Maybe I should take super sneaky ninja training or something. I’ve been doing a lot of sneaking lately, and the results have been... mixed. Emphasis on the getting caught part.

Tonight wasn’t shaping up to be any different.

Petunia had sent me a tip about a potential villain meet-up. Some super secret, definitely nefarious kind of exchange, she said. Something hush-hush, off the books, whispered about in dark alleys by men with weird trench coats and worse breath.

As for how Petunia gets this kind of intel? No clue. None. The woman’s connected in ways I don’t understand and honestly don’t want to. She says jump, I don’t even ask how high—I just hope I’m not landing in radioactive sludge.

What I do understand is that she keeps sending me to deal with it. And look, I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: I do not have a good stealth track record. Stealth is about grace, silence, and subtlety. I’m more of a “trip over a mop and crash through a window while trying to whisper” kind of operator.

Still, here I was again, adjusting my cowl like a real pro. It wasn’t black—no, black reflects light. This was a nice, dark midnight blue. Still wished I was wearing more of it. Dark blue is the unsung hero of nighttime espionage. It’s got that shadowy look without making you look like an edgelord with a katana collection.

The place in question tonight was a factory. Again. Because of course it was. This time, it was a tech facility on the outskirts of the industrial district—lots of glass, steel, and that too-clean feeling that means you’re either in a rich nerd’s lab or about to be vaporized by something built in one.

Apparently, someone was trying to steal some classified files from here. The contents? No clue. Something very important, according to Petunia. Maybe plans. Maybe tech. Maybe Apex's secret coffee recipe. Honestly? Not important to me. The important part is: stop the thing. Whatever it is. Before it happens. Probably.

The word “important” has now officially lost all meaning.

Speaking of things Petunia didn’t mention—this place? It was owned by Apex Industries. Apex. As in, the superhero megacorp with enough funding to build orbital laser defense systems and biometric toilets. So naturally, their security was probably ten levels above my paygrade. Facial recognition, AI-guided drones, maybe even some cursed Roombas.

So again: why the hell was I here?

I exhaled a silent sigh as I crept through the loading bay. The moonlight slid off polished concrete and stacked pallets of future headaches. I moved like a shadow. An anxious, undertrained, slightly sore shadow—but a shadow nonetheless.

Gran had said there’d be an open door. Just one. Around the back. She didn’t say how she knew. I didn’t ask. She has that look that says “I will answer with riddles and you won’t enjoy it.” So I just trusted her.

And wouldn’t you know it, there it was. Door ajar. Just a crack. Like someone had left it open for me.

That’s usually a bad sign.

But I was already here. Might as well get caught inside rather than on the doorstep.

I slipped in, heart already picking up speed. Time to find out who was stealing what, and maybe—just maybe—not screw this up for once.

Maybe.

Probably not.

But hey. Worth a shot.

…

Okay. In hindsight?

I’m an idiot.

Why didn’t I just, you know… alert the company? Tell security? Call their tip line? Anything other than break-and-enter like I’m starring in my own budget espionage flick.

But then again, Gran did send me here. And she didn’t say “call it in,” she said I needed to be here. Which either means there’s more going on than a standard data heist… or she just really enjoys putting me in deeply questionable situations. Could go either way, honestly.

Alright. Deep breath. Trust Gran. Go with the flow. Try not to get tasered again.

I slipped deeper into the facility. Corridors stretched out ahead of me—glass walls, soft white LED lighting that flickered just enough to put me on edge, and that eerie, sterile silence that only rich tech buildings ever manage. No distant hum of machinery. No footsteps. No murmured conversations. Just the soft squeak of my boots and the growing sense that I was walking into something I didn’t understand.

Where was security? Where were the engineers pulling an all-nighter? Where was the janitor?

Nowhere.

Except for that unconscious body right there.

Shit.

Laid out slumped against the wall, a guy in an Apex security uniform. Breathing, thank god—chest rising, face slack, a little bruise on his temple but nothing fatal. At least, I hoped not.

I crouched beside him and gave him a quick once-over. No signs of struggle, no blood. Whoever took him down did it fast and clean. Too clean.

This wasn’t just a random robbery.

Alright. Brain: do not spiral. There is a mystery afoot. Also, no time to be sentimental. He’s alive. He’s fine. I’m moving on.

“Onwards, Aoshima,” I muttered under my breath, quoting a meme from a show nobody watched but me.

Down the next corridor: two more bodies. One slumped over a desk, the other laid out in a breakroom with a spilled cup of instant ramen beside him. Both breathing. Both out cold. Still no alarms. No lockdown.

I was starting to get really nervous.

If someone could move through a corporate tech lab like this, quietly neutralizing everyone in their path without triggering a single alert, then they weren’t your average smash-and-grab meta.

This was surgical. Professional.

And whatever they were here for?

They were probably close to getting it.

And now I was stuck in here with them.

Fantastic.

I made my way up a stairwell—slow, careful steps, ears straining for anything besides my own breath and the quiet hum of electricity. The second floor was different. Fancier. Carpeted. Glass partitions and chrome fittings, like they were trying to convince visiting clients that yes, they were very rich and very competent.

I came to what could only be described as an important-looking office block—sleek doors, frosted glass, tiny little plaques with titles like “Regional Director of Strategic Integration” which probably meant “guy who goes to meetings about meetings.”

There were a couple of bodies out here too.

Alive ones. Breathing. Thank god.

Also bleeding, but, like, internally. All the blood was where it should be—on the inside. I didn’t see any signs of open wounds, no pools, no spraying arteries or horror movie shit. They were just… out cold. Like they’d been shut off.

Okay, that’s not unsettling at all.

I knelt for a moment next to one of them—a woman in her forties, glasses askew, curled up like she’d just laid down for a nap in the middle of the hallway. No signs of distress. No bruising. Chest rising and falling like normal.

I moved past her and the other, careful not to step on a hand or knee. Every muscle in my body wanted to tense, scream, run, but I kept it tight. Kept moving. 

The office door was slightly ajar. Of course it was. Never a good sign when the boss’s private sanctum is just waiting open for you.

Inside: big desk, sleek holo-display on standby, neat shelves, wall safe, few too many awards. Guy had a framed picture of himself shaking Apex’s hand like it was some kind of Nobel Peace Prize.

But no culprit.

Which made sense, I guess.

If I were a thief, I wouldn’t go straight to the C-suite either.

Server room.

That’s where you go if you want the juicy stuff. Data. Schematics. Files with ominous names like “Project EXO” or “Contingency Black.”

I wasn’t a hacker, alright? I was tech literate, not tech wizard. I could run diagnostics on my gloves and fix a broken drive shaft, but I wasn’t about to start slicing through encrypted networks like I was in a spy movie.

Still. I could get there. Figure out what was taken. Maybe catch them in the act.

I crept toward the back of the office, looking for a map, a terminal—anything that might point me to a server room.

And in the quiet, under all the tension in my spine, a new thought crept in:

What if I was already too late?

I stepped further into the office, shutting the door behind me with a soft click. Maybe I’d get lucky and find a security monitor, or a digital log, or—hell—even a post-it note saying “Villain meeting moved to sub-basement, bring snacks.”

But no. The room looked… normal. Weirdly normal.

Too normal.

Everything was pristine—too pristine. The desk didn’t have so much as a fingerprint on it. The keyboard was dead silent, the holo-display dark, and the coffee cup on the corner wasn’t just clean, it was dry. Not recently used. No clutter, no mess, no signs of someone living in this office. Just a showroom.

Except—

Something was off with the bookshelf.

Not like “rotating secret passageway” off. But one of the little trophies on the top shelf—some Apex award shaped like a stylized lightning bolt—was pointed backwards. Like someone had spun it around and never fixed it. Which was weird, because everything else was symmetrical. Lined up. Too perfect.

I stepped closer, squinting. The lightning bolt was sitting on a tiny hinge. The whole thing wobbled slightly when I nudged it. I reached behind it and felt around—and bingo. Little indent. Hidden button.

Goddamn Gran. She had to know something about this place.

I hesitated a second, then pressed it.

With a soft click, part of the wall panel behind the bookshelf shifted. Not slid open or anything dramatic—just... unlatched. Enough to show a narrow seam in the wood.

I braced myself and pushed.

A section of the wall swung open about a foot, just wide enough for me to squeeze through.

Inside: a dark hallway.

Concrete. No decor. No polish. Just cold industrial grey with a faint blue emergency light humming from the floor panels.

Not exactly a server room.

Not exactly not a server room, either.

I exhaled slowly.

“Alright,” I whispered. “Let’s see what kind of secret shit you’re hiding. Not that I am here to snoop. Just get the villain. Probably.”

And stepped into the dark.

The hidden corridor wasn’t long, but it was the kind of long that felt endless. Every footstep echoed with a muffled, ominous thud, even though I was trying my damnedest to stay quiet. The air was stale—dry and too still, like no one had walked down here in weeks. But that didn’t add up. Someone had to be here. There were unconscious people upstairs. Someone did that. Recently.

I kept going.

The passage curved slightly to the right, just enough to block the line of sight back to the hidden entrance. Now I was completely cut off from the office. No light but the soft blue floor glow, no sound but my own breath.

Then I heard something.

Soft. Mechanical. Like… humming?

Not music. Not an engine. Some kind of electric vibration, like a coil winding or a generator idling just on the edge of perception. I froze. Tried to figure out the direction. My ears weren’t great for this kind of thing—I wasn’t built for stealth or surveillance, I was built to punch a hole in a car and keep moving.

Still, I crept toward it.

A door appeared at the end of the hallway, recessed into the wall with a keycard panel to the right and no visible handle. It was matte black. Fancy. Very not-a-normal-factory-door.

Then I noticed the floor in front of it.

Scuffed.

A lot.

Boot marks. Some old, some recent. There was a faint dark smear off to the side—oil? Blood? I couldn’t tell in the blue light, and wasn’t in a rush to lean down and sniff it.

Someone had been here. More than one someone. Recently.

I reached out to test the keycard panel—maybe Petunia gave me some kind of access override without telling me. She’s sneaky like that.

Before I could touch it, the panel chirped.

Green light.

Door hissed open.

Okay what the fuck.

I hadn’t even touched it. No one else in the corridor. No camera I could see.

I took one cautious step forward, fingers flexing, ready to punch a laser or a robot or whatever the hell Apex thought counted as security.

But there was no laser.

No robot.

Just... servers. Racks of them, humming gently, each one glowing with soft internal light. Temperature dropped about ten degrees in this room—colder, drier. The hum from earlier was louder now. Everywhere. White noise, vibrating in my molars.

And dead center in the room?

A terminal.

On.

Open.

Waiting.

There was a file on the screen. Just one.

No label. No name. Just a blinking prompt.

“HELLO, MISS MOMENTUM.”

My stomach did a backflip.

Because I hadn’t touched anything.

I stood there for a second, staring at the glowing words like they might rearrange themselves into something less unsettling.

“HELLO, MISS MOMENTUM.”

Yeah, no, still creepy.

I glanced around the server room again. No movement. Just the endless rows of humming machines, blinking away in quiet rhythm like they were breathing. No vents hissing, no security drones flying overhead. Just me and whatever the hell this was.

I stepped closer, boots making the faintest squeak on the clean server floor. The terminal didn’t react.

I tapped the keyboard.

“Who is this?”

The blinking prompt paused for a moment. Then:

“A FRIEND.”

Oh good. That’s not ominous at all.

I chewed the inside of my cheek, fingers hovering over the keys again.

“Why are you watching me?”

Another pause. Then, line by line:

“BECAUSE YOU'RE INTERESTING.”

“BECAUSE YOU'RE STUBBORN.”

“BECAUSE YOU’RE IN OVER YOUR HEAD.”

Well. I can’t argue with the last one.

I backed away a step, heart thudding against my ribs like it was trying to do its own escape attempt. I wanted to bolt. Just run the fuck away and say screw it.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I typed:

“What do you want?”

The pause that followed wasn’t like before. This one lingered. Not out of delay—out of deliberation. Like whatever was on the other end was thinking, or choosing its words carefully. I didn’t like that.

Then, the text blinked to life again.

“TO WARN YOU.”

“APEX IS NOT WHAT HE SEEMS.”

Right. That wasn’t hard to believe. Apex had always been just a little too clean, a little too perfect for a megacorp dabbling in everything from prosthetic limbs to drone warfare to “metahuman support solutions.”

“Then why me?” I typed back. “I’m just a C-Class hero. I’m already way out of my league half the time.”

Another pause. Then:

“YOU TOOK DOWN A B-CLASS SUPER VILLAIN IN ONE HIT. YOU TOOK EACH OF HER HITS TOO.”

“‘JUST A C-CLASS HERO’ IS DOING YOU AN INJUSTICE.”

Okay. I won’t lie. That one made me sit up a bit straighter. My cheeks were warm. Maybe I was blushing a little. I mean… I did flatten Bombelle like a goddamn freight train. After she’d flattened me like a trampoline full of bricks.

Sure, I was mostly a smear by the end, but I got up.

“Fine,” I typed, grinning despite myself. “Still stands. Why me?”

This time, the response came fast.

“BECAUSE YOU HAVE A STRONG SENSE OF WHAT’S RIGHT AND WHAT’S WRONG.”

“BECAUSE YOU SEE INJUSTICE AND FIGHT IT, EVEN WHEN YOU’RE OUTMATCHED.”

“BECAUSE I WANT THAT POWER.”

Okay hold up.

“Are you… planning to steal my power or something?” I typed.

“WHAT. NO. WHY WOULD I DO THAT.”

“I dunno, seems like a villain thing to do,” I replied. “Is that even possible? Oh wait, is that what Apex is doing? Are they stealing powers from arrested heroes and villains, disappearing them through the SCU, maybe experimenting or draining them, consolidating power through a hidden metahuman extraction program, slowly building an authoritarian elite of perfect, loyal supers with curated morality and no accountability?”

The cursor blinked.

And blinked.

And blinked.

Then:

“…”

I waited. Nervous.

“WHAT THE FUCK.”

“YES. EXACTLY THAT.”

…oh.

Oh shit.

“WHAT THE FUCK.”

“You typed that already.”

There was a ping. A file attachment slid into the corner of the screen, labeled simply:

[LOCATION.DAT]

“YES I DID. OKAY, THIS MAKES THINGS EASIER. BE AT THIS LOCATION IN NINE DAYS. ONE A.M. SHARP. IF YOU WANT TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS.”

Uh-huh. Sure. Totally normal.

“Riiiight. Sure. Okay, I have one question before I agree.”

“GO AHEAD.”

My fingers hovered over the keyboard for a second. Then, slowly, I typed:

“Are you Umbra?”

There was no response.

For a long moment, the screen was silent. The cursor blinked at me like it was judging me. Then—

“...”

“YOU ARE SMARTER THAN YOU ACT. BE THERE OR NOT. I WILL BE WAITING.”

Wooooow. Okay. So just to recap:

My girlfriend (allegedly), who is a supervillain (allegedly), and is Umbra (allegedly)—one of the most dangerous rogue metas on the planet—just asked me to help take down Apex, the most powerful and most obscenely rich man alive.

Cool. Coolcoolcool.

I should say no.

I should say no.

I absolutely should say no.

But her ass, tits, and overwhelming charisma are all saying yes. And honestly? That trifecta wins most of the internal votes.

I sighed and typed:

“Fine. I’ll be there.”

Another long pause. Then:

“GREAT. GOOD. I MEAN THIS IS MOST PLEASING NEWS.”

“ONE MORE THING.”

“Shoot.”

“YOU HAVE ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY-FIVE SECONDS TO GET OUT OF THERE BEFORE YOU GET CAUGHT. SECURITY JUST ARRIVED TO INVESTIGATE THE BLACKOUT.”

…

MOTHER FUCKER!