I had to admit, the preppy look with the wide shoulders, narrow waist, clean cut and nicely taken care of, it appealed to me, and it had always. Not that I was even remotely thinking of actually moving forward with a relationship.

“I’m probably going to have to duck out and handle some minor crisis or another, but stick around and don’t disappear on me, we’ll find the time and figure out if we can place you with the Attendant.”

“That’d be great.”

“If I get caught up in something, find one of the others. Chat with them, they’ll tell you what they think of the team.”

There were a few other capes distributed across the crowd. It was interesting how people seemed so keen on them, even approaching them, happy to see them. The sentiment of blame hadn’t gripped the refugees here.

A teenager with a moon design on her mask and dress-like costume.

I saw a humanoid mech the size of a car, with a glass tank for the ‘body’, something large and fishlike within the tank. The mech sat on its ass, feet sticking out, and children were crowding around to tap the glass and climb on the feet. The tinker, as I took it, was the one sitting on the suit’s shoulder. Another cape was standing on the end of a rod, three stories above the ground, the end of the rod stuck into the side of the building. He looked stern as he looked down at the scene, his arms folded, until someone waved up at him and he waved back.

“Is that the whole team?”

“Not even close. With the teams merging, we’re taking on a lot of others. We’ll be breaking up into three sub-teams later, but all with the same name and brand.”

“I don’t know if I’m hurting my chances saying this, but I’m kind of crossing my fingers you guys are going with the Shepherd’s name and brand, but the Attendant’s approach.”

Whorl smiled again. “We might be.”

“I like the approach,” I said.

“How do you interpret it?”

“Giving people security. Moving slowly, with measured steps, informed by the lessons of the past. You guys seem pretty focused on taking and holding territories, improving neighborhoods. After what happened at the Norfair community center, I think giving people time to get used to capes again is key.”

“I think it might be,” Whorl said.

Above, the cape that was standing on the end of the horizontal pole whistled. As we looked up, he pointed.

“That’s my cue,” Whorl said. “No pun intended. I’ll be right back.”

Whorl headed toward the building that the people were filing out of, moving at a light jog, with a fog-like nimbus building at his shoulders and arms.