In the vampire boratory, Clive and Lorelei were cataloguing the overtly magical tools and materials. Travis was doing the same with the teological tools, while also cheg in on an IT specialist from the Cabal on the puters. Emi aying greater attention, watg over his shoulder. She wasn’t a puter specialist, but she had, at least, used ohat wasn’t old enough to vote.

  The rest of Jason’s panions had moved on to other tasks. Some were sweeping the plex for any lingering vampires and victims. They had turned up several, mostly homeless people who had died along with the blood oak. Jason was talking with the others through voice chat as he flew through the skies of Melbourne in a bck car.

  “Bro, it sounds like killing the leader kills all the minions, like in an old monster movie,” Taika said.

  “That would seem to be the case,” Danielle replied. “That’s good if we o kill an army of minions quickly, but not if we want to save them.”

  “I don’t suppose any of the victims have regained sciousness?” Jason asked.

  “No,” Carlos said. “And don’t expect them to any time soon. They’ll be atose for days while their souls shake off the trauma. We’ve dosed them with as much healing magic as we without doing more harm than good. We’re lucky any of them lived at all. What they went through was tantamount to being -fed spirit s. If they’d had any magic of their own, none of them would have survived.”

  “We’re ing up on the plex now,” Jason said.

  “You found your creepy magic experiment specialist?” Clive asked.

  “I did,” Jason said. “Try not to be rude when you meet her.”

  “Why would we be rude?” Clive asked. “Isn’t that your kind of thing?”

  ***

  While the meraries had jackhammered into aor shaft, the actual entrao the bunker plex was a small security building. The vampires had purchased it through a discreet shell pany and mild gover corruption. It was more vehan ay shaft, and a rge operation was now bei up around it.

  The security building was in the er of a car park that serviced the nearby warehouses and industrial spaces. There was a security cordo up in the car park, with a couple of tents and aions van. Looped around it was a simple rope barrier, the actual deterrent being a rge security force. A half dozen squads in bck tactical gear were positioned around the cordon. Outside of the line was the press, growing in number as more and more vans arrived. Reporters were trying to get a rise from the security team while camerame up tripods and deployed drones into the air.

  The security force were the first to notice the approach of a flying bck sports car, raising their guns. The press were filming moments ter, although all their cameras picked up was a static blur. The car approached the ground, but instead of nding, turned into a cloud of roiling darkness. Two people dropped from the cloud to nd lightly on the ground, a man and woman. The cloud was drawn down and sucked into the man’s shadow, like dust into a vacuum er. The reporters immediately rushed at the pair, many already having reised Jason.

  “I’m not taking questions at this time,” Jason said, without slowing down. Some of the reporters moved into his path, at which poiopped and gred. They quick-fired question his way, then yelped and screamed as they floated into the air. Jason used his aura to pick up the entire media ti, including their vans, and deposit them on the roof of a nearby warehouse. The camera drones were crushed, as if by invisible hands, and the scrap was dropped on the roof as well.

  Jason and his panion then walked to the cordon rope, where a security team was waiting to meet them. The security personnel’s ay didn’t show through the tactical helmets, but it paiheir auras. They were also throwing nervous g the stranded reporters.

  “Mr Asano,” the squad leader said as she stepped in front of him. “There are security protocols in pow.”

  “I’m sure there are,” Jason told her. “I just don’t particurly care.”

  “Sir, we o vet everyoempting to ehe facility. I’m well aware that you could break me and my team like a carton of eggs, but we have a job to do. For all I know, you could be a reporter using illusion magic.”

  Jason turo look at the reporters on the roof, in various states of distress.

  “I’ll aowledge it’s unlikely,” the squad leader said.

  Jaso out a frustrated sigh.

  “Why do I keep running into people at checkpoints who fulfil their duties with iy?” he pined. “Where are the cowards I don’t feel bad about browbeating?”

  “I’m not really sure how to ahat, sir.”

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “Squad Leader Jessica Sundernd, sir.”

  “Jason Asano.”

  “I’m aware, sir.”

  “I don’t really carry ID. Well, I do, but it’s a magic tattoo on my back. I don’t think that’s valid in Australian jurisdis. What about you, Ms Bine?”

  “I’ve been living in a magic city for the st decade,” Jason’s panion said. “I haven’t had any legal identification since I came back from the dead in Arizona. Yht me here through a portal, which I imagine is illegal entry. I don’t have a passport, let alone a visa. I’m not even sure my US citizenship is still valid.”

  “Because you died?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Were you decred dead, legally?”

  “I suppose not. The other cardinals murdered me and I came back to life in a shed.”

  “You’re probably fihen. Just to be clear, when you say cardinals, you’re not talking about Catholics, right?”

  “No, that was what we called the EoA leadership. Cardinals, after the cardinal dires. I was Mrs South.”

  “Right. Like Mr North.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Uh, sir?” the squad leader interjected.

  “Right, sorry Jessica,” Jason said. “You know, you call me Jason.”

  “I’m definitely not going to do that, sir.”

  “Fair enough. Look, we o go in. You know who I am, and this is Audrey Bine of Asano, so now you know who she is. I’m going to need you to take my word for it, because we’re going inside.”

  “Sir, if I vince you to wait a moment, I’ll radio my supervisor and see if I clear you. That way, you don’t have to beat the crap out of all of us on your way in.”

  “Fair enough,” Jason said. “But do try and make it quick, or I’ll put you all up there with the reporters.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  She took a few steps away and started talking into her radio. Jason waited, looking around absently.

  “I should probably get a phone,” he mused. “Do they still have phones, or is it hologram watches or something now?”

  “I think they still have phones,” Audrey said. “Again, I’ve been living in a magic city for a decade. Surrounded by vampires.”

  “Is that weird for you? The vampire thing?”

  “Not really,” Audrey said as she looked around. “You’re not very big on following rules, are you? Or ws.”

  “I suppose not. Except ic ws, I guess. I kind of have to follow those, since I’m the one who… ah, that doesn’t matter. I’m more of a ‘do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the w’ guy.”

  “You realise that when regur people try that, it doesn’t work out.”

  “It doesn’t always work out for me, if I’m being ho.”

  ***

  The bunker work’s single installed elevator was a freight elevator installed as part of the inal stru. Jason and Audrey rode it down until it stopped with a shake. When the doors opehey found most of Jason’s team arrayed in front of it, brandishing ons.

  “What did I say about not being rude?” he asked them.

  “That’s an energy vampire,” Humphrey said, pointing his sword at Audrey.

  “Indeed, she is. Audrey Bine, may I introduce Team Biscuit. Team, this is Audrey. A few decades ago, she ran aremely sketchy joint project betweeant magical fas of the period. That program was how she ended up in her current state, which she has long-since learo manage.”

  “What about magilight turning vampires evil?” Taika asked.

  “Energy vampires aren’t subject to the same effects,” Clive said through voice chat from the b. Audrey’s eyebrows rose as Jason looped her into the versation. The others were notified by text as she joined.

  “So, this is the system they talk about,” she said as Clive tinued his expnation.

  “Magifused sunlight doesn’t impact the personalities of energy vampires the way it does the regur vampires,” he said. “In fact, vampires and energy vampires aren’t the same kind of creature at all, despite the name.”

  “He’s right,” Carlos said through voice chat. “Energy vampires aren’t self-perpetuating, like regur vampires. They only e into being through unusual circumstances.”

  “Like with Thadwick,” Neil said.

  “Exactly,” Carlos said. “It’s why energy vampires are so much rarer. Their e to actual vampires is thematic at most. The huhe o feed on the living. The underlying magic is very different.”

  “Are you sure?” Humphrey asked.

  “Quite certain,” Carlos said. “I’ve vivisected more energy vampires than anyone on Pallimustus, so far as I’m aware.”

  “Uh, Carlos,” Jason said. “Just to che… again. You are still a priest of the Healer, right?”

  “Why do you keep askihat?”

  “I’m pretty sure it’s because of what arently aensive vivise program,” Belinda said.

  Jason g Audrey, who had turned pale.

  “Okay, I’m bringing Ms Bio the b, Clive. My grandmother pinched her from the work years ago, and she’s been running destine experiments ever since. She has more experieh the biological aspeagitech than anyone else on the p, so she has the best ce of figuring out what was going on down here.”

  “Gd to hear it,” Clive said. “The most useful thing I’ve figured out is hently I o study the teological aspects of how magic is used here.”

  ***

  Jasohe appropriate expertise to dig into whatever the vampires had been doing, so left it in more capable hands. In the meantime, he caught up with Anna on the cloud ship.

  “The step is to back off,” she said. “A lot happeoday, and we o see how things fall. The meeting with the ambassadors, the he vampires. The people you let see into yigdom.”

  “Is Disney going to let us call it that?”

  “You’re happy traumatising a small army of reporters who are already making a massive deal of it, but you’re worried about branding?”

  “I may have fought a god, but I do not want to take on Disney wyers.”

  Anna shook her head.

  “Dealing with the press like that—”

  “Anna, I’m not going to let anyone pressure me. Not like st time. I want to do things diplomatically, and I knoying all-powerful tyrant doesn’t help with that. But I’m still going to, from time to time.”

  She sighed.

  “I knht now, we o see how things py out. Don’t make any more spectacles until the refugee handoff. This vampire bunker situation pounds what was already deeply plicated.”

  “I agree. I’m more than happy to retreat to territory and keep quiet. I leave the cloud ship here. My is what the vampires are up to. The rest is politics, but that’s a threat of a very different nature. If the vampires have more of those blood tree things, it pletely reframes how we o deal with them.”

  “Will you find that out any time soon?”

  “No idea.”

  “Then it doesn’t ge the pn. Give the dust time to settle. While we see how things develop on the political front, we o look at the public image of you and your . How the aftermath of today pys out will be a rge factor in that, but we look at general approaches. The key is that if your public image is a positive o’s all the harder to pressure you politically.”

  “So, using telekinesis oers was a bad idea?”

  “Actually, no. The Engineers of Assion are long gone, but ohing they did tio resonate, even now. They braheir people as superheroes, and that has stu the public imagination. Most major cities maintain a cadre of magic users to handle supernatural threats. Monsters, obviously, but as magic bees more on, it’s increasingly being used in criminal activity. Mostly by fic faembers who fell out of the fold over the st decade or so.”

  “Superheroes? Are we talking full-blown spandex vigintes?

  “More like extremely fmboyant SWAT teams with rge publicity departments.”

  “Where do I fit in?”

  “You’re the world’s first superhero. These modern superheroes spend most of their time making public appearances and arguing over who is the most like Batman. Their publicity team would kill for a rolling battle against vampiric blood servant bikies. Not to mention that EoA actively worked to turn you into an urban legend, i days before magit public. They were using you to pave the way for their own superheroes.”

  “I remember,” he said with a scowl. “They tried to use the Broken Hill disaster for publicity. Sounds like not much has ged.”

  “Well, now we reap the rewards of all that.”

  “In case my tone was unclear, Anna, I was implying that using these events for publicity is a bad thing.”

  “I’m not asking you to take advantage of dire events to promote yourself. I’m just expining how we’re going to frame things, and what kind of events we’re going tet for intervention.”

  “You wao do superhero things. Are you askio fight crime?”

  “No. Just keep doing what you did today. Hahreats that no one else . Be what no one else be. Holy? The thing with the reporters pys into that. We build aire Avengers League around you and your team.”

  “It’s not Avengers League, Anna. It’s Avengers or it’s Justice League.”

  “Jason, I am incapable of expressing the depth to which I do not care. The point is that you have a team of colourful, diverse and incredibly attractive people. We sell the crap out of that, and do some actual good in the process. We’ve already been brainst ways that you and your team help people. Fet fighting monsters; I want to see Wexler walking through cities, g people with her aura. That’s good publicity and just good.”

  “I like the idea, but I don’t want to have reporters following her around like it’s a publicity stunt. The priority should be helping people, not being seen helping people.”

  “The good thing is, that’s the right approaage as well. It’s better publicity to just do it and have people find out, which they obviously will. You ’t b cities in miracle healing without people iigating what happened.”

  “I’m not opposed to the idea, but we o prioritise our as the right ces that need what we offer the most.”

  “I pletely agree. I’ll have the team put together a pn.”

  “The team?” Jason asked.

  “Once I joihis little operation, I started putting together what is essentially a think tank. We have the opportunity to make incredible ges. You and your people have the power to ge the world. The key is not doing more harm than good, so we’ve been pnning out how to do that. Our core approach is to identify potential areas where you could do some good, and then start sulting with locals. Figure out what the people on the ground need aermine if that’s something rovide.”

  “Instead of deg what they need and imposing it on them?”

  “Precisely. We’ve beeremely tentative at this stage, while waiting for you to arrive. Now, it’s time to start moving in ear.”

  “Who is this team, exactly?”

  “I’ve been quietly recruiting, with the help of yrandmother. Experts in all manner of fields, many poached from the UN. World Health anisation, Food and Agriculture anisation, UNESCO. People I know to be capable and reliable. That’s the core brains trust. The goal is to build local anisations in any areas of operation. The Cabal tends to hold sway in areas of greatest need, and they’re actually way ahead of us on this. The work they’ve been doing since going public is incredible. I only realised how muce I ected with Boris Ketnd.”

  “This all sounds more ambitious than I thought you would go for.”

  “We have a unique opportunity, Jason. You do whatever you want, essentially without sequeo you. We o figure out how to use that, without the sequences falling on the people we want to help. Maximising positive ge while minimising harm.”

  Jason leaned forward in his chair.

  “Okay,” he said. “It sounds like you’ve been busy while I was crossing universes. Catch me up ohing.”