The cold doesn't bother me.

  That sounds like a brag. It's not - it's just true. Sitting on this rooftop for the last two hours would be miserable for anyone else. Sixteen inches of snow, temperature in the low twenties, wind cutting through the gaps between buildings like it's got a personal grudge. But I run hot. Always have, even before the powers. Now I can just... decide to be warm. Tiny jets of gas venting from my pores, burning off before they even become visible flame. Like having a pilot light under my skin.

  The earpiece crackles.

  "Hellhound, comms check."

  Sam's voice. Calm, steady, all business. I grin under the mask - her old mask, warped and melted into something new. Something mine. It feels poetic.

  "Hellhound reads you loud and clear, Bloodhound."

  "I'm not using a callsign. I'm in my bedroom."

  "That's less cool."

  "I'm aware." A pause. "Lighthouse, you there?"

  Tasha's voice, slightly more distant, like she's not speaking directly into a mic: "I'm here. Drone's in position. I've got eyes on the building."

  "What are we looking at?"

  "Two people inside I can see through the window. Ground floor, west side. Looks like they're in the same room. Probably the guards."

  "Just two?"

  "Just two."

  I let out a breath. Two guys. Skeleton crew, just like we thought. Everyone else is out hitting more businesses, taking advantage of the blizzard aftermath, making the most of Maya's manufactured chaos. The warehouse is practically empty.

  "Okay," Sam says. "One last run through, Aitch."

  I've done this three times already, but I get it. She's nervous. Not about the plan - about me. About sending someone else in instead of going herself. I saw her face when she handed me the earpiece earlier today. The way she looked at the old Bloodhound mask before I took it. Like she was giving away a piece of herself. At least, that's what I assume the emotion was.

  I don't tell her that's why I warped it. So it wasn't hers anymore. So it was mine.

  "East side of the building," I recite. "Service entrance. Metal door, probably steel, definitely locked. I melt through the hinges, catch the door before it falls, slip inside. Ground floor is warehouse space - that's where they're storing the stuff from the break-ins. I document everything with my phone. Then I move upstairs to the back office. That's where the records probably are - territory maps, payment schedules, the whole operation. Document that too. If I can burn any of the records without getting noticed, do that. Then I exit the way I came."

  "And if something goes wrong?"

  "Smoke bomb, flare, disengage. Get to the extraction point. Don't engage unless I have to."

  "And if you have to?"

  "Disarm, don't injure. If I absolutely have to hurt someone, it's to make them let go of something, not to put them down. I'm not here to kill anyone."

  "Good." She sounds almost relieved, like she was afraid I'd forgotten. I haven't. I know the difference between a superhero and a thug. You don't become a good guy by doing bad-guy things. Not even to bad guys.

  "Drone's stable," Tasha reports. "No movement outside the building. The guards haven't shifted in twenty minutes. They're probably watching something on a phone."

  "Or playing cards," Sam adds. "Either way, they're not patrolling."

  "Which means they're not expecting anyone," I say.

  "Which means you have the advantage. Don't waste it."

  I stand up, shake out my arms, feel the familiar warmth building under my skin. The vest Sam gave me is a little snug - even though it's sized for a 14 year old girl, I guess, shouldn't it be a lot snug? - but it's comforting. Snug. Like armor should be.

  "I still say I didn't need this," I mutter, tugging at the straps.

  "You're wearing it or you're not going," Sam says, echoing what she told me this afternoon. "That was the deal."

  "I remember."

  "Then stop complaining and start moving."

  I shimmy off the rooftop, down the fire escape. Once the fall is survivable, I drop down, hanging from the ledge so I don't snap my ankles like twigs. The snow crunches under my boots. Loud in the silence. The whole neighborhood is quiet tonight. People staying inside, roads still half-buried, the world muffled and frozen.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  Perfect conditions for a heist. Or for stopping one.

  I move through the alley, staying low. The building is half a block away - I can see it from here. Old commercial space, two stories, brick facade with faded signage that says something about plumbing supplies. No lights visible from the front, but that doesn't mean anything. They'd be smart enough to keep the lights off, operate in the back where nobody can see.

  "Visual on target," I murmur.

  "Copy," Tasha says. "I'm repositioning the drone. Give me thirty seconds."

  I wait. Count my breaths. The cold still doesn't bother me, but the adrenaline is starting to build. That electric feeling in my chest, like my heart's trying to climb out through my ribs. I've felt it before - cliff jumping, urban exploration, that time I tried to fight three guys who were hassling a kid at a bus stop and got my ass kicked until my powers kicked in.

  This is different, though. This is real. This is the thing I've been preparing for, even if I didn't know I was preparing for it. Three weeks of surveillance. Maps and schedules and stolen clipboards. Two years of kiddie MMA. All leading to this.

  "Drone's in position," Tasha says. "I've got a better angle now. Both guards are still in the same room. Northwest corner, ground floor. You should be able to come in from the east and avoid them entirely until you're ready."

  "Perfect."

  "Aitch." Sam's voice. Quieter now, more personal. "You remember what I said about escalation?"

  "Yeah."

  "If things go sideways - if there's more guys than we thought, if someone's got heavier firepower than expected - you get out. Don't be a hero."

  I almost laugh. "Isn't that the whole point?"

  "No." She sounds serious. Dead serious. "The point is to hurt their operation and get evidence we can use. The point is not to get yourself killed proving something. You can be a hero without being an idiot."

  "Noted."

  "I mean it."

  "I know you do." I take a breath. "That's why I trust you."

  She doesn't answer. But I can hear her breathing change, just slightly. Processing.

  "Approaching the service entrance," I say, moving again. "Going dark until I'm inside."

  The building looms up ahead of me, brick and snow and silence. The service entrance is right where the satellite imagery said it would be - a heavy metal door set into an alcove, probably used for deliveries back when this place actually sold plumbing supplies. There's a padlock on it, which is cute. And a deadbolt, which is slightly less cute but still not a problem.

  The padlock first - shackle gets cherry red, I wrench it, the metal tears soft.

  The deadbolt's smarter. I can see the edge of it in the gap between door and frame, just a sliver of brass. I press flame to it, tight and focused, while my other hand pulls steady pressure on the door handle.

  Heat and force. The bolt starts glowing. I pull harder. Something groans - metal losing its shape, going soft where it shouldn't. The bolt stretches, warps, and then *gives*, sliding out of the frame with a dull scrape.

  Door swings open.

  The inside of the building smells like dust and cardboard and something chemical. Cleaning supplies, maybe. Or whatever solvents they use to strip serial numbers off stolen merchandise.

  "I'm in," I breathe.

  "Copy," Sam says. "Lighthouse?"

  "Guards haven't moved. You're clear."

  I slip inside. Let the darkness swallow me.

  The ground floor is exactly what we expected. Open warehouse space, high ceilings, industrial shelving units arranged in rows. And on those shelves, on the floor, stacked in piles that reach up to my chest--

  "Holy shit," I whisper.

  "What? What is it?"

  "It's... all of it. Everything." I'm scanning the room, trying to take it all in. Cash registers, still with the drawers hanging open. Electronics - laptops, tablets, a whole crate of phones. Boxes of merchandise with store labels still on them: clothes, tools, bottles of booze. A stack of lockboxes, probably from safes that got cracked. "Sam, this is everything from the break-ins. All fifteen of them. It's all here."

  "Document it. Every angle. Don't miss anything."

  I pull out my phone. Start snapping photos. No camera flash, no noise. I heard in Japan they make it so that your phone has to have a noise. I get the reasoning, but, well. I'm glad I have it this way here. Tasha's drone can't see in here, and I need evidence.

  Snap! A pile of cash registers.

  Snap! Electronics with store stickers still attached.

  Snap! A hand-written inventory list taped to a shelf, itemizing what came from where.

  "They labeled it," I murmur. "They actually labeled which stuff came from which store."

  "They have to track it somehow. For fencing, for distribution." Sam's voice is tight. "That's good. That's evidence of coordination. Get a clear shot of that list."

  I do. Multiple angles. Zoom in on the handwriting.

  This is it. This is what connects the "random" break-ins during the blizzard to a single organized operation. This is what proves Maya - or whoever's running this - didn't just get lucky. They planned it. Executed it. And now they're sitting on the profits, waiting for the heat to die down.

  Not anymore.

  "Okay," I say, pocketing my phone. "Ground floor documented. Moving to the stairs."

  "Copy. Lighthouse?"

  "Guards still stationary. You're doing great, Hellhound."

  I grin under the mask. Hellhound. It sounds right. It sounds like someone who matters.

  The stairs are at the back of the warehouse, a narrow metal staircase that probably used to lead to offices. I move quietly - the cutproof padding on my knees and elbows makes a slight scraping sound against the railing, but nothing loud enough to carry. At the top, a hallway. Two doors, both closed.

  "I'm upstairs. Two rooms. Which one?"

  "Left should be the records room based on the building layout," Sam says. "Right is probably storage or a break room."

  I try the left door. Unlocked. It swings open onto--

  "Jackpot."

  The room is small but packed. Filing cabinets line one wall, drawers hanging open, papers spilling out. A corkboard dominates another wall, covered in maps - hand-drawn, annotated, showing blocks and streets and little symbols I don't recognize but can guess at. Territory markers. Coverage zones.

  And on the desk in the center of the room, a laptop. Open. Screen dark but not off.

  "Sam. I found it."

  "Describe what you're seeing."

  "Filing cabinets. Maps on the wall - territory maps, has to be. And a laptop. I think it's still on."

  "Don't touch the laptop. Just photograph the screen if there's anything visible. Focus on the physical documents."

  I start with the maps. Photograph each one, making sure to get the annotations, the handwriting, the little coded symbols. Then the filing cabinets - payment ledgers, business lists with checkmarks and X marks, route schedules that look like the clipboard I stole three weeks ago but more complete. More comprehensive.

  This is their whole operation. Laid out in paper and pushpins like a war room.

  "I'm getting everything," I tell her. "This is - Sam, this is everything. How they're dividing up the neighborhood. Who's paid. Who hasn't. Who's next."

  "Good. That's good. Now--"

  "Hellhound." Tasha's voice cuts in, sharp. "Keep your head on a swivel"

  I try not to let my blood run cold. "What's up?"

  "The guards. They're moving. Someone called them - they just got off a phone and they're heading toward the stairs."

  Toward me. Awesome.