"This is already going to be uncomfortable enough as it is," I immediately shot back in response to Amanda's first words. "Let's not start off by lying to each other. There's nothing fun about it."

She, of course, offered an easy shrug. Her smile never even wavered. "Who's lying? I, for one, am planning to enjoy every minute of this. After all, you have to admit it's at least a little funny. I mean, after everything that happened between us, what are the odds that you'd have to ask me for help dealing with your very next problem? But then, I suppose I do owe you for all the… hmm, let's call it, assistance you gave me."

"You mean because I made your brother vulnerable for you," I stated flatly. "I fought him and cut through all his invulnerability charges. So you were able to kill him, just like you always wanted."

Her lips pursed thoughtfully. "I wouldn't say always. Actually, I was kinda off and on about the subject a lot. He was my brother, after all. He scared me. He was out of control. He made me do things for him that I didn't want to do. And yet, sometimes he was… better." She trailed off, and for just a second, I almost believed she was wistful. "But yes, you helped me kill him. Thanks."

"There are not enough words in all the languages on Earth for me to tell you just how much you are not welcome," I shot back. I had to bite my lip not to say anything worse than that. Glancing at Wren helped a bit. I really couldn't rise to this woman's bait. Instead, I pushed on. "You said you wanted me to be here and listen to you. But that only happens if you keep your word about fixing the shield. If you can't do that, if we think for a second you're just messing with us, this is over."

Amanda's expression couldn't have looked any more innocent. "Hey, I don't see any shield here to work on. Bring it out and I'd be happy to get to work. Better than sitting around all day. They don't really let me work on tech very much. For some reason, the idea makes them all nervous."

Before I could say anything to that, Caishen spoke up. "They're sending it in now. As agreed, you'll have privacy in here to work and talk about whatever's on your mind. But remember what I told you." She turned, pointing up into each corner of the shop. "There are cameras there, there, there, and there. Each camera is connected to defensive measures. The moment you try to pull anything, the moment you make a move against Paintball or Trevithick, you won't even have time to regret the decision. Tell me you understand. Or don't." Her tone darkened pointedly. "I'd love to have an excuse to put a stop to this right now."

"If I tell you I'm terrified, will it make you happy?" Amanda's own voice was much more casual. This was all just fun and games for her. "Look, it's like I told you, and the shrink, and that little bitch with the truth-seeing power back in Detroit, I don't want to kill the kid. Or hurt him. I mean, not physically anyway. Scout's honor, this isn't about carrying out revenge. He'll be perfectly safe with me. They both will. You wanna bring truth-girl in here and make me say it all over again?"

"Truth-girl?" I had absolutely no idea who she was talking about. But it sounded like they'd taken the time and effort to try to make sure Amanda wasn't trying anything, which I really appreciated.

"Gospel," Caishen informed me. "She's a friend of Skip's from the Michigan Ten Towers branch. Don't worry, she doesn't know the details about all this. But her power forces people to tell the truth, and allows her to see through illusions and such. She helped make sure this one was… well, I'm not stupid enough to say she's on the level, but at the very least, she's not planning on harming you." To Amanda, she added, "On the other hand, just because you aren't planning that doesn't mean you might not change your mind. So if you do, remember those cameras."

Wren finally spoke up, sounding understandably nervous. "You're gonna leave us with her?"

Caishen gave a heavy sigh. "That's part of the deal. She wants privacy with… well, with both of you, really. But the second you want to leave, any time you need a break, or just can't be around her anymore, give the signal and we'll pull you out. Actually, if you want to cut it short now, we can--"

"No." Wren's head shook quickly. I knew why she was saying that. She refused to be the reason we didn't get this shield fixed, no matter how scared she was of Amanda Sanvers. "It's okay."

"It's really not," Caishen muttered with an obvious sigh. But in the end, she knew as well as we did that there wasn't another choice. We absolutely had to get this shield working before Saturday. "Fine. We'll let you get to work then." To Amanda, she added very pointedly, "I would love almost nothing more than to have a reason to make sure you're never a problem for anyone ever again. But if you do anything here to give me that reason, I'll make it hurt."

If Amanda was intimidated by that, or had any reaction at all, she didn't show it. She just stood there giving that enigmatic smile that said nothing. For a moment, I wondered if that was something she practiced in the mirror. It wouldn't have surprised me. That didn't seem like the sort of thing that came naturally.

Yes, that was a weird thought to have. But what part of this wasn't weird? We were getting help from one evil piece of shit supervillainess to deal with a much worse evil piece of shit supervillainess. All to save our biological robot friends, their sister, and her mercenary friend. Oh yeah, and to stop that worse evil piece of shit supervillainess from taking over a bunch of Star-Touched, including the old friend of one half of that bitch.

You know what, this life was weird sometimes.

But mostly, all I could do was think about how much I was willing to do if it meant saving Paige and the others. Seriously, I did not care what it took. I had to get them back. I had to know they were safe. Never had that been more clear to me than when I was looking at Amanda and telling myself that this was absolutely within the bounds of what I was willing to do. Sure, she was evil. I didn't believe for a single second that she had been forced into doing any of that stuff. She did it because she wanted to. She was dangerous, and very clearly up to something. But I didn't care. Not when it came to getting Paige and the others away from Casura.

No one said anything else until Caishen left. She had promised no one would be listening in. Which, yes, I might not have trusted on its own. But Rubi assured me that she would make sure of that. And on top of that, Wren apparently had a toy of her own that would move any sound away from where the cameras were. They were watching, and we could make a single gesture that would summon help, but they weren't getting audio. Whatever Amanda wanted to say would stay between us.

Apparently the answer to what she wanted to say, at least at first, was nothing. She just started pacing slowly to one side, then back to the other. The whole time, she was watching us. When I finally got tired of seeing that, I turned away from her pointedly to look at the younger girl. "They should be transporting our thing in any second. You really think you can fix all the problems with it in time?" Yes, I was intentionally making a couple jabs at Amanda by referring to the device she had made as ours, and mentioning problems with it. It was childish, but whatever. She deserved worse.

Sure enough, the woman grunted before Wren could reply. "Oh, I think you'll find it's very easy to upgrade my devices. I like to make sure I can fit all my newer ideas on them without totally tearing them down."

The restraints she was wearing clanked a little as she lifted her arms to gesture at me. "I honestly thought they'd have a harder time convincing you to go along with this. But hey, glad to see you're just that desperate. Now which of your friends are in trouble right now? Clearly, it's not the kid." She gave a soft, mock gasp. "Oh no, tell me it's not the kung fu action grip combat dolls. Doesn't that take out like half your fighting strength? My word, no wonder you wanna get them back."

Lots of stuff that she was saying was pinging my internal alarms, but I couldn't tell how much she actually knew for certain and how much she was just making an educated guess about. Either way, I was glad to have the helmet so she couldn't read my expression. The body language was probably enough on its own. I took a breath before letting it out as I steadily replied, "You don't need to know any details. You already have all the information you need. We have to get that shield working so it'll transport the person going into it to one location and move everyone already inside of it to another. That's it. That's all we need from you."

Wren's head bobbed up and down quickly as she raised herself up to her full height. Which was actually bigger than mine since she was hovering in the air. "Yeah, I don't think you can mess around and make it send you somewhere, cause I'll know what that looks like."

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Amanda bowed a bit graciously to the other girl. "I wouldn't dream of it. Please, I know better than to think I could pull something like that and get away with it right under your cute little nose. This isn't about escaping. I'm right where I want to be. Well, right where I want to be for the moment. No, this is about getting a chance to talk to the kid himself without any unnecessary fighting between us."

Her attention had moved to me then, and I could see the calculation in her eyes as she practically stared through to my soul. It creeped me out, to be honest. "Isn't this fun? We get to be friends. Or at least allies. You have bigger, badder fish to fry than me. And I get to be on the side of the angels for once. I can't wait to see my name in the news as they talk about all the good things I've done." Pausing for a second, she gave a sly smirk. "Do you think they'll give me a new Star name? That's what they do with villains turned heroes, isn't it? Give them a whole new costume, a whole new name, a whole new identity? What do you think I could be called?"

Before I could respond to that, there was a buzzing sound from nearby, and we all looked over to the middle of the shop as the shield device appeared. It was about four feet tall and five feet wide, looking kind of like a big truck engine attached to a radar dish that was on top of a series of tubes, and what appeared to be a dozen car batteries. Then there were some other strange bits and pieces tacked onto the sides.

As soon as she saw that, Amanda gave a small squeal of delight and moved that way. The shackles on her ankles made it hard for her to go very quickly, but she did the best she could and practically hugged the thing. Again, as well as her restraints allowed. Leaning over, she kissed it and purred, "Mama is so sorry she had to leave you behind, baby. Don't worry, we're gonna make you even better now. We've got some brilliant help, isn't that right, kid?"

I was torn. Part of me wanted to demand she stop beating around the bush and just get into what she wanted to talk with me about already. But another part wanted to hold off on that as long as possible. I had no idea what she wanted here, but I was very certain I wouldn't like any part of it. Was it better to rip off the Band-Aid, or wait?

Wren, for her part, firmly replied, "This isn't about making your machine better for you. It's about saving our friends and stopping someone worse than you."

Amanda made a sound like she was offended, hand touching her mouth with that gasp. "Worse than me? Boy, I must not have made nearly the impression I thought I did if it's just so easy for you to go out and get a better nemesis. You couldn't even wait a full month? I think I feel cheated on. Were you playing with this other villain while we were still doing our thing? Be honest now. Am I being villain cu--"

"That's enough," I snapped instead of engaging with that. "You wanted me here to talk, we've talked a bit. Now you get to work a little before we do any more of that. Not my fault you wasted your time on nonsense. Maybe when you get your next chance to talk to me, you'll actually get to the point faster." I was doing my very best to sound firm and confident, and to not let the rush of anxiety make my voice shake too much. I was terrified inside. Not of Amanda, really. Though there was still a little fear about what someone like her was capable of. But no, most of my worry was coming from the thought of what was going on with Casura and what would happen if she started noticing me disappearing too much and looked into it. Sure, she wanted me to try to stop her, but I wasn't certain how much she would let that go on.

Amanda simply looked at me with that curious expression, like she was trying to decide something very important about me. Then she bowed her head and agreed, "Well, of course. I came here to help, didn't I? So, let's do this, kid. Which one of you should I use it on? I'm guessing Paintball, but I wouldn't want to assume."

I blinked at that a couple times. "Use what on?"

Her smile grew. "My power, obviously. You do want me to help fix the machine, right? I need ideas to do that. I get my ideas by using my distraction power, remember? This isn't a trick, that's why I asked you first. If you want me to be able to work on the machine, I need to use my power."

Oh. Oh, dammit. Right, naturally, that made sense. Of course she needed to activate her tech abilities if she was going to upgrade this thing. And we already knew that her tech ability came from using the other power. Fuck, why didn't we think of that? But if she used it on me, I would be out of commission for a few seconds, which would leave her alone with Wren. Sure, it wasn't likely she'd be able to do anything with that, but I didn't like it.

Unfortunately, the other option wasn't any better. I didn't want her to use her power on Wren because… well, duh.

I was about to tell her to do it to me, but the younger girl spoke up first. "You should use me instead. I mean, the ideas you get for inventions have to do with the powers of the person you are using it on, right? My power is about making things move. We want to make them move. So I'm the best choice."

Oh boy, did I ever want to argue with that. But she wasn't wrong. I really, really hated this. At least it meant I could keep an eye on her myself.

Amanda seemed to be watching me to see if I would object to that. When I stayed silent, she winked at me before turning back to Wren. "Okay then, here goes. Now don't be surprised and don't panic. The next thing I'm going to say will be a stupid question that uses my power. This isn't an attack. I'm not trying to escape. So nobody overreact."

With that disclaimer laid out, she focused on the other girl and asked, "If an elephant and a dragon had a baby, would it breathe fire through its trunk or mouth?"

While Wren went completely still and seemed to be seriously considering that, the woman looked over at me and added conversationally, "Personally, I think it would be the trunk. Gives a better aiming ability, you know?"

Immediately, I thought of Bumbershoot. That's exactly what he did. Could she have known that? I didn't see how. Dani had picked him up after she was already in prison, and as far as I knew, she hadn't done too much with him that would've gotten back to Amanda. But it was also so close that I had to wonder about the coincidence. Which, for all I knew, was the point. She might've been intentionally screwing with me by bringing that up. It sounded like something she'd do, killing two birds with one stone by using her power and taunting me about what she knew.

Just as Wren visibly snapped out of the effect, Amanda brightened. "Oh yeah, that's the good stuff. I should've used my power on you before, kid. You've got some great ideas locked up in there." She clapped her hands together eagerly. "Let's get to work, shall we? This thing is about to be so much better."

To her credit, for whatever that was worth, Amanda was true to her word. She really did dive right into fixing up the machine. She didn't drag it out, she didn't make more demands, and she didn't try to do anything underhanded. At least, not that we caught. And by we, I mostly meant Wren. She was watching the woman like a hawk, just in case. But as far as we could tell, Amanda stuck to what we were asking for.

Well, she stuck to it for about an hour, anyway. Then she set her tools down, turned around, and faced me. "Time for a break. Which means it's time for me to be able to talk to you. It's only fair, isn't it?"

Honestly, I wanted to say that nothing about this was fair. I sure as hell didn't like it. But I did have to admit that she had stuck to her side of the deal so far. I couldn't back off now. So, with a sigh, I agreed, "Fine, then say what you want to say. Or ask what you want to ask. And for the record, no one said I had to be completely honest, so this is about demanding to know who I am or where I live? You can forget it."

She laughed lightly. "No, no, that's not what I want to ask. I don't need you to tell me any of that."

Strolling away from the machine, she looked at the ceiling for a moment before turning her gaze my way once more. Her voice was casual. "Well, to start, I was curious about how much you know when it comes to what the real leaders of our dear city are up to." A casual giggle escaped the woman as she watched my body language. "Oh yes, those ones. Like, do you know about how badly they're trying to identify someone in their orbit who happens to be an Abyssal?"

Once again, she didn't wait for me to voice any denial. She just looked at how I reacted, despite my attempt to hold myself as still as possible, and snickered again. "Right, of course you do. You're very well-informed, Mr. Paintball. But the thing is, it's so difficult to identify Abyssals. I don't know if you're aware, but it turns out their little memory erasure thing doesn't always just work right after a Collision Point. There's a bunch of times when it happens just because they were correctly identified as an Abyssal even in human form. Or, you know, whatever they happen to be when they aren't big and scary. Someone figures out their identity and that person gets their memory erased. Doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen often enough to make it pretty hard to actually pin them down. You practically have to be perfect to pull off identifying them and retaining it."

Amanda sure liked the sound of her own voice, because she kept going. "Fortunately for our dear leaders, they've got someone, some very special person, whose entire thing is perfection. That's basically their power, see? They're perfect. That includes a perfect memory, one that can't be tampered with. If it gets changed, their power changes it back. So they've got that person, whoever they may be, doing all the legwork to identify this Abyssal of theirs."

Maki? Wait, was that Maki? It had to be, right? I knew they could shift back and forth between male and female. Was that a perfection thing? And they were so good at… basically everything. Plus, well, I knew they were investigating potential Abyssals.

"Why do you care?" That was Wren, piping up as I was quiet. "What does it matter? Do you really wanna stop them from containing an Abyssal?"

"Stop them? Heavens no, perish the thought." Amanda assured us as her head shook. "No, see, my interest is with that perfect person. I have a project I want to get into with them. And you know what? Turns out my hunch was right. Paintball does know who they are.

"I can't wait to see how much more information I can find out about them."

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