Imp focused on her power, pushing back against the erasure that her power established at all times. Pushing herself into their awareness again.

“—who’s… ah, Imp,” Roman said. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Imp said. She looked at Peep, “I’m going to figure out how you do that.”

“Tinker B.S., as Tattletale puts it,” Peep said.

“Are you guys going to kill each other if I leave you alone for five minutes?” Imp asked.

“We have the flash gun,” Darlene said.

“And birds,” Aiden said, as the birds picked up in volume again.

“And birds,” Darlene clarified.

“Okay, great. Just… keep it down. Tattletale is napping and we maybe don’t want to remind Rachel about the puppy incident.”

Peep ducked her head down, wilting under the memory.

“Chin up. She’s gentler than you would think. Give it a bit of time, and if she doesn’t come around, I’ll talk to her, okay?”

“Thank you,” Peep said, mollified.

Imp gave the kid a pat on the back, then stepped out into the hallway.

Parian was there, along with Rachel, Bastard, and Doon. And then there was Brian, or a version of Brian.

“Hi,” he said.

Same voice. Same face. He looked uncomfortable in the black leather jacket and jeans he wore.

“Hi,” Imp replied. She looked around to check for bystanders, then pulled off her own mask. “You’re not wearing the lame skull face paint anymore. That’s cool. You can always say Valkyrie made you do it, at least.”

“That’s my face now,” he said. “This is face paint, covering it up.”

“Oh.”

“And Valkyrie turned Titan. It’s why I’m here, now,” he said.

“This is going swimmingly. Just like I imagined,” Aisha confided in Rachel. “My foot stuck thoroughly in my mouth.”

“That happens when you talk as much as you do,” Rachel told her.

“Valkyrie sent some of her flock out to find people they used to work with, or to help the Wardens. She wanted some of us, me included, to stick close to her, because we had tools she needed. Now that she’s gone, I was thinking of joining with you guys or the Red Hands.”

“They’re gone,” Parian said. “Broken up.”

“I thought it might be that.”

“The only reason they stuck around like they did was because of the political marriage of you and Cozen,” Aisha said. “Without that, new city, new dynamic, it couldn’t last.”

“We weren’t married,” he said. His eyebrows drew together. “Were we?”

“It’s a figure of speech, big brother,” Aisha said. She took a step forward and took hold of his collar, the zipper digging into her palms. “Why are you talking only business? Where’s the ‘happy to see you’?”

“Y—” he started. Again, his eyebrows drew together. “You went and grew up. Your face changed shape.”