All around us, prisoners were noticing the scene. Women’s voices were raised. Pleading to be let out, threatening, commenting. Less lewd than the guys’ side had been, but there was still lewdness.

My skin crawled at the thought of Amy. My heart raced like I was only a step away from attacking Amy again, yet she wasn’t anywhere near here, and I wasn’t that angry in the moment.

“The less said the better,” I answered her, as diplomatically as I could.

“Then I won’t say anything.”

Rain and Tress caught up.

“Those are my arms,” Swansong said.

“What?” Tristan asked.

She pointed at Tress’s new addition. The black wire mesh connected individual cylinders… pale shells that would have once been parts of Swansong’s arms.

“Uh, yeah,” Rain said. “I wanted to do something more practical when we thought things were getting bad. I made a few prototype versions of your arms. With levers, switches, and wires inside, like the snapshots Lookout took of the inside of Tress’s suit.”

“Sneaky,” Damsel called out, smiling.

“There’s a limit to what I can do with your hands without leaving you worse off,” Rain sounded apologetic as he explained to Swansong. “And I had a few days where my tinker power was working better. Not that that is very tinkered up. Half and half.”

“It’s fine,” Swansong said. “If you’re going to use anyone’s arms as a model, you at least used tasteful ones.”

“I appreciate the thought,” Tress said. “And thank you, Swansong, for being okay with the use of your arms.”

“Your hands are okay?” he asked Swansong. “They’re working fine?”

“They’re sufficient for tonight, thank you. Let’s focus on Lookout and the prison, not me.”

“We have one more person to grab,” Crystalclear said.

Tristan held up the compass.

“I’ll get her,” Crystalclear said. “You catch your teammate up.”

He wants to tell her that we’re Goddessed.

That was fine.

Capricorn clapped his gauntlets together. I didn’t miss the flash of dark red across the back of one gauntlet. He spoke with authority and confidence, “Then let’s talk goals. Goddess, Lookout and Natalie are after the assistant warden and the wardens Teacher co-opted. Lung and Teacher’s soldiers are at the front and are presumably after Goddess. Prisoners are staying put, but we’re in a weird place right now.”

“Weird how?” Rain asked.

“It’s about confidence and doubt,” I said. “Prisoners could riot or test their ankle bombs if they get too agitated or overconfident, and that leads to either casualties or an unsalvageable situation. They could betray us if they think this situation doesn’t work out for them, you never know with all the powers we have around us. Officers don’t know who to trust, but they could start shooting people or people with the power could start detonating bombs if they panic.”