Gerry stepped back and considered his stock from the customer side of the bar. The Merchant was a small bar by Hudson City standards; old school décor, lots of dark wood and brass, scents of mahogany and pipe smoke. It was nothing at all like J/T, where Gerry last worked. No, the Merchant wasn’t trendy in any sense of the word and that went doubly for its stock of liquor.

Gino and Brandon Cassini exchanged looks and adjusted their respective grips on their firearms, a Glock for the wiry Gino and an Uzi submachine gun for the bulky Brandon. Their heads swiveled back to the door and, by unspoken agreement, the younger Brandon reached for the handle. He glanced at his brother and, receiving a nod, opened the door quickly, bringing his weapon to bear.

For a moment his mind couldn’t process the scene. The lot outside the warehouse door was smoky. Two of the other men were down, groaning. Brandon didn’t pay them any mind; they were piciotto, button-men, and therefore expendable. Willy the Pick was holding his face and whimpering, his clothes smoldering. There was evidence of a small blast on the asphalt nearby.

He opened his eyes slowly, blinking away his grogginess. The light hurt.

“About time, hoss.”

Squinting, Luke tried to focus on the figure before him. It seemed indistinct. Opaque. Slowly the haze cleared.

“You done napping?”

Luke tried to laugh, coughed instead. Everything hurt.

“Quite a mess you got yourself into, hoss.”

“I know,” Luke croaked. He was still tied to a chair. Tightly. “I know,” he said again.

“Any ideas how you’re going to get yourself out of it?”

Luke sighed. Wheezed, actually, but it amounted to the same thing.

“I’ll figure it out, Dad.”

The slap of the gloved fist against skin was like a whip in the room. Luke’s head rocked with the blow but he maintained control and only allowed the barest of grunts to escape. He turned his head slowly to regard the man in front of him and spit a glob of blood to the side. One eye was swollen nearly shut, the skin split across the cheekbone. His nose and lips both bled, and when he smiled—a humorless smile full of anger and promise—pink tainted his teeth and gums.

The man before him seemed unphazed by the glare, if indeed he even noticed. He simply stepped back and looked over his shoulder as two men entered the room. Black Mike Calvone and his lieutenant Willy the Pick were smiling.

“Are we sure we want to do this?”

“Hello? Am I talking to myself here?”

“Yes, we want to do this.”

“What a shock. How ‘bout you, Jen? You don’t have to—“

“Y-yes. For him, yes.”

“’Atta girl. Frankie?”

“I don’t know, man. I’m not really—“

“Frankie.”

“I mean, yeah. Yeah, I’m in. Right? I’m in.”

“Doc?”

“What? Oh. Yes. If I can help, I will, of course. I’m just not sure…”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I just…”

“Listen, you’ve done plenty. You got us to the game, okay? No need to go any further.”

The bustling Friday night traffic in Hudson City did nothing to slow Nemesis and Soldier Boy as they raced towards Lafayette.  The updates were few and far between over the communicators, but it was clear that whatever was happening in Fayettenam, was more than Paladin, Avatar and Heatwave could handle on their own.  The hypercycles slid in and out of traffic, onto and off of the sidewalks and even skimmed over the Stewart River to land on the banks of Crown Point.

There was only one person in the cafeteria when Nemesis finally finished up with Phi. Heatwave was sitting at one of the tables reading a magazine. She looked up as Nemesis entered and hastily put the magazine down and covered it up but not before Nemesis saw it was a copy of Soap Opera Digest. It was the first time he had ever seen a hint of her life out of costume.

Danny raised his hand to knock on the door, then hesitated. She was his cousin. She liked him. They got along. But would she listen? His arguments were good ones, but he was up against a legend here. And despite having been on the team for nearly half a year, he was still considered to be the new kid.

Ah well, he thought, nothing for it.

He knocked once upon the oak-paneled office door, then opened it and stepped inside. He knew she was in there; he could smell her.  "Cheers," he said brightly as he stepped into Ophilia DiSantiago's office. "Do ya have a moment or two?" 

The Galaxy Diner was used to the occasional strange person walking through the doors under the big neon sign on the corner of Harnett Street and 4th Avenue. And while perhaps they weren't the strangest persons to do so, Stone and Mojito presented a most attractive couple of personalities as any.