The East Coast Coalition Building's briefing room was a tense mix of corporate suits, military personnel, and interceptors from a variety of companies. 

The discussion, led by Paul Moss who was a liaison between the army and interceptors, revolved almost entirely around the new superhumans dominating global news feeds.

“They aren’t Jawal. They aren't interceptors,” a colonel from the Army stated, pointing to footage of a figure floating above a seemingly decimated Jawal in London. The same figure she saw at her apartment helping the people on the boat. 

“We can’t assume they’re only here to help.”

“Maybe they're the next phase of the invasion,” a CEO of a rival interceptor company butted in. “They look human, but the Jawal are the standard we have to go by. Any mysterious newcomers deserve all the scrutiny we can throw at ‘em, I say.”

“Why are we assuming that they’re evil?” An interceptor pilot spoke up this time. 

On a screen high up on a wall, the face of Sabrina Johnson, a round blonde with a pleasant disposition was shown. 

She held on to something out of view, but items in the background gave away that she was in zero-gravity space. “What if they’re here to help? Has anyone actually made contact with them?” 

She was an I.T. interceptor pilot assigned to NASA.

When she wasn’t zooming around in her white, pink and blue battle-modded spacesuit, she was studying the effects of space travel on the brain.

Holes did not commonly open in space, but it had occurred enough times in the early years of the Jawal invasion that an interceptor was required to be there.

Kiera, speaking with the measured diplomacy of Rebecca, cut through the noise. 

“Assuming things is always unwise, dear. We treat them as an emerging threat until we have know more. Let's date them, casually. Still focus on the Jawal, and keep a wide berth from them as we can. If they want to take out our trash, why stop them?” Kiera was getting the hang of her mother's playful lingo. 

Rebecca may have entertained the idea of meeting with the mysterious individuals, but Kiera couldn’t afford going after everything her mother may or may not have done. 

Once I.T. was stable and Kiera felt ready to take over the company officially, she wanted to know she made decisions she could live with.

Looking around the room filled with screens showcasing every video and angle of the mysterious individuals that army intelligence gathered, Kiera had mixed feelings. 

She couldn't remember who in the room called them ‘humanoids’ first, but it stuck.

One of them was a beautiful-looking female with pink hair and always in a pink hoodie. She looked like a normal young adult, except for the fact that she was flying. When she turned into a pink dragon that stopped an 18-wheeler from going overboard on a bridge, Kiera’s mouth was left wide open.

On the opposite wall, a lithe, casually dressed figure was dashing back and forth at unnatural speeds, hauling a five-foot wide container full of ocean water to a forest fire.

The last one, a handsome man in shorts, was dragging a satellite with engine failure back into space. No wonder Sabrina was defending them.

They don’t need oxygen. Kiera noted, and recognized him as the humanoid she saw earlier that day. 

“Do you notice that, Rebecca?” An older Indian woman asked her. Kiera smiled.

“Ophelia, great to see you. Notice what?” They shook hands in greeting. Ophelia Ouseph was fifty-four years old veteran pilot. Her experience made her a wise leader and excellent interceptor, and she had been friends with Rebecca for many years.

“Their clothes.”

“They’re too casual. As if - they’re trying very hard to seem normal.” Kiera replied.

“And they show up at the same time? In addition to the increased rates of Holes opening and Jawal attacks, this looks like a coordinated strategy to me.” Ophelia viewed the screens critically. Kiera nodded. 

No one would go into space wearing normal clothes if they didn’t know their full capabilities. These weren't the neighborhood superheroes that suddenly had powers. And if she had supernatural abilities, she wouldn’t show them for the world to see without hiding her identity. 

These humanoids wanted to be seen. 

And since they were all over the news, they got what they wanted. 

And that was dangerous.

I hate the unknown.

Eventually, the decision was made to form temporary joint teams to handle the increased Jawal influx. Each company would assign their pilots into compatible teams to increase efficiency and use everyone’s strengths appropriately.

When Jamie heard that NovaStar, Bluestar, and Mirror were assigned together, she decided her week couldn’t get any worse between the slander online and Rebecca's nitpicking.

The week got worse.

The new team—NovaStar flying above and shielding their movements using sound displacement, Blueheart phasing through abandoned buildings with practiced ease, and Mirror staying hidden in his photon-bending suit—patrolled a dilapidated warehouse in Queens. 

The air was thick with the smell of grease and rust.

“NovaStar, make sure you stick to the grid pattern. Any deviation could draw unwanted attention to us.” Delilah’s voice was cold over the shared comms, already irritated by Jamie’s erratic movements.

“Relax, Bluestar. Unlike some people, I can multitask,” Jamie chirped back, before her HUD lit up with a small, energy signature near an abandoned warehouse. “Got something. A truck… and someone. And it’s not a Jawal.”

Hidden behind a stack of rusted containers was a figure in black clothes, attempting to roll a metal crate with two terrifying Jawal onto the truck she had sensed earlier. The Jawal were bound in a series of chains that rivaled the ones used on boats.

NovaStar broke rank from her high flying, zipping down with excessive speed. “You have the right to remain silent, scumbag!” she shouted. 

Jamie chose maximum power for a quick and impressive sonic blast.

The resulting sonic boom wasn't just loud; it was concussive. 

The blast immediately stunned the figure, causing him to drop the crate, but the shockwave was so immense it destabilized the warehouse. 

The massive structure groaned, then began to topple, creating a cascade of wreckage that thundered down onto the pavement.

“NovaStar, what was that?!” Bluestar roared through the comms.

Both Mirror and Bluestar were forced to abandon their low-profile posts. 

Mirror slipped out of thin air, his invisibility cloak deactivated to grab the unconscious man before he was crushed under the building's debris. 

Bluestar used pure strength to stabilize the structural beams of the warehouse itself, before using her suit’s phasing abilities to phase and dephase the beams back together. 

Jamie’s showmanship had crippled their simple mission to find hidden Jawal into a full-blown construction project.

Bluestar called Mirror to work on the beams farther away from her, and NovaStar was ordered to watch the unconscious man. 

Who assigned her as leader?

Oblivious to the chaos she’d caused, NovaStar landed by him, striking a ‘casual’ pose for the cameras she assumed were watching. 

“That’s how you handle a low-level threat!” She said out loud in the melodic hum of her suit’s voice. 

Looking around for something to tie the man up with, she found old industrial wiring behind a wall. After binding him up, she ran over to the truck and wailing Jawal to finish them off quickly.

No one's going to steal my thunder!

As soon as she got to it, another figure stepped out from the shadows.

One of the humanoids from the news—the female with long pink hair had appeared. But today she was wearing a strange silver and red suit. 

“Please leave them alone.” She said quietly.

NovaStar got into a fighting stance. “Or what?”

Mystery girl didn’t reply but instead charged at NovaStar. She braced for an attack and was surprised when the pink haired girl executed a graceful flip over her head.

NovaStar activated her boosters to go after her, sonic emitters tuned to an invisible blade, and stopped short when the pink haired woman was holding the unconscious man like a human shield. She got a better look at him now, clad in black and wearing combat gear you couldn't buy from a normal store.

“If you want him to live, you’ll let us go.” The girl threatened.

She’s really using the guy we tied up as a hostage? Damn it.

Swallowing her pride, she comm’ed Bluestar. “There’s a humanoid who has the guy hostage. Threat to kill.” 

She heard Bluestar swear on the other end. 

“Contact Phillip, not me! He’s the invisible guy!” NovaStar remembered that Phillip piloting Mirror was capable of turning invisible and manipulating light. 

NovaStar pinged him, and waited until she read his signature a few feet from the target before she fired up a wide sonic blast to stun the girl. The plan was for the invisible Mirror to get close, wait for NovaStar's blast to concuss the woman, and cloak the unconscious stranger with invisibility until they could get out of the fighting range.

Then NovaStar would be free to dance.

She won't know what hit her.

The pink-haired girl dropped the hostage, and turned around before the blast hit her. 

On her back were pink moth-like wings spread wide, which she used as a shield before whipping back around as though nothing happened. 

The shock made Jamie hesitate a second too long before moving.

The other girl was quicker and grabbed the unconscious man, slicing at the invisible Mirror with a blade that appeared out of nowhere, and jumping into the air. 

NovaStar moved to follow her, engaging her thrusters, until she heard Mirror shout, “The truck!” 

The engine started with a growl and took off in a wild maneuver through the warehouse debris. 

If they lost it in traffic, things could get dangerous for the civilians in the city. 

The pink haired girl was a distraction!

“Destroy it!” Bluestar made a quick call. Better to end it now than later. 

NovaStar didn’t argue, flying fast and using her sonic blades to cut the tires. 

Mirror put up the illusion of a wall, forcing the driver to make a sharp turn into a dead-end alley.

Bluestar phased into the truck with a dive, but came out only a second later visibly pissed. 

“The truck's empty!” Delilah’s voice was barely contained fury. “NovaStar, there's no Jawal! No driver! No cargo! It was a decoy.” Mirror placed a hand on her shoulder.

“You got distracted by the low-hanging fruit, Jamie.” Delilah continued, calmer. “We lost two, potentially three assets and caused a structural collapse - for what? To look good? If you kept your eyes on our trafficker, we wouldn't be missing a key piece of evidence.”

Mirror had released the wall illusion, and the street - the mess - was exposed for the public to see.

Bluestar wasn’t done. “You’re lucky that was an abduction and not an assassination.” They started back to headquarters. “That would have been on your head.”

“How could they have driven the truck with no one in it?” NovaStar asked, unwilling to accept defeat or humiliation yet. 

Mirror shook his head. “They have the technology to do it. Traffickers.”

Looking at the now-open truck that had nothing but chains inside, NovaStar understood. “So traffickers are transporting Jawal parts now?”

Underneath their exact location, a slow-crawling waterproof truck drove deep into the darkness of New York's sewer system, shaking with the tremors of two giant beasts fighting for freedom.