June 9th, 2013, 8:42 PM
“I understood you were looking for me,” Victoria said from behind Nicator’s mask.
“My sister has failed.” Steelmind’s voice came from a remote body. “One of her knights is dead and three others are injured. The quarry has escaped.”
The office he used was simply decorated, a print of the standard picture of the Tyrant up on one wall, the furniture mass-produced business decor. It could have been an ambush but in fact it was irrelevant. Neither of them were paying any attention to anything but the other.
“I can do better,” said Victoria.
“You can do better than Bloody Lizzy? Give me leave to doubt.”
“He rabbited. He’s very good at that.” Nicator’s voice was very cool and collected, whatever Victoria was thinking. “Her priority was a surprise attack followed by a quick battle. She brought overwhelming force to try to crush Jacobin in the first attack, but he saw her coming. He could sense her through the iron in her warplane’s bullets, and then he ran as fast as he could, which is fast. She brought too many knights for an ambush; almost all of them relied on visual targeting and they were just getting in each other’s way. If she were sensible, she would have gone in alone, or with one or two knights as backup, and only brought people who could take hits safely and see through his cloaking field.”
Steelmind studied her. “And what would you have done, Victoria?” His face was unreadable.
“To kill or capture?” She saw no reason to let him rattle her. That had always been intended as a disposable secret identity.
“If you had your choice.”
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“Plastic explosives in the walls,” she said. She shrugged. “Pyre wanted them alive.”
“And then if you had to?”
Victoria shrugged. “My armor has no iron in it. That’s all he’s manipulating, iron; I’ve watched his videos. No nickel, no bronze, just iron. I’d go in ready for his invisibility, with just a few knights to engage him directly and use the rest to cover the exits. We’d use concussion grenades, sonics, flamethrowers; anything with too wide an area to dodge.”
“Indeed.” He paused. “Constantine?”
“Supervillains get more respect.”
“You want respect.”
“I want the fifth county. Pyre had no heirs of his blood.”
“The fifth county is a selection of rotting ruins that any new count would need to demolish in order to rebuild. Its sewage and water have just been critically damaged, its palace is a small lake, large stretches of its territory are still literally smoldering. To make matters worse, its taxable population is less than one percent of the first district’s and the treasury is not only empty, but nine hundred million dollars in debt.”
“Pyre’s personal debts are his problem,” said Victoria. “What I want is the fifth county, ruins and all. The honor of a count.”
“I want Jacobin,” said Steelmind. “My sister has the power to dispose of the fifth county.”
“For now. I can wait.”
Steelmind’s remote body shrugged. “Bring me Jacobin, and you’ll have your county when I can give it and my respect when I see him in chains.” He stood up. “Is there anything you need to take care of him? Suppressant cuffs?”
“I have my own,” said Victoria. “But just to make sure I don’t get any nasty surprises - I want Royal Intelligence’s files on Jacobin, and his friend, Luminosa.”
“Redacted as necessary for state purposes.”
“Of course.”
“In that case,” he said, extending his robot’s hand, “we are agreed.”
- 8:46 PM -
“That was a fiasco,” said Bloody Lizzy, glowering at Were. He never normally needed a hospital bed, given how fast he healed in beast form, but they’d had to pull his body mass in metal out of his torso.
“Yes.”
“A screw-up from start to finish.”
“Yes.”
“And it was my fault,” she said testingly.
“Yes.”
She smiled suddenly. “Thank you for telling me the truth. Now. You’re in fighting condition?”
“I heal fast.”
“Great. Take the uninjured knights and track him down. Once you’ve got him, form a perimeter and call me in. I need to go intimidate my brother before he does something stupid.”
“As you wish,” said Were, standing up. “I’ll collect them.”