Brockton Bays Marvelous Mage

It took a full minute for Taylor to internalize what Director Piggot had said, her mind clearly struggling to come to terms with it. After the long moment passed, she finally spoke up.

"She is in prison?" She asked. "No trail or…"

"For her previous crimes? She was already found guilty of those, so when she broke her probation, the charges were already waiting for her," Piggot explained as gently as she could manage. "What happens to her next depends on what kind of evidence we can bring against her for what she did to you."

"We?" Both Danny and Taylor reacted to that comment.

"Yes. This is the kind of Parahuman crime that the PRT was designed to stop. Just because the criminal involved is a little closer to home does not mean we hang up our hats and leave. However, there is a catch," Piggot admitted, Miss Militia wincing slightly beside her. "Sophia issues need to be kept out of the public eye. She has already hurt our reputation enough, any more and we will see serious backlash from the public, backlash we cannot afford."

"What about her handler? And principal Blackwell?" Taylor asked, leaning forward. "And Emma and Madison, and Julia and-"

"The agent in charge of Sophia Hess has already been arrested, this morning, in fact, when she came in for work," Miss Militia responded. "We found plenty of evidence to put her away for a long time, even beyond her work covering up Sophia's crimes against you. She is going to see significant time in prison for all of her crimes, that I can assure you."

"As for Blackwell… Well, we passed on the information we have on her to the FBI and IRS. They will most likely pick her up in the next few days or so. They certainly have enough evidence to convict her of a few federal crimes," Director Piggot added. "As for your peers, the case will be returned to BBPD in the next day or so, but we may have gotten them on the right track already. Expect updates from a… Detective Sheryl, in the next day or so."

Piggot glanced down at her papers for the name, which we all already knew. Meanwhile, Taylor seemed to have returned to us, her emotions running through her body as she leaned back against her chair, looking stunned, absolutely shocked at how this was going.

"I… I never expected… I never expected anything to ever work," She admitted. "I thought the best I would ever get was to wait it out, to be the bigger person and just endure it…"

"I am glad we can finally bring your long-deserved justice, Ms. Hebert," Director Piggot admitted, Miss Militia nodding her head in agreement. "But we still have to discuss you and your father's silence."

"We already signed an NDA," Danny said.

"That was simply concerning the connection between Sophia Hess and Shadow Stalker," She explained. "What we want is your verbal agreement that you will keep the rest of the connection silent as well. Technically, we cannot force you to sign an NDA involving the handler or the Ward grant, since it is possible to explain that connection without immediately exposing an Ex-Wards identity."

"Why is it so important to protect her identity now?" I asked. "You said yourself that she isn't going to be coming back."

"Because the safety and security of the Wards and their secret identities must remain bulletproof," Director Piggot explained clearly and concisely, meeting my eyes and staring back. "It has to be one of our highest priorities. They put their trust in us, after all, it's only right that we do our best to protect them. Even if they don't deserve it anymore."

I could see that while she didn't like it, Taylor could at least understand the sentiment, which was ultimately where I was as well. Danny just squinted at the director.

"What's the catch?" He asked. "You're asking us to verbally agree, and that's it?"

"No. We have a sizable settlement ready as well," She assured him. "All we ask is that you leave the PRT assets to us. We will assist your case against the others as best we can. Hell, we can even sign off on using one of our lawyers, pro bono. Just as long as you leave Sophia and her handler to us. We will keep their arrest and case internal."

"What about assurances that this will never happen again?" I asked, Director Piggot looking over at me. "What's to keep this from happening to someone else?"

"Oh, trust me, this has already sparked changes," Director Piggot assured me. "The amount of dust Sophia kicked up by first attacking you, to only turn up again? With the amount I was able to put together for your settlement, other departments are already scrambling to check their Wards and other departments for similar issues. As for preventing this from happening in the future, the idea of a report line for Ward or Protectorate corruption has been floated around, as has the idea of assigning someone as an internal watcher of sorts. I can't guarantee these ideas are going to be instituted quickly or at all, but I can guarantee something will be put in place here and that it is likely many other Protectorate and PRT locations will as well."

Danny and Taylor continued to ask questions, wanting to know what else was being done, what they were expected to not say, and several other minor questions. About an hour later, when the conversation was over, they shook hands with the director, and she handed them a check. It was none of my business how much was on it, so I didn't ask, but judging by how Danny had almost tripped and dropped it when he read it, it was probably a lot.

The father and daughter pair said their goodbyes, Danny once again shaking my hand while Taylor actually gave me a hug. Judging from her father's reaction, this was a rare event, which didn't surprise me with how much trauma she had withstood. I patted the tall girls back before they both left, escorted out by Miss Militia.

"Arcanum, thank you for agreeing to come in today," Director Piggot said as she packed away her papers. "While it only minorly concerned you, you helped keep Taylor and Danny calm, which was exactly why I asked you to come in."

"I'm just glad this all… came to a relatively tightly wrapped ending," I admitted. "This… fucking hell, it's a cluster fuck, I don't envy you."

She snorted, closing her last folder and stacking them together before leaning back in her seat.

"Was there something you needed?" She asked, picking up on my intent.

"A few things, yes. Our healing agreement. I wanted to amend it slightly," I admitted, holding up my hand to keep her from assuming the worst. "I was being unreasonable before in demanding you move your people to a public hospital when you have to deal with things like secret identities and security issues. As long as you have everyone ready in the morning for me to stop by and heal, I will agree to come here and heal them."

"I see. I appreciate the courtesy, it will make keeping my people safe much easier," She admitted, leaning forward and steepling her hands. "Why the sudden change of heart?"

"Now that the hospital has everything streamlined, and they stopped trying to bully me into healing more than I agreed to, it only takes about an hour every morning," I explained. "And I realized you are dealing with Wards and Protectorate members, meaning secret identities are involved. It's just easier for everyone involved if we do it here."

"And are you looking for anything in return for this convenience?"

"No, not really," I responded with a shrug. "Although, if possible, I would like payment for the next few people I heal to come in materials. Or at least access to somewhere I can buy materials."

"... What kind of materials?"

"I need five pounds of tungsten, titanium, nickel, copper, and mercury," I explained, chuckling when she gave me a look. "What? I told you guys I am a tinker."

"Those should be easy to source… Could I ask what you're using them for?"

"Part of what makes me tougher can be changed and mixed up by using other materials. I want to add a bit of variety."

She seemed a bit surprised at my easy admission, before breaking down the sentence in her head and realizing that while I had technically answered her question, it didn't exactly give her much to go on.

"Very well… two days of healing for free should cover that?" She suggested, and I nodded. With the reduced cost they were paying me, that wouldn't be too much. "Good. I could have them ready for you after your testing with Assault."

I nodded before standing from my seat and holding out my hand. Piggot stood as well, shaking my hand before sitting back down. Knowing a dismissal when I saw one, I left the room only to be waved down by an agent. He guided me down through the building, with the obvious destination being wherever Assault was. We had barely made it down a floor before I could feel the Marvelous Mage system finally stirring. It seemed like it was finally satisfied with the status of the quest to assign me my reward.

I politely asked the guard to lead me to a bathroom, before locking myself inside a thankfully clean stall, closing my eyes to wait. It didn't take long for the charges to reveal themselves. The first filled easily, and I got the feeling that I had earned that by simply stopping the chase from happening. The second charge filled slower, and I could feel that I had earned this one by cutting through bureaucracy and making sure that Taylor got her chance at justice.

The third and final charge was even slower to fill, giving the sensation that I almost had not earned it, but by participating in the meeting and helping to keep… something from happening, I had technically earned it. Judging by the fact that I had no idea what I had prevented, which meant it was avoided through pure chance, I couldn't exactly argue with that feeling.

My mind was racing, all three of the charges sitting in my mind, ready to be used. As much as I wanted to rush and invest them, I knew that would be stupid, especially considering where I was. I needed to get out, to get some time to think. I quickly left the bathroom, washed my hands, and let the guard complete his task, leading me to a large padded gymnasium-like room, with a raised platform in the middle. There, Assault and Miss Militia were waiting.

"Hello again," I greeted, waving to the two heroes. "Long time no see."

"You joke, but some patrols feel like a lot longer than they actually are," Assault pointed out, shaking my hand. "How was your meeting?"

"It went about as well as one might hope," I said vaguely, the hero pouting. "Sorry, it's not my story to tell. Plus, your boss probably wouldn't like me spreading it around."

"Fine, fine, keep your secrets. So, what's up with your new digs?" The hero asked, gesturing to my jacket. "It's the only part of your costume that's changed, so I gotta assume it is the source of whatever is new."

"Alright, Sherlock, well done. It adds a bit of ablative shielding around my body that slowly recharges," I explained, patting my chest. "Which apparently messes with your powers. Considering we are on the same side, I don't want it messing with us in the field."

Beyond experimenting with Assualt's powers, I was also happy to run more tests on the shield itself. I had already done some minor experimenting when I first made the jacket, but I really had no idea of its true limits. This was an excellent opportunity to really put it through its paces, even if it meant revealing some of its quirks.

"Well, let's start out with the basics," Assault suggested before tapping his chest and spreading his arms open. "Go ahead and hit me. Somewhere in the realm of a normal person's strength, please, just in case my power doesn't activate again."

I looked at him with a raised eyebrow before giving Miss Militia a look. When she confirmed his words, I shrugged and fired a simple, low-energy punch to his chest. The kinetic energy manipulator took it simply, not moving an inch.

"Interesting, that felt like a pretty standard attack," he admitted. "Got the usual feedback from it and everything. Well, let's try…"

For the next hour or so, Assault and I messed around in the gym, throwing each other around and testing out my ablative shield's ability to block his kinetic manipulation. We figured out very quickly that if he was hitting me, his power struggled to connect. When I attacked him, however, his power clicked on easily, without issues. I had to assume it had something to do with how the shield interpreted damage or impacts. When something hit me, it hit the shield first, whereas when I hit something else, the shield let me hit him directly.

We also tested things like catching me from a fall, which worked fine, or me trying to push him out of the way, which didn't work in the slightest. Her could let himself be pushed, of course, but my armor didn't override his instinctual absorption of impacts to let me shove him around. It was all interesting, and I'm glad that we got the chance to experiment a bit, but we didn't discover anything groundbreaking.

When we were done, however, I convinced Miss Militia to shoot me with a couple non-lethal options, like tasers, beanbag rounds, and rubber bullets, all of which she could create with her glowing green, transforming weapon. After pointing out that I was bulletproof underneath the already impressive ablative armor, she agreed.

That experiment had some interesting results as well, as the taser round was stopped by my shield, preventing the little nubs from shocking me at all. On top of that, as far as we could tell, my shield could stop all of the non lethal rounds she knew about, including some rather large rubber bullets. The shielding would drop a lot when it absorbed the impacts, but I never even felt them.

I unfortunately could not convince her to actually shoot me, the experienced heroine drawing a hard, and not entirely unexpected line at "real" bullets. I couldn't exactly blame her, so I dropped the idea pretty quickly. She did point out that there was testing equipment that could safely measure the strength of my shield in the power testing facilities, but I denied the suggestion. The ablative shield was a backup against powers that functioned weirdly, like Shadow Stalkers. The fact that it reacted to Assaults was proof of the pudding, that it added a layer to my protection that was not just pure durability.

When we were finished, Assault led me down to the parking lot, where my materials were already waiting, a pair of agents standing there, several packages. I carefully fed each chunk of metal into Troy before putting the two separate glass containers of mercury into my pockets. I made a final farewell to the government hero before finally leaving the PRT at a trot.