“Hi Lookout. That’s fine, good, thank you,” I said, stumbling. I still wasn’t sure if it was good we were being reinforced. But I wasn’t sure what we were supposed to do against something like this. “Backline figured out a way to preserve the island. Any chance you can figure out why and pass it to me?”

“Displacement powers,” Kenzie said.

“That was a fast response. Are we going by the power sourcing term, the power endstate term, or by PRT classification terminology?”

“I, uh, checking.”

I kept firing. Each Titan we’d seen so far had something about it that changed the entire dynamic of a fight. The longer I could keep him down, targeting one limb, then another, then a part along his back that seemed intent on growing, the longer it was until we had to deal with whatever he brought to the table.

“Vic!” the loud voice in my ear made me startle. I was still holding the phone there.

“Yes?”

“Power endstate terminology. Whatever that means.”

“It means if powers, once everything’s said and done, move things from here to there, by way of teleportation or interdimensional shifting, they ward off the cracks. That’s good. Utterly useless for me, but it might help for Capricorn.”

“Capricorn constellations block cracks?”

“Possibly. If they’re that certain about using the term and clarifying the point. It might be only when it’s emerging.”

“I’ll pass it on.”

“If the Wardens aren’t already telling as many people as possible, try to convince them to, or get people to pass on the word.”

“Okay! Uh, bulletin, I’m getting overloaded with information, there’s so much to sift through and I don’t want to mess up your aim by dumping a whole report into your one eye, so I wasn’t sure if—”

“What’s the bulletin?” I asked. I hated to interrupt, but ‘bulletin’ meant a succinct news statement. A flustered Kenzie might have made it into an essay.

“We’ve got ID on the first new Titan. It’s Mystic Magic Impaler.”

A heroine, I thought. Fuck.

Whatever my feelings were about Super Magic Dream Parade and their vigilante-level ugliness dressed up in gaudy distraction, they’d been fighting for the side of good, they’d been cooperating, and they’d helped.

“They were part of Teacher’s campaign. They got targeted.”

“Yeah. Three times.”

“Three?”

“They were lined up for an ambush like the Navigators were and then slept through it, their reputation was attacked like yours was, and they were the capes sent after a villain team Teacher set up to look more dangerous than they were.”

They were heroes who killed. I wasn’t so different from them in that, I was sorry to admit, but I’d never enjoyed it or joked about it the way they seemed to.

“Why was he so interested in them?” I asked. “Because they were easy marks?”