Dashing devil omnibus 2.., p.146
Dashing Devil Omnibus 2: Books 4-6, page 146
“Right again, Jill,” Phil replied. “And according to people that were there, Devil and The Devoted did everything in their power to be respectful and not to make the event about themselves. They entered quietly, sat at the very back, and apparently left early. They even made an attempt to draw the press off once their attendance was leaked by one of the people at the funeral who’d set up a live broadcast. That doesn’t sound to me like either the Authority or The Devoted were making any attempt to exploit the event for public favor points.”
“I can comment on that,” Kayla interjected with a serious expression before turning to face the camera. “From what I know of Dashing Devil and his team, the last thing they would want to do was to turn those children’s funeral into a publicity stunt. If they did, I’m certain I would have been one of the first to know—at least I hope they would have asked me to cover it.”
“I’m sure you’re right, Kayla,” Jill reassured the now frowning reporter. “I think it’s safe to say, despite what some people are claiming on the net, that the eulogy for Henry and Maxine Dashing Devil gave was done with pure intentions. That becomes even more obvious to anyone who has seen it.”
The anchorwoman pursed her lips. “I haven’t seen it yet myself, but we at News2 contacted Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs and received their permission to share some of the footage with our viewers. You can judge for yourselves if Devil only spoke to garner public favor.”
The news desk shrank down into one corner as the screen filled with a closeup of a stoically sad-looking Boyd standing at the podium in the funeral parlor. News2 played it right from the beginning but paused after he said he didn’t think anyone could fully prepare to speak about such a tragedy.
“It’s worth noting that the Fact Checkers verified that statement.” Phil’s voice cut over the stilled image of Boyd when he paused and scanned the gathered mourners. “Dashing Devil literally would have rather fought the Last Dragon again than address the people in that room. That lends further credence to him viewing this as anything but a PR opportunity.”
The clip continued to play on. While the big demon tried to contain his emotions, they were clear to anyone who was watching. His golden eyes, usually fierce and determined when he appeared on screen, reflected a deep sorrow and empathy as he spoke about the tragic loss of two children taken from their parents far too young. The pain etched into his expression was palpable. It resonated with the grieving parents seated before him when whoever was taking this from their pocket datapad tilted it to show Mrs. Jacobs squeezing the hand of an openly sobbing Mr. Jacobs.
As the footage continued, viewers could see the genuine respect and honor in Boyd's demeanor as he recounted the bravery and kindness of the Jacobs children. The Devoted’s Captain, usually so commanding and powerful, spoke with a softness that conveyed both strength and vulnerability. It was evident that he was speaking not as a Hero but as a man—one who grieved and carried the weight of that loss with him.
And that was before his tears started falling.
Tinker noted that Mrs. Jacobs had been right to refer to what Boyd had done during the eulogy as pretty crying. He didn’t get all red and splotchy the way she did when the water works started—like was probably happening right now, given how tight her throat got at seeing the depths of Boyd’s sorrow all over again. Glancing around, she confirmed that there wasn’t a dry eye at the table, or floating just off to the side of the screen in Silvie’s case. Laura was holding out the best, her eyes had just misted over as she rubbed Daisy’s shoulder.
The clip ended before Boyd’s heartfelt apologies at the end, likely for liability reasons. Heroes really weren’t supposed to admit to any form of culpability, which even an apology for not being good enough could count as. They had spent like a full day on it in her original six-month training program.
Boyd was a stickler for the rules—at least for what he considered the important ones. Evidently, her team captain didn’t think the culpability rule was one of the important ones.
When the clip ended, the camera cut back to the news desk to show that Phil had turned around in his chair. Tink snorted softly… the man was too proud or thought he was too manly to show his tears to the world. Kayla had tears openly streaming down her cheeks, but while she didn’t cry as prettily as Tink’s hunky demon, she pulled it off artfully with the occasional dab at her eyes with a tissue.
Jill, on the other hand, had completely lost her shit.
The normally too-chipper anchorwoman was in a shambles, openly bawling into her hands. “Why… D-didn’t th-they w-warn m-me it would be so saaaad,” she sobbed, her shoulders shaking dramatically.
“Those jerks said they wanted our honest reactions,” Phil said gruffly, his back still to the camera.
“I’m sorry, y-you two,” Kayla replied. Her voice shook a bit, but she was much more composed than the other two. “I would have warned you if I knew you were going in blind. I first saw it last night and had a similar reaction.”
“Can we go to commercial?” Phil asked grumpily.
“Why isn’t anyone bringing me some tissues?!” Jill demanded as she waved franticly off-screen, likely at some poor intern who was about to be chewed out for a media executive’s decision.
The broadcast cut to commercial, and Silvie turned the screen off before slowly floating back towards the table while wiping at her eyes with her palms. “It g-got me even w-worse the second t-time,” she admitted with a hitch in her voice.
“Y-yeah,” Raev replied, dragging in a ragged breath before letting out a shuddering sigh. The fiery redhead wasn’t much of a crier, but even her cheeks were damp. “I think I was being strong for him yesterday.”
“Me, too,” Hope added, wiping at each cheek but having a hard time keeping up with the streams that trailed down her cheeks.
Tinker realized in that moment that angels could both be pretty criers and the saddest-looking things that could possibly exist. The golden glow she gave off had dimmed. Hope and Silvie then fell into each other’s arms to comfort one another, taking turns wiping the other’s tears away.
“It wasn’t that sad,” Daisy lied, trying and failing to hide her tears behind the screen of her colorful hair.
“It got me pretty good,” Laura admitted, although it looked like she had shed only a few tears. She had one hand on Daisy’s back and the other on Tinker’s shoulder, rubbing both soothingly. It felt nice.
“Poor Boyd,” Tinker added softly—mostly so she wasn’t the only one who stayed quiet as she wiped at her face with her napkin.
She almost forgot all about why she was sad when a sudden surge of warmth, love, and assurance flooded her. That’s when she heard it. And by the way everyone perked up, they heard it, too—a rapid and steady thudding that only grew louder. Or, more accurately, closer.
Her big hunky demon could be as quiet as a Spectral Mouse when he tried, but when he wasn’t thinking about it, you could feel him coming through the vibrations in the stone floor.
The thudding stopped for a second and then he came soaring into view, landing just shy of the table with a thud that had their silverware clattering on the surface. Water dripped from his wings, and he wore only a towel around his waist that he held closed with one hand. He looked around with a small amount of panic showing on his expression as he took in all the crying women.
“What happened?” he half demanded, half begged for an explanation. “Why is everyone so sad?”
“Girl stuff, Darling,” Silvie said with a little giggle. “We’ll be okay.”
She slipped out of Hope’s arms and pulled the angel with her as she floated over to the big demon and tucked herself into his side. Hope strode behind her to wrap her arms and wings around him in a hug. They each made their way over, Laura almost pulling Daisy along with her, to join in on the group hug. Tinker took her customary spot with her arms wrapped around his waist, cheek resting against his stomach.
Mindy power walked into the dining room wearing her emotionless mask, the one she only used when she was upset about something—at least at home. She had a big towel wrapped around herself and her hair was pulled up into a loose bun to keep it dry in the bath. For whatever reason, she wasn’t joining the group hug. The Mind Powered just stood nearby and watched, which was concerning.
‘I blocked his Bonds without his permission,’ Mindy sighed into Tink’s thoughts. ‘I knew it would upset him, but I didn’t think he would catch on so quick with how hard I was trying to distract him. He hammered his way through my block in an instant the moment he realized he couldn’t sense all of you.’
‘Are… are you two okay?’ Tink sent.
‘It will be alright, I’ll just keep my distance until he cools off.’
Tinker leaned back as best she could with the others pressed close to look up at her big hunky demon. His concern filled golden eyes found her own. “You’re not so mad at Mindy for trying to give us a moment for… for girl things… that you wouldn’t appreciate her joining the hug, are you?” Tink asked, not believing that he would be—despite Mindy having access to his thoughts and evidently thinking that would be so.
She watched him melt a little. When he gave her a reassuring smile, it was a bit rueful.
Boyd rumbled, “Of course not.” He looked over to Mindy and added, “Come here, my love.”
‘Thanks, Tink,’ Mindy said warmly as she padded over on bare feet and settled in behind Tinker, making the little inventor the pickle in the middle of a warm and comforting sandwich.
Tinker may not have had romantic feelings for the women she shared her hunky demon with, but she loved them just the same. She pressed her cheek into Boyd’s stomach and sighed. They would all be okay as long as they were together like this, supporting and caring for each other.
Chapter 37
Half an hour later, Tinker, Laura, and Boyd were all fully suited with their training loadout. For Laura, that meant no lethal or extremely dangerous chemicals. Tink had her photon-based weaponry set to stun so that any errant shots wouldn’t cut the flesh of anyone present. And Boyd was loaded out with Billy Balls and his sword and dagger had been switched out for practice versions that would break before seriously wounding someone.
It was the day after the funeral and Mindy had advised that the thing to do would be to try to return to a normal schedule. After a team discussion that included Davis and Royce after their group hug, it was determined that they would return to their patrols tomorrow. Laura would visit The Tower to have her classification updated and Raev listed as her trainer before her official field training could begin.
That meant Boyd had a few last things to check off as her head trainer.
They’d started off the day with Tink’s second and Laura’s third and final mandatory Pain, Fear, and Failure training. He got the feeling that she would come back for more, which was good for her—even if it wasn’t the best for his heartstrings. They had both done well.
Tinker had avoided any period of dissociative shock this time, though they’d stepped things up a notch, and he judged them both fit to continue with some physical training. It was actually going to be Laura’s initial certification exam, but Boyd wasn’t about to tell her that until she’d passed with flying colors.
They’d gathered in the multi-purpose training room and Boyd had configured it to an obstacle course. More specifically, it was the exact same course he’d had started Laura out on to begin her Hero training. His little inventor was being included because she came out of the second traumatic session even more determined than the first, and Laura had said she didn’t mind the company.
This wasn’t meant to be sentimental, especially given that he had kept things to light flirting during her training sessions—at least he’d tried to, to the best of his ability. One of the things that made his Trainee such a good fit for their team was her confidence and aggressiveness. But her training sessions hadn’t exactly been chock full of fond memories built between them.
Laura had tackled dozens of different course configurations with increasing difficulty ratings during her training. But based on the glint in her pale green eyes and the eagerness he sensed bubbling across their Bond, she immediately recognized this one. Boyd looked on with pride as Tinker and Laura prepared to tackle the obstacle course.
It had been quite a journey to get here, filled with countless hours of training, lessons, and a few setbacks. But seeing Laura now, so determined and focused, Boyd knew she was ready to move her training into the field.
“Laura,” the big demon said with a smirk, “I see you recognize your old friend.”
“Friend might not be the right word,” she replied wryly with a smirk of her own, pale green eyes flashing. “Nemesis might be more applicable.”
“It was part of your training.” Boyd grinned back at her. “That would make it more of a rival than a nemesis.”
“Semantics,” Laura scoffed before her gaze returned to the set of obstacles with the challenging glare he’d taught her to use when confronting Powered Criminals. That glare very successfully communicated that she knew—not thought, or believed, but knew—that she could tear whatever she used it on to pieces.
Tinker’s helmet and visor extended up from the slightly thicker ring of material around the collar around her neck in a manner that resembled the folding hidden door to Granny’s core chamber, parts came out in interlocked segments that clicked securely into place with their neighbors. Tink insisted that while there was some loss of structural integrity as a result of the design, the convivence and inability to put a helmet down and forget it somewhere more than made up for it.
“It doesn’t look too hard,” Boyd’s little genius noted after scanning the course with her armor’s onboard sensors.
Granny had already suggested the most efficient way to traverse it.
“Take the armor off and say that again,” Laura challenged as she crossed her arms and settled her weight on one hip, evidently taking offense at Tinker’s remark. “When I first tackled it, I didn’t have any Powered strength at all. I was pretty much a normal human.”
“Sorry,” Tinker said with a nervous laugh. Her rapid, staccato speech with a few stutters made a rare appearance. “I… ah… I c-couldn’t even m-manage the first wall without my armor or some s-sort of equipment. I didn’t mean it would be easy for a normal p-person, just that Boyd n-normally sets up harder ones. I d-don’t even see any targets.”
She turned to Boyd. “Are there hidden targets? Is that what made it so tricky?”
“Nope, no hidden targets.” Laura frowned. “But if it’s like old times, occasionally an ‘unknown threat’ will show up and attack you. If you fail to disable the threat before it reaches you, you have to start over.”
“Unknown threat?” Tink asked, her brow scrunching behind the mostly transparent pink visor that covered her hazel eyes as she looked from Boyd to Laura and back again.
Boyd nodded in confirmation, keeping his face neutral. “The unknown threat is a simulated attacker meant to keep you on your toes and test your reaction time. Just like in the field, you never know what might come at you.”
Laura’s training had paid off, as she managed to keep a straight face. “But as the course itself isn’t much of a challenge for you Tink, we can give you some targets.”
Boyd grabbed a hand-held tablet from his monitoring desk and tapped the screen a few times. A set of target drones, which looked like red and white striped balls, came floating out of ports that opened in the wall. They took up positions throughout the course, none of which were meant to be trick shots or otherwise difficult.
“Tinker is up first,” Boyd said. “Don’t stop after your first round, just keep going until you can’t, or I say otherwise.” He gave her a wink. “And hit as many targets as you can on each pass.”
“Alright.” Tinker nodded, squaring her shoulders.
She then turned and walked to the starting line. Two short mechanical arms folded away from the back of her armor, looking like a high-tech version of the thick bone that connected Boyd’s wings to his back. Several smaller arms extended from each, folding out before faintly glowing pink panels appeared, forming angular, segmented wings.
Each of the panes of solidified light looked like it could be a blade and part of her training would be using them as such. Sure, they were there to stabilize her flight and allow her to perform more intricate aerial maneuvers than propulsion packs permitted, but each blade of light was pretty much a weapon.
Her wing span was only about seven feet, though. The wing blades extended two and a half feet in either direction from her body, so using them as such would be risky. But Tink had declared them to be better than a clumsy blaster. To which Boyd had replied, recognizing the quote, “Not as clumsy or random as a blaster; an elegant weapon for a more civilized age.”
Tink had gotten so worked up that he’d remembered Obi-Wan’s words from their first real date, that all further explanations and demonstrations of new gear had been put on pause for thirty minutes. A brightly blushing, but very excited, Tink had requested Granny activate her ‘privacy mode’ for the next half-hour.
The saucy AI had done so, but not before bouncing her brows and giving her ‘granddaughter’ a wink.
With her wings prepared, Tinker gracefully floated several inches up off the ground before shooting forward. She made the course look easy, flying through it at close to a hundred miles an hour. Most of the obstacles were completely negated by her flight, but she mirrored the course, staying only three or four feet above the ground, or the obstacles, so that it at least looked like she was sticking to the course.
As she literally flew through the course, Tink took out the target drones—multiple times. Either another mechanical arm would come out of the slight pack on her back and a light dart would shoot out, or her course would veer over to them as she sliced through the drone with her light wings’ sabers.
