"What the hell was that?" Redbough says, looking at Mainbrace oddly. Not quite concerned, but something ballpark.
"Calculated risk," Mainbrace says coldly, swiping an alcohol wipe efficiently over her hands. There are traces of blood on her knuckles; not, of course, hers.
"Since when is that a thing?" he asks. "Since when do you take a risk without pulling six kinds of Grinch face and arguing about it?"
She ignores him, and he rubs his neck.
"Okay," he mutters. "I'll put that in the incident report, then?"
Nobody cares about what Redbough puts in the incident report, not with the Skull Doctor and his Skullions off the streets.
They don't much care when Mainbrace 'forgets' to call backup before going into a warehouse after the Highway Pirate.
They start reluctantly paying attention somewhere between Rantabulous, Earthquake Tony, the Caustic Sisters, Inzidiuz, and I Am An Intellectual Property Crime.
I Am An Intellectual Property Crime isn't even much of a villain, more of a performance art nuisance, and Mainbrace picks them up, stonefaced, and throws them through a glass bus shelter.
"Are things okay at home, Mainbrace?" Kentarch says, in the syrup-sympathetic way of a manager who's about to put you on unpaid leave and not lose thirty seconds' heartache over it.
"Is this the wind-up to another ha ha, get laid, Mainbrace joke," Mainbrace says, stonefaced, so Kentarch sighs and puts her on a two week suspension.
Mainbrace is fine. A goddamn supervillain dragged her back to her own home, her own bed, then ghosted her. She's fine. Worse shit happens at sea. Worse shit happens on Tinder.
She spends two weeks on her couch, surrounded by growing piles of takeaway containers.
"You can't just knock people around, Mainbrace, and you know that. I need you to not do that." Kentarch looks at her across his desk, vaguely perturbed.
"Okay," Mainbrace says, stonefaced, and he's right, she knows you can't do that. She reins that in.
"Mainbrace. Jesus christ." Kentarch pulls the bourbon out of his bottom desk drawer, tops up his coffee.
"I didn't knock anyone around," Mainbrace says.
"An armoured car ran you over," Kentarch says. He looks haggard.
"I hip checked a stolen armoured car to a halt," Mainbrace says.
"Redbough said you were limping afterwards."
"No," Mainbrace lies, stonefaced.
"What the fuck is going on with you?"
Mainbrace contemplates what's probably going to be another two weeks on suspension, sitting on her couch, not even bothering to turn on the TV. Absolutely nothing is going on with her, and never will. "Nothing."
"That really doesn't seem the case," Kentarch says, and Mainbrace shrugs, and then she's on suspension for another two weeks.
It seems sudden, but the thing is, it's not, not really; this has been waiting, building. The Mainbrace, get laid jokes are years old, and Mainbrace can't even tell when she's getting flirted with, really, gets scared and defensive more than anything if she thinks she might be. Which might be pathetic, but it's not the least threatening thing in my life was a supervillain who hit it and bounced hard pathetic.
The only sudden part is Mainbrace giving the fuck in. There's nothing in her life, and it's all pointless. She's pointless. So who gives a fuck?
"There's a three strikes thing, Mainbrace," Kentarch says uncomfortably. "If I have to put your conduct down as a threat to yourself or others once more...."
"Yep," Mainbrace says, stonefaced.
So she's down near the old docks and she sees The Literalist skulking about, and she's not stupid. She can see he's got himself spotted on purpose, that he's bait, that he's leading her on and on towards some particular warehouse. She thinks she's spotted Speedy McReadie hurtling around the dark alleys, too, and that stinks of supervillain team-up.
After Skull Doctor, and Highway Pirate, and Rantabulous, and Earthquake Tony, and the Caustic Sisters, and Inzidiuz, and I Am An Intellectual Property Crime, and the rest of the list that Mainbrace specifically has very conspicuously been down on like a ton of bricks?
Mainbrace knows the words trap and retaliation.
But who gives a fuck?
