Erin looked around as Cyclops did. Michelle and Centaur were down already, knocked unconscious by forces unseen.

Wearing his usual outfit, something like a cross between Zorro and an archeologist, in various shades of grey and dark green, Alleyshadow coalesced from magical shadows and revealed himself as standing between the two prone bodies, looking smug and assured with his staff in hand.

The Cyclops, reacting faster than Erin expected, leapt towards her, realizing his last gambit was his hostage. There was the muffled buzz of the wizard muttering a language long unspoken. A dull hum, ethereal and indistinct, followed that, and the tip of his staff glowed a last time, blasting Cyclops away from Erin before she’d had time to react to any of it.

Cyclops made a crash of noise as the light blasted him into the wall next to the doorway. Apparently this spell was not crafted to be silent. Cyclops was just as unconscious as the others, though.

Erin looked at all the Pawn criminal mutants, each of them unconscious, then to Alleyshadow. “Ah, thanks.” She’d only just considered that while the Pawns may not have much brainpower, nothing prevented them from just killing her. 

Alleyshadow tipped his hat with his free hand and started to approach. “That’s just my job. Are you alr-”

“Hey, you want to be careful,” Erin interrupted his approach, and took a step back, “there was a whole lot of mutagen near here, just fifteen, thirty minutes ago. It’s all over me.” Erin was acting a bit on instinct, but she also didn’t really want another Invader that close just yet.

“Well-” Alleyshadow tilted his head, “- having a victim worry about me is rather uncommon. And don’t worry, I have a barrier up.” 

He tapped the haft of his staff with his thumb. “Are you okay, Miss, ah, Razor, was it? I’m Alleyshadow.” His accent was smoothly American Midwest. 

Erin knew that while Nathan Jing’s backstory had traces of his Chinese heritage, they didn’t define his character. It was pretty common for D-grade Protagonists that took on minority ethnicities to hyper rely on their assumed heritage to inspire their powerset and story.

It looked like she was safe for now, until she mutated, at least. 

If she ever mutated at this rate.

Erin spared another look at the mutant Pawns on the ground around before finally answering Nathan. “Err… I’m fine. Nice to meet you. Probably going to mutate, eventually, if Doppelganger wasn’t lying. You stop the dispensers around the water treatment plant?”

Alleyshadow gave a roguish half-smile. “Just barely in time, all thanks to your brazen defection on the Prisoner’s Dilemma. We saw you destroying your own bomb, though we didn’t have audio - that was very brave of you, by the way - so we decided to prioritize the city since we couldn’t get to you in time. The others should be done shortly, they are securing the perimeter and trying to track down Doppelganger’s route.” Alleyshadow ducked down and muttered another spell over the Centaur. Between the Pawn’s eight arms and four legs, glowing grey chains made of light appeared.

“Thank you also for distracting these four. I couldn’t have gotten the drop on them without your help.”

She’d seen the shifting shadows, and hoped it was Alleyshadow. She hadn’t known for certain though. His powers looked more alien in real life than they did in video recordings. “Didn’t even know you were here,” Erin lied, not wanting to play up any sort of heroism on her part. She motioned to herself, not wanting Alleyshadow to ask to follow that line of though. “So when is this mutagen stuff supposed to kick in?”

“That is the presiding question, isn’t it?” He gave a stereotypical thinking pose - a Protagonist used to a well-placed parlor scene - before turning to the third mutant on the ground. “Ferret described it as ‘very quick’. Seconds, not minutes. I was sent because we weren’t sure how, ah, you’d react to all the mutagen and changes, and would try to calm you down if needed.”

“Calm me like these guys?” Erin dropped the look she was giving Alleyshadow. He was honest enough to look chagrined. “Never mind. In spite of my undignified response to being kidnapped and taunted by a villain, I am not actually prone to fits of rage… usually.” Erin wanted to spit in his face, but her fervor really was gone for now. She didn’t need the Plot to tell her she was still helpless against the Invaders. 

Alleyshadow laughed, and motioned for her to move closer. He turned to them and pulled a piece of chalk from his belt and began scribbling a few runes on the ground between Erin, and the thugs and the office she’d escaped from earlier. His mutterings were all old Gaelic, according to online sources. Supposedly, he was trained in the ways Merlin had been. Of course, Merlin was just mythology from the pre-Plot days, like King Lancelot and his best friend Arthur the Green Knight.

That Alleyshadow didn’t draw upon his Chinese heritage to form every aspect of his character, which was sort of a relief. While it would occasionally spark forum flame wars to discuss if it was worse or better if the Protagonists were completely native or assuming ethnicities outside their own, usually people settled on Protagonists not leaning hard on ethnic or regional cultures was easier to deal with. After all, this was all assuming that Protagonists were human at all. 

All of this information felt like poison roiling around in Erin’s head, knowing that these Protagonists were just using her world to ‘play around’.

Faint glowing domes fell over the unconscious mutants as well as the doorway she came from. She assumed it must have been some sort of magic barrier. As she considered it, Alleyshadow turned to look her over.

“I probably should contain you in the same barrier somehow, to be honest. You still have mutagen on you, supposedly, and who knows what it would do to the others.” He gestured, and Erin could see his hand was shaking a little from all the magic use. He saw her see his shakes and gave a small laugh, “I’ll be fine. I just used quite a bit of magic all at once. Do you mind if I give you a token to wear? Using a focus will be easier on me.”

“A token is just fine.”

“And are you alright? I didn’t ask if you were hurt or anything.”

“Just tired, a little dazed.” Her ankle was sore, and she was willing to bet it would get worse before it would get better. She wanted no extra help from him. Not today. “It’s been a long day.”

He laughed. “I am sure it has been.” He pulled from his robes a glowing crystal with a chain through it and muttered a few words. The stone flashed, and he offered it to her. “Wear this around your neck. It should hold out until we get you to a proper chemical shower, or a ward. Or whatever The Ferret suggests…” he said. Erin put the necklace on over her head without complaint. “You know, you are taking this rather well.”

“I’ve grown up in a world with superheroes and villains. And you are supposed to be one of the good guys, right?” That last carried a lot of acid, but she followed up more reassuringly as the buzz of the Plot made itself known again. “I mean, if it had been Doppelganger at the door, sure, I’d panic. These guys, they’re just hired hands, and probably wouldn’t do anything if I cooperated. I’m already slated to mutate soon, if Doppelganger wasn’t lying or incompetent. Maybe I will panic when I mutate.” The Plot buzz faded again, apparently just making sure to warn her against breaking the fourth wall. 

She was burned out after her rampage. The Cavalry were relatively harmless compared to Doppelganger. And she was tired. She would muster more rage for the Plot’s nastiness another day.

The crystal was strangely heavy around her neck, but was just another weight to add to her intangible ones. 

“Surprised it hasn’t happened yet. Sorry to say it, but I am not a biochem expert. I am half decent with physics - have to be in order to break the laws - but The Ferret should know more. She said the change was incredibly fast, given the varied possibilities. She’s developed the neutralizing agent… but I don’t know if she intended to use it on anything but the latent forms of the mutagen.” Alleyshadow had the decency to look a little worried.

Erin did not really want to wait around in awkward silence and tension as they mulled on her fate. “Well, I’ve always had a slow metabolism.”

Alleyshadow chuckled. “I can see why they like you.” Erin froze; she wasn’t supposed to know who Tyson and Misty were. Alleyshadow recovered quickly. “I mean, you’ve got the right attitude to be trapped in this mess. I’m sorry it happened at all. Any idea why Doppelganger picked you up?”

“Nope,” she lied smoothly, having expected this question. “They did a monologue. ‘Something something mutagen, something something a choice of heroes’.”

Alleyshadow nodded, not seeming surprised. “And you got angry because…?”

It was Erin’s turn to chagrin, and she said, “I just… didn’t want them to get the satisfaction of letting their plan work. If I’d ever been faced with this sort of thing, I promised myself I wouldn’t just roll over for some two bit villain.”

Alleyshadow glanced at her, frowning. “You expected to face being kidnapped?”

Erin blinked, looking at Alleyshadow, almost confused as she answered, “Well, I said it before, right? We live in a world of superheroes and villains. I didn’t expect to be kidnapped per se but… We’re in Meridian City: mad science and magical cults are our specialty. If Doppelganger had succeeded, then how many people would have mutated?” Alleyshadow looked like he’d never realized how drastic this all was. 

Erin continued, a little annoyed these Protagonists didn’t even realize the scope of what they do to the world. “Was it just last week that half the cars in the city were taken over? Or is that when Beast Hunter caught that warlock, ah, Ethermancer trying to raise the dead spirits of all the animals that had died in human captivity? I barely remember. With all that? Of course I half expected something dumb like this would happen.”

Erin paused, almost adding ‘everyone does!’ She didn’t want to have the words strangle in her throat again. “It’s practically as common as a mugging, or a car accident. Hopefully, it never happens but...” Erin struggled to hide her irritation that the Protagonists didn’t realize everyone was expecting the worst all the time.

But then, they are usually dealing with Puppets, aren’t they? Just like if Erin talked about the Plot with Janey, Pawns were known to be oblivious to the obviousness of it all. Did Protagonists never get confronted with the magnitude of this sort of thing?

Erin was coming to the conclusion that she didn’t have the same kind of… filters everyone else had. At this point, either she was a complete Puppet and didn’t even know it, or she wasn’t going to be a Pawn as long as she didn’t try to break the fourth wall too much with the Protagonists.

She had no idea why. What had Protagonists called it? A ‘Cognizant’? 

Alleyshadow shook his head as if not sure how to absorb all of that. “You are frightfully pragmatic, Erin. Come on, let’s meet up with the others.”

Erin nodded, and followed him through the maze of the water treatment plant.