Issue 6 epilogue - What have I done?

Link stares down at the half-mask in his hand, broken off from Lady Destine. And he looks behind him, at the Ready Room and the broken window where a grenade went in. The red indicators in his heads-up display are flashing, but he doesn't pay attention.

Otto pulls up, with Pneuma driving. Both are in combat mode, ready for anything. Link waves them down wearily. Only when he tries to disengage Niki does he realize what's going on. The young robot is offline entirely. His anger is dissipating, and a sense of panic sets in. Pneuma helps him strap the half-disassembled exoskeletal form to the top of the car, and they take off for the workshop.

"What happened out there?" Pneuma demands tersely. Otto doesn't need to speak; even in silence, Leo can read his apprehension.

"The Gnome is working with the Shadow Syndicate. Judson Snow, my dad. He's back.. But there's more."

The STF drains out of Link's helmet and he pops it off. Sweat runs down his face. In the passenger-side mirror, he looks at himself and sees a train of blood coming from the scalp. "The Lemurian submarine. The thieves must have hit it hours after we actually got it out of the water. So I started thinking, how could they have known about it? I thought maybe a leak in Lemurian embassy security. I was wrong."

"There was a signal Quorum detected from the Antarctic. You saw what they did with the security scanners we placed around our site, right? They beat it with a simple signal loop. The Antarctic was exactly the same M.O., just on a much bigger scale. Solar Girl was weak around the sub - and around that big bruiser we just fought. ACTION should be taking him into custody."

Leo realizes he's talking at a mile a minute. But Pneuma and Otto are tensely listening, so he must be making some kind of sense. He lets it all out, a verbal torrent. "He took off his gloves. He was radiant. They'd done something to him. They used the Lemurian power source to power him up. The Gnome's been doing that for years. He had a drone there - like my surveillance units, only a lot more advanced - and he was ordering those guys around. He gave them orders to go easy on me."

He feels like he's rambling. He swallows, tries to organize his thoughts, starts again. "The Gnome is working with the Syndicate. They must have had me under observation. They saw us raise the Lemurian submarine. They took the power core from it. Maybe they had prior intelligence about it, maybe not. Either way, they got something valuable. They then used it to enhance at least one test subject."

"Then they sent foot soldiers and two tough cookies to attack the Ready Room - well, no, to get an ice gun away from one guy. One of Ice Pirate's mooks. I had to call in a marker with Agent Waters to get a list of names. We hit the streets, narrowed it down. We tracked the guy back to the RR. Solar Girl destroyed the weapon. But still, that was way too much force for just one ice gun. So it wasn't just the gun as a weapon. They wanted the ice control technology. That's when the Antarctic connection hit me. They're down there, they need a way to stay insulated, maybe this gun has the key. Or maybe they found something down there that makes the gun work better. Either way, the common factor is me again. I went after Ice Pirate. If the Gnome had me under surveillance, that's when he became aware of the technology. All he had to do after that was tail me right to the Ice Pirate's man."

Pneuma finally speaks up. "If that's true, they were thwarted now, so they might try to break Ice Pirate out. Didn't you say Quorum tracked down a source of the parts to make the gun as well? They might be next."

Leo nods. "Yeah. We have to tell Una Mar. We have to tell ACTION."

---

Back at the workshop, Leo studies the damage to Niki in mounting horror. The new untested attack he used - venting hydrogen from the capillaries and using the vernier control circuit to ignite it - backfired when he blew up the car. I blew up a car, he reminds himself with growing feelings of guilt. The result was a series of micro-explosions throughout most of Niki's shell as the car's explosion ignited the hydrogen still being circulated through her interior. There were spare parts enough for a full replacement, and a night's hard work would finish the job, but --

He stares sadly at the charred hulk of his new friend, watches as her optics light up. "I'm really sorry, Niki. Are you okay?"

"That hurt pretty bad, boss," the robot answers weakly. "But the racing... that was fun.. thank you for that.."

Otto is parked nearby. Leo realizes that as he's been wheeling Niki around the workshop to various diagnostic units and spare-parts bays, Otto's been re-parking himself to be close by.

Leo pats the charred shell gently. "We'll get you fixed up. You're just getting started, kid. There'll be plenty of races for you to win. I promise."

"She'll be okay, right boss?" Otto asks. It's strange to hear a plaintive tone in his voice. "If she needs any spare parts, I got plenty."

"She'll be fine, Otto. I promise." Leo clutches his head, trying to stop himself from thinking too much about how things ended up this way. "I'm gonna make this right, buddy. I swear. To both of you."

---

Pneuma's face is the first thing Leo sees. He's in the hammock in the workshop. He's covered in grease. He discovers through probing with his fingers that there's a bandage on his forehead, one he didn't put there.

"You work too hard, Leo."

"I do that when it's my fault," he replies, with whatever energy his tired body can muster. It's not much, he discovers. "I was stupid. I heard my dad and I attacked. We maybe could have walked away. A bunch of civilians in the bar, and I forgot about them completely. I'm a complete jerk." There, he observes silently, there's the energy.

Pneuma runs her hand gently through his hair. "You charge in. It's who you are. This time, it was a bad thing to do." If Leo's hurt at hearing this shows, she chooses to disregard it. "You need to hear that. It sounds like you already knew it. That's good. That means progress. Niki's back on her feet. I heard Solar Girl stopped a grenade. So... it could have been worse."

Leo tries to gracefully exit the hammock. He falls, with only Pneuma's strong arms to catch and cradle him. As she helps him to his unsteady feet, he hears her voice very near his ear. "People make mistakes. We learn from them. Learn from this one. Sometimes.. charging in is the right thing to do."

---

Someone collected newspaper clippings of Link's recent exploits on one wall in the workshop. The most prominent one is of Otto in combination, punching through an ice wall at the bank. Leo's studying it over a cup of coffee. "Go home, Leo," advises Beta as he walks past, but the young man ignores the advice. He's still struggling with the implied heroism of the picture. How different he feels today.

Contemplation sets in. Ice walls - the ice gun - Antarctica - the frozen cops - the barriers Ice Pirate's men created.

Then it hits him. The galaxy of ideas explodes in his mind, so forcefully that he loses the mug. "I have it!" he bellows. "I have it!" He sprints to his desk, pushing all the other paperwork off it in a single pile to the ground, and grabs a sheet of draft paper and some pencils.

Every few minutes he yells instructions across the lab. He's not even sure who's listening. "Increase carbon farm production 100%! No, more! Crank it to maximum! I need the servo production sped up." He breaks the graphite tip of one pencil, snatches up another one, and continues furiously sketching. "Damn that old man, damn him if he thinks he's so smart! Selfish old bastard, all he wants is money and recognition. He doesn't care. I'll show him. He may be older, he may be smarter, he may be better equipped. But nobody, nobody, is more determined than me!"

What if? - People were wrong about the Enforcers

Invictus drew in a breath. He didn't like what he was about to say, and nobody here would like it either. But he'd never backed down from a challenge before. This would merely be his last. The founding board of the Enforcers waited. He spoke.

"The future prediction matches with Aresian history. The destruction of humanity will come from this time period, from a member of the most powerful force on Earth. That time, according to the prophecy, is now. That force, according to everything we know, has to be us. One or more of us will destroy the human race."

Almost a dozen voices clamored for the attention of the room. Triton's booming voice cut through the din.

"Other heroes can stop us, should that happen."

Invictus' smile was sardonic. "They'd try. But can they? Do you really believe that?"

The sea-god reluctantly withdrew. The Aresian looked from face to face. Some wore masks, but their feelings were as plain as their bare-faced comrades.

"There is only one force that can stop us. That is ourselves. The Enforcers have to be sealed away. The Anti-Zone is the safest course of action."

Others broke in. Oya was first. "What about our enemies? Earth isn't free of villainy yet."

"We will... we will have to take steps. Permanent steps." This raised the loudest objections of all from the founding board. Invictus sighed. This, he knew, would be the hard part.

Moleculon was next. "You're talking about murder. You're talking about killing them, or depowering them. All of them. Xee, Nuculon.. that's one thing, but without us, even some of the mid-level criminals will run roughshod over the cops and the junior heroes. We've been too good at our jobs."

Invictus nodded. "Yes. Anyone who could have posed a significant threat. We have a couple of decades of work ahead of us. But no more. After that, we have to seal ourselves away."

The Marksman spoke up. "Hold on. Like you say, there's basically nobody who can stop us in combination. That means the governments of the world too. They won't like it. They'll resist us. And we'll push back. We'd have to. How do you know that this won't turn us into the destroyers your prophecy predicts?"

Invictus sighed. "We'll have to balance force, coercion, and .. well, honestly, a blind eye. Some of the worst villains will have to be allowed to run rampant for awhile. The need for law and order will make the government accept our actions."

Captain Victory's comment was a disgusted grunt. "Law and order. Really, Jordan? You're going to terrorize the populace indirectly! How are you better than the villains you're talking about taking down?"

"No, he's right." The Shroud's voice was quiet, but it commanded silence from the others. "Leaving the superhuman world a blank slate is the only way. He's not asking you to like it. He's asking you to do it."

"What about the non-founders? What do we tell them?" Microman asked. "This doesn't sit well with us. How will they react?"

"They will have to understand. We'll see some desertions. We have to accept that. Everyone we can't afford to lose is already in this room." Invictus put his hand to his forehead and rubbed at the growing pain there.

"You're talking about creating a new age. A dark age where murder has become acceptable," Hoplite concluded. "You're gambling that there's a light at the end of that tunnel. You're gambling people won't follow our example once we're gone. That's a big gamble."

"I know. But what else can we do?"

Invictus' simple question invited alternatives, but none came. The group stayed silent for minutes.

"The Anti-Zone. We'll be fighting all the people we put there." Oya finally speaks. But her point signifies acceptance. The others seem resigned too.

Microman rubs his chin. "The future might need us. The only way they can get us back, if the worst comes to pass, is to retrieve us from the Zone. Besides, I'm not a fan of suicide, even if I was fully convinced that this outcome was certain. I want a chance to come back."

In due course the motion was put to a vote. And in due course the tally was announced. Plans were made. Letters were written. Documents were sealed. A capsule was fired into space, one that could be found at a certain place and time, explaining everything. An apology to the future, if there was one, for what was to come next.

What if? - Link died and came back

He feels like he's been asleep for a long time. Every part of his body feels numb.

"Do you know your code name?"

The voice is familiar. It takes a few seconds to connect. It's Pneuma. But he can't see her yet. He wants to open his eyes, but they don't.

"Link."

Did something happen? Coma patients - or concussion victims - flash through his mind. He trusts Pneuma. But she's speaking again.

"Do you know why you chose it?"

He tries to swallow and thinks he was successful, but it's hard to tell. "Connections. Things connecting together. Machines. Family. Bonds. I wanted.. something that sounded cool too."

Pneuma laughs softly. But he's know her for years. Something in her voice signals that something is very wrong. "Leo, you're about to open your eyes. Be ready."

How could she tell him what he's about to do?

His eyes open. He's staring at the ceiling of his workshop. He tries to get up, unsuccessfully. "Servo activity spike. Should we release the clamps?" someone asks. Pneuma's voice, out of his field of vision, answers. "Release clamps. Leo, this is it. I'm so sorry. Get ready."

He finds himself sitting up. Where his legs should be are the lower half of a prototype robot shell. He raises a hand and finds an allotropic carbon prosthetic. He raises it further, touching his face, and feels the smooth surface of an artificial skin.

Pneuma is there, now, looking at him with sad eyes. He turns his head to look. His body is still connected to the apparatus of the workshop. Cables are plugged into his arms, his legs, his torso. He feels a slight tugging when he moves his head.

"What.. what happened?" he croaks.

"You died. You sacrificed yourself to save your teammates. So... we resurrected you from one of your regular brain backups. We put it into the AI creator. Full scan, number of evolutions zero. You're in one of your prototype shells, number thirteen I think."

"I feel different," he says at last.

"You'll adjust," Pneuma says quickly. Leo knows it's a hollow promise, knows she's trying to reassure him. He smiles at that. Or thinks he smiles. He forgets - does this unit have an actual mouth? Or is that sensation unreal, like a phantom limb?

"Alright. I trust you guys. And sooner or later I want to know what happened to me."

Pneuma nods. "Everything in good time. We're here for you, Leo." She leans in to hug him. It feels warm, and comforting, and human.

Good enough. Bodies come and go. Some things are more permanent.

Issue 6 prologue - Niki's second day

Leo threw everything in the back of the rental truck. Alpha drove it to the test site, and Leo and Pneuma followed in Otto. For hours, they subjected the thruster array to every test they could think of. Heat, pressure, exhaust venting, and emergency fuel ejection are all exercised, again and again. This isn't the first time they've done this work, but it's the first time they've executed the entire test suite. But the jets do their job.

Back at the workshop, Leo preps Otto. The huge car-robot unfolds, from a credible sports car imitation into something that looks more like a tanned hide. The construction robots - Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Delta, with Bob overseeing - mount the thrusters and run fuel pumps throughout the infrastructure. Leo takes care of writing the new pieces into Otto's proprioception software. It's midnight by the time they're done. Leo's the only one who needs to sleep, but he's the last one to quit working.

Leo's slung a hammock up in one corner of the workshop. He's toying with something in his hands when Niki's voice startles him. "Hey Leo?"

"Yeah, what is it?" He looks over. The motorcycle is parked, kickstand down, several feet away. She must have been watching. It's easy to overlook their presence when they hide in vehicle mode, he observes silently.

"Alpha. Beta. Gamma. Delta. And Epsilon and Zeta. Big brother told me about them. And Pneuma. And Nike. Are you Greek?"

Leo laughs aloud, the sound echoing off the workshop walls. "I'm a big mix. My dad's name is Judson Snow. Judson is from Jude, the short form of Judas - the betrayer from the Bible - and that's the Greek form of Judah. Yes, part of me is Greek. I've got some Italian blood too. My full name is Leonard Vincent Snow. Leonard Vincent from Leonardo da Vinci. My dad says we're his descendants. I think he means in spirit, since we're both inventors."

"Oh. That's cool. So you're part Greek." Niki laughs for a moment. "You're a Greek geek." She pauses. "And that's why you call us Greek names. Are we Greek too?"

"You can be whatever you want to be, Niki. The future is yours, now." Leo smiles softly, and returns his eyes to the figure he's turning about in his hand - a well-worn action figure replica of the Enforcers hero Hoplite.

Issue 6 prologue - Victory

The workshop has one room that Leo never enters, except for occasions like this. He flicks the lights on and stares at the contents. White walls, a comfortable cushion on the ground, a featureless white box with some cables leading out of it. They terminate in a halo of metal and circuitry.

For the last two hours, Leo's been drinking tea, listening to calming music, and psyching himself up. He steps inside and closes the door behind him. The silence becomes a sound of its own. He fancies being able to hear the words he's about to speak aloud, like an echo of destiny.

"Before the omnipotent witness, I pledge never to use this power for evil."

He sits down on the cushion. Careful fingers take hold of the halo and guide it over his head. A green button lights up on the device attached to it. After a final moment of deliberation, Leo presses it.

In his mind are memories of things that never were. In his mind's eye, there's a girl - a little sister to the big robot he knows as Otto. She's small and fast. She loves to fly. The clouds and the road call to her equally. Most of all, she's happy, because she has a family.

Minutes turn into hours. Leo's visualization gradually stops when he realizes he's heard the chime of completion from the device. The neurochip in his brain has been feeding a steady stream of mind-state into the computer via the interface device he wears. Now it's letting him know it has enough to work with.

The product of his dream won't be exactly like he imagined. It's better that way. Real people are full of surprises.

Computing power has advanced considerably since he created Otto. The evolution period takes mere minutes now. And Leo is ready, as a keyboard and monitor slide out of the white box to let him communicate with his creation.

"Hello".

The text is immediate. "Hi!"

Leo smiles, interested already. The first moment of consciousness for a new entity, and what she feels is enthusiasm? Alright then.

"Do you know your name?"

"Niki." The blinking cursor seems somehow eager, flashing on and off impatiently for him to type something in response.

"Do you know why you have that name?"

The text flashes back immediately. "Nike. Goddess of strength, speed, and victory. But you didn't want to call me a shoe. So Niki it is."

Leo grins and keeps typing. "Welcome to the world, Niki."

----

The other robots have assembled in the workshop. Link has plugged Niki's black box into the central hub, and waves goodbye without a word as the other robots, one by one, connect themselves to the same device. He heads up the stairs to the junkyard to look at the stars.

What's happening downstairs is a policy he instituted a long time ago: when a new robot is created, the others get to talk to it as soon as possible. They are having a conversation that Leo doesn't get to hear. Whatever they say is between them, and will stay that way.

Pneuma eventually comes up the stairs and approaches him. "She's ready for you," the girl announces with a quirky smile. "She's interesting. Just be careful with her in the field."

Leo doesn't know what to make of this announcement. With one raised eyebrow, he heads back down the stairs. There's one more thing to say.

The voice systems are online. Niki's teenage voice emanates from the speakers. "Hey Leo! I can see you on the camera. This feels weird."

"Hey Niki." Leo smiles, and runs his hand through his hair while he steadies himself. The words are always hard to say, but they have to be said. He plunges ahead. "Niki, I created you, but you are your own person. I'm going to ask you to join our organization. You have the right to say no - to do anything you want, in fact. Take your time and think this through, because it's important. But I do swear one thing to you: if you do leave, you can come back for repairs and maintenance, at any time, and I will provide it. No obligation. No questions asked. Ever."

Niki's voice finally comes out of the speaker. "That's really sweet. I promise I'll think about it, and give you an answer soon, okay?"

Leo pats the computer console affectionately. "Sounds good. Until then, get some rest. You've had a good first day."

Issue 6 prologue - In a family way

Leo is throwing the football around with Otto in the minutes before dawn. The mall's parking lot is empty, and security isn't making the rounds for another few hours.

"What do you think of having a little sister?" Leo asks. He winds up, tossing the football. Otto's wheels screech as he gains traction, going from zero to 60 in a few electrically-powered seconds. Thirty yards away, the ball sails effortlessly through the car's open window and lands on the driver's side seat.

"What do you mean, boss?" Otto asks curiously, rumbling back and ejecting the ball into Leo's waiting hands.

Another toss, another peel-out, another good catch. "A little sister. You know, someone like you, only younger, definitely smaller. One might be on the way. I want to see how you feel about it."

Otto's brakes squeal as he comes to a sudden stop. "Waitaminnit. Boss, are you and Pneuma... I mean, is she in a family way?"

Leo almost falls over. "No, you big lug!" he yells. "First, we aren't even dating, much less that.. And hey, why is this second? Second, a robot can't have babies! Why are we even having this conversation? You've seen me make a half dozen robots already."

Otto's voice laughs, as Leo's face grows more and more red. "Just joshin' you, boss." The car returns. Leo, noticing the sunrise, opens the car door and slides in.

----

Back at the workshop, Leo's got Otto's hood open, and is performing maintenance on the advanced robotics therein. There isn't even a facade of an engine - the modular transformation technology looks quite unlike anything out on the market today. But to Leo, it's familiar territory, and his hands move on their own while he continues the conversation.

"I'm working on metastable metallic hydrogen as a propellant for rockets. I think I can make a flight system. I want to build them into you. You're the most familiar platform I've got to work with. You okay with that, buddy?"

Otto's voice rumbles over the noises of Leo's diagnostic machinery. "Sure, I wouldn't mind flyin'. But what does that have to do with a sister? You're holdin' out on me, boss."

Leo smiles, and wipes some grease from his forehead before it drips into his eyes. "Well... you're the only one of us who doesn't have a human-scale body."

Otto doesn't need to remark on "us". The bonds of family are close, familiar, and assumed after all these years. "I like bein' the big guy, you know that!"

"True, you do. But... you're lonely, Otto."

The car says nothing. Leo fills the silence. "The rest of us have more places we can go and be together. I've offered to build you a smaller shell, but you've said no. I didn't ask why, and you didn't say. Alright, that's fair. But.. I don't want you to be alone. And a second flight platform - a motorcycle, say, with exoskeletal connection points like the others have--"

"Yeah, I get ya." Otto rumbles, revving his engines experimentally as the diagnostic monitors blink through their tests. "Thanks for thinkin' about me, boss. I'd like to say I don't need anything like that. But you're right. I do miss out sometimes."

Leo disconnects the sensors and closes the hood. "So, how about it? Can you be a good big brother?"

The car rumbles thoughtfully. "Dunno. Never been one before. What's it like?"

Leo laughs. "No big brother ever knows what it's like, until he really does it."

Issue 5 epilogue - the life of the party

The bar is loud, but Leo doesn't hear it. He's staring into his drink, watching the surface ripple as though dancing to the music. It sinks in that somebody said something. He turns and sees Pneuma, human as anyone else here in appearance, and the words catch up to the sight. "Stop thinking so much, Leo."

The young man sighs, and grins. "I'm too obvious. Sorry."

"Or tell me what you're thinking about, either way," the girl offers. She sidles up to the bar, waves down the bartender, and places an order. "Now. Emma is a blast, but you're looking moody, so you've got my time for a few minutes."

"Emma? It's Emma now? I'm still on Ms. Hunter-Hull. You guys must have hit it off."

"No distractions. Answer my question."

Leo takes a drink, swallows, smiles. "Yes ma'am. I'm not moody. Just realizing that I'm out of my depth on some of the things we're going to face. Jimmy really saved our bacon. He's the quickest thinker we have right now. I managed - barely - to hold my own against some toys. He took on a demigod on his own terms. That's great, and we got off really lucky. Karen saved an entire jet airliner from going down. Those people on board are alive today because of her."

"You're moody, Leo." Pneuma pokes him gently on the nose, then tries her own drink. "You aren't jealous of your teammates. You're just wondering if you can contribute too, aren't you."

Leo lets silence answer while he takes a drink and savors it. Finally he relents. "I took on a bunch of overgrown toys. Yeah, it was an important job. Given the chance to do it over again, absolutely I'd do the same thing. What I'm worried about is.. if it comes down to me, something only I can do for the team, will I be up to the task?"

Pneuma wrinkles her nose. "I was right the first time. Stop thinking so much, Leo. Just do what you have always done - charge in and do what you feel is right. I still have my reservations about Karen, but she really proved herself with the submarine. Given the choice, I would have turned her down. In this case - this one time, you keep in mind - I would have been wrong. You made a choice with her, and I see now why you did it. Sometimes following your gut is the best thing you can do."

Leo's face betrays sudden surprise as Pneuma grabs his hand and drags him away from the bar. "Like this. Out on the floor, young man. I want to dance."

What happens now? - age 18

The newspaper headlines are competing to outdo each other. "War In Heaven". "A Changed World". "How Many Dead?". "Earth's Darkest Day". "Unthinkable". "Devastation". A few brave souls are arguing that the world was saved by some unknown benefactor or happy accident. One incident in Wisconsin has a mystery figure in a mask pirating local television broadcasts to mumble a manifesto over a looped sample of "Ding dong the witch is dead". But all the stories have this much in common: the Enforcers are gone.

"The future is yours, now." Those simple words, localized for the viewer, were shown on every screen on the planet. It wasn't unthinkable - the Enforcers numbered gods among them, or so they claimed - but it was a stark reminder of where common people stood. A thing had happened; all they could do was survive the aftermath.

Some are celebrating. Some are weeping. For many, whatever they personally thought of the Enforcers' approach, the supports that held up the world have been kicked out. For them, the question isn't "are we in danger" or "did we luck out", but simply "what happens now?"

Leo remembers reflecting on this at age 18, the year the world changed. The Enforcers themselves had never busted down his door or thrown him in prison because of his family connection. But they had never put the Gnome away for good either - nor those like him.

He wore a suit and tie, for the second time in his life, to the court hearing at which he was given custody of Judson Snow's estate. Much of it had been sold off to pay for damages caused by the Gnome, but the old man wasn't that bad off. He was at most an accessory when other villains used his inventions, and he had shown plenty of legal income (and paid taxes on it) when foreign parties purchased his equipment. Leo slowly becomes aware that the Feds knew - but couldn't prove - that this was simply an excuse to launder some money, so they got their revenge by handing the lot of it to his estranged son.

He remembers the increasing sense of distance with Pneuma. And he remembers the night of the argument. It started - again - about the Snow estate and its disposition, and became something more. And, of course, Leo remembers how it began.

"With this money, I can finally build you a proper body, Pneuma."

He remembers her face - back then, an incredibly articulated but still clearly artificial metal - contorting in frustration and anger. "Leo, no! Stop. Listen to yourself. Upgrading me is irresponsible right now. You have your future to think about. Invest the money until you can find a job."

He finally got angry. At eighteen, he was invincible and he knew it. "I can find a job anywhere. I can find work in computers, in programming. It pays well. It'll be fine. Stop worrying so much. Things will be perfect, I promise."

Pneuma let out a sigh. "Things won't be perfect. Things aren't perfect. Leo, they aren't. Listen to me."

Leo stopped. The shock of hearing the girl of his dreams - quite literally - tell him this unbalanced him enough to secure silence for what was to come.

"You run up your parents' electricity bill paying for us. You're working two after-school jobs. You don't have any plans to go to college. But you're still trying to fit us into your fantasy family. Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Otto are still with you, yes, but.. Epsilon and Zeta ran off. They left you, Leo. And I know why. We're just copies of you. This is narcissism and escapism. You dreamed us up to be your toys."

Leo could only stare, open-mouthed, as she went on. What is she saying? There's no way she can be right? But what if she is? Thoughts warred against each other. Confusion, then horror, took hold of his heart.

"I'm leaving too, Leo. It's not because I hate you. It's because I love you too much to see you destroy yourself over us. You need to grow up, and fast. Stop playing with toys. Think about yourself for a change."

Pneuma drew close and gave him a soft hug, then turned away. She slipped on the black longcoat, hat, and scarf she used to travel in human crowds. Her hand was on the doorknob when he finally spoke.

He forgets just what he said at that moment. But he remembers Pneuma smiling sadly, and leaving anyway.

The paperwork for the Snow estate was immense. Krasnov, the lawyer overseeing the distribution of the estate, would see Leo three times a week. When he was on the road, Otto would handle steering and navigation, leaving the young man to his own brooding thoughts. Early on, these came in all varieties of self-pity. But over and over, the question appeared clearly in his mind. "What happens now?" He thought about the question, grappled with it, avoided it, tried reframing it, all to no avail.

And one day, six weeks, Leo remembers Otto stopping overly long at a traffic light. The passenger side door opened and a figure in a black coat slid into the seat beside him. But it wasn't Pneuma.

"Epsilon?" Leo asked in shock. "What are you doing here?"

The robot smiled, chrome skin peeking out from under the scarf he wore. "It's Bob now, Mr. Snow. I'd like to come back and work with you again. But I'm going to be my own person, if you don't mind." And he and Leo shook hands, and the young man cried tears of joy.

Pneuma was waiting for him when he got home, and she and Bob exchanged nods. "We met a few days ago," the gynoid explained. "Bob and I had a long talk. I think.... I think we realized the same thing, in different ways."

Leo knew enough to stay quiet. Whatever they had to say was more important than his feelings.

Pneuma, sensing the opening, smiled and spoke. "Leo, don't take this the wrong way, but you're an idiot. A helpless, lovable idiot. But this was something you weren't thinking about. It really nagged at me. It nagged at Bob. I didn't want to be created in your image, forced to be a toy, but... those thoughts came from me."

Her smile grew wider. "Don't you see, Leo? It was me. It was all me. And if we're thinking so differently that we'd argue about something like that, then... I am a real person. I am real, Leo!"

She grabbed hold of the surprised young man and gave him a bone-crushing hug that drove the air from his lungs. He was still dizzy when she let go, and her smile faded a little as she kept talking.

"I.. I can't be your girlfriend, Leo. I'm still worried. Please understand. What I feel, about you or anyone else, I have to know it came from me. I have to be sure. I have to be my own woman. I have to live my own life. But... I will stay with you, and I'll keep being your friend. You so desperately need one, Leo. You need people to look after you."

Leo smiled. And later he found out what he'd said to her the day she left. "Neither of us are copies of our makers," he'd said. And as Pneuma and Bob pulled close for a group hug, he knew it was true.

Later, the old debate resumed itself - the first of many times Pneuma would nag at Leo about his situation. "So? What are you going to do about the estate?"

Leo pulled a manila folder from his filing cabinet and handed it over. As the girl started to leaf through it, he explained. "My father sold a lot of weapons to a lot of people. He made things that hurt people. He kept records, though. So I'm going to work to make that better."

Pneuma looked up in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

He grinned back. "I'm moving to New Troy. A port city, lots of international trade. Judson Snow did a lot of business there, and bought a lot of parts too. A lot of his buyers will have a presence there. And he built one of his laboratories in the city. The government wanted me to take a look at his technology, see if they could get any ideas on how to counter some of his inventions. I'm going to do some inventing of my own."

Pneuma shook her head. "Wait, just exactly what are you going to invent, Leo?"

"The future." The young Snow rubbed his hands together. "The Enforcers are gone. Nature abhors a vacuum. People are going to start using the things my dad made. Him and others like him. I'll build things of my own. The question everyone's asking is 'what happens now?' The answer is 'whatever we make happen'. We have to do something, Pneuma. I want you to help me."

"You're an idiot, Leonard Snow," was her sharp response. "You're an idiot through and through. You're going to charge right into this thing like you always do, and you're going to need friends."

And as she watched his face fall, her sudden smile lit a fire in his heart. "So of course we'll be there with you."

Building a relationship - age 16

At sixteen years of age, you need two things to be cool. You need a car, and you need a girlfriend. Leo built himself a car. Unfortunately, he's only been in the area a few months, he's bored at school, and he doesn't have many friends. He's too obsessed with being awesome for the nerd cliques to welcome him, and he's too interested in computers for anyone else. With no natural alternatives available, he resolves to build a girlfriend.

He's done this sort of thing twice before. Otto was his first artificial intelligence - a black box the size of a desktop PC, which he's managed to shrink down since then but is happier living as a car. Alpha was the second, and the first to have a humanoid body of its own. Several other shells have been built, but none have their own intelligence yet.

The shell won't be fully lifelike. He's okay with that, because he knows it can be rebuilt and improved. The mind, though, he only has one shot at.

When Leo builds an AI, he's really using his father's work in a way it wasn't designed for. The neurochip at the back of his head has a full diagnostic that he knows how to access - because it taught him how - and "full" means "full". He can access every part of his own brain. He can create recordings of it, or download a backup. And he can extract parts of it.

AIs are built with a secret that Leo knows. There is no "self". The self is like a piece of music that arises from playing notes in harmony. The right notes and you have an opera, or a rock ballad. The wrong ones, and you get noise. So Leo creates a new person by forcing himself to remember what they are like, to play-act like he is that person. He imagines the seed, and the evolutionary software he wrote that the neural map plugs into will do the rest. He is the composer; the black box computers he builds are the conductors; his memories are the orchestra.

Leo has never had a real girlfriend. There was Carol Anne, back in grade school, but that consisted of one kiss behind the school and a lot of mud-throwing. Leo remembers waving goodbye to her as the witness protection program's car drove him away, and he remembers her not noticing. So all he has to go by when creating the AI's seed is what he sees on television, what he overhears from his classmates, and what he feels missing in his heart.

Focusing on the images is a matter of a couple hours, like watching a movie you've never seen. Actually dumping the neural map is a matter of minutes. It feels weird, but Leo is used to it now. Finally, the indicator lights come to life on the black box. Processing the neural map into a new personality will take hours or days. So Leo gets to work on the shell.

He's halfway through a basic torso when there's a "ding". Tools fall out of his hand as he rushes back to his PC and plugs everything in. She's asleep right now, he thinks. He types a few commands. Slowly, slowly..

"Hello," comes a voice. It's a toneless neutral, but the AI will adjust it. "Hello," types Leo, then repeats it out loud to the microphone. "Do you know who you are?"

"Pneuma," is the digitized reply. The voice is wavering, as the AI inside tries to make it sound like what both of them imagine his girl will sound like.

"Do you know what it means?" Leo asks hesitantly.

"Pneuma is breath, or soul, or spirit." The voice is sounding more feminine with every syllable. "Pneumatic, of a woman, means rounded or shapely." It pauses, and Leo gets a chill as it sounds, now, exactly how he imagined. "Am I the woman you wanted me to be, Leo?"

"I hope so. I want you to be." He isn't sure what else to say, so he points behind him. It's useless - there's no visual sensors for the AI to use yet. "I'm building you a body. It'll be done really soon. We'll make it better together. Pneuma, I'm going to make you perfect."

The next several days, Leo is busy until late hours installing the brain into the new shell. His foster mother bangs on the door and tells him to go to sleep more than once, only for him to turn out the lights and resume work with the aid of a flashlight.

One time the knocking on the door isn't late in the evening, and it isn't to tell him to go to sleep. "Leo, are you in trouble?" his foster-mother asks. "There's an FBI agent who needs to talk to you." Leo can't pull his blankets up over Pneuma's still-incomplete shell fast enough. He opens the door, face flushed, breath uneven. "What? No, mom, I'm not in trouble," he says automatically. Then he notices the man standing next to her. Or rather, he notices the tie.

"Thank you, Mrs. Conway, young Leo and I go way back. He's not in trouble, I'm just paying a visit," the man's voice says. "May we...?" Mom purses her lips, and nods, and walks away, but Leo almost doesn't notice.

"You like the tie?" The jacket the man is wearing closes over it, and Leo looks up, realizing that this is the first time he's seen the man's face. "It's got a pattern on it. A very subtle one. I can't see it, but you can. Your father can. People like you, with intuitive genius, can. The smarter you are, the more distracting it is to look at. It's a passive super-intelligence detector. But I'm old-fashioned like that."

He walks in the room, and Leo watches his eyes flicker over the bed, and knows that the man knows something about what he's up to. "Not all of my colleagues share my style. Most of them are wearing black body armor and packing energy weapons these days. Not hard to see why. A typical superhuman's energy attack will go through a cheap suit really well. One of the people I worked with got killed when the crowd she was in was attacked. She'd have made it with protection. Well, so would the civilians. Hell of a world we live in."

"I'm rambling, I'm sorry. Old man's prerogative. Agent Ted Waters." The agent turns and smiles. "Leonard Snow, or do you prefer Leo? I've been watching out for you most of your life."

Leo's panic has turned to wariness. He wants to go to the bed, to protect his work there, his dream, but he'd give himself away if he moved. So he stays frozen in place. "What do you want, Agent Waters?"

"The lady who got killed. My coworker. One man's crazy ideas, one man's desperation, one errant blast - well, maybe errant, maybe he intended casualties - ended her life. For him it was easy. For her it was thirty years of effort and hopes and dreams, ended like that." Waters snaps his fingers and stares out the window. "Power. That's what it does to people." His eyes find the young man's, and he looks very old. "You have power too, Leo. People worry about what you'll do with it."

"I don't have any power. I'm just a kid, going to school, like everyone else," Leo protests bitterly.

"You can build amazing things." Waters pats the mound on the bed gently. "Strong things. Maybe dangerous things. I'm not going to tell your mom, or anyone else. But it's my job to know, Leo. Your dad--"

"I'm not my dad!" Leo's volume surprises himself.

Waters holds up his hands, motioning for calm. "I know, I know you're not. I know that's not you. But you have his potential. Maybe not as much, maybe a lot more. Nobody really knows. So what if you do what he did - maybe for your own reasons, maybe the best of intentions - and you start building things that can be used as weapons? What should we do?"

Leo sighs. He thinks about an answer - he has to, it's been on his mind in some form since he was old enough to realize who and what his father was. And he has it, as he glances down at the covered robotic shell, and remembers what he's built and why.

"I don't build weapons. I build friends."

That makes Waters smile. "I like that. I do. And it makes me glad to hear. It won't satisfy most people, though, just hearing you say that it's okay. They'll still want you under observation. But I'll make sure that for as long as I can, I'll be the one observing. Is that okay with you, Leo?"

Leo sighs. The whole idea of having his life under surveillance because of his deadbeat dad doesn't appeal to him at all. But.. "Yeah, I guess it's okay. I mean, I can't stop you, can I?"

Waters gently pats his shoulder as he walks for the door. "Trust takes time. Relationships take time. We'll get there together. See ya around, Leo."

Issue 4 epilogue - you hired who?

"You hired who?" Pneuma demands. The living room of the Snow residence suddenly feels like a cage, and Leo gamely answers.

"Her name is Solar Girl. She seems to have the powers - but none of the mental problems - of Invictus. I'm absolutely certain they're related. She's looking for a place to stay, and--"

He doesn't make it through. "Let me repeat," Pneuma says with the quiet certitude of a distant thunderstorm. "You hired who?"

"I know what you're asking." The young man sighs. "No, I don't think she has a 'real identity' in the traditional sense. No, I'm not 100% sure what her motives are. No, I don't know that she won't turn into another Invictus."

"Then why did you go over my head, Leo?" the girl demands.

Leo thinks a moment. Why did he? He doesn't want to admit the answer, so he stalls for time. "Emma Hunter-Hull vouches for her."

"A former supervillainess vouches for this stranger?" Pneuma deadpans. "Great."

"She vouched for me!" is Leo's only immediate protest, but his partner brushes that off with a wave of her hand. "That calls her judgment into question even more, doesn't it."

Leo's had enough. "Fine. What do you tell a young woman with no place to go, and no identity, with villainous family hanging over her?" He doesn't need to say the rest: what do you say to someone just like me?

Pneuma is silent for a long time. Leo turns away, only to feel the girl's arms slide around his neck and pull him back into a hug. "You should have asked me first, Leo. But this time, I'll understand."

The two stay quietly together for a minute, then separate. Something else must fill the silence, and Leo volunteers it.

"Ilium is getting paid well for the Lemurian salvage, right? I talked to Una Mar about that. The reason they had to have us do it is that the wreck happened in United States waters. Somebody raised a fuss and insisted that some Americans be involved, so we got chosen. But everything's fine, she understands how it is."

Pneuma nods. "Good. That's good. And you were busy in the workshop after that. I know you, Leo. You got something from that."

Leo's enthusiasm bubbles out. "Metastable metallic hydrogen. The Lemurians have been working underwater, miles deep, since before America was colonized. Their ships are coated with an artificial crystalline shell that resists and contains extreme pressure. If there's a breach, the crystal automatically expands to seal it, like coagulation in blood. Well, I found a way to use that to create high-pressure chambers to create metallic hydrogen!"

Pneuma isn't dumb, but sometimes Leo needs to be grounded. Asking questions always does the trick. "Okay. Tell me the practical application."

The young man is ready for this. "Thrusters. The specific impulse of MSMH is five times that of the space shuttles H2O2 fuel mix - the richest, most energy-dense fuel we're using in commercial applications today. I can build rockets into Otto. If I can get my hands on a jet-powered craft, I can create a new flying robot. I can fly, Pneuma, I can fly!"

Pneuma smiles proudly. "Good. Now make sure you don't blow yourself up, and we'll see about funding whatever equipment you need to make this happen."