Ashley gave me a look over her shoulder, her head tilting with the motion. It made the projection of smoke spill down from her eyes and bounce off her shoulder.

Sitting on the table, Byron tugged at his straps, fixing on the last pieces of his armor. He tugged again, then twisted around, trying to see what he was doing.

They weren’t the only signs of restlessness around the room. I suspected a lot of people here had hoped to hear something closer to a timeline of hours, not days.

“There are two ongoing wars between villain factions in two locations,” Cinereal said. “The first is between Semiramis, Little Midas, and Bluestocking, Earth N. The Wardens and Foresight have discussed it and we would like to push for a stable alliance between Bluestocking and Semiramis. For those of you who don’t know, these are behind-the-scenes operators who are stepping in to fill a void after Marquis has left for Shin and Lord of Loss was arrested. Auzure, you have a working relationship with Semiramis.”

“We do,” Lark said.

“You’re up to date on who these individual faction leaders are, and what they represent?”

“We are.”

“Talk to Semiramis, then. See what it would take, and broker a peace with Bluestocking. Offer assistance in taking down Midas.”

“We can try.”

“We need better than try. We need success. All three parties know about Teacher and we need that handled. We want Midas arrested and at least temporarily shuttled to our prison world, and we want Bluestocking and Semiramis cooperating with each other and with us.”

“We’ll manage it. Can we bring in others if we need help with the actual handling and takedown?”

“Yes. Talk to the Wardens if you need help organizing that,” Cinereal said. She got a nod from Lark and moved on, addressing the rest of us, “The second war is over the portal-wracked areas in the heart of the city. Those of you who are more used to working over there will recognize the names. Deader and Goner operate from a corner world much as we’re operating from the Bunker. Barrow is a corner world, in a manner of speaking. The Lords of the Pit have the villains of the Pitstop under their thumb. We think the best use of resources would be to put Advance Guard on this.”

“We’ve already been preparing to handle it,” was Mayday’s response. “While I have the floor, I also want to say we’re taking the last steps to fold the Kings of the Hill into Advance Guard. If you’re looking for them, it’s best to go through us.”

The fox and the hound, Foxtrot and Houndstooth, raised their hands. Dangerous mischievousness and stoic seriousness, respectively.