the only explanation for the long tunnel that I could think of. To give them time to escape.

  Or maybe merely to gain time to prepare for a fight. So much for fast and hard, giving them no time to get set.

  The underground tunnel or corridor ended at large steel double doors. It was maybe fifty yards away when they came into my scanner range.

  “There are eighteen, so she did pick up two spares somewhere along the way. Two are energy A-class, and there’s a second S-class in there. The rest are A-class brawlers.”

  Nate grunted.

  Carina ordered, “Open it up. The rest of you keep this distance, rifles ready.”

  Myriad split up into three and one of her copies ran forward and slammed into the door. It didn’t break, but the right side where she’d hit did bend, creating a small space between the doors.

  She put her hands in the space, and one of her feet against the other door for leverage, then ripped the right-side door out. The sound of the door’s clang against the side wall was lost in the loud explosion, no doubt a trap for not having a key.

  Myriad was blown backwards, and somehow landed gracefully into a back roll that absorbed all that momentum as she rolled back, and she sprang back to her feet using her hands.

  Nate gave the order to breech, and we all moved forward, the four of us supers led the way.

  When we got close, the bent metal door against the sidewall rose and was flung down the corridor.

  Alyssa stepped forward to be ahead of me, and I let her, as did the three Myriads and Tina. Her shields put mine to shame, and they wouldn’t be beaten down in this century. The huge metal door hit my petite sexpot, and just stopped dead, she didn’t even move a millimeter, as it just fell to the ground.

  I really didn’t care about her power, not when it came to our relationship, it had nothing to do with how sweet she was, or mischievously playful, but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t hot on a very shallow level. Sure, I didn’t want her for her power, it didn’t even register in that way, but it was still a thing.

  She started to cast a few steps before we breached the large room, and I had my gauntlet up and already aimed, even if I couldn’t see the guy I knew where they were all standing.

  We both fired simultaneously, and two of the normal A-class ex-heroes were frozen, one in sparkling white and one in red. We kept going forward, and the tactical team behind us opened fire on those two as the supervillains got their first shot in.

  The two energy wielders turned out to be fire, and pure energy. The latter similar to the energy bolt White Witch could fire, but much smaller and weaker. Not weak exactly, but not as overwhelming. The fire exploded around White Witch’s shields, and the energy bolt hit my shields. It had some effect, maybe five percent of my magic shield which Rose started to immediately bolster with my personal power.

  Tina started to sing, and the regular A-class ex-heroes looked at her distractingly. I decided to focus on the bigger threats, rather than help take down the lesser ones, the twenty humans in the Tactical teams were already taking those out, thanks to Tina’s assistance.

  The room they were in was very large, with multiple couches, a stereo system, and television. In essence, it was a living room carved out of the ground the size of a house, and there was a back hallway that probably led to personal rooms? The stuff in the room was very eclectic, and none of it really went together.

  White Witch, myself, and Myriad focused on the two energy wielders, Andrea, and the fourth S-class who I had absolutely no information on. All that had happened in a split second after all, and there was a lot going on.

  The three Myriads ran forward, toward the energy users, and I focused on Andrea and sent a plasma bolt her way.

  Andrea waved her hand, and the plasma bolt changed trajectory, and a chuckle escaped my lips when it slammed into the other S-class. What wasn’t funny is I don’t think he even noticed.

  White Witch started to cast, and I recognized it, it was that long ass spell that would finish the fight and trap them all. We just needed to last for about thirty seconds and make sure none of them escaped.

  The Myriads reached their targets, and she kicked out into the two energy wielders. Their shields absorbed the blows, but they were both knocked back as they fired a return shot into two of the Myriads at close range.

  I raised both gauntlets, and I unloaded a barrage of rail gun slugs and my cold ray at Andrea.

  As I suspected, she had no trouble with the slugs, but the cold ray unlike plasma, had zero mass, her telekinetic shield was about as useful as a screen door in a submarine. Her power did stop the ice particles in the air from surrounding her, but the ray itself slammed into her not inconsiderable chest. She was still wearing that skintight thin suit that left nothing to the imagination, too much so.

  Andrea screamed in pained rage, waved her hand, and a heavy metal framed couch rose up and shot across the room at me.

  My first inclination would’ve been to dodge, but there were squishy humans behind me, so I activated my stasis to full strength. The couch hit me, and I didn’t move, but the cost in energy to absorb all that momentum wasn’t a great thing.

  My suit was more than capable of standing fast, much like my partner’s shield, but allowing some of that momentum transfer, in other words being flung back as I normally was, took a lot less power to protect me and efficiently bleed off inertia than being an immovable wall did. Granted, the momentum wasn’t much different between the two, but there was a great difference in power cost between my gravity drive, and my full stasis and kinetic shielding. It was much cheaper to use my gravity drive to bleed off that inertia while being flung back.

  Point being. My shields wouldn’t be able to take that kind of thing too many times, and it was a major drain.

  Two of the Myriads had taken down the flame wielder, and all three of them were punching and kicking the energy wielder savagely, knocking him in several directions in quick succession to keep him disoriented as they took down his shield.

  The tactical team was doing well too, with Tina’s help they’d already taken down six of the twelve typical A-class. Although, a few were fighting against Red Siren’s alluring song, and rushed the entrance.

  Three more seconds had passed.

  The unknown S-class screamed. Every unshielded person in the room joined him, as they slapped hands over their ears and stumbled, from the tactical team and Myriad, to the six A-class enemies still standing. The three that were rushing across the room stumbled, but the rifle fire also stopped and there was no one to take advantage of it.

  The energy wielder was shielded, and he lifted his hand to shoot a Myriad right in the face. Of course, I was shielded too, my hearing enchantment wouldn’t pass anything that would harm my hearing or disorient me.

  I shifted my aim, and I shot first. A cold beam slammed into him, and thankfully took down the last of his shields, they were weak from Myriad’s beating. The energy wielder froze in place, as he was covered by what looked like crushed ice.

  Andrea sent more furniture our way, and fortunately it hit White Witch that time. I doubted my Alyssa even noticed.

  People started to recover, and Red Siren’s voice started to take on a compelling quality again, when I looked back the S-class sonic was running out of the room in the back corridor. I let him go, and shot another cold beam at Andrea, she was powerful, her energy was still up there, but so was mine.

  At the same time that I renewed my assault on Mindwave, the three Myriads attacked three of the A-class ex-heroes from behind, and the three closer to our side renewed their charge.

  I thought about switching targets again, but Red Siren’s voice changed subtly, and her song changed tune. The ex-hero A-class in the middle of the charging three went a bit glassy eyed, before he punched out with both fists to either side. The other two were completely blindsided by their buddy’s attack, and went flying off at angles, and slammed into the walls instead of us.

  Myriads battle was going well, she was just such a badass, but it would take time to beat down the three she was fighting.

  In the meantime, the soldiers had recovered from the S-class sonic, and they opened up on the ex-hero with glazed eyes. With twenty of them, the guy went down in one wave of overwhelming fire.

  Red Siren immediately changed targets to one of the other two, who had been in the midst of recovering from that sucker punch, and her new target jumped the other one, and just held him in a tight bearhug hold right in front of us.

  Needless to say, perhaps, the two tactical units opened up on both of them simultaneously.

  White Witch’s spell was almost done, but the only one left standing on the other side was Mindwave, who looked really pissed off. Her eyes narrowed as she looked past me, and she grinned maliciously. Shit, telepathy!

  Nate ordered, “Take down Adamantine, now!”

  Then I felt a plasma bolt hit the back of my shields, then a second one. Fortunately, his team was too smart to follow that order, and before he could shoot me a third time Carina took him down with a rather impressive spinning kick that rung the asshole’s bell.

  Regardless, I was still at about half my personal energy, and my shields were slowly being recharged by Rose’s excellent power management.

  The last three A-class heroes had been put down, and the Myriads were surrounding Mindwave.

  “Surrender Andrea. You’re outnumbered, facing nineteen plasma rifles, and the four… six of us.”

  One of the Myriads shot me a look, and I just shrugged, there were three of her after all.

  Mindwave sneered, and lifted her hand, but before anything happened a bright wave left White Witch as she intoned the last word in the Latin spell. It obliterated Mindwave’s shields, and it wrapped her in a bubble that started to drain the rest of her energy and keep her frozen.

  It also did the same to all the downed ex-heroes, as I knew it would. That’s why I hadn’t bothered with the cuff spell. I knew she’d be done long before they could recover.

  I turned around, and I looked at Nate who lied unconscious on the ground, and then shook my head.

  Carina said defensively, “She did it.”

  White Witch sounded pissed on my behalf, “She’s not a controller like Red Siren, she’s a brainwasher telepath. That takes time. For her to flip him so fast he must have been very close to that already, and deeply wishing he could take us all out. That’s not acceptable.”

  Carina sighed, “Millicent will decide after we all debrief, but I can’t say you’re wrong.”

  “What about Sonic, shall we? You can cuff all these guys while we find him.”

  Boom!

  The back hallway beyond the living room door disappeared in cement dust, and when it slowly cleared, I could see the corridor had been completely collapsed. There must be another way out, but I feared the sonic S-class would escape.

  “Or not.”

  Carina started to bark orders, and her and Nate’s people started forward pulling out suppression cuffs.

  Red Siren said, “I don’t think his heart was in it, I don’t think we’ll be seeing him again.”

  “You think?”

  She looked at me, “Yes, I recognized the look in his eyes, and that voice of his could’ve killed all our people, if he’d wanted.”

  I just nodded, and hoped she was right.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It’d been a hell of a day. The cleanup had taken hours, and thanks to Rose my paperwork was done before we even got back to the building. Debrief took a while, and despite what happened all that happened to Nate was an official note in his file and enforced counseling. Unfortunately, I’d be working under his authority for a while longer.

  I took it with a grain of salt, I wasn’t happy with it by any stretch, but it was what it was. Perhaps it was a good thing, he was a reminder that we all needed to be wary of a government that would be happy to replace us, outlaw us completely, because they wanted all of the control and power.

  It wasn’t until after dinner, that Alyssa and I had a moment of privacy, this time she invited me into her apartment to spend time together. I suspected the reason for that was she didn’t want to give the impression she was moving in with me, even though I was sure she wanted to spend another night with me. The look of admiration, tender affection, and lust in her eyes was unmistakable, during our many shared gazes.

  Her warm brown eyes were so beautifully expressive, as was her angelic face.

  I was also sure she saw those same emotions in my eyes.

  “So, what did that mean earlier?” I asked, after a lingering kiss that was shockingly hungry and demanding.

  She blushed, “I don’t know from experience, but I thought maybe you’d change after, you know. I was afraid you might become overprotective. You verified it in the tunnel, when you didn’t even blink when I stepped forward to take that door.”

  I snorted, “Nope, I’m happy to hide behind you.”