The shadow manifested to her left, as if it was stepping in from another room, its feet still planted firmly on the ground. Young. He folded his arms, and in the shroud of his indistinct form, the lines between costume and flesh were blurry. He could have been a reptile, covered in thick layers, with sleek, broad bands.

“Hi,” the wounded man said.

Glines gave him a small nod of acknowledgement, before turning his full focus to the tower.

Valkyrie could have asked the shadow a question, but she didn’t. She let him study the distant tower, and she turned her attention to the hero who had noted her helmet. One finger tapped the metal, producing a sharp sound. “These things are more important than you would think.”

The wounded man smiled. “No offense, Valkyrie, but I don’t think that, whatever it is, is going to bop you on the head. If it does, that bit of metal won’t change the outcome.”

The man in costume was nervous, she realized. He’d been here for at least a day—she looked back in the direction of the camp, where tarps and tents were erected, positioned where they could watch the tower, still far enough away that it would take twenty or thirty minutes of driving a conventional vehicle to get close. At least a day that he’d endured the roaring, the screaming, and watched as the Earth’s oxygen was slowly and steadily pumped away into oblivion, to no seeming point or goal.

“I don’t think it’s about to strike me across the head,” she said. And this is still important, for other reasons.

“You know what it is, then?”

She shook her head slowly, turning her attention briefly to Glines, who was still studying the thing.

“No,” she admitted.

“Uh huh. That’s reassuring,” the wounded man said.

The helmet was heavy in her hands, and it felt even heavier as she shifted it to one hand, so her other hand was free to adjust her hair, pushing it out of her face.

It was possible that events could have unfolded in such a way that the masks and helmets weren’t necessary. But some of the first capes, including Vikare, who had worn a costume very similar to her own, had wanted to protect their identities.

Somewhere along the line, the masks and helmets had become synonymous with identity.

With her hair sufficiently adjusted and pushed out of the way, she set the helmet down on her own head. Anchor-heavy.

“You look so calm,” the wounded man said. “You’re not freaked?”

She raised a hand, holding it flat. The only tremor or movement was because of the wind, as air flooded in the direction of the vacuum-driven vortex the vacuum at the tower’s base. She was calm.