The scent of stale coffee and disinfectant clung to the air, a familiar perfume of PRT Headquarters that had, in recent weeks, acquired a sharper, more acrid undertone – the smell of desperation. I walked beside Colin, his powered armour a silent, gleaming shell that seemed to absorb the already dim light of the corridor. He was annoyed, more so than usual, and I wondered if it was the weight of recent events or the prospect of another meeting with Acting-Director Tagg. Probably both.
James Tagg had stepped into the vacuum left by Director Piggot's… query. Summoned to Washington was the official term, but we all knew what it meant. Her history with Thomas Calvert had marred her tenure, fairly or unfairly, and the subsequent investigation had been swift, brutal. I wasn't sure Emily would ever sit in a director's chair again, even if they cleared her. Tagg, sensing the power shift, had taken to his acting-directorship with a terrifying, almost vigorous, intensity. He was a man who saw a Gordian Knot and reached for a chainsaw, not a scalpel.
Colin paused at the conference room door, the motion sensor granting access with a soft hiss. He didn't look at me, but I felt his irritation. "Hannah," he said, his voice the usual filtered baritone, but with a micro-inflexion of something I couldn't quite decipher.
"Colin," I acknowledged, stepping past him into the room.
The usual occupants were already there. Ethan, Assault, lounged in his chair with a carefully constructed nonchalance that didn't quite reach his eyes. Battery sat beside him, posture perfect, though the slight frown lines around her mouth were deeper today. Triumph fiddled with a pen, his gaze fixed on the blank datapad before him. On the large wall-mounted screen was Dragon. Eidolon, Velocity and Dauntless were out on patrol, trying to project an image of stability we were far from possessing.
At the head of the long table, Tagg sat like a raptor on its perch. His suit was immaculate, his thinning hair slicked back, his eyes sharp and predatory. He radiated an impatient energy that made the air in the room feel tight. He'd always been ambitious, but this new mantle of authority had amplified his worst tendencies.
"Armsmaster. Miss Militia." Tagg's voice was sharp, cutting through the low hum of the room's climate control. "Please, take your seats. Let's begin."
We sat, the scrape of chairs loud in the sudden silence. Tagg wasted no time on pleasantries. "Coil. What progress have we made in convincing Mr. Calvert to develop a more… realistic appreciation of his circumstances?"
The supervillain, damn his calculating soul, was proving stubborn. He clung to the delusion that he could bargain, that some sliver of information he possessed was valuable enough to buy him a softer landing, a less permanent oblivion. Prudently, before she had departed, Piggot ensured that he hadn't been made aware that whoever it was who was behind orchestrating his downfall had also systematically corrupted his reputation and devalued his entire portfolio of secrets. There was nothing Coil could offer right now that would save him from the Birdcage. Or perhaps he knew this, and this was just the last, desperate act of a dying man trying to retain some semblance of control. The PRT, for its part, was happy to let him marinate in that delusion. Hope, however false, made a man talkative.
"He remains… resistant to providing substantive intelligence without further concessions," Colin reported, his voice flat, betraying no opinion. "He is particularly insistent on receiving legal counsel to negotiate terms."
Tagg's lip curled. "Legal counsel. He'll get counsel when he's standing trial. We are not negotiating with that snake. His only path from that cell is to the Birdcage."
Armsmaster continued, ignoring the outburst, "As per your directive, I investigated the base location Calvert divulged. The site was… clean."
A flicker of annoyance crossed Tagg's face. "How clean?"
"Empty of personnel and contraband, Director. More than that, it appeared to have been professionally sanitised. Any servers or computer systems too large for rapid removal had been physically destroyed beyond any hope of data recovery. In fact, the clean-up job was so well-executed that the only indication that the location was ever an active site were the damaged servers." Colin paused. "Whoever dismantled Coil's operation was exceptionally thorough. They understood forensic protocols."
Tagg's jaw tightened, but he nodded, a curt, angry jerk of his head. "Dragon," he said, turning his attention to the screen. "What of Coil's alleged subordinates? Any actionable intelligence there?"
Dragon inclined her head slightly. "I've cross-referenced the individuals Calvert named. Several non-cape mercenaries, the Tinker known as Chariot, and one internal PRT staffer he accused of being an informant for him." Her voice, always calm, held a note of frustration. "I've managed to confirm their identities through various databases. However, locating many of them has proven… problematic. They appear to have gone to ground shortly after news of Calvert's arrest became public."
She continued, "For the few I could locate – the PRT staffer and two of the mercenaries – the situation is equally frustrating. I found no significant digital or financial evidence linking them directly to Coil's criminal activities. The financial transactions are clean, and all communication logs I could recover were either chaff or heavily encrypted using non-standard algorithms."
"So, the bastard's lying?" Tagg mused.
"Not necessarily, Director," Colin interjected. "My assessment suggests Calvert was truthful in his belief of their guilt. This isn't a case of deliberate misdirection on his part. It's more likely that the same entity responsible for his public unmasking and the sanitisation of his primary base has also taken steps to obfuscate the complicity of these lower-tier assets. Perhaps to recruit them, or simply to deny us easy victories."
Tagg slammed a hand on the table, making the pens jump. "Damn it! We need arrests! We need to show the public, show Washington, that we are doing something. Eidolon's presence is a temporary balm, not a solution. He's due back in Houston in two days. The moment he leaves, the villains will be at each other's throats again, further complicating any attempts at pursuing this matter. At the very least, we need scapegoats to appease the public, and we need them now!"
"Director," Dragon said, her voice still even but with an edge of warning, "making arrests without substantive evidence, especially given the current public scrutiny, would be… ill-advised. If challenged in court, and if those charges are proven baseless, it could catastrophically worsen our already tenuous position."
Tagg waved a dismissive hand. "Legal niceties, Dragon. We're past that. We bring them in, we lean on them. Hard. A confession under pressure is still a confession. Retroactively, the problem solves itself. The public wants villains punished; they won't scrutinise the process too closely if we deliver results. Armsmaster, begin preparations. I want a list of actionable targets from Calvert's scraps by the end of the day. We move on them tomorrow."
Colin's helmeted head dipped in a silent acknowledgement. My gaze met Ethan's across the table; he gave a subtle, almost imperceptible shake of his head. Even he, with his often-cavalier attitude, seemed to grasp the recklessness of Tagg's approach. Battery stared straight ahead, her expression unreadable.
"As for Coil," Tagg continued, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial growl, "we need to accelerate his… cooperation. Time is not on our side. The higher-ups are already fast-tracking the paperwork for his transfer. His court date will be a formality. Whatever useful information he has, we need it before he's staring down a life sentence with no hope of appeal. We have days, perhaps less, before he's out of our hands and whatever secrets he still holds are lost to us. I want him talking. Continuously." His gaze sharpened. "He wants legal counsel? Fine. I am sure we can locate someone suitable. Someone… cooperative. One who understands the PRT's broader interests in this matter, and can guide Mr. Calvert towards a more… cooperative frame of mind."
…What?
Tagg rose, smoothing his jacket. "This city is on a knife's edge. At the end of the day, it's our job to make sure it doesn't fall the wrong way. Whatever it takes. Never forget that. You are all dismissed."