Neither Elaine nor Allie expected good things to come out of flicking on the news. Which made for a pleasant surprise when what they saw wasn’t incredibly bleak. As it turned out, Lexi wasn’t kidding around when she said she was going to get the word out. Just about everyone was in a frenzy to get out their take on Azur, on the delta prisons, on the ensuing protests, on Kraken, on Siren, on Slipspace and Arcadia. 

The jury was out on that last bit, some really were fully on board with killing fascist enablers, but they were a vocal minority. It seemed for the most part, both the media and the public were at best defending the dead heroes, and at worst both-sidesing the issue. Things were a bit more contentious with Azur, as it turned out people didn’t take kindly to the notion that a cure-all medicine was being developed for the mega-rich only. Elaine found herself wondering if Lexi’s friends intended to leverage that to further paint Siren and Kraken in a negative light. Like most instances of torture, the prison thing was being swept under the rug, but those who did care were all the more galvanized for it.

From what she could tell, the situation on the ground was tense. Protesters were lined up across from Azur HQ in a standoff with cops wearing full riot gear. But even having only just heard about it, Elaine could tell by the way the broadcasts cut their footage from shot to shot that something was being omitted. There was an unease in many of the faces shown in the crowds, and countless gazes seemed to be directed at something just off camera. 

Elaine’s focus was broken by a low gasp to her right. Allie’s eyes were fixed on her tablet. She motioned Elaine to look, tilting it toward her, and Elaine realized what the media was trying not to show. Someone’s live social media feed showed a crowd of deltas, maybe a hundred or so, some of whom were dressed in regular civilian clothes, some of whom were in full battle regalia. Elaine was fairly certain she even recognized a couple of moderately well known villains among them. They had their powers on full display, jets of fire were flung into empty air, brilliant bursts of light fired into nothingness, airborne deltas circled low, all manner of horns and claws and wings were unleashed as they stared down their adversaries. Across from them was a wall of cops backed up by a growing crowd of guild accredited heroes.

“Shit, shit shit shit they're gonna tear each other apart.” Allie stood from the couch, marching across the room. “Lexi!”

“I know, I know. I see it too, Allie, agh, fuck. It wasn’t supposed to get this bad this fast.” Lexi strode from her workspace to join them.

“We have to get down there and help, there’s no way it’s not going to boil over with that going on.” Elaine had no intention of wasting time, she moved with purpose to suit up.

“Elaine, stop. None of us can be there. It’ll turn into an all out war zone if either of you show up and I highly doubt they’ll just let me waltz right in either. I already got in touch with Maddie. She’s on the way with a few like minded heroes, her entire powerset is based around keeping people safe, she and her friends can keep things from getting too bad but, fuck.” Lexi sat hard onto the couch behind her, rubbing her temples. 

“That’s all well and good Lexi, but I agree with Elaine. We can’t just sit around and watch those people get torn apart.” 

“Allie please, I know you want to help, but you being there will only make things worse. And what exactly did you think was going to happen? We weren’t going to take down Azur and the entire guild system without violence.” Lexi’s face was creased in concentration as she turned the day’s events over in her mind.

“So what, this is justified? This is a necessary sacrifice?” Deep down Elaine knew that wasn’t what Lexi meant, but the powerlessness she’d been feeling was getting to her.

“No, that’s not what I mean. There are others like us, others willing to fight. We were all supposed to organize and attack the system in conjunction with public pressure to threaten the people at the top.” Lexi brought her hand up to vaguely gesture at nothing, as though trying to find whatever part of her plan was missing.

“This is the first time I’m hearing about any of this, were Allie and I going to be involved with any of this?”

“Yes, of course. I know you two wouldn’t let us act alone. And once we got the ball rolling they would be too busy dealing with us to crackdown on the mass protests. But we haven’t had enough time to prepare that part of the plan. I missed something somewhere. These delta protests weren’t supposed to happen, not this quickly, everything will move way too fast now. I wasn’t thorough enough. There were too many variables.” Lexi hung her head in defeat, she sounded absolutely miserable.

“So what do we do Lexi? You can fix this. I know you can.” Allie crossed the room to lay a comforting hand on her sister’s knee.

“I’ll come up with something. Just give me a few more days, for now we have to hope Maddie can keep the peace. Things are going to only get worse, the media can’t hide the delta protesters from the public forever.” Leaving it all to Lexi again wasn’t something Elaine or Allie wanted to do, but neither could think of a better plan. They reluctantly agreed, and the waiting began.

The following three days had been excruciatingly slow, and palpably tense. Sentinel and her colleagues had enough good will on either side to keep something resembling peace, but time and time again things rose to the brink of chaos. Rocks would be thrown, or a stray blast of psychic energy would ricochet off a cop’s shield and both sides would form up ready for a fight that never quite broke out. Teargas had been deployed daily, but the crowds always reformed, growing hour by hour as the city came to a standstill. Public opinion was still all over the place, and the reveal of the delta protesters did nothing to ease that. A great many people were uneasy at the idea that previously unknown super-powered people were coming out of the woodwork to make demands under threat of violence, even if all they wanted was to end the torture of and experimentation on their fellows.

Elaine had been taking it particularly hard. Every time she saw things come to a head she couldn’t help but feel she’d taken the city to the edge of all out warfare due to her stupid decision to fuck Allie that night instead of let them escape. Allie, and to her surprise Lexi, were always quick to shoot down those thoughts. Time and time again they reminded her that the change they needed to happen could never come without it eventually erupting. Allie was quick to point out that If anything Elaine had sped things along. Neither Elaine nor Lexi were happy about that argument though, Allie was acting as though her imprisonment and torture was a necessary evil, as though she were some sacrificial cow.

For her part, Lexi had no shortage of guilty feelings. She threw herself into her work all day and all night, berating herself for missing whatever variable she overlooked originally that caused things to speed along too quickly for her and her co-conspirators to respond to. In a way, the three of them came to rely on one another to keep their own guilt-complexes in check as they watched the world outside devolve into foreboding deadlock. 

After another anxious day waiting and watching social media and news for each and every update on the goings on, Lexi emerged from her lab with an exhausted, but accomplished air about her. She trudged across the room and flopped onto her favorite sofa, before rolling on to her side and glancing at Elaine and Allie. 

“I did it.” Lexi seemed barely conscious. It would be kind of cute if there weren’t so much at stake.

“Great job sis, now what, exactly did you do?”

“Have new plan. Also presents.” She mumbled. 

“Okay, well can you elaborate on said plan and presents or do you need a nap first?” Allie was remarkably patient with her sister, meanwhile Elaine just wanted to shake the answers out of Lexi.

“Mmhh, give me a sec to compose myself.” Lexi laid her head back on the couch, breathing slowly and evenly. Elaine was about to check if she’d just fallen asleep when, with an exaggerated groan Lexi arched her back in a luxuriating stretch, sat up, rubbed her eyes, and began.

“Okay, so I have about thirty deltas currently on board with the plan, including us three. It’s lower numbers than I wanted, but if we all coordinate we should be able to cause trouble in enough places to stretch the authorities and heroes thin. Myself and Mind’s eye are going to be working behind the scenes doing strategy and logistics. And with my planning skills and her web of information we should be able to pull this off.” Her voice never lost that sleepy edge, but now that she was in her ‘planning mode,’ Lexi seemed surprisingly lucid.’

“Question, what exactly are Mind’s Eye’s powers?”

“Bet you’d like to know, wouldn’t you Elaine?” The sass in Leix’s voice had a lot less bite when she was practically slurring from how tired she was. “She’s one of the most secretive women in the world, you really think I know what she can do? Well, I do know. But I’m not allowed to tell you. Promised her I wouldn’t.” 

“Okay, so what’s our next move?”

“My next move is to go to sleep. But first, presents.” She clapped her hands and a pair of drones whizzed into the room, each baring a set of sleek, lightweight power-armor. “One for each of you. Will hide who you are, change how your powers work a bit so as to keep people from figuring you out that way too. They’re good models too. Kinda like mine, just more maneuverable and a bit less durable. I actually have a third one so I can pose as someone else if I need to go out, but for now I'm on armchair duty, or maybe bed duty. I've earned it.”

The larger set, which must have been Elaine’s was form fitting and deep burgundy, it’s visor was an opaque black which Elaine had no idea how she was meant to see through, but knowing Lexi it was probably somehow clear as day to look through. On the wrists and ankles were wide cylindrical chambers, and affixed to the back, coming over the shoulder were a pair of spider-leg looking appendages that appeared to have some sort of maneuverability capabilities.

“The suit should work with you to make your portals cast faster and be nearly imperceptible. To the average person you’ll just somehow be able to strike from any direction without warning. It’ll also make setting traps with your portals easier ‘cause they’ll be harder to see, and help you cast your portals past your usual range like you did when you killed Siren. The pointy bits on top are good for stabbing and climbing.” Lexi mumbled. Elaine crossed the room to examine her new getup, running her hands along it softly and giving a quiet nod of thanks.

“How ‘bout mine?” Allie asked. The smaller suit was a deep green, with strips of dull green light running all along it. Despite that, it didn’t seem to have as many fun built in toys like Elaine’s had, though there were some interesting things going on with the gloves. They were practically pistonded gauntlets.

“It should increase your control over the color and texture of your energy projections. You should be able to easily create camouflage, and shaping your energy will take less concentration, you could practically do it in your sleep.”

“Is that so?” Elaine shot her girlfriend a sly smile, Allie blushed.

“I dunno what kind of innuendo that was, Elaine but given the way you’ve been grinning like an idiot a lot around my sister I guess you two are officially an item. Congrats. Back to the matter at hand, the gauntlets hit hard, and also act as a focus for concentrated bursts of energy from your fingertips.” Lexi was interrupted by an excited outburst from Allie.

“So you’re saying I can fingerblast people?” She was giggling endlessly as she spoke, and Elaine couldn't hold back a smirk either. 

“Right, Allie I will pay you any amount of money to never say that again. Moving on, let’s talk targets.” As Lexi outlined the course of their crusade, Elaine couldn’t help but feel hopeful for the first time in days. Lexi really had delivered this time, they were going to finally be able to actually get out there and help people. And more and more it seemed like the plan might actually succeed. Real, lasting change might actually be coming. It wasn’t going to be easy, but Elaine was a supervillain, and judging by Lexi and Allie, doing things the easy way wasn’t a villain’s style.

SapphicSounds

We must protect sleeby Lexi.

Hello my lovely readers! We're coming up on the end soon. But don't worry, we'll be seeing more of Elaine, Allie, Lexi and Sentinel in the future! Keep your eyes peeled, cause I may be doing a voice reading of chapter 13 as well.

If you wouldn't mind, feel free to check out my Patreon! There you can read the first three chapters of my scifi romance story Complications of Interstellar Dating, which follows Ves, a butch trans woman, and her relationship with her spunky, excitable alien girlfriend, Amaryllis. Perhaps more enticingly, there's a very delicious audio reading of Searching For Normal's full chapter sex scene performed by yours truly (as well as a free sample, if you want to get a feel for it without paying). And lastly, you'll get early access to my writing. You can become a patron for all that, and soon more content here.