Harlow was surprised they didn’t crash. 

They almost did, but thanks to Black Star’s powers, they were now floating a foot or two above the ground. Harlow had looked around a bit, wondering if she was doing that on purpose? 

“Hey, Cass…?” She whispered. Black Star stayed perfectly still. They were both at a weird angle that was almost perpendiculars to the ground. Harlow felt pressure building in her forehead after a couple minutes and tried again. “Cass-“

“I’m not dead.” Black Star replied. Her eyes were back to their normal brown color. She looked tired, no exhausted. Harlow was positive she slept less than her, but right then it didn’t look like it. “Are you okay? One of those got you, right?” Black Star righted the both of them and then dropped Harlow gently. Black Star slid to the ground, taking a couple of breaths and looking at the ground. 

They were back at the woods again. Harlow wondered if they were at the same exit as before. She stood for a moment, just trying to regain composure before looking at the processor in her arms. She’d already connected to the monitors before and found some interesting information. this probably held the rest of Gizzard’s research. 

“Okay, let’s head back.” She said, then stopped. Black Star was still on the ground. She wasn’t breathing deeply any more, but she was still looking at the ground. Harlow frowned, then walked over to Black Star and knelt beside her. 

“Are you okay?” 

“…yeah. Just needed to get my bearings.” She reached out to Harlow to help her up. Harlow pulled her to her feet and looked around. “Okay, well let’s not stay out here. I can only imagine what the news will say about us now…” She muttered aloud.

“Probably more stuff about how we’re both dangerous criminals. They’ll probably throw in a tip line, and maybe some unflattering pictures that the drones took while chasing after us.” Harlow guessed, then watched as Black Star made her way to a very large tree trunk with a person shaped hole in the bottom of it. She gestured into it at Harlow. “How many entrances are there to this base?!” Harlow exclaimed. She heard Black Star chuckled dryly. 

“Come on, we can hook that thing up to my setup at home.” She walked into the tree without another word. Harlow found herself at a loss. She wanted to say that treating it like it was normal didn’t mean it was. On the other hand, she wanted to ask if she was supposed to consider Black Star’s apartment home? She’d been there for, what, like one day? 

She decided to put a pin in it for now. That was a discussion for after they figure out what the heck was going on. 

So Harlow entered into yet another hidden entrance that lead to what she was going to call ‘Villain City’ until someone told her its proper name. Just how many entrances does one place need? Yeah, she was referring to the Citadel as well, but the Citadel had over 15 hidden entrances alone! And that was just one building in all of Graves city! How many more ways could someone possibly go underground?

Harlow and Black Star made their way back to Black Star’s house. And as soon as she walked through the doors, Harlow felt a massive weight fall off of her shoulders. Yeah, it wasn’t like they were in the clear, and she definitely was going to check the news to see if they appeared on it, but man the thought of just showering and taking a nap really overcame her.

But she could at least set up the processor first.

Harlow gently placed the computer piece on the desk, then looked over Black Star’s tech setup for several minutes. It was very hard to tell what was plugged in where. And even harder to figure out what was okay to get rid of. When she tried to ask for help setting it up, Black Star had conveniently went to take a shower. Harlow only that’s what she was doing when she heard the water faintly through the door.

Hmmm…Harlow looked for the outlet to connect everything. It took about twenty minutes. Maybe longer, but Harlow was too engrossed with unplugging everything and putting in in a different order. Then she need to make sure the wall of monitors that Black Star had, for some reason, completely covering the wall. When Harlow had used it the other day, she didn’t make any comments on it. It seemed exactly Black Star’s style; overdramatic and flashy.

“Have you actually looked into it yet?” Black Star whispered, causing Harlow to jump nearly a foot into the air and fell on her side. She heard chuckling a bit before looking over the new desk set up which could be explained best as ‘Didn’t want to tell her she hated the setup but was clearly upset with the previous setup’.  “Aha, yeah…guess that’s a no.”

“Don’t judge me. It’s not like we’re on a time limit.” Harlow said, glaring at Black Star while she stood back up.  “At least, I hope not…” She trailed off, then finished plugging in the last wires. 

The screens came to life once again, all showing a different part of the same desktop screen. Gizzard’s screen. The same limited amount of files and icons from before, but Harlow had already gotten a Quick Look at them. “So, some of these have the names of our victims on them. They have lists, dates of their disappearances…I just-“

She cut herself off and began to open the files she’d look at before. She joked earlier about their being a time limit, but remembered that some of the files mentioned whether or not someone was “ready” for something. For what though? Black Star leaned against her desk, arms folded as she glanced at all of the different names. 

“Did you spot anything unusual?” Harlow asked. She was still trying to cross reference each file, and now added another file beside the ‘Superhero Day’ one, called ‘Sleeper Project’. Again, it had a list of names from the missing superheroes and villains. the only difference, as far as they can tell, was that it was basically a directory of every hero working at the Citadel. Some had a green box filled by their name, and some didn’t. Harlow stood back to absorb what she was seeing. It was like a puzzle where she arranged the pieces in the right order, but none of them were clicking. Finally her brain latched onto something.

“Cass, when is Superhero Day?” She asked quietly, as if speaking any louder must disrupt the fact-gathering session. “Hasn’t it already happened or?” Black Star shook her head. 

“No, no it’s not happened yet.” She moved Harlow out of the way to scroll down the file. At times, she’d quickened her pace but slowed. Like she was looking for something. “You know it’s only been like, 3 days? Superhero day is in like a week and half.” She said it so nonchalantly but Harlow just stared at her. It’s only been three days?? why does it feel like its been weeks, no- months since this whole thing started? She really needed to get to sleep, because it was affecting her badly. “Why do you think villains were kidnapped? To be guinea pigs for this new project?” Harlow snapped out of her thoughts. 

“What do you mean by that?” She asked. Black Star shook her head some, then seemed to completely relax when she found what she was looking for. Harlow’s name, or Technomancer, was in the smack middle of the screen. It didn’t have any green block beside it, it didn’t say ‘ready’, and it seemed altogether that they hadn’t gotten to her yet. Harlow watched Black Star visibly soften. “We don’t even know what this project really is, we can’t just say-”

“I think you know what this project is, Harley. I’m not sure why, but the Citadel is the one kidnapping their own heroes.” Black continued scrolling through each of the files, one by one. “Maybe we should see if the ol’ Gizz-bird had a summary of the project and its scope. you guessed it pretty early on that it must have something to do with Superhero day, let’s see why.”

“Even if this did have something to do with it, then why kidnap villains? I haven’t seen a single file on them yet. And none of the people we saw before looked like anyone of the registry…” Harlow said. She didn’t know why, or maybe she did. But a small pit was beginning to form at the bottom of her stomach. “And why do they need a full registry of every hero that’s every worked with the Citadel?”

Black Star shrugged. It wasn’t really her job to say, after all. That’s what they went through all that trouble to steal this thing for. Harlow thought back to all those bodies they saw in Gizzards’ lab. What were they all for? And they certainly, at least as far as she saw, weren’t any of the heroes that went missing recently. She thought back to that video, the one with Henry Atoms. What were they doing to him? To all of them? 

“Harlow! I think i found something else!” Black Star exclaimed. She looked over the screens and gestured wildly at a file she just opened. It wasn’t one of the ones that were pinned to the desktop, but apparently a note-type application. In it were a bunch of logs with dates on them, going back several months to almost a year now. “Did Gizzard make notes of this stuff?” Harlow’s eyes widened. 

Of course she would! She’s a scientist! And scientist all need a record or log of all their projects. But definitely Gizzard, who Harlow felt would possibly ruin all sorts of projects if she didn’t have something keeping her focused. It explained the way she reacted when Black Star took it. 

“Harlow, here’s the first one.” Black Star pulled up the oldest log she could find. Almost a year ago now. 

[Log 0001–date 202X

Director Chow’s vision for the future of superhero-dom is quite possibly the peak of all biological sciences in have seen yet. And to think he’d request my assistance on the project! I’m so stoked and I cannot wait to see where this project leads. My name is gonna go down in history. I’m a herald for the new scientific era!! 

Um, anyways— I’ve gotten the go ahead to get a sample of Director Chow’s DNA to see how his meta genes manipulate his body, and how it could manipulate that of other heroes too. I’m so excited, this is a whole new era for me! I need to arrange for a pickup so myself and my colleagues can figure out how to replicate Chow’s power in machine form. I’m sure if he could do it himself he would, but I am so honored that I’ve been chosen instead!! We made a splash at this years superhero Day with the on-call responders, and I can wait to see what he has in store for next year! ]