Excerpt from Jane’s Secret Radio Broadcast 11/15/0089:

  “Thanks for meeting me. Let's jump right into it — what do you say to those that call you a Supervillain?”

  “Supervillain? I thought you were a journalist. I’m not evil.”

  “I’m not really a journalist ma’am. At least not an impartial one. I care deeply about the Superhero community. And they consider you a villain.”

  “Well, then I’d say that’s all just a matter of perspective. The Quick Corporation has a vested interest in having a monopoly on hero work. As Whitehot, I threaten that status quo. So, of course to her, I’m a Supervillian.”

  “I wouldn’t call burning down people’s houses, ‘hero work.’”

  “So, I cause a little property damage when fighting the shadowbats. I’m new to this. As White Rabbit, I mostly punched and kicked. As Whitehot, I don’t always have complete control over my laser blasts.”

  “So you say. The Super-net seems to be sceptical of your intentions. Just last week you were seen robbing a bank.”

  “Resecuring stolen wealth. The bank had fallen in with the corrupt, and was funding criminal activity. By taking it, I was stopping crime before it started. Criminals can’t buy guns, or drugs, without cash.”

  “And you have evidence of this, of course?”

  “Yeah. The fact that I went, and got it. Did people whine like this when Captain Iron busted a gun ring? No, they thanked him for it. Now, I’m not saying I’m Captain Iron, but you'll notice that he’s a him, and I’m a she. Maybe I wouldn’t be so controversial without tits.”

  “Are you alleging that people object to your — let’s charitably say ‘volatile actions’ — because you are a woman? That it’s sexism?”

  “No. I don’t know about sexism. But I just figured people would be more grateful that a new Superhero is on the scene. I work hard for the people. Where’s my parade? Where’s my comic book?”

  “Based on popular perception, you’ve yet to really prove yourself. Carla Quick has. When heroes fight, everyone loses. What would it take for you two to make up?”

  “I’m ready any time. She just doesn’t seem willing to talk. Maybe you should ask her that?”

  Red Fox Action Log 47:

  We’ve been traveling around the United States in our Fox Foundation van for weeks, chasing leads, stopping crime, and still we felt no closer to finding a Superhero for the team. Sleuth and I did get to bust up a bank robbery, so that was thrilling, but tempers were beginning to fray. Not knowing exactly how to reach our next step, just where we had to be, and also the knowledge of what White Rabbit could be doing out there, weighed heavy. Sleuth had made contact with the museum in Garden City but he was cagey about what that meant.

  We’d stopped at a gas station to refuel, a couple hundred miles from Garden City, and hopefully, Bronze Boy.

  Sleuth brought back hot dogs, handing one to Gunnar, who leaned against the van. I sat down on the ledge of the open back doors, and took one as well. Sleuth’s eyes failed to hide his disgust, but he bit into his too.

  Beautiful — pork, mustard, bread, and god knows what else. It was gone in moments. I looked to Sleuth who had to choke his down with a can of .99$ tea, slick with condensation.

  “You’d think super smelling would make hot dogs taste better,” I said, tossing the trash, and wiping my hand on my pants.

  “Only when the food I eat is real meat, and not, ‘meat product.’ I can smell the detritus. And the grease.”

  “The grease makes it better!”

  “Want your arm for the drive up?” Sleuth asked.

  I had a prosthetic in the back somewhere, but it couldn’t hold a charge for long, and was uncomfortable to use. I’d take it out on missions, but hardly wore it otherwise.

  “Nah,” I said, “I mostly drive with my knees anyway.”

  “Then, I’ll drive,” Sleuth said.

  “Suit yourself.”

  I sat in the passenger seat, and Gunnar climbed into the back to lay down. He’d said he was pretty wiped after handling the last leg. The police scanner we’d taken with us barked something. I turned it up.

  “—Number of hostages unknown. Four cars in transit. Repeat, multiple Hotel Kilo on premises. They are to be considered armed and dangerous.”

  “Did you hear Hotel Kilo?” I asked Sleuth.

  “I did.”

  “That means Hunter Killer robots, yeah?”

  “It does.”

  I turned to Gunnar who had their laptop open, already piggybacking off the cellphone towers to get news alerts.

  “What’s Carla up to?”

  “She’s engaged with Bunny.”

  I swore.

  “That means it’s us,” I said.

  Sleuth shifted into first gear, and eased us out of the gas station parking.

  “It does indeed,” he said.

  “Did you catch where?” I asked Gunnar.

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  “Sporting Goods store less than 12 miles down the road.”

  “Think you can get us there before the FBI?” I asked Sleuth.

  The sound of the roaring engine nearly drowned out his response.

  “I think I can certainly give it my best.”

  We soared down the highway. I climbed over the seat into the back. The Foundation had given me an adapted super suit that was easier to get on one handed, but Gunnar still did his best to help me in it while we bounced around in the back.

  I’d learned to get real comfortable having others see me in my underwear. Couldn’t be helped. Last to go on was the prosthetic. It strapped around my chest with a complex series of pulleys and straps. It had a battery operated gyro in it that moved mostly from the shifting of my torso. The arm ended in a hook, like a sailor.

  Prosthetic technology had advanced light years from where it had started a hundred or so years ago, but it still couldn’t find something more useful than a two-pronged hook. You know, if it works, it works.

  I pushed the button that made it stay at my side, instead of activating the gyro that kept it horizontal.

  I checked my belt. Smoke bombs, knife, explosive tape, it was all there.

  “I thought Carla Quick got rid of the Hunter Killer bots?” Gunnar asked.

  “The problem,” I replied, “is that you can always rebuild them. If you don’t properly destroy or collect the waste from a fight with them, they can collect the parts and rebuild them. And sometimes it’s not even the robots themselves, it’s people sticking them in their basements and messing with them.”

  “Think that’s what happened here?”

  “No idea. Out here, as far as we are from most cities, it could be anything.”

  We parked the van behind a desert shrub as close to the police cordon as we felt we could risk, and endeavored to run in on foot. Gunnar promised to hang back. I was a little nervous about it, considering what happened last time I left allies behind, but HK bots were not to be trifled with.

  I also wasn’t so sure about bringing Sleuth with me either. He had been invaluable in the last couple scrapes we’d gotten in, but I couldn’t fight and look after him at the same time.

  My cardio had only taken a small hit all things considered, and Sleuth was in excellent shape, so we made it to the sporting goods store before many more cops showed up. Had we been Superheroes, maybe we would have had the pull to work with the cops, but we weren’t. They would just try to arrest us or lock us out of their plans.

  So, we had to be quick.

  The Trout Special Shops loomed up ahead.

  “We have to assume they’re armed,” I said. “These places have lots of guns.”

  “Yep,” he said, pulling out his stun gun. It probably wouldn’t work on one of these guys, but it was all he had. He didn’t like real guns.

  “Maybe switch to the baton," I said.

  He nodded and did so.

  Gunnar texted me. I stopped to glance at it.

  Back parking lot had plenty of cars. And as far as we could see, just one HK bot.

  His cylindrical head, with the huge black eye-like camera, pivoted back and forth. Its thin, skinny metal arms held a modern AR-style rifle. I motioned for Sleuth to hang back behind one of the cars, and he nodded. I sent the text.

  The bot immediately held the gun at its side as it rapped on the side of its head comically, in an act of percussive maintenance.

  I checked my mask to make sure it was secure. I grit my teeth. I felt the rage bubble up in my chest, an anger I hadn’t felt in a long time. I’d been waiting for a chance to let loose. Losing an arm will get you acquainted with anger real quick.

  I felt for the instinct. I plucked the string. My hand disappeared. So did my prosthesis. How that worked was anyone’s guess.

  I ran forward. He didn’t hear me until it was too late, raising his rifle and looking around dumbly.

  I leapt, sweeping my leg through the air. My boot crashed into its head. The rifle went scattering off. Good. No gunfire yet.

  I stomped on its chest once, twice, three times, until I finally made it through the casing, and crushed something vital. It went still. Some kind of sparkling blue fluid seeped from it.

  You have to remember, two arms or not, I am very good at this kind of thing.

  Sleuth walked up to me.

  “I detest guns,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “I should take the rifle.”

  “Probably, if only to make sure someone else doesn’t grab it.”

  He nodded, and bent to retrieve it. He pulled the receiver back to check the chamber, then gave me a thumbs-up.

  These things weren’t alive. At least not in the way we could appreciate. In the past, they’d been controlled by a mainframe, a virtual reconstruction of a Supervillain. Now, they were more like untethered drones, a hazard more than a unified threat.

  “Get anything off of it?” I asked.

  Sleuth knelt down, and sniffed significantly.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Someone definitely put this thing back together. Can smell the oils from his hands. Male. Young. Very anxious.”

  “You can smell if someone is a dude just from the oils on their hand?”

  “Sometimes. Especially an adolescent. Distinctive hormonal cocktail.”

  “And the anxious part?”

  “The cortisol.”

  “Wow.”

  “We should be very careful. Young men are the most dangerous kind of person.”

  “Are they?”

  He just nodded. I had mostly left the psychological Fox manuals alone. Much of it was outdated anyway.

  We entered the dark building. The light of the emergency LEDs illuminated the aisles, but left deep, dark corners.

  First thing we saw was a wall of hanging skis, then rows of goggles, and socks. The winter gear section. I briefly glanced at the goggles. There were thousands of them. Hundreds littered the floor, likely knocked off by customers that sought a specific style. I pitied whoever had to stock this section.

  I didn’t go invisible. I’d not pushed the ability to its limit yet, and didn’t want to strain it unnecessarily.

  The enormity of the store could not be exaggerated. However many bots they had in here, there was no way they could patrol the whole thing, at least not well.

  Glancing at the signs, I spotted the guns and ammo section. There had to be someone watching that. I waved at Sleuth, and slunk in that direction.

  Peeking around the corner of an endcap, I spied a peculiar sight.

  A woman stood over the broken HK bot, skirt fluttering from recent movement.

  She was gorgeous. My pulse quickened.

  Some people are pretty. Some are attractive. Some have an innate sensuality to them.

  And some people reach out, and grab your heart like an idly plucked flower, unmooring you from your previous life, and carrying you off somewhere else.

  I shook my head slightly, and fought to focus myself.

  Her hair shone red in the dim light, bound in a single braid that lay on her shoulder, and her glasses were simple wire frames resting on the bridge of her nose. Her dress must have been tailored, as it hugged her thin frame perfectly in black lace with pink accents. The dress started with a high collar and stopped right above the knee, revealing white stockings, and small black flats.

  The barest trace of something, some energy or electricity sparkled in the air for a fraction of a second, and then was gone. Maybe something from the robot that lay in two pieces on the ground.

  Had it been ripped in half?

  I motioned for Sleuth to stay, then stepped out of the shadows.

  She raised her first back as if to punch me.

  “Woah!” I whispered harshly. “I’m here to help.”

  She eyed me up and down, then dropped her fist.

  “About time someone showed,” she said, her voice dark and melodic. “Nice not to have to do this all on my own.”