“You can’t control us!” a middle-aged woman shouted. Someone was trying to get her to stay still and stay put, holding her wrists, but she was fighting. “You put powers in charge of the city, you override our police force, you shut down and attack civil protests and assemblies!”

“You shove us into tents in the wintertime while powers get houses, you make us wait a year before we get four walls to call our own, and then you make us move!”

“We just want you to be safe, we want to help,” Withdrawal said.

He was drowned out.

“I was in the tent cities with you!” he called out. “I was there, helping, keeping people safe!”

He wasn’t sure anyone could even hear him. He wasn’t sure anyone was listening enough to even try hearing him.

Someone else threw something. He couldn’t move in time to stop them. Fume Hood and Finale arrived, but Finale looked too spooked to know what to do. She made a finger-gun, visibly biting her lip, which was exposed in the gap between scarf and mask. Her eyes roved over the crowd.

“Fin!” he called out to her to get her attention. He shook his head.

Finale backed off, doing nothing more than raising her voice to call out, “Calm down! Please!”

Fume Hood had her orbs. Each the size of a fist, they spun in an orbit around her outstretched hand, which she held out, palm facing the crowd. A shield of sorts, to ward off the crowd. It worked. It made a good scene, her hood and little cape fluttering with the heated fan hidden at her back.

And Caryatid finally arrived. Stoic, unflinching, invulnerable, immovable. Far better for holding the line than he was.

Keeping a crowd of people from running past checkpoints and border security. Things were at a standstill already, but if this went tits-up and the line was breached, it would bog things down for at least an hour. Everyone would need to be cleared out and backed up, everyone mid-processing would have to start over. Otherwise there was a risk of stowaways.

He’d already seen something similar, when patrolling the tent cities and observing people making their late arrivals from Earth B to Earth G.

Someone hit Caryatid with a weapon. She was in her breaker form, so it did nothing.

“Don’t do that!” Finale called out. “Why would you do that!?”

“Can you capes back off? Make room?” one of the Patrol called out.

Withdrawal checked. There were more people in Patrol uniforms arriving. Some with shields.

“You’re agitating the situation by being here,” a Patrol uniform said. “The intent is appreciated.”

“We were asked to help,” Withdrawal replied.

“What help!?” someone nearby shouted, almost in the uniform’s face. “Where were they while we were in the tent cities!?”