Archive of Our Own

“Ah, good evening, Zedaph!” The receptionist greeted as Zedaph walked in the door of Tek Industries.

“Good evening!” Zedaph smiled back. “Just waiting for Tango, you know the drill.”

“Of course. I’ll let him know you’re here.” The receptionist made a short call, then turned back to Zedaph. “He’ll be right down.”

Zedaph nodded. “Thanks. I hate to impose all the time, but...”

“Don’t tell him I said this,” the receptionist mused in a conspiratorial tone, “but I think you’re good for him. I swear, when you don’t drop by, that man never leaves his office.”

“Well, he is dedicated,” Zedaph replied. “This company is his whole life, after all.”

Internally, he grinned. That statement was more true than anyone - besides himself and two people at the office - ever knew, and he was proud of his little pun. Obviously Tango wasn’t a mindless slave to the business, but he had been programmed specifically with company purposes in mind.

At that moment, there was a ding, and the elevator opened to reveal the smiling android. “Hey Zed!” Tango waved. “Sorry if I kept you waiting.”

“Never,” Zedaph laughed. “Barely had any time to chat! Were you expecting me?”

“Call it a hunch,” Tango replied. After thanking his receptionist, he and Zedaph walked out of the building into the falling night.

Once they were out of earshot, Zedaph turned to Tango. “You don’t get hunches. What’s up?”

“A couple of suspicious-looking dudes outside your studio,” Tango said, almost casual. “I almost decided to meet you there, except we agreed that that’s not a good idea for secrecy.”

“Right, right, your security camera,” Zedaph remembered. “Yeah, those guys... a couple of my coworkers offered to distract them while I left. They were doing a bang-up job of it, too - I overheard a bit of a conversation about pizza rolls? Anyway, I hope they weren’t taking too much of a risk, doing that for me.”

“And what about the risks I take for you?” Tango asked, pretending to be offended.

Zedaph laughed and bopped him lightly in the arm. “Hey, you’re the one who offers. And maybe I trust you to be a little better at defending me - and yourself - than I do my human coworkers.”

-----

They were four blocks and around a corner from Zedaph's apartment when a man stepped out of the shadows in front of them. He was tall, intimidating, with a sharp face and beard, but his most striking feature was the metal augmenting the left half of his face. A flash of more metal was just visible on one of his crossed arms.

Tango automatically stepped forward, slightly in front of Zedaph.

The man looked from one to the other. “Don’t worry,” he told them, in a deep, accented voice. “We can take both of you.”

Hands grabbed both of them from behind. Tango broke away almost immediately, surprising his attacker with his strength. But the man behind him caught him again, twisting him into a more solid hold, this time surprising Tango with strength - super strength, it had to be - of his own.

Zedaph squirmed and even tried kicking out behind him, to no avail. He could tell that the person holding him wasn't using super strength against him, but they didn't exactly need to. "HELP!" Zedaph yelled to the air.

"If anyone comes to your aid, they will find that you are nowhere to be seen," the leader gloated.

Zedaph kicked one more time, then seemed to submit. Seconds passed. The group was about to start marching them somewhere, when a bat dropped onto the face of the man holding Zedaph. The man flinched and cried out in surprise, loosening his grip to swat at the animal. Zedaph took the opportunity to wriggle free and start running.

They let him run. "Hokay," the leader decided, watching him disappear around a corner. "This will bring our target out tonight, then. E, be ready. But wait for my command, or you might get hurt."

He raised a walkie-talkie. "B, you there?"

"Sure enough, I am."

"Check in with 49th and Oak when you can. I want to know what building our escapee went into, just in case we need it."

"You got it, boss."

Finally, he turned to Tango. "You... are very interesting, aren't you?"

"Not really," Tango lied. "I'm just his friend, trying to get him home safe."

"Oh, you're much more than that." The man reached out a metal hand and brushed it across Tango's shoulder. Static crept into a corner of Tango's visual processing. He shuddered. This man could control electricity with a touch, couldn't he? And maybe sense it, too, if he already knew what Tango was.

Oh no. Electric powers. Tango knew exactly who Zedaph would go to for help. And against anyone else in the city, it would be the right decision, but...

The man had mentioned luring out his "true target". Capturing Tango hadn't been their intent, although surely they were planning on keeping him, now. And Zedaph? He was just the bait. And now the bait was about to unwittingly lure in the next big catch.

-----

Zedaph burst in the door of the apartment he shared with two of his friends. "Impulse!!"

Impulse stood up to meet him. "Whoa, Zed! What happened?"

"T-Tango-" Zedaph panted, hands on his knees. "Tango's being kidnapped!"

"What??" Impulse and Skizz both said at once. 

Impulse immediately grabbed a monogrammed t-shirt from the chair it had been draped over. "Are you saying someone actually managed to restrain him? How many people were there?"

"Three," Zedaph briefed, as Impulse changed shirts and put on a leather jacket and sunglasses. "Just around the corner. Only one on Tango, he must have super strength or magnetism or something to hold him. One tried to grab me, but I got some help and got away. Their leader's a big scary guy with a bionic face."

"Bionics? I can handle that easily," Impulse said. He ran one hand through his hair as he moved toward the door, making it stand up in spikes maintained by arcs of static electricity. "You'll stay here with Skizz until I get back, right?"

Zedaph nodded. 

"Good luck out there, Mr. Super Volt," Skizz added.

"Thanks," Impulse replied. "See you in a bit."

-----

He recognized the three men surrounding Tango, from dossiers provided by the HHH - the House of Hermiton Heroes, the local agency for registered supers. These were three of the supers in the local mafia. Even the best surveillance barely had any information beyond suspected aliases; their leader, who turned to Super Volt as he ran toward them, was known only as Doc.

Super Volt wasn't sure why they hadn't left yet, but he didn't worry about that for long, as his attention was drawn to their prisoner.

"Let him go," Super Volt threatened, his eyes starting to glow as he prepared an attack.

Doc smirked. "You'd have to fight us for the right to him."

Super Volt glanced from one to the next. Something was wrong here. But what...

"Electricity does terrible things to bionics," he warned.

"Does it now?" the cyborg man asked, raising his eyebrows with false innocence.

The bionics should have given Doc reason to avoid electric powers, but he seemed to want Super Volt to attack him for some reason. Super Volt didn't want to give in to whatever devious plan this was. But he also couldn't hit the beefy man holding Tango without also hitting his friend.

That left the man with the white hair and a dark mask over his face, standing in a shadow and trying not to be noticed. Super Volt stepped closer to Doc, then suddenly turned and directed a full blast of electricity at the other.

Doc raised his hand. Rather than hitting its mark, the electric discharge redirected into him. He reveled in the energy as if it were a gentle rain.

He smirked. "All your stored charge? Thank you so much for your generous donation. E, grab him. He's harmless now."

In the blink of an eye, the masked man was behind Super Volt, blocking his escape and grabbing his wrists.

"Im- Super Volt, no!" Tango cried. He thrashed furiously against his captor, who struggled even while using his super strength to hold Tango back.

Doc turned back and thrust his other hand toward Tango. To Super Volt's horror, an electric pulse almost identical to his previous attack engulfed the android. Tango screamed, a horrible, distorted sound cut blessedly short by the power surge crashing his systems. 

Tango's captor slung him casually over one shoulder. Before Super Volt could yell anything more, space folded around him.

When it cleared, he staggered, a little nauseous from the unexpected upset. E released Super Volt's wrists, gave him a smile that just barely quirked one edge of the mask, and vanished into thin air.

Super Volt looked around. He was in a prison-like cell, lined mostly with rubber and wood. They had been expecting him.

He slumped, defeated, to the ground. All he wanted to do was save his friend. But now... they had both become tools of the nHo.

-----

Zedaph tossed and turned, pulling his blanket closer around himself. It had been hours since Impulse had left to take care of the bad guys. 

Finally, he poked his head over the side of his bunk. "Skizz?" he whispered. "You still awake?"

Skizz stirred. "I wasn't," he murmured. "Not that I was sleeping very well."

“I’m worried, Skizz,” Zedaph said. “Aren’t you? How can you sleep when they’re both out who knows where? What if something happened?”

“Yeah, dude, I’m scared,” Skizz replied. “I just... don’t think there’s anything we can do in the middle of the night.”

Zedaph sighed and flopped onto his back. Usually he was the sound sleeper of the group, but tonight, he just couldn't.

A soft squeak came from an enclosure in one corner of the room. "You just keep doing your thing, William," Zedaph told it. "This is all human problems."

After a few more minutes, Zedaph heard Skizz sigh and sit up. "Come on. Sounds like you need the Patented Skizz Method of helping you sleep."

Zedaph giggled slightly and clambered down from the top bunk, trailing a blanket behind him. "If you say so."

He followed Skizz into the kitchen, then went to the living room and sat on the couch. Skizz poured some milk into a pot and set it on the stove.

"Tomorrow, we'll make a plan, okay?" Skizz said as the milk heated. "If he isn't back by then. We'll get some decent rest, and then we'll make a plan."

"A plan sounds good," Zedaph sighed. "I kind of have the beginnings of a first step, but that step would have to wait till daylight anyway."

"Well there you go," Skizz declared. "No use staying up all night then."

He stirred in some chocolate, poured it into two mugs, and took them over to where Zedaph was sitting. Zedaph took his mug gratefully and sipped at it.

For a time, they just sat, drinking their cocoa in silence. When Zedaph put his mug down on the table, Skizz took hold of Zedaph’s wrist and started rubbing slow, gentle circles with his thumb.

Zedaph let out a sigh and tried to relax. “One of these days, you gotta tell us where you learned this.”

“Haven’t I mentioned, it’s a technique from deep in the heart of the jungles of Egypt?” Skizz winked.

Zedaph just smiled and rolled his eyes. Skizz had not, in fact, mentioned that before. It had almost become a tradition: every time Skizz did this to calm them down at night, they would ask about what he was doing or how he learned to do it. And every time, Skizz replied with a new and usually completely nonsensical answer.

Skizz could feel Zedaph’s pulse under the thin skin of his wrist. It was definitely still an anxious heartbeat, but as Skizz continued, it calmed and slowed to normal. And then, just a smidge slower. Zedaph’s eyes closed. He leaned his head on Skizz’s shoulder.

Skizz leaned on Zedaph in return, his heart syncing with Zedaph’s. Within a few minutes, both were fast asleep.

-----

The next morning, when Skizz walked into the kitchen, he found Zedaph with a jar of peanuts in one hand and a bag of corn chips in the other. “...Zed, is that your breakfast?”

Zedaph was already moving toward the door. At that moment, Skizz registered that Zedaph was in his superhero garb, bright pink and yellow with a pink mask over his face. He had never registered with the HHH, but he'd made a costume and alternate ego for himself anyway. Skizz sighed. “Please tell me you’re not going vigilante on this.”

“I’m not!” Zedaph protested. “...Well. Maybe technically I am. But I’m not being hasty about it! I have a plan. The start of a plan. A plan for how to get a proper plan going.”

“And that plan involves peanuts?”

“It certainly does!” Zedaph declared.

Zedaph took the snacks all the way out to the front stoop of the building, where he stepped to the side and held a few corn chips in the air before tossing them on the ground, all the while making occasional trilling sounds that Skizz didn't realize humans could make.

Within seconds, a half-dozen pigeons had descended on the corn chips. "Hello, ladies and gentlemen," Zedaph greeted. The pigeons all looked up at him. "I've gathered you here this morning because I need your help."

Ah. That would explain him getting into costume early. Zedaph was relatively famous in Hermiton because of his TV role, and tried very hard not to show his superpowers in any context where he might be recognized. He had even considered staging a fake "live" interview with his superhero identity as evidence that they weren't the same person. (Impulse talked him out of that one; it would be hard to stage without his coworkers finding out the truth, for one thing, plus with Zedaph not even being a registered Hero, it'd be more trouble than it was worth.)

"Do any of you all hang around this area enough to recognize the man who sometimes walks with me in the evenings?" Zedaph asked the collection of pigeons. "Little shorter than me, hair the same color as mine?"

A couple of them bobbed their heads and cooed.

"Excellent. Next question: were any of you around that corner-" he pointed - "as the sun was setting last night?"

No clear reaction.

"Alright, yeah. It was getting dark enough for bats, so I'm guessing most of the pigeons were roosting by then. Anyway, my friend has been kidnapped, and I think you all might be able to help me find him."

One pigeon got distracted at that moment, fluffing its feathers and making an annoyed noise at a rat that was trying to sneak away its corn chip.

"Hey now, there's enough for everyone," Zedaph scolded, tossing another chip their way. "I think you rats could be useful as well, come to think of it, what do you say?"

The rat grabbed the corn chip and chittered at him. Satisfied, Zedaph turned back to the other pigeons. "Alright, I don't have much more time to chat. You all are going to help find where they took my friend, okay? Look for the man with shiny metal all across one side of his face." Zedaph put his left hand up to his face to demonstrate. "I need to know what buildings he used, especially overnight or early this morning. For your help..." He opened the jar of peanuts and took a small handful. "You each get a bit for agreeing, and more later for getting me good info."

Zedaph tossed the peanuts on the ground, and the pigeons immediately started squabbling over them. Then, they all flew off in different directions.

Zedaph chanced a smile and turned back to Skizz and the apartment building, closing the peanut jar and the chip bag. "See? The start of a plan. Hopefully, by the time I'm done today, they'll have something for us. Meantime, I'm going back in to change into my work clothes and have my actual breakfast."

-----

Impulse poked at his oatmeal with his plastic spoon. He was getting fidgety already; between the stress and the lack of sleep, his charge was building fast.

"How's the breakfast, Super Volt?"

Impulse startled slightly, then sighed. His back was to the door, but he recognized Doc's voice.

"Not great, I'll be honest," Impulse replied, still not turning toward the door. There was a rumor that the nHo had an ally with the power of persuasion if you made the mistake of looking them in the eyes, so he wasn't taking any chances.

"We'll get you a better one tomorrow," Doc assured. "Especially if you help us out a little today, okay?"

"Like that's going to happen," Impulse snorted.

“You haven’t even heard what I want your help with,” Doc replied. He sounded a little hurt. Impulse was sure that was an act.

“I can guess,” Impulse snapped. “I produce electricity. You absorb it. You want me to be your little personal generator.”

Doc chuckled, a low sound that would have been kind in another context. “Think of it as mutually beneficial, hey? You have an incredible amount of power - perhaps too much. Or it will be soon. I’m offering you a place for that power to go, where it can be put to use instead of just vanishing into the sky. If you agree, you will be well taken care of.”

Impulse’s shoulder twitched. He grimaced. He had no idea how Doc knew, but the man was right: Impulse wasn’t immune to his own electricity. Resistant, yes, but if he didn’t let it loose it would still overwhelm him before very long. However, given the choice between that and helping a supermafia gain power...

“I think I’m good,” he bluffed. “Not planning on losing any of my reserve just yet.”

The door unlocked. Impulse resisted the urge to look, or to try making a break for it. Doc stepped in and placed something near the wall. “Okay then. If I’m not here when you change your mind, just use this.”

The door closed again. Footsteps echoed away down the hall.

Impulse chanced a look. No one was at his cell except the usual guards. The object Doc had given him was a fairly innocuous-seeming metal box, except for the terminals on top. A battery. So that even if Doc wasn’t available, they would still be able to steal his electricity and Doc would still be able to use it. Well, they weren’t getting it. Impulse huffed, climbed onto his cot, and tried once again to sleep.

-----

Evening came again, and Impulse and Tango were still missing. Zedaph and Skizz had both gone to work and tried to act like everything was normal, but the worry was plain on their faces. Since Skizz, Impulse, and Tango all worked in the same building, Skizz was asked most of the questions, and couldn't answer a single one.

In Tango's absence, Skizz waited for Zedaph so the two could walk home together. They walked slowly, observantly. It was an uneventful walk home: no incidents, but also no news from Zedaph's pigeon recruits. Once home, they made tentative plans. Zedaph insisted on Skizz having a disguise, despite not being a super; Skizz agreed to wear his sunglasses and a scarf around his face. 

Neither even tried to sleep without the Patented Skizz Method that night.

The next morning, they were awoken by a thump and a frantic fluttering. Zedaph rushed to the window and opened it for the pigeon outside to comfortably land on the sill. Skizz watched, not quite awake, as Zedaph listened intently to the pigeon's cooing and flapping.

"Yeah? You did?? Are you sure? ...Okay, hang on a sec." Zedaph turned to Skizz excitedly. "They've got a possible place. No way to know for sure since they can't get inside, but they saw the guy with the face go in this morning, and leave a bit later looking annoyed."

"What does being annoyed have to do with anything?" Skizz mumbled, as Zedaph trotted into the kitchen for the jar of peanuts.

"This is Impulse we're talking about," Zedaph replied. "He’s not exactly going to just lie down and give his kidnappers whatever they want, is he?”

Skizz laughed. “Yeah, that’s true.”

"Neither of us have work today," Zedaph pointed out. "You want to just... go?"

"Absolutely," Skizz declared. "We've gotta get to him as soon as possible, dude."

Zedaph gave a few peanuts to the bird, then went to get dressed - in his super suit, of course. He stopped at his pet rat's enclosure, and Willam the rat climbed obediently up Zedaph's arm to sit on his shoulder, mostly hidden in a fold of his cape. "Alright, I'm ready."

Skizz put on plain clothes, then donned the sunglasses and scarf. "Me too, dude. Let's do this."

-----

Impulse squirmed uncomfortably on his cot. Too many of his muscles would no longer stay still. He rolled over and tried to stand, but a leg muscle spasm sent him sprawling.

This was bad. This was really bad. He'd never charged this much, this fast before. It had to be mostly from the stress, not just of being captured himself, but of knowing Tango was somewhere in the facility, having who-knows-what done to his lifeless shell. Of course, the figurative ticking clock on his power didn't help. Add onto that his lack of sleep (he generated less when he was asleep) and his total refusal to discharge even a little bit (usually he would let out larger bursts once or twice a day, and smaller, almost subconscious pulses throughout), and he was already alarmingly close to capacity after only a day and a half.

But what could he do? They had been thorough. He could potentially discharge his electricity into one of the insulating materials in his cell, but that would take a lot of focus and power differential that he didn't have.

Or... he could give his charge to Doc. The battery still sat untouched in his cell. Waiting. Tantalizing, even. Hell, he may be holding enough power at this point to blow the battery completely.

But there was the principle of the matter. He had sworn an oath to never knowingly aid or lend his power to an enemy of the HHH. Even just this one time.

Even to save his own life.

...There was an awful lot of yelling happening outside. Could it be... no. No one knew where he was. He pulled himself to the barred window on shaking hands, but whatever was happening, it hadn't reached this hall yet.

His arm started shaking, and he sat back down. His heart was racing, despite the lack of exertion, and his vision was starting to fuzz. Please, not now... Impulse tried a meditation technique. He didn't think he would die in the next hour, but he wanted to be able to do something for what was hopefully a rescue party. Maybe he could at least stay...

con...

scious...

-----

Skizz and Zedaph crept down the hall, optimistically nervous. The guards had gone down with surprising ease, considering who was fighting them. Each expected a camera to track them or an alarm to go off any moment, despite Zedaph's preparations. They had reached an odd-looking cell, though, and weren’t ready to turn back yet.

Zedaph, a few steps ahead, suddenly gasped and pressed his face against the cell window. “Over here!” he whisper-yelled. “I found him! Oh my god, what did they do to him??”

Skizz rushed to see for himself. Impulse lay on the floor of his cell, contorted in an almost fetal position, his only movement an occasional twitch. It was hard to tell whether he was still conscious.

Skizz fumbled with the keys they had stolen from an unconscious guard. “You go find Tango, alright?”

“What are you going to do?” Zedaph cried. “Look at him! His electricity’s obviously going nuts!”

“Don’t worry about it,” Skizz insisted. “We gotta find Tango before it’s too late!” He flung the door open. 

Zedaph hesitated, ready to stop Skizz, not willing to have to try to rescue all three of his friends on his own. Skizz crouched next to Impulse. One hand went to Impulse’s chest. Skizz barely flinched at the residual jolt, quickly stabilizing himself. He closed his eyes, his other hand starting to tap-tap, tap-tap on the floor.

“Skizz, what-”

“Shh.”

Finally, Zedaph ran off to find Tango. Skizz kept his eyes closed in focus, listening to Impulse’s fibrillating heart, while tapping out a different, more familiar beat.

Over the next few moments, he felt Impulse’s heart fall into the same, steady rhythm. Impulse’s breath hitched, and Skizz steadied that too, taking his hand off Impulse’s chest to direct it. He couldn’t do anything about the electricity in Impulse’s body, but some of the excess had discharged into Skizz himself, and he hoped that would help.

Footsteps came thump-thump-thumping down the hall. Guards. Skizz switched his focus, drumming out a quick syncopation on his legs, listening with satisfaction as the guards tripped over their feet.

He wouldn’t be able to hold them off forever, though. And he might be cornered. Skizz looked back at Impulse, who was starting to stir. The amount of electricity in that man right now could have killed either one of them.

That gave Skizz an idea. Possibly dangerous, definitely scary, but he’d done it before. It pained him to do this to his buddy, it really did, but it might just keep Skizz out of trouble and give Impulse the motivation to escape. He dramatically flopped down next to Impulse, as though he’d been shot - or shocked. Carefully, Skizz slowed his own heartbeat, until it became difficult to stay awake. He felt Impulse roll out from under his arm. Knowing both Impulse and the guards would check to make sure, Skizz finally, after a moment's further hesitation, stopped his own heart.

-----

With difficulty, Impulse sat up. He was sore all over, but he was... conscious? Holding on to less electricity than before? He must have discharged some. But into what-

Skizz. Oh god, Skizz was on top of him. Where had he come from? A rescue mission? Had they tried to move him? Impulse scooted away, then apprehensively reached over and grabbed Skizz’s wrist.

Nothing. No breathing, either. Impulse started to panic. His friend was- Skizz was-

Guards barged in. Impulse struggled to his feet.

One guard glanced at the body on the floor and laughed. Laughed! “Well, that’s both our intruders taken care of, isn’t it, then?”

Both? Was Zedaph here somewhere too? Captured, or...

The other guard turned to close the cell door. Thunder boomed. Both guards flew across the hall and slumped to the floor. Impulse wasn’t sure if they were unconscious or dead. He frankly didn’t care. He was going to save his friends.

Those of them that could be saved.

-----

“...so yeah, that’s the story of how I got a scar on my-” Zedaph cut off as one of the guards slapped him across the face through the bars. He stumbled, but just grinned. He’d taken a couple of those just in the last few minutes since they’d dumped him in here, for wasting the guards’ time.

The two guards turned to leave. Zedaph, spotting something coming down the hall toward his cell, quickly called, “Hey, wait!”

Reluctantly, the guards turned back. “What?” one of them growled.

“You were wanting to know my superpower,” Zedaph said with forced casualness, trying not to look at the approaching figure, “and I hadn’t told you yet. It’s-”

Super Volt stepped up behind the guards, setting one hand on each of their necks. Both guards jerked and crumpled to the ground.

“The power of distraction!” Zedaph told the unconscious guards, dancing a bit in excitement. “Oh yeah!”

Impulse allowed himself a small smile at that as he searched the cell door, finding an electronic keypad nearby. Another burst, and the door was opening.

"I'm glad you're okay," Zedaph effused. "You looked in pretty bad shape when we found you. Whatever Skizz's plan was-"

He halted at the look on Impulse's face. "...wait," Zedaph realized. "Skizz... he isn't with you. Where-"

"His plan..." Impulse whispered hoarsely. "He... he did save me from... myself. But... he... he's not coming back with us."

“Oh.” Zedaph’s face fell. “No! No, I.. I... he can’t have. He can’t have just...”

Zedaph sat down heavily on a bench, and Impulse let him, but urged, “We have to finish this mission. If it wasn’t vital before, it is now. Not just for Tango and for Hermiton, but... for Skizz.”

Zedaph nodded. “And you’ve gotta be a big help, okay? So his sacrifice wasn’t in vain.”

Before any more grieving could be had, they heard a scratching sound from the air vent in Zedaph’s cell. “Oh!” Zedaph exclaimed. “That’d be William back from his mission!”

The brown and white rat plopped out of the air vent onto Zedaph’s shoulder and started chittering in his ear. Zedaph nodded along, finally giving the rat a couple of treats from his pocket. He turned back to Impulse. “We know where Tango is.”

-----

The rate of incidents on their way to where William was leading them was surprisingly small. Zedaph pointed out every security camera that wasn’t working, every open or stuck lock, and praised William highly for his work. William - and some friends - had been wreaking havoc inside the walls since before the rescue party had even entered the building, Zedaph explained.

Zedaph stopped Impulse and pointed. Around the corner was a room with two nervous guards.

“They’re still guarding that room even though everyone else has been trying to stop our escape,” Zedaph whispered. “That has to be it.”

“Can William distract them long enough for us to get in?” Impulse whispered back.

Zedaph murmured to William, then replied, “I don’t think he’ll be distracting enough for us to sneak past. But he can certainly do enough to let you do your thing.”

“Good enough.”

Moments later, they were pushing the door open behind two unconscious guards.

They found themselves in a room of server banks. Tango slumped near the main control computer. “There he is!” Zedaph rushed over, Impulse following more slowly. “Oh my word, what happened to him? He looks like he’s been burned in places.”

Impulse was silent at that, turning away so Zedaph couldn’t see the tears starting to form. He blinked them away and focused on the computer screen. “It looks like a bunch of gibberish. They must have figured out how to download, but not decrypt anything yet, and just left him here as it all gets transferred.”

“Well, transfer it back!” Zedaph said.

“That’d take too long,” Impulse muttered, pressing the CANCEL button. “Argh! It needs an authorization code to stop the process.”

“Type in ‘password’,” Zedaph suggested. Impulse glared at him.

“‘12345’?”

Impulse sighed. “Do you have any actual ideas?”

“I-I don’t know, unplug him?” Zedaph stammered. “I mean that’d probably be hard on him but it can’t be worse than losing him to the nHo.”

Impulse dragged his hands across his face. “Do it.”

"God, this is a mess," Zedaph observed. "They plugged half a dozen adapters together and then gave up and just started sticking wires in him."

"Well, he's not exactly meant to be physically hooked up like this," Impulse replied distractedly, still trying to interact with the screen and getting stopped by authorization warnings. "Just unplug something and we'll figure out how to get the wires out of him later."

Zedaph nodded, found the first recognizable connection, and disconnected it. Immediately, warnings popped up on the screen, and Tango listed sideways. Zedaph barely caught him.

"Now what?" Zedaph questioned.

Impulse put his hands on the storage drive in front of them, his eyes starting to glow faintly in the darkened room. "They think they'll be able to decrypt all that, and we can't let them. We destroy this, load Tango's last backup when we get out if we have to." Electricity crackled. LEDs winked out around the room. The monitor displayed static. "Let's go."

He helped Zedaph maneuver Tango into a fireman's carry, and the two hurried back down the hall in the direction of Impulse's special cell as quickly as they could manage. When they reached the cell, Impulse stopped dead in his tracks. 

It was empty.

Impulse ran inside while Zedaph swayed uncomfortably under Tango’s weight. “I... hate to say it, but I don’t think we have time for this,” Zedaph said. “We have to get Tango out of here. Tango is...” He stopped himself from saying “salvageable”. As if Tango wasn’t a person to care about. As if Skizz wasn’t a person to care about. But Skizz wasn’t the one currently holding the data and secrets of half of Hermiton in his brain. And Skizz wasn’t there-

“Dudes!”

Zedaph yelped. He staggered, dropped Tango, and fell on top of him. Impulse whirled around and backed up against the wall, looking terrified.

"No, no no no no no," Impulse whimpered. "You can't- this can't be happening."

“You- how...?” Zedaph cried in shock.

“Yeah, I’m...” Skizz hesitated, looking for a way to explain. “I’m here,” he finished lamely. “I’m sorry.”

He held out his hand to help Zedaph stand. As Zedaph reached for it, Impulse blurted, “Don’t trust him!”

Zedaph froze. Skizz paused, then dropped his hand with a sigh, his downcast expression hurt, but unsurprised. “I know how it looks, guys. But believe me, please. This is real.”

Impulse just stared, his breathing still panicked, eyes starting to shine like he was ready to fire another electric blast. His hand went unthinkingly to his wrist.

Noticing this, Skizz held up his own left wrist, showing off the colorful beaded bracelet around it: decorated in the same style as the others’, but no two of the three patterns quite identical. "Tango gave us these months ago. I remember. I'm the real deal here. I'm alive."

“But... how?” Impulse whispered. “I saw... I woke up and you were dead. Lying on top of me-” His voice rose in volume and pitch and started to crack as he got more worked up with every word. “You- you must have tried to move me, to touch me when I was overloaded, and... and I killed you. I killed two of my best friends just by having power and now you’re just standing here like it didn’t happen? Like you’re the ghost of Skizz, haunting me forever for what I-”

“Wait!” Zedaph interrupted. “Imp- Super Volt, you said you think you killed him? Like, your electricity when you were lying in your cell and he first touched you?”

Impulse, confused into silence, simply nodded.

“That can’t have killed him,” Zedaph continued, getting excited, “because I saw that happen. We were together when he went into your cell and put his hand on you. He definitely got zapped, but he shrugged it off no problem. And after he told me to leave and find Tango he wouldn’t have been zapped again because that’s not how your power works! I know it sounds crazy, but I think this really is the real Skizz!”

"It's true," Skizz corroborated. "I'll explain what happened when we're all safe, I promise."

Impulse hesitated a moment longer, then reached forward to put his hand on Skizz's shoulder, to convince himself that Skizz really was alive and not an apparition of guilt. The simple motion turned into a tight hug, tears falling on Skizz's very real shoulder.

Skizz returned the hug. "I am so, so, so, so sorry, dude," he murmured.

“You scared me so bad,” Impulse whispered. “Don’t ever do that again, you hear me?”

Skizz gave a rueful smile. “Never again, buddy. I will absolutely never scare you that bad ever again.”

He regretfully pulled out of the hug and moved to take a turn carrying Tango. “Now let’s get out of here.”

-----

As they hurried toward where Zedaph remembered the entrance to be, Skizz, not for the first time, wished Tango were awake. Tango wasn't usually powered down for long when not connected to something, so the lack of movement was worrying. Plus, the android was not exactly lightweight.

Impulse and Zedaph both skidded to a halt when they saw who awaited them at the door. Doc had arrived, and looked ready to fight all of them on his own, to recapture them - or worse.

Skizz didn't stop.

As soon as he saw Doc, Skizz's speed increased. He leaned forward, the extra weight of Tango now in front of him, and charged. With a shout, he crashed into Doc, knocking himself, Doc, and Tango all sprawling on top of each other in the now-open doorway. Impulse and Zedaph, stunned, ran to help as Skizz got to his feet.

"Dude!" Zedaph cried breathlessly, staring at where Doc now lay unmoving on the ground. "Oh dear."

Doc groaned and coughed in a breath. Impulse hurried to pick up Tango.

"Run!" Skizz yelled.

And so they ran, hoping against hope that Doc had arrived alone, that the teleporting E or some other unknown threat wasn't waiting to ambush them outside. 

But, it seemed, all that was waiting for them was pigeons. The birds lifted from the ground and trees, following the group along. "Thank you," Zedaph panted. "Keep an eye out. I'll get... I'll do my promise when I can. Not now!"

Skizz suddenly turned, ducking into a nearby parking garage. The others followed him, finally stumbling to a halt in one corner of the structure, hidden from the entrance and windows by parked cars. The pigeons dispersed as if there was nothing to see.

Impulse dumped Tango onto the ground as gently as his exhausted arms could manage and slid down to sit next to him. Zedaph and Skizz followed suit. None of them spoke for a while, everyone taking time to catch their breath. Skizz leaned back against a car. Zedaph wrapped his arms around his knees and dropped his head into them. Impulse stretched his shoulders and stuck his legs out. Finally, he spoke up. "Thank you."

Zedaph and Skizz looked up at him. Impulse continued, "Seriously, you two were amazing back there. I was so focused on myself and my hero oaths, and on keeping you safe. But if you had been much later, or had actually listened and not come for me at all, Tango's data would be in nHo hands and... and I would be dead, probably. I underestimated the nHo, and I really underestimated you. Once we're somewhere safe, you'll have to tell me the whole story."

"And tell Tango too," Zedaph added.

Impulse looked over at the damaged android. "Yeah. And Tango too."

-----

"Somewhere safe" was decided to be the offices of Tek Industries, where Impulse and technically Skizz both worked. It was mid-afternoon by the time they had finished resting in the garage, pulled together some food (Skizz, being the only one dressed like a civilian, had removed his disguise for a tense grocery run), and then gotten themselves all the way to the office building. All three were, of course, still in disguise, with nothing on them to connect to their civilian lives, so Impulse didn't have his key - but they did have Tango himself with them. Impulse had watched Tango unlock the door by moving his hand over a particular spot on the wall...

He raised Tango's hand to where he thought he remembered it should be.

The door clicked.

Zedaph hurried to open the door and hold it so it wouldn't lock again. Impulse and Skizz carried Tango inside.

"Now what?" Skizz stage-whispered. "It's the middle of the day. There might be people here."

"It's not a workday, though," Zedaph reminded him. "Just a couple of overtime people, right?"

Impulse nodded. “Tango mentioned once that he inherited a penthouse up top of this place. He doesn’t go there much, but he said he uses it as a workshop, so there should be tools and stuff up there. I think it’s this elevator...”

The elevator in question looked like every other elevator in the building, and served many of the same floors. They dragged Tango inside and let the door close.

"Welcome."

All three jumped in shock. Zedaph looked down at Tango, then looked around. "Oh, was that the elevator talking?" he realized. "Geez."

"That sounded way too much like Tango," Skizz laughed nervously. "I got excited there for a second."

"Ooh," Impulse noticed, pointing at the elevator button panel. One button, which had appeared all black before, was now lit with the company's logo. "That must be the place." He pressed it.

"This is cool," Zedaph commented as the elevator rose. "It's like a secret lair, like the big-deal superhero teams have!"

Impulse raised an eyebrow at him. "None of the heroes I know in Hermiton really have a lair, Zed. It's kinda more of a supervillain thing."

"Well they do in the cartoons," Zedaph grumped.

Impulse laughed good-naturedly. "Zed, you are the only super I know who watches cartoons about fictional superheroes."

"They're fun!" Zedaph argued. "And motivational. In the cartoons, the heroes always win!"

-----

When the elevator dinged open, the space in front of it seemed at first to be much like any other floor of the building: a hallway leading to their left, with a functional-looking metal door on the opposite wall that they could safely assume led to the stairwell. But then they exited the elevator and turned to see down the hall.

"Welcome home, Tango Tek."

"Still creepy," Skizz muttered.

"Hooooly cow," Zedaph breathed, walking almost reverently to the next corner. The space rapidly opened out into a huge, mostly open-plan living space that filled the entire T-shaped top floor of the building. The elevators had been in one wing of the building; at the end of the wing to their right, past a dining area and sitting area, glass doors looked out onto a U-shaped balcony that provided the best view one could likely have of the surrounding city. Straight ahead was another hallway, leading to a few more standard-looking, though still probably quite big, rooms.

There was one other room besides the stairwell in the entry wing, as well. Impulse sighed in relief when he saw it. "The workshop's right here, guys," he informed them. "Help me get him inside."

The workshop was, of course, lined with tables and shelves of tools and parts, as well as a few mechanical "arms" attached to the ceiling. Near the middle of the room was a conveniently human-sized steel table. Incongruously, next to the "operating table", someone had set up a small folding tray table, which contained a laptop connected to a webcam and a single external speaker.

"First things first, let's get Tango up onto the table," Impulse decided. So the three did so, hoisting the android onto the surface that was almost certainly made for him.

The screen of the laptop suddenly winked on. There was no lock on it, just a dialog window:

Device recognized.

Connect?

Impulse looked back and forth between the laptop and Tango. Making a snap decision, he clicked "Yes".

Connecting. . .

They watched with bated breath. None of them knew what to expect.

Device connected.

The webcam moved, making them all jump. The camera lens shifted, refocused, moved again, pointing at each of their worried faces in turn.

"...Hey guys." Tango's confused voice emerged from the speaker. Zedaph let out a small gasp. The webcam moved around again. “I... have some questions.”

“One for you first,” Skizz said. “Is this actually Tango we’re talking to? Not one of the recordings we keep hearing?”

“Oh, those.” Tango gave an artificial sigh. “Those are not me, no. Well... not really. Anyway, why- how am I in the workshop right now? Possibly more importantly, how did you three find your way in here??”

"I... may have remembered you telling me this was here," Impulse replied sheepishly. "And since we technically had you with us, the elevator let us in."

"'Technically'," Tango repeated with a short chuckle.

"You were really hurt!" Zedaph exclaimed.

"Oh, believe me, I know," Tango replied drily. "I've been running a diagnostic as we speak. I got really fried, apparently. Looks like I got overloaded with a high voltage from somewhere?" The webcam turned toward Impulse.

Impulse shrank back from the blank gaze of the camera. "I-I-" he stammered, voice rising even higher in pitch. "No, I... I didn't mean to..."

"Is that what you meant when you said you thought you'd killed two of us?" Skizz murmured. Soft, not accusing, yet Impulse still flinched at the words.

"Was it you, or was it the other guy?" Tango asked. "I could tell the guy with the metal face had some kind of electricity-related power. He practically knocked me out before you even got there."

"...Both?" Impulse squeaked hesitantly. "He... I think he was goading me. So I tried to hit his henchman instead of him, but he absorbed all my charge anyway, and..."

"And used it to zap me," Tango finished. "My longer-term memory banks are all surge-protected and backed up, thankfully, but my working memory of the last few moments of that definitely corrupted. But my guess is that you had no idea what this guy could do, yeah?"

Impulse nodded.

"So don't beat yourself up over it being 'your' electricity that damaged my body," Tango reassured. "Charge is charge, it doesn't matter whether metal-face got it from you or from sticking his hand in a wall socket."

That drew a small chuckle from Zedaph, and after a moment, Impulse joined him. “Alright,” Impulse finally said. “I still feel bad about it though.”

"Well, if you really feel the need to make it up to me or something," Tango decided, "I will probably need some human help with repairs. The mechanical arms above us can't do everything."

“O-oh,” Impulse replied. “Sure, I... guess I could do that. I should do that. But not, like, right this second, right? I need to get rid of more charge already.”

“I’m still finishing up the diagnostic anyway,” Tango said. “Go do what you need to do.”

“Yeah.” Impulse excused himself and trotted toward the stairwell, headed up to the roof.

Tango's camera turned back toward Zedaph. "So, why are you in costume, Mr. Worm Man? Did the rescuer need rescuing himself?"

"He sure did," Zedaph replied. "And we almost didn't make it in time. But we got both of you out in the end, with the power of wit, and spunk, and a whole lot of rats! And pigeons, of course. Pigeons are quite good at finding secret evil lairs, as it turns out. Speaking of which, you wouldn't happen to have a jar of peanuts anywhere around, would you?"

"I... don't exactly keep food around here, Zed," Tango pointed out. "I can work on printing you all some access cards so you can come and go from this floor..."

"Take your time," Zedaph decided. "Honestly right now I just want to sleep for, like, a week."

"That's totally an option too," Tango offered. "Bedrooms are at the other end of the floor. You might need to clear some dust away; they... also haven't been used in a while."

"Hey, before we go there," Skizz stopped him, "I need to explain myself to you and Impulse. I promised I would as soon as we were safe."

"Say what to us?" Impulse queried, stepping at that moment back into the workshop.

"I wanna talk about how I 'died' in their compound and came back," Skizz said, words starting to rush, then slowing back to his normal pace. "It has to do with something I should have told you years ago, frankly."

"What... stopped you?" Impulse asked tentatively. "From telling me, I mean."

"I was scared," Skizz replied simply. "Scared of what would happen if ANYONE knew. I wasn't just hiding this from you, dude, I want you to understand that. My own mother doesn't even know."

"Just tell us already, then," Zedaph burst impatiently.

Skizz took a deep breath and held it for a few seconds. "I'm a super," he finally said.

The room was silent. 

"You know you could have told us that," Impulse eventually murmured. "No matter what your power is. Supers keep other supers' secrets. It's how we survive."

"I know," Skizz sighed, "and I should have! But I was being so paranoid and stupid about it that it never even crossed my mind."

"You haven't told us what kind of power you have," Zedaph urged. "Or how dangerous and scary it really is!"

Skizz gave a dry laugh. "It's not gonna sound scary when I say it. I can control any rhythm I can hear or feel or know."

Impulse frowned. "When did it start?"

"Around the same time you got yours," Skizz admitted. "We were teenagers, I just thought your power was so cool and mine was so lame, so I never really wanted to talk about it. I mostly just used it to cheat at Guitar Wizard."

Impulse managed a laugh at that. "Dude, even when we were kids, you were always better than me at Guitar Wizard. I doubt you ever needed to cheat at it to beat me."

Skizz looked away with an embarrassed chuckle. “Yeah, well.” He sighed. “Anyway. Later on, well after you’d moved here and I hadn’t yet, it finally occurred to me what this power meant and why it’s so scary.”

Impulse and Zedaph both frowned, trying to connect the dots.

“Every rhythm, dudes,” Skizz reiterated. “That includes this.” He put his hand to his chest.

“Heartbeats,” Impulse gasped in realization. “Oh, man. Yeah, that... that’s some power right there. If you had somehow gotten onto the wrong side of things...”

Skizz nodded with a shaky breath. “So I got really adamant about telling everyone I wasn’t a super at all. And, uh. I won’t tell you the whole story right now, but at one point in the past I was in a situation where I thought ‘better if no one has this than these people do’ and actually stopped my own heart to keep that from happening. I woke up in a ditch where they’d dumped me, about 20 minutes later. Believe me, I’m not proud of that moment. But that’s how I knew I could do that trick during the rescue.”

“But...” Impulse asked, voice starting to break. “Why did you do that today? Why did you have to... to...”

“I’m not proud of that, either,” Skizz replied. “It was a tense situation, the first idea that entered my brain to buy us - me, let’s be honest - some time. Strategically? Only kinda dumb. Emotionally? What it did to you? Even worse idea. Unforgivably bad. Probably the stupidest, most selfish thing I’ve ever done. The only thing I accomplished by playing dead was to hurt you, and for that I really am so sorry.”

Silence fell again. Impulse leaned against the operating table for support. Skizz had found a chair at some point during the conversation. Zedaph was sitting, leaning far forward, on the end of a workbench. The only sound was Impulse’s and Skizz’s sniffles, and the occasional zzp of Tango’s camera moving and focusing on one, then the other.

“Let’s go to bed,” Zedaph finally suggested, sliding off the workbench and standing up. “Unless either of you need another minute?”

Impulse caught himself yawning. “...Sleep would be good.”

“Bedrooms are past the kitchen,” Tango directed. “You guys deserve it.”

They trooped across the expansive suite, finding the smaller bedroom first. There were a few simple furnishings, centered around a queen-size bed with four pillows. Zedaph made a beeline for the bed and started shoving the pillows around. "I call left side, Skizz gets the middle but Impulse gets double pillow action if he wants, how's that?"

"I don't... really need two of these pillows," Impulse protested weakly.

"Wait, why am I in the middle?" Skizz questioned.

"So you can be in close contact with either of us without it being awkward," Zedaph explained. "I don't know about you two, but my brain is definitely still trying to both stop completely and keep running at about a million miles an hour, so we'll all need the help actually sleeping. Plus, out of the three of us, you gave us the biggest scare, so you get to be sandwiched between us where it's safe."

Zedaph was right. None of them could calm themselves enough to sleep unaided. Even with Skizz's usual makeshift use of his powers, it was a difficult task. Once Zedaph was finally asleep, Skizz rolled over to face Impulse's back. After some coaxing, he took Impulse's wrist and started rubbing slow, gentle circles.

"I'm sorry," Impulse murmured.

"You have literally nothing to apologize for," Skizz insisted. "Tango wasn't your fault. I was definitely not your fault."

"I was suspicious of Doc," Impulse admitted. "Even with his bionics he wanted me to use my power on the situation. That should have been a clue. But I tried it anyway, and it all backfired."

"Doc? You mean metal-face?" Skizz clarified with a smile. "You mean the guy that got bulldozed by three men on a mission?"

Skizz's comments got a brief, quiet laugh from Impulse. "Yeah. That guy."

Skizz kept working his power on Impulse, until Impulse yawned and finally asked, "You know, now you're actually going to have to tell us what you're doing here..."

"It's an ancient technique I learned from a certain wizard of guitar," Skizz replied. After a pause, he continued, "Seriously. I get a feel for the rhythm that's there, and then I start slowing it down, just a little at a time. So subtle that you never notice what I'm doing, even if you're looking for it. Juuust enough to get the effect I want, and no further. The strategy's the same, whether the goal is helping my friend or beating him at video games."

Impulse snorted at that. "Alright. You've done it plenty on me before... I'll... always trust you."

Before he could elaborate further, Impulse, too, was sound asleep. His friends taken care of, Skizz turned his power inward. Sometimes, he needed it too.

-----

Tango tried not to worry too much about his friends while they slept. Hopefully they were sleeping - Tango, of course, had no idea what exactly had happened over the last couple of days, but it had clearly frightened them badly. None of them except Impulse had really been in a high-stakes hero situation before, and even Impulse probably hadn't done anything quite like what they had just had to do.

To save me, Tango realized. Zedaph had used his powers to escape the first encounter. It was only then that Impulse had come back for Tango. And then, despite the android being a load of dead weight significantly heavier and more awkward to handle than a human, those three wouldn't leave him behind. Of course, there had also been the issue of the nHo trying to download all the supposedly-secure data in Tango's head, but he strongly suspected that that had only been a secondary motivator for his friends.

Sleep sure took up a lot of time. Normally Tango engaged in an artificial form of sleep for at least part of the night, recharging his battery and unconsciously sorting memories much like a human would. But with his body already non-functional on the table next to him, he didn't have the mechanisms nor reason to do that tonight. He decided to occupy himself by planning some next steps and taking care of the ones that he could do remotely.

Step 1: Three new access keys to the building and penthouse. Tango's body would be out of commission for a little while, and he didn't want them to have to drag it all over the place just to get back up here. Really, he should have done this sooner, in case of a situation like this. The microchip that the security sensors recognized would probably fit neatly into a bead that they could add onto their decryption bracelets, for a subtle and, in his opinion, pretty cool mode of entry. He spent some time designing a bead around the chip, then sent the design to the workshop's internal network. A 3D printer whirred to life in one corner.

Step 2: Improve his - their - security. He wouldn't be able to do this remotely, but he could make a plan, direct Impulse on executing part of it, and implement the rest when his body was functional again. Building security could be improved, and he probably needed a few more failsafes in his body as well. And, frankly, he had plenty of secure backups - he probably didn't need to store as much sensitive data in his own memory banks as he did. Doing so was more a matter of convenience, and a little convenience could easily be sacrificed for significantly more safety.

Step 3: Food, probably? His friends would need that in the morning. As far as he knew there was no food in the entire penthouse. He'd been living alone far too long for that. Tango sorted through his memory to put together a shopping list. It was still the middle of the night, but once morning drew closer he would order groceries to the building.

Step 4: ...There was no step 4. He had gone through all the most pressing concerns, and now there was once again nothing to do until his friends woke up. Tango decided to at least try forcing the memorySort aspect of his sleep process, setting a time limit so that he could still finish his more important tasks.

Suddenly, he was awake, well before the planned time, and for some reason nervous, almost fearful - as if he had been awoken by one of the emergency sensors on his body. He looked over at it, but there was no change. So why had he been so frightened?

Tango searched the activity log for his 'sleep' time. At the end was an entry that said, Error: Could not save corrupted memory segment. Retry?

There wasn't enough information left to figure out what might have been in the corrupted bit, so Tango mentally sighed and agreed, setting it to sort last so that everything else could go smoothly, then continued the rest.

-----

Impulse opened the workshop door with a yawn. “Morning, Tango.”

Tango couldn’t quite turn his camera far enough to see the door from where it currently sat, but he could hear that it was just Impulse so far. “Morning, Impy.”

An audible sigh. Tango chuckled quietly. “Did your night go okay?”

“I slept,” Impulse said. “With Skizz’s help. Major improvement over the previous two nights right there.”

“Well, while you guys were sleeping, I’ve gotten some stuff going,” Tango announced. “Check it out.” He pointed one of the ceiling arms toward the 3D printer. Impulse frowned and wandered over, squinting at the small beads on its platform. “What are these for?”

“There’s one for each of you,” Tango explained. “They’ll get you access to this floor of the building. Which you’ll need in a second, because I also ordered some food for you guys to pick up downstairs.”

"You were busy," Impulse commented, inspecting the round, red beads. "Oh, are they shaped like this so they can go on the friendship bracelets you gave us? That's clever!"

"Yeah, they are," Tango confirmed. "I'm planning on adding another layer of security later, but for now, just pick one and go down to reception to pick up the stuff I bought ya. If they ask, just say I told you to take it."

By the time Impulse had gotten back upstairs, Zedaph and Skizz were just waking up. Impulse set the bags on the kitchen counter. "Morning. Have you guys talked to Tango yet? He bought us breakfast."

"Oh, sweet," Skizz exclaimed, digging into one of the bags. Then he frowned, looked in the other bag, and started giggling. "Dudes, look at the selection our robot buddy picked out for us."

As they pulled food items out, it became increasingly apparent that Tango, well, had tried his best. It was certainly all breakfast food... mostly.

"What in the world is this?" Zedaph laughed, showing off a softball-sized pink fruit with soft green points sticking out all over it and more green bits at one end. "It looks like something you whack back and forth over a net."

"I think it's called a dragonfruit," Impulse speculated. "I've heard they taste really good, actually. ...Why is there a jar of peanuts in here?"

"Oh, that's probably mine." Zedaph grabbed it. "I mentioned them last night, but I didn't expect Tango to actually get some."

"We've got cereal, but no milk," Skizz announced. He held up two boxes: one in bright rainbow colors, with equally brightly-colored sugar cereal, and one plain white box with a simple logo and something suspiciously healthy on the front.

"That's probably just as well," Impulse replied, as he opened the refrigerator to put away a carton of eggs, "because his fridge isn't plugged in."

"Does he have any working appliances?" Zedaph wondered, looking around with a box of frozen waffles in his hand. "Ah, well, he's got a toaster, at least."

"What about a coffee maker?" Skizz asked, finding a red can of ground coffee under a bunch of bananas and a single apple.

Impulse started rifling through cupboards. "I don't know..."

"Is that what this thing is?" Zedaph pointed to a large, boxy appliance next to the toaster.

Skizz looked over. "Yeah, that's a schmancy espresso machine. I don't think it'd work with the cheapo regular ground stuff though. You’d probably end up with coffee-flavored hot water or something."

"I'm willing to try that," Impulse interjected, earning a laugh from Skizz.

The toaster dinged. Zedaph found plates and put a waffle on each one. "Here you go. A naked waffle for each of us."

"I have an idea," Impulse realized. He peeled a banana and started slicing it over his waffle. "See? Now it's fancy!"

"Do you actually want to try coffee from the espresso machine, dude?" Skizz asked. "Because I could try to make something halfway decent..."

Impulse shrugged, already eating his banana waffle. "Might as well."

Skizz did his best to pack coffee into the espresso machine and started it up. The three of them stood around the kitchen island, eating waffles and fruit, until a voice from the machine startled them. “Your coffee’s done.”

“God,” Skizz muttered. “Again with the Tango voice everywhere.”

“At least that one actually sounded more like him,” Impulse observed, reaching for the mug. He took a sip and wrinkled his nose. “Yep. That’s pretty bad.”

“Told you,” Skizz chuckled.

Zedaph picked up his plate. “Come on, let’s go let Tango know we’re up.”

-----

"How was breakfast?" Tango asked casually.

Impulse started to make a joke, but Zedaph beat him to it. "It provided some much-needed entertainment."

Tango paused, confused, before giving a tentative chuckle. "That bad, huh?"

"We've got the waffles," Impulse offered with his mouth full, holding up the plate to demonstrate. "Waffles are good."

"Does everything in this place have to have a Tango voice?" Skizz asked. "I've never had an espresso machine talk to me before."

"Oh, that one actually was me," Tango explained. "A bunch of the appliances and some other things are like smart devices, where they all connect to the same system, except the system is me. Whenever I'm up here I can sync up with them, and stuff like the espresso machine even has speakers I can talk through."

"But the voice that greets us every time isn't you, you said yesterday," Impulse clarified.

"Yeah, that's not part of the system, it's just a recording. Honestly I hate that thing," Tango said. "I've just never found it important enough to do something about it. It uses one of the really early, 100% pre-programmed prototypes for my voice, which is why it sounds kinda like me, but wrong."

"Well, if we're all going to be going in and out all the time, we'll have to take care of that," Impulse mused. "Oh yeah, Skizz, Zed, there's these little beads for your friendship bracelets over here and they give us access to this place so we can leave and come back any time." 

As Zedaph and Skizz got up to check those out, Impulse got up as well. "I gotta go de-zap myself, and then I'll be back to finally do repair stuff with you," he explained to Tango.

"Oh! Speaking of going outside," Zedaph remembered, "I gotta go reward my pigeon friends who helped us find you. I'll be out on the balcony."

"You want me to stick around for moral support?" Skizz asked as Impulse reentered the room. "Or do you need me out of the way so you can actually be your usual competent self?"

Impulse started to answer, then hesitated. He thought about it for a moment, just watching Skizz. He nodded to himself. "You can hang out here if you want!" he offered. "You never know, I might need an extra hand or two." Impulse looked up at the mechanical claws resting against the ceiling. "...An extra human hand."

-----

It took several days for Tango to be fully - or at least sufficiently - repaired. Tango created alibis for all of them being away from work for that time - though Zedaph chose to return to work earlier than Impulse and Skizz did. Impulse, since he was employed by Tango's company anyway, was easiest to excuse. All three were delighted and various degrees of surprised when Tango asked if they wanted to move into the penthouse permanently.

“I hadn’t really been using it,” Tango explained. “It hasn’t been a comfortable place for me to be since... for a long while. Especially since I’ve been here all alone. It’s way more secure than your little apartment, and this whole luxury space would go to waste otherwise...”

The idea was mulled over for a short time, but quickly agreed upon. There was no reason for any of them not to take an opportunity like that. Zedaph immediately started calling the place their superhero lair again. “It’s huge, luxurious, it's got a great place to sit and brood over the city, a high-tech workshop, AND a secret entrance that only we can use! It’s definitely a secret superhero lair, Impulse.”

From there, it seemed to take no time at all to move the three of them in. Zedaph spent equal time on the balcony and in the workshop, consulting with Tango and using the shop tools to design a cozy dovecote for his new pigeon friends. And somehow, amidst the excitement, Impulse and Skizz still managed to repair Tango's body to a point where Tango felt confident he could return to it, and they even had time to work on a second, minor side project.

Everyone gathered in the workshop for Tango's return transfer, despite his insistence that it really wasn't that big of a deal. It was as simple as finding the right menu and pushing a button. Then, a few tense seconds of radio silence.

Then, Tango moved his hands.

The others cheered as Tango, successfully back in his android body, sat up and looked around, blinking as he tested his vision and focus. He laughed at the celebration, only briefly cut off by Zedaph throwing himself forward for a hug. Impulse held out a hand to help Tango stand.

"I've only been repaired, moving isn't new to me," Tango laughed, standing easily without Impulse's help. "Now - you said you have something else to show me?"

The three led Tango out of the workshop. "Just wait right here a sec," Impulse instructed. "Zed?"

Zedaph nodded. He stepped out the door into the stairwell, letting it lock behind him. After a few moments of suspense, Zedaph threw open the door and strode back inside like he was stepping onto a stage. Behind him, a recording of Impulse's voice played, modified slightly to sound like an event announcer: "Hel- lo and welcome to the Team ZITS Awesome House!!" A tinny, synthesized trumpet jingle accompanied the voice.

Tango's grin turned into a cackle. "What?? How- when did you have the time to do that??"

"It wasn't difficult to reprogram," Impulse explained, "once I actually found the controller for it. The hardest part was keeping the new recording a secret, Mr. I-Am-The-Computer."

“Aaand it doesn’t need to be that particular message,” Zedaph said, “although frankly I’m not sure why you’d want to change it. But if we ever get sick of it, we can change it to something else, right, Impulse?”

“Absolutely,” Impulse nodded. “It’s just a sound file. We could make it anything, or take it out entirely.”

“I love it,” Tango declared. “So much better than before. Did you change the elevator one, too?”

“Still working on that one,” Impulse said. “It’s a little harder to get to, so I wanted to get your approval before I started messing with your elevator.”

"You definitely have my approval," Tango declared. "As long as you don't break the elevator, of course."

-----

At some point during the day, conversation revealed that the penthouse had been partially designed with Tango in mind, and Tango was not only able to connect to most appliances and electronics in the place, but also charge himself from anywhere on the floor.

"So why do you sequester yourself in your office most nights?" Zedaph wondered.

"Because like I've said, I didn't like coming here for a long time. Even to power down and charge. Eventually it just became a habit. Now that it's our space, though... I have a feeling I'll be spending a lot more time here."

Impulse grinned. "Yeah, you will! Tonight, you're sleeping with us. No workshop, no sitting at your desk..."

"You don't want a big ol' robot taking up bed space," Tango laughed.

"At least share the room, then," Impulse decided. "It's plenty big enough."

The amount of space in the master bedroom was almost daunting. But the group had moved in there for the gratuitously huge bed - the one in the second bedroom had fit them all cozily when they needed the close contact, but it had certainly not been designed to hold three adult men. The master bedroom held them all with room to spare.

Tango settled near the bed, leaving space for anyone getting out of bed but still sticking close. After making sure everyone else was in bed, Tango sat simply, back against the wall, arms down, legs straight out, and activated his sleep routine. He was a little apprehensive, after the last time he had done the memory sorting process, but it had to be done, preferably every day or two.

As soon as he ran the routine, he felt himself power down and slip seamlessly into unconsciousness - not the deep deadness of his body and circuits being heavily damaged; this was a 'lighter' level, more like human sleep, where certain stimuli were recognized as potential threats and would wake him.

The others looked over from where they were tucked in bed. Status indicator lights shone behind Tango's eyes, glowing red in the dark room. Skizz chuckled and turned the other way. "Who knew," he whispered to the others, "that a pair of glowing red eyes in a dark bedroom would be a comforting sight to fall asleep to?"

Tango was standing on the sidewalk. Beams of streetlight bent around him, leaving his immediate surroundings dark. Impulse was there - no, Zed - no, Impulse. Tango tried to walk toward his friend, but he couldn't move. Shadows were closing on his friends. They needed help. He couldn't move. The streetlights shifted. They all focused on Tango at once. It was hot, he couldn't think, there was Impulse's face, there was another face, the light was burning-

Tango jerked violently, tumbling to the floor and crashing into a bedside table. He picked himself up, unsure where he was as he fearfully waited for his non-essential functions to come online. Something fumbled above him. A lamp turned on.

"Wha's happening?" a sleepy voice murmured. Impulse. "Tango? Was that you? What's wrong?"

"I... nothing," Tango whispered. "One of my memory files is corrupted, is all. I think it's the one that was running when I got overloaded. It keeps trying to save, but it's not playing right..."

"Mm... so you're saying even robots get nightmares," Impulse commented. "Join the club." He laughed softly and patted the bed next to him. "Come on in, will ya?"

"I don't see how that would help," Tango frowned. "Now that I've come up against the corrupted file, I can skip it and deal with extracting it tomorrow-"

"It'll be nice," Impulse insisted, patting the bed again.

Tango hesitated, then cautiously climbed into the bed next to Impulse, very aware of how his weight pulled one side of the bed down. Impulse clambered over him, pushing him more toward the middle.

"Huh?" Skizz muttered, waking slightly and squirming at the weight shift and the cool synthskin now pressed against him.

"Don't worry about it," Impulse replied. "It's just Tango joining us."

"Oh, ok."

The two fell asleep again quickly, one on either side of Tango. Zedaph, on Skizz's other side, had somehow not woken at all. Tango prepared to 'tell' his sleep program to skip the file and continue, but before starting it again, he chose to stay awake for a few moments more, contemplating. It was quite warm in the middle of a bed, surrounded by three humans - too warm to normally be comfortable for him. But Tango found that, tonight, he didn't mind the warmth so much. Not when he knew it came from his friends, in close proximity. Warm, and safe, and always there for him and each other. There had been a human or two in this place with him before, long ago. But he had always just been the servant robot, back then. No one had ever treated Tango quite like this before.

Impulse was right. This did feel nice.