“We’re going to need to get you a new mask,” Emily muttered as she looked at Teddy’s bear mask. The plastic was a little warped on the sides and there was a crack along one ear. Just normal wear and tear on something made so cheaply.

“Oh, can I get one made of steel?” Teddy asked. “With knives for fangs?”

“I . . . don’t know if we have the budget for that,” Emily said.

She stuffed things away in a duffel bag, including Athena’s leather jacket, then stood up and looked to the Trinity sitting on the edge of her bed. “I’m still getting changed,” she said.

“All right, take your time.”

Trinity nodded.

Emily had a minute or two to waste, so she booted up her laptop, then it was on to Oogle for a quick search. Black Shield, Thunder Clot, and Spin to Win, the three Cabal members Cement had mentioned, were all identified as Heroes.

The news said Cement had been captured by Glamazon and Silver Fox, but the news could be lying, especially if the Cabal controlled those two as well.

Black Shield’s presence online was nearly nonexistent. There was an article or two, but they always had the Hero as part of a larger group. A young woman, in tight black spandex, standing at the rear. Her costume had some armor over the chest and knees and shoulders, black on black, with a few dark-gray highlights. The Hero’s weapons were the only things that really stood out.

Emily clicked over to an Ikipedia page to check out the weapons and frowned. The Void Shields. Some Gadgeteer tech shields that could fire lasers. They were both basically gauntlets with a big teardrop-shaped shield, the point ending five inches past the Hero’s knuckles, and the rounded part only about as wide as her forearm.

Her power was listed as “Black Shield Creation,” but Emily had no idea what that meant.

Thunder Clot was a different story. He was a much louder sort of Hero. Plenty of participation at local hospitals, visiting sick children, doing volunteer work, baking cookies for some charity work.

Thunder Clot was an average-looking man, if on the thinner side. A bright yellow costume over a dark blue skintight suit. The armor looked high-tech, and he had some screens on his forearms. His helmet was a cross between an army hat and a bicycle helmet, with a yellow-tinted visor attached to heavy headphones.

There was plenty about his activities, and some footage of him firing lightning bolts at a mugger out in the open, but that was it. Emily didn’t get the “Clot” part of his name. He was a speedster, though, the way he reacted almost instantly.

And finally, there was Spin to Win.