The sound of crumpled steel banging against locker in Winslow High was what caught the attention of everyone nearby. Students and teachers flocked outside, only to see an imposing figure floating in front of a damaged locker.

A very recognizable figure indeed, as Alexandria was one of the foremost heroes in the world. Her black and gray bodysuit, mask and cape were very distinctive, after all.

"What the hell is she doing here?" a jock shouted out.

"What happened here? Why would someone put such filth inside someone's locker?" the hero demanded as her black boots tapped down on the rough carpet.

One teacher, more brave than her peers, came over. "Oh, my god. That's disgusting."

The used female hygiene pads and products laid out, scattered from the smashed opened locker.

"Someone was locked into this locker." There was a smeared hand print on the backside of the locker, along with strands of curly, dark hair. Alexandria suddenly looked at the crowd. "One of you call 911 and inform them that there is a Parahuman Incident here at the school," she called out, gesturing to include all of them in her orders. "This has become a crime scene."

"Wasn't that Hebert's locker?" one of the 'out crowd' girls asked.

"You. Have all of these classrooms evacuated and all of the children kept back. I'm taking personal charge of this crime scene until the PRT and the police arrive. Try to find out which class this Hebert girl was supposed to be in," Alexandria ordered.

"Yes, ma'am!"

Armsmaster skidded to a halt in the front of the high school ten minutes later. Velocity blurred up next to him.

"She's right there, big as life and just as imposing. What is she doing in Brockton Bay?"

"That is the million dollar questions. It's most likely nothing, but it could be that she followed a villain here." The heavily armored tinker walked inside, even as his HUD noted that the PRT response was about 10 % slower than it should be. Something he would have to mention to Director Piggot the next time they met.

It was his people's lives on the line if they were slow, after all.

"Armsmaster. Good to see you again," Alexandria said as she walked over. They quickly shook hands in a brisk, friendly manner of business acquaintances.

"What's the situation?" he asked as he walked over to the obvious disturbance. Idly, he wondered if it was a good thing that seeing dismembered bodies had desensitized him to the ugly mess.

"I found this scene. It appears that a parahuman situation occurred here, where a girl was shoved into her locker. She possibly burst out, but there is no evidence of her leaving the site," Alexandria explained as she walked over, trying to take care to not step on the evidence.

"Velocity, you are leaving tracks. Try to keep back." Armsmaster frowned as he considered things. She had not explained why she was here. "What brings you to Brockton Bay?"

Alexandria's mask covered everything about her face of importance, but just the posture and angle of your head could tell you a lot. Like the surprise she was emoting. "I- I can't remember."

The tinker nodded to himself even as he sent a message through the Protectorate message system. "I'm initiating Master-Stranger protocols. Considering the situation, it's possible that the victim triggered, took control of you to force you to come and rescue her. Which-"

"-would be incredibly bad. A villain with the power to control any parahuman from across the country would have to be dealt with as soon as possible."

"Exactly. If you'll come with me, we'll get you to the quarantine holding cells at our local base. Do you need a lift?" Armsmaster was wondering if she could actually fly. There was other possibilities. Always other possibilities.

"No, I'll just keep close," Alexandria said as she lifted off the ground.

"Velocity, I want you to head there with Alexandria. I'll catch up and we'll start to go down the checklist."

"You got it, Armsmaster."

They were accelerating the entire time on the run/flight over to the repurposed oil rig. They stopped on the small docking platform attached to one of the main four legs.

"You know, I'm not entirely sure why we have this base out here. You'd think that being safe in the water isn't being safer with Leviathan around," Velocity joked, one of his overused jokes that got a groaner out of almost everyone. He hit the button access the control panel, typing in his long password and putting his eye up to the scanner. Luckily it worked right through the peephole on his helmet.

"You know, you are exactly right about that," Alexandria replied in a serious tone. "We'll need to rig some chains so I can lift this out of the water and put it someplace inside the city or just outside. Probably closer to the north side of things, as that is where most of the problems are in Brockton Bay."

Velocity was blinking at that, as she took his joke far too seriously. "Well, we do have our forcefield-"

"Don't be silly. Artificial forcefields barely slow down Endbringers. This is a floating death trap."

"Um, right." Huh, and he thought he was just being morbid. "Follow me, please. Oh, there's Triumph and Assault. And, Assault, you can't shake her hand with that stupid shocker you got at the joke shop. Stranger-Master protocols," Velocity told his team mates.

Triumph nodded his lion-armored head. "Armsmaster has a good reason to worry if someone can take over you, Alexandria. We'll still be good hosts, of course."

"Ahhhh. I just wanted to see if she'd jump from the shock," the ex-villain said in a playful tone.

"Dude, you've been trying to get everyone with that damn thing. I have no idea what Battery sees in you. And you are making us look bad."

"Very well. Lead on, Velocity," Alexandria said graciously, glad that her mask covered her face to hide her smile.

Half an hour later, Armsmaster finished riding his motorcycle back to the Protectorate base. His motorcycle switched back to wheeled mode from its ski jet mode and to that same dock that the others had just used. The elevator stopped at the vehicle bay where he left his motorcycle in its tinker-repair bay. He needed to give it a tune up and fix that issue it had with balance at lower speeds in the water.

Whenever he had time for it. Perhaps next year.

He ran up the three flights of stairs to his lab/office, getting in five minutes of exercise to make up for all the time he'd lost going to Winslow High. He had remarkably small information to work with.

"Call Dockworkers Union, ask for Danny Herbert in Human Resources. Connect when he answers," Armsmaster told his computer.

Then he sat at his desk and verified that Alexandria was actually sitting calmly at the table in the quarantine room, with no one else still in there.

Beep. "-my name is Danny Hebert, you silly machine," an upset voice said from the video phone.

"My apologies, Mr. Hebert. I misstated your name. This is Armsmaster with the Brockton Bay Protectorates. There has been an incident at your school. Do you know where your daughter would go if she left school early?"

"Is Taylor hurt? What happened?" he replied, suddenly sounding quite worried.

"We do not know if she was injured or not. But we do want to talk to her about what happened to her locker. Once forensics is finished, we'll hopefully know a little more. Would she just go home? Or does she have any friends that she would go to?"

There was a long pause. "Not... recently. She used to have a best friend, Emma Barnes, but they haven't gone out in at least six months. If she's not at home, she's likely to go to the library. She's a good kid, Armsmaster. She knows to stay away from gangs and drugs."

The library? He'd have Dauntless swing by there after he finished checking the Herbert... Hebert home.

"Thank you very much, Mr. Hebert. I'll try to keep you informed if anything else has happened. Goodbye." Armsmaster frowned after disconnecting the call. The school should have called him by then. Well, not everyone was as efficient as he was.

A larger screen came out of the ceiling on a robotic arm. "Computer: Call Protectorate West. Priority Beta, highest ranking administrator."

A minute later, the masked face of Rime came on the line. "This is Rime. How can I help you, Armsmaster."

"I've had to put Alexandria into our containment facility due to the worry that she was controlled by a new master. She does not remember why she was at one of our local high schools, investigating a parahuman incident."

"Hmm. She's away on Triumvirate business. We should bring in our local lords and masters. Probably Chief Director Costa-Brown also."

"Good idea. Computer: Call Director Piggot."

The stocky visage of the leader of the Brockton Bay PRT came on in only moments, the screen splitting into four square. "Armsmaster, what's the issue?" She had learned to be direct and no-nonsense with him.

"First I would suggest that we bring in Chief Director Costa-Brown so I don't have to go over this again. This affects two separate cities," Armsmaster explained.

The pretty face of the Rebecca Costa-Brown came on the screen even as Director Tanner appeared.

"What is the situation, Armsmaster?" the chief director asked as she looked at him intently.

"Alexandria is currently quarantined due to Master-Stranger guidelines here in Brockton Bay after she could not explain why she was taking charge of a possible parahuman incident at our local school," he explained. "I'll be contacting Dragon and having her help figure out what sort of power was used. But currently it is not safe to leave her."

"Alexandria?" Costa-Brown asked curiously. "I was under the impression she was resistant to mental attacks."

"She's not here in L.A. right now. She said she would check in later, but that she would be out of contact for several hours today. So this is likely her," Rime said helpfully.

Armsmaster noted that the chief director looked annoyed for a second. "I figured this was important enough that I should inform everyone. But I need to try and solve this mystery as fast as possible."

"Keep us informed," Director Piggot said curtly.

"And keep a lid on this, Armsmaster. We can't have it publicly out that Alexandria was possibly controlled," the chief director said.

"She's supposed to be at a few functions this evening that she would not put off," the last director noted. "We'll have to come up with something important enough for her to not show up to that meeting in Washington D.C. in three hours with Senator Manning, but doesn't require her to be visible in public."

"Let's leave the Armsmaster and Rime to handle their ends while we discuss that on our own," Piggot said.

With that, Armsmaster was disconnected. He thought for a long moment as he thought back over the conversation. He would have to review his recording later to get a deeper insight. "Computer, call Dragon."

She appeared instantly, as always. Which, now that he thought about it, was a bit odd itself.

"Armsmaster? How can I help you?" the masked face on the screen asked with just a hint of warmth.

"I'm going to need you to monitor me while I go try to verify what happened to Alexandria. She showed up at Winslow High at a possible parahuman incident, but does not remember how she got there."

"Certainly. I don't have any higher priorities right now."

"I've opened a channel to my armor's cameras," he said as he stood up and started walking down the corridor.

"I'm in, Armsmaster," Dragon's voice said in his helmet directly.

It was only one level up and near the detention rooms. Assault was leaning against the wall.

"Do I have to stick around, oh boss of mine?" he asked in his flippant manner.

"No, you're free to go. I've got Dragon monitoring me," Armsmaster stated simply. He leaned down to let the retinal scanner work as he typed in his twenty-five digit password.

"Wahooo! Got a date night before patrol! I need to get some roses or I'm going to be sleeping on the couch!" Assault said, taking off at a run.

Armsmaster clamped down on his annoyance. It was just easier to ignore the ex-villain most of the time. He let the first door slide closed behind his blue and silver armored form. Then the inside door opened. Exiting would be annoying, but the five minute wait would not be lifted until the quarantine was canceled.

"Armsmaster. I should have asked for a newspaper or a book to read," Alexandria said as she stood up.

"I'm sure we can get you something if we can't get a resolution to this mess quickly," he promised. "Still no memories of why you were in Winslow High?" he asked.

"I'm accessing your lie detector and using my servers to handle extra processing power," Dragon stated simply through his helmet.

"I- No, nothing still. I'm feeling very confused."

Not an outright lie, but definitely not the truth either. Weird, Armsmaster thought to himself. Well, the first thing is try ordering her to do something she would never do on her own. "If you don't mind, Alexandria, would you unmask so I can confirm your identity?"

That seemed to surprise her. "Certainly. I should have thought of that myself."

Got her. No way would Alexandria unmask to him. So this was likely-

His whole thought process screeched to a halt as the very young looking face of Rebecca Costa-Brown was revealed from under the mask.

"Is there a problem, Armsmaster?" the now unmuffled voice of the chief director asked even as her face showed confusion.

"Armsmaster? That's an identical match to the Chief Director," Dragon said in surprise in his ears.

"Chief Director Costa-Brown?" he blurted out in surprise.

"You remembered! I'm glad of that-" Alexandria's face turned to confusion as she noted his confusion. "What's the problem?"

"You can't be the Chief Director. Who the hell are you?" Armsmaster demanded angrily. Damn it, he was going to have to be quarantined himself.

"No. I have to be. I don't want to be her again." Her face turned into an anguished, distressed visage. "Please, don't make me go back."

"Armsmaster! You need to calm her down!" Dragon said worriedly.

For his part, he was thinking very hard how to do that. "Miss, they can't hurt you any more. You're safe. They can't put you in that locker again."

She had been backing up to push against the metal wall of the containment room, her head shaking the entire time. "You promise?" she asked in a very small, innocent voice.

"I promise," he said simply.

The unmasked form of Alexandria melted or sublimated away, leaving the blood and filth caked form of a young fifteen year old girl, still wearing glasses who slid down the wall curl up into a ball, breathing fast and just barely not sobbing as a used tampon fell to the ground with a wet sound from the wall behind her.

"Taylor Hebert, I presume?" Armsmaster asked.

"Help her up. I think you might need to give her a hug," Dragon said in his ear.

"Right," he muttered to himself. He didn't like kids. That's why he mostly left the Wards to Miss Militia or the PRT. He awkwardly help her up and tried to pat her on the shoulder comfortingly. When she threw herself into a hug around him and started sobbing, he was totally at a loss.

And in perfect, bad timing, the airlock door opened up to admit a black and gray garbed figure. It closed immediately behind Alexandria per its programming.

"Armsmaster, are you alright? I see you've resolved the issue here then," Alexandria said as she stepped in, her cape swirling behind her. "I flew here as quickly as I could when I found out that there was a 'me' here."

A mental control in his helmet sent a quick text message for Dragon to record this. "Only partly. I first need to ask you to answer a question."

The masked head tilted ever so slightly. "Oh?"

"Are you Chief Director Rebecca Costa-Brown?" the tinker said directly. If she attacked, he was likely dead. He'd have to tell the girl to resume her copied form.

"That's ludicrous, Armsmaster. What's going on?" Alexandria stated after a short pause.

The HUD burned with the word LIE.

"Taylor, turn back into Alexandria right now. And you had better have a very good explanation about why a parahuman is in charge of the PRT, Alexandria," Armsmaster almost snarled out. "You are undermining everything it stands for." His halberd appeared in his hands, extending to full length with shinks and clicks.

"Armsmaster?" Taylor said in confusion, but followed his instructions, turning once again into a perfect copy of Alexandria.

She stood still for just a moment. "Yes, actually, I do. The most important reason in the world. To save humanity. So you have a lie detector in there now? I'll have to remember that in the future."

"Save... humanity?" the Taylor-Alexandria said in stunned confusion.

"Yes. All of it, across all Earths in all dimensions. It appears that we are going to be recruiting two more people today to stop him," Alexandria said unhappily.

"I'm not convinced yet," the armored warrior said.

"We can't talk about it here. Too insecure. This could be recorded or worse."

"It is recorded and set to be sent out to the rest of the world if I disappear," Armsmaster half-bluffed. "We will think about not releasing it if you start talking and actually convince us."

Alexandria seemed to be thinking hard, then pulled off her mask, showing her makeup smeared face. "I guess I have no choice. Before Scion appeared, the organization I am part of saved the world from a monster from another dimension and deep space. It's a parasitic organism. Due to happenstance, our two first members managed to kill it in a once in a lifetime chance. The problem is, that it's mate is still alive and we believe capable of destroying Earth and all humanity. And it is very likely that if we attempt to attack it that we will only make it worse. There is a 99.98 % chance that if we act too early or too late that humanity dies. All humanity, everywhere."

"We've dealt with large threats before, so I'm not seeing why you needed to infiltrate and take over the PRT." Armsmaster at least pointed his halberd away slightly.

"No, we haven't dealt with a threat on this scale. In fact, because we can not destroy the Endbringers, we know that we are severely under prepared to deal with the threat," she explained as she continued to talk.

"Worse than an Endbringer? That's... a serious accusation," the leader of the Brockton Bay Protectorate said slowly.

Dragon was listening closely, all of her system mapping her biometrics and muscle movements. The real Alexandria had not said one lie yet, which was quite worrying.

"Considering that the threat is Scion, I can state for sure that we can not deal with him as a threat. He can deal with the Endbringers with impunity while we fight and die by the dozens. When Scion snaps out of his current state, he will destroy the Earth. While we can not predict his actions directly, every precog of sufficient power knows that in at most two hundred years or so the Earth is destroyed." She was being absolutely earnest now, trying to convince them.

Dragon spoke up, commandeering the external speaker on Armsmaster's armor. "She hasn't lied once since she tried to about her civilian identity. I think we had better listen very carefully, Armsmaster."

"Dragon. That makes sense. So actually three people," the unmasked Alexandria said unhappily. "Please, I have proof, but I have to take you there to it. It's in another dimension, so I have to have you drop the quarantine."

"Disable the quarantine on my authority, Dragon. Do we need to wait for Dragon to arrive in one of her armors, Alexandria?" Armsmaster asked.

"It would be best," the clandestine leader of the PRT said.

"I would only be able to go with you if you could leave a way to transmit a signal back to my base," Dragon said carefully. "Otherwise I can not go at all."

"That's being very paranoid. This can not get out to the general public-"

"I can not go without a signal back to my base. That is final."

"It will take a bit to set up. Is the teleport blocker on right now?" Alexandria said as she pulled on her mask.

At some mental commands, the protective barrier dropped. "It's down for now."

"Door," Alexandria called out. To the side of them, the metal wall of the quarantine room just disappeared to show a hallway. "I'll be back in half an hour." With that she walked through the dimensional portal.

"Can- Can I get a shower and some clean clothes?" Taylor asked as she let her Alexandria form dissipate.

"Yes, we can do that. Dragon, are you on your way?"

"ETA is twenty-five minutes with my fast reaction suit," she replied.

"I'll call your father and let him know that you are all right while you shower. Let me show you to the woman's locker room. Would you like a mask so that no one else sees your face?" Armsmaster asked carefully.

"Oh. That would probably be better, wouldn't it?" Taylor said, showing a little more vigor and life at the thought.

The commuter train clattered along as it left Brockton Bay, the gloom of the afternoon outside under the clouds making everything look washed out.

"Are you sure we needed to leave, Sophia?" Emma asked her friend.

"It was fucking Alexandria there, looking at the locker we stuffed your ex-friend Taylor in. So yeah, I'm fucking sure I don't want to go back to Juvie. And you might be unlucky enough to be there with me. Because she will fucking not take any shit and she will find out what the hell happened. And I doubt that the school will be able to stonewall her for a fucking second," the dark-skinned girl told her friend.

"But we don't even have any clothing and just the money on my allowance ATM card," the redhead said plaintively. And Sophia made her leave their phones behind in a locker at the train station with their batteries removed.

"Fucking cope. And we're emptying your account. We'll lay low for a week or so and then call your parents to find out what happened. If it's all blown over, you'll go home and get the lowdown. God this is such a fucking mess. What were we thinking?" Sophia was very unhappy right now.

"It's just gross and she was only going to be in there a few hours. They can't make too big of a deal of it, can they?" Emma asked.

"They can if they want to. Which since none of those pussies like me means they probably will try to throw the book at me." And Sophia had hated prison. She suddenly smiled at Emma. "Besides, we can prove we're strong enough on the streets there."