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The Zeranid War was going badly.
At first, the various heroes of Earth had only been drawn in by their extraterrestrial allies. The Protectors of the Planets had asked the Chastisers for help defending someone’s homeworld; a week later, the Chartreuse Candelabras had asked the Fairness Association to pinch-hit saving a key space station…
In just over a month, they had all been overwhelmed, as had hundreds of other worlds, stars, and entire solar systems. The Zeranid hivemind was unstoppable in its hunger and its cruelty. It devoured any flesh or plantlife it touched, turning the dead into, at best, warped mockeries of their past selves, gargling screams through twisted vocal chords as they clawed for a taste of their former loved ones. Or was that the worst, and the best was to simply be consumed entirely, absorbed into the biomass of a giant chittering swarm of the worst parts of wasps, slugs, Centaurian carcinoids, Antarean behemoths, and so many other species that had already fallen to the horde?
And then of course they were intelligent enough to turn their victims tech against their next prey. They didn’t seem to have any goals beyond consumption, no inclination whatsoever to communicate much less parley; any telepath that tried was psychically devoured by the hivemind—that’s how the Y-Men lost Khaki Black and her latest clone. But they sure could fly a spaceship. Their only exploitable weakness was a strong preference for boarding parties over ship-to-ship combat—because it was much harder to eat people who’d been blown to pieces, presumably.
The top heroes of Earth had all fallen back to the Fairness Association’s orbiting Guardfort three days ago. Yesterday, it fell. Now the Zeranid ships were cannibalizing it for parts (and unlucky survivors), while Diego Dodgers, a.k.a. Captain Canada, sheltered in a spare Arctic base with her remaining team. Those who’d stayed behind had managed to activate the Millennium Shield just in time, so Earth was still safe…for now.
The heroes were taking turns making what might be final calls to their loved ones, on the one hyper-sat phone that worked through the electromagnetic waves of the Shield. They’d rolled a die to keep the order fair. Dave (Dave Dodgers, Leader USA) had frowned when Diego’s number came up first, guilty that he’d benefit as well, because Diego’s husband had the strongest, most endearing sense of fairness in the world.
Diego would feel guilty when it was Dave’s turn. For now, she just strode into the designated call room, a.k.a. emotional breakdown room, a.k.a. storage room full of crates of canned food, and paced anxiously until her sibling picked up.
“Hey, Dee,” Morgan said—and, praise be, used their babysitting experience to jump straight to, “Ducky’s still good. You wanna talk to him?”
“Yes,” said Diego. Morgan was already doing the half-muffled hand-over-mouthpiece thing that didn’t even work on smartphones (oh, how their generation suffered) and calling, "Ducky! Your mom’s on the phone!"
“Hi, Mom!” Ducky shouted into the phone a few moments later, as cheerful as though he’d never heard of Zeranids—which he hadn’t. Diego and Dave had left him with Falconguy for what they'd thought would be a quick weekend trip helping the Protectors. Diego had called Morgan for long-term babysitting in the middle of a bloodbath on some Centaurian moon (which the Chastisers had promptly lost), and Morgan had snapped Ducky right to them. Morgan had already been off-planet for weeks, hidden away like a dragon's treasure before anyone else even guessed a war was coming.
“Hi, sweetie!” After 18 straight hours of fighting and running, except for the hour and a half crammed into an escape shuttle, Captain Canada finally let her knees give out a little. She sat on a crate full of canned tuna. “How was your day?”
Ducky eagerly launched into an epic, mostly unfollowable saga of trying to skateboard down the trunks of giant trees, playing hide-and-seek with his new best friend (Diego flinched, memories of the Guardfort’s invasion too fresh), and other adventures from the tropical paradise planet on which he was safe with his auncle.
It might’ve been more followable if Diego was less exhausted. As it was, she let Ducky’s six-year-old babble wash over her like sunlight and fresh rain, and even squashed her flash of guilt at...well, the unfairness of it all. Two of her teammates had kids here on Earth: Falconguy had his “secret” farm family, and Fenrir’s teenage werewolf daughter was in the Young Chastisers. They’d be in danger with the rest of Earth’s population if the Millennium Shield ran out of power, unless Earth’s heroes could somehow solve the crisis that most of the rest of the galaxy had failed to stop. (Professor Uncanny was sure the Zeranids weren’t supernatural…but she was working on magically tracing their origin anyway. Or the Y-Men could find some sort of genetic engineering hack? They were good at that sort of thing…)
No matter what happened to earth, Captain Canada and Leader USA could fight knowing that their child was safe, because Ducky was with Morgan, and anything that threatened Morgan would have to get through Alex Stewart. It was a horrible, fucked-up kind of relief, because an calamitous interstellar war against a ravening horde out of Lovecraft's nightmares was Alex Stewart's Stanley Cup. They were out there somewhere gleefully bathing in the blood of the galaxy’s misfortune. But it was the most relief Diego had—
There was a familiar gurgling chitter on the other end of the phone, not interrupting Ducky’s energetic, “—and then Hawk did a triple axle flip, except they bumped their head, so Morgan said we’re not allowed to—”
“Ducky,” Diego said, trying so hard not to sound as sharp as her focus suddenly was. Her every muscle was tense. The storage room swam around her. “What- or who else is in the room with you right now?”
“Not now, I’m talking to my mom,” Ducky was saying away from the phone. To Diego, “Sorry, Mom. Hawk wants to keep playing.”
“Hide and seek!” gargle-crooned the voice that had haunted Diego through the Watchfort, including out of the mouth of something that still had Steel Woman’s eyes. It was a new affectation, since a couple planets ago—the Zeranids never used to speak. Now, they echoed like the world’s creepiest, most eldritch kindergarteners.
On the phone, Ducky sighed, put-upon as only a six-year-old can be.
“Okay, you hide, and I’ll look for you,” he said to his companion. “I’ll count now. One…two…”
Because Diego was listening with every fiber of her being, she could hear the energetic answering chitter, then the fading skittering noise.
“Sorry, Mom,” Ducky said again. “I gotta go, or I’m lying to Hawk.”
“That’s good, sweetie,” Diego said reflexively. “You— That’s your friend, Hawk? The alien kid?”
“Yeah!” Ducky enthused. “Can we have a playdate when we get home?”
“I have to ask your dad,” Diego said. The sat-phone’s plastic case creaked in her grip. “I love you sososo much, and Dad will call you soon, okay? Give the phone back to Auncle Morgan now, please, before you go play.”
“Okay. Love you sososo much back.” Ducky’s voice faded as he took the phone from his ear. “Mom wants to talk you to you. I have to find Hawk again. Bye! One, two, three…four….”
“Heya,” Morgan picked up again, also as cheerful as though there wasn’t a galaxy-spanning war going on.
“Morgan,” Captain Canada said levelly. “You said Alex brought you out there to babysit.”
“Yeah?”
Morgan sounded innocently confused and curious. But Diego knew her sibling well enough to know they knew they were in trouble.
The problem with Morgan was, after obfuscation came defensiveness, defiance, and doubling down. Diego had spent her whole life watching their parents, and then also their idiot baby brother, go through this cycle with the "wayward" Sterling, and sworn not to do the same.
(God she hoped Chad had also gotten into an escape pod, and was now safe in some Fairness Association HQ. Their parents—)
Diego took a deep breath. She forced herself to relax back onto her crate-seat, and reminded herself that no matter what, Ducky was still safe. She had to keep believing that, as much as she did every time she sent him to Morgan’s, and Morgan’s "partner-in-crime"’s, for an evening.
A really horrifying number of clues were slotting together in her head. Changes in Zeranid behavior, especially the latest with the creepy talking. Ducky’s erratic descriptions of his new best friend from over the past month. Morgan’s even more erratic hints about what they’d been up to in that same time…. But she managed to keep her voice calm-level rather than righteously-furious-level
“Alex gave you a Zeranid to babysit.” Despite her best efforts, it wasn’t a casual question.
“Yyyup.” Morgan popped the P with a distinctly heroism-defying insouciance, but otherwise stayed civil.
Dodger kneaded her temple, and considered the biggest missing puzzle piece in this whole interstellar apocalypse. “Are you babysitting the Zeranid core hivemind?” Her voice rose rose out of her control. “Is Ducky playing Hide and Seek with the Zeranid core hivemind!?”
“Hey, Hawk’s a great kid!” Morgan said sharply. “Don’t be speciesist, Diego. And I’m making sure neither of them gets into too much trouble with the skateboarding, I promise!”
“Morgan,” Diego snapped. “Do you know what—”
She cut herself off with a mental curse. Of course Morgan knew. Morgan just didn’t care. Or, Morgan cared immensely, with a righteousness that'd be utterly heroic if it weren’t aimed so horrifically, for the worst monsters in the universe. For Alex “serial mass murderer” “S-tier” Stewart, and now, apparently, for the progenitor of the Zeranids, slaughterer of 240 worlds and counting.
(Diego was pacing again, five steps back and forth between the canned food crates, and still gripping the sat-phone so tightly that it threatened to break.)
But something in her voice must gotten through to Diego’s favorite sibling’s stubbornly villainous heart, because she could hear them, too, taking a deliberate calming breath. Albeit less near-tears shuddering than hers. They were both working on talking to family, these days.
“Dee,” Morgan said, gently like when they’d used to talk her or Chad out of nightmares. “I promise that Ducky is okay, and Hawk is not going to eat him. And I am making them both wear helmets while skateboarding.” They added, concerned. “Are you okay? You sound really stressed.” Wary of starting another near-argument, but caring, “Is the space war really going that badly for you guys?”
Mom shoved me into an escape pod then ran back to finish activating the Millennium Shield, six hours ago, because even if they can somehow never show it around you, both our parents are heroes to the core. Dad had already stayed behind three floors earlier to hold back the Zeranids. I don’t know if Chad made it out; hopefully the others will get comms up to the Fairness Association while I’m on the phone with you. I have teammates on the line, and countless friends and other family on this planet, as do you, you callous moron—friends other than Alex fucking Sterling. I love you, but I sometimes think you should be rated C- or even B-tier, for being a willing accomplice to things like this, even if you’ve never killed anyone directly yourself.
“It’s not great,” she admitted, exhausted.
“Do you…need a break?” She couldn’t see them, but she could imagine Morgan holding their hand up, ready to snap. “It's the first of the month tomorrow—I could bring you here for a few days. You can sun on the beach, hang out with Ducky, and then I’m sure Alex can send you back next time they swing by.”
The worst, most terribly unfair and villainous thing was how much she wanted to say yes. Or at least beg them to save Dave instead.
Like she’d summoned him with her thoughts, a polite knocking on the storeroom door, which she’d been ignoring, stopped, and the door swung open to reveal a concerned-looking Dave Dodgers. He was also looking Leaderly—he tapped his wristwatch with a questioning tilt of his head.
Oh yeah, Diego had been supposed to hand the phone to the next person after ten minutes. It had definitely been at least fifteen—Dave must’ve sacrificed his own time.
Diego, a.k.a. Captain Canada, pulled her shit together.
“No, I’m fine,” she said firmly. She met the steady gaze of her husband and partner-in-heroism, and asked, with a nonchalance that fooled absolutely nobody, “So, did Alex make the Zeranids, or did they just find them and think they’re…” (she struggled to stay polite) “…neat?”
Dave’s eyes widened, and his mouth shaped a series of curses that only a WWII supersoldier entombed for 70 years could come up with.
Meanwhile, Diego could hear Morgan rolling their eyes, as they said in their indulgent, ‘you get one clue where I hid your homework’ voice, “Alex made them.”
“That’s…monstrous.” Her effort to be neutral failed. But at least she stayed friendly.
Made them, she mouthed to Dave, who kept cursing silently.
“Yeah.” Now, Morgan just sounded fond. “You should’ve seen them when the Antareans and the Zoroxians finally realized they needed to team up to save themselves, and then they both still got obliterated. They’re, like, adorably pleased with themself about this whole space war.”
Diego simply could not contain all of the emotions she wanted to scream right now, not and continue talking to her sibling. So she initiated polite phone-call farewells, reiterated that Dave would call Ducky later (for about 2 minutes), and hung up.
Dave walked right over and wrapped his arms around her. But he spoke as Leader USA. “So we’re in a hell of a jam, eh?”
Diego leaned against him, and Captain Canada answered, “We can call off Professor Uncanny, at least from the tracing spell. Some sort of mass banishment would still be great. Or, I was thinking, if we can get a genetic sample to Dr. Hatfield from the Y-Men, he could engineer some sort of virus…”
They had to find a solution, now. Their only other choice was to pray that the massive, experimental electromagnetic shield now circling Earth like a giant hamster ball could outlast the bloodlust of the universe’s greatest monster, who happened to basically be Diego’s in-law. And, frankly, Diego wouldn’t bet on even a millennium being long enough for that.
She added, “Ducky’s having a blast, though. And Morgan promises they’re making sure he and Hawk wear helmets, on all these skateboard stunts. I think this phase is going to last—we’re going to need to build that backyard skate ramp, after we save the world again.”
Dave shook his head with a rueful smile. "My ma wasn't kidding—there really is always something else, when you have a kid."