Of every possible day during her time as part of the Carrion Feast gang, Xena would have never guessed this would be the one where everything changed.

  It started like any other day, really. Chaffster banging the shit out of a random grunt three rooms over, so loud that it woke her up. If not for that, she'd be sleeping in. But here she was, getting up at seven like a good little schoolgirl because some fucking idiot had to be so noisy.

  She could handle some noise, but not when she was still hungover from the night before. Now she was left staring up at the ceiling as the obnoxious bonking kept her awake.

  Unable to get more shut-eye, Xena lifted the blanket and threw her legs over the side of the bed, looking to ease her headache. She hadn't drunk enough water yesterday.

  Here in their hideout, being up early was a good thing because it meant there was no one in the bathroom on this floor. She splashed her face with water, then got ready for the day.

  Their hideout was outside the populated area, closer to industrial terrain but not quite abandoned as it might have been in other districts. No, rather, this was private property hired from a real estate mogul that may or may not have been a villain in disguise. Not like she knew for sure, she wasn't the person who handled that kinda stuff. It was great for her that she had access to hot water though. She didn't know what she would do if she couldn't at least have a decent shower every day.

  Their base of operations was located on the periphery of Central. One of those areas where the heroes rarely if ever came. Though it did help they had Hoodwink concealing the presence of this place a bit, the main benefit was definitely obscurity. When no one knew where it was, no one would be able to bust down the door and start arresting people left and right.

  Once she was back in her room, she threw on a hoodie because fuck wearing her costume all day, then pulled on a pair of shorts. No mask, because she wasn't the least bit concerned about people seeing her face. Her civilian ID was only useful for buying groceries and little else. Not like she had family to go back to; none of them did.

  Around the base itself, villains and normals alike mingled however they pleased. She liked it better that way, made things easier because nobody made a hassle about it when she stayed over at someone else's room to get a good night's sleep, and maybe more than that if she felt like it. Last night she hadn't quite managed it though. Her usual squeeze wasn't available because of an unfortunate health complication. Death, mainly. Consequence of a heist gone bad the other week.

  She wasn't too sad about it. The dude had been good for one thing and one thing only. But now she was up with nothing to do, so she might as well head down and eat a bit.

  Just as she opened the door, though, she saw Raze walking in her direction. His messy blonde hair and stubble framed a long, unkind face, and his bloodshot eyes were looking at her. She'd never appreciated his forceful leadership style ever since he took over the gang, but at least he always let them do their thing until noon at least. The fact that he was here was a pain in the ass. And the first sign that something was off.

  “What's up, boss?” she greeted, trying to hide her annoyance. And her wariness, ‘cause the boss was acting weird. That was the second sign. Twitchy. Paranoid. Eyes darting back and forth. Raze wasn't normally the type to be so on-edge.

  Her feigned casual attitude seemed to work, since he got straight into it. “Bloodbrand. Is Chaffster up?”

  “Uhh, I think so?” The noise had died down, but he shouldn't be asleep yet if he'd pulled an all-nighter. The guy wasn't a big sleeper in general.

  “Go fetch him,” Raze replied without missing a beat. “I want both of you geared up and downstairs in ten minutes.”

  What the hell? What brought this on? But before she could ask for elaboration, Raze twisted on his heel and strode away.

  Then, she remembered something about him. Raze didn't have genuine precognition, exactly, but he did possess a sort of long-term danger sense. He had made a single offhand comment about that aspect of his power a while ago, but it seemed important now. She couldn't think of another reason why he'd be acting like this. It was an instinct that steered him right and kept him alive for so long in a pond filled with bigger fish.

  Not that he was weak. Far from it, she would rate him at about a high B or low A, going by standard Aegis rankings. There was even one time where he'd come face to face with the leader of Homeland and didn't die in two seconds.

  He was no Unbound, sure, but he was definitely the closest out of all of them to reaching that point. She didn't have a way to quantify that, of course—no one she knew did. It just felt true when she said it to herself.

  When he was out of sight, she knocked on Chaffster’s door and yelled at him to dress up and meet downstairs before doing the same herself.

  Sudden shifts in her daily tempo like these weren't entirely unheard of. It was part of the life, even if the days were pretty relaxed for the most part. The fight could come to them at any time, or there could be an invaluable opportunity the boss wanted them to pounce on.

  With practiced ease, she donned the tight leather outfit, red streaks lining the pants and vest with a bastardized masquerade mask covering her face. They didn't normally wear masks around base, but the situation called for it.

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  Soon enough, everyone had gathered on the ground floor, awaiting Raze's next orders. It wasn't military discipline by any means, but they had the experience to know when to stop fucking around.

  Raze started going on about keeping watch around the base, which confused her, but it seemed he was set on this as they all spread out to act like sentries or some stupid shit.

  Three whole hours she'd wasted in her place on one of the balconies on the second floor, bored out of her skull playing phone games or looking at porn. But, credit where it was due, someone did eventually turn up.

  There, in the distance.

  A woman.

  Xena brought her feet down where she'd kicked them up and shot a text message in the group chat.

  Given their location, it couldn't possibly have been a coincidence that this stranger was here on the exact morning where they had to abandon their usual routine and stand watch for hours on end, for two reasons. One, you didn't see random civilians striding up here every day. And two, the newcomer was absolutely not a civilian.

  The sleek, reinforced black fabric clinging tightly to the lady’s body wasn't a normal outfit (Xena looked her over twice to make sure), and the white bird mask with painted red markings gave away her identity as a supe.

  Granted, Xena didn't know if it was a white-hat or another villain, but the way she walked towards them with purpose put all ambiguity as to the woman’s destination out of her mind.

  Footsteps came from behind her and she turned, seeing Cipher walk up together with Chaffster.

  “Who's that?” the latter asked, his hairy barrel-chested torso rippling with muscle as he crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. Seeing him like this, she could see the appeal others saw in him, but she just couldn't stand his attitude. Or his snub nose and beady eyes, even if it was covered up by a lion mask right now.

  “Dunno,” she drawled, stretching like a cat and getting into a more comfortable position. “Think Raze’ll have us fight?”

  “Unlikely. Although he might be engaging in combat himself,” Cipher chimed in. The bespectacled, wiry man might have seemed out of place with their gang at first glance, but she'd gotten him to snort enough lines with her to know better. He was wilder than she was in some ways. During parties at least. At the moment he just enjoyed his role as the numbers guy. Everyone needed a numbers guy, really. And this was theirs.

  “Found her,” he continued. “That outfit matches one Calliope, a heroic D-rank Aegis operative based in A23G. Suspected sonic manipulation power.”

  Xena felt her eyebrows rise. “That's it? Nothing else?” She would have expected more, it didn't seem right for someone like that to be so unimpressive.

  “Involvement with the Venin incident. A period of inactivity. That's it,” he confirmed.

  Venin, huh? That story had been making the rounds around the country lately. It wasn't particularly impressive in scale, but it was a massive PR disaster for the government in terms of how many heroes had died prior to Noor showing up and wiping the floor with the newly unbound gang leader. Plus, a huge part of the district had been wiped out after the remaining civilians and heroes were saved by Voyager.

  The footage was really cool. She would've liked to go there and see the wasteland for herself, but they were sadly already rebuilding.

  Eh, it didn't matter.

  Still, she had to acknowledge that fighting a shifter Unbound that massive could cause problems for a lot of people, them included. She didn't think the Carrion Feast’s combined might could stand up to something like that. Well, maybe if they rallied around Raze, and he had time to set the terrain? She shook her head. Probably not even then.

  Either way, Raze slammed the front doors of the building open. His face was red and he was hyperventilating on the floor beneath them. He stepped out of the building to meet their guest.

  “WHY. Are. You. Here,” he ground out.

  “To overthrow you,” Calliope said while resting a hand on the wrapped stick at her side, and Xena was thrown by both the words and the voice. The volume was low, but she could hear the woman as if she were right here pouring liquid honey into her ears.

  “Don't think I'm ignorant,” their leader shot back, now costumed in a biker outfit with a spiked helmet. “My people already figured you out. You can't even take me. Let alone all of us.”

  “Come at me all at once, then. It won't make a difference,” the not-heroine answered, words filtered with a vibrating undertone.

  Raze gave a mocking laugh.

  And attacked without warning.

  The clash came and went so fast, Xena couldn't follow it. Two rushing blurs passing each other. Then they both came to a stop, Raze facing away, Calliope with her back to him facing them.

  Xena and the others saw it at that moment.

  Raze was down an arm.

  The inflated red-spiked appendage was on the ground, gushing blood much like his cut-off stump. The swing had been so quick and clean, she hadn't seen it happen. How had a stick even… except it wasn’t a stick.

  In Calliope’s hand was now a sword, the earlier “stick” now unsheathed. The model itself struck her as unique, or at least rare. While Xena was by no means an expert in swords, she knew it wasn't quite a katana. The blade was almost completely straight and lacked a wrist guard, so it didn't even look like a weapon when it wasn't drawn.

  That wasn't all. It also looked to be blurring with vibrations, giving off a sound that reminded Xena of a hummingbird. There wasn't even any blood on it.

  Calliope twirled her sword, strutting toward the still-recovering Raze. Sweat coated the boss’ face, his features twisting into a snarl. But Xena could see his veins bulging, the clenching muscles in his neck and jaw betraying how hard he was trying not to scream his lungs out.

  “Fucking bitch,” he spat, repositioning. “You think you've won?” He stretched out his remaining arm and made a pinching motion with his fingers. A wave of bladed spikes burst forth from the severed arm and rushed at Calliope.

  Unbothered, the woman blurred again and appeared behind Raze, sword raised for a decisive strike as the audience watched him narrowly dodge with bated breath.

  Until now, Bloodbrand had harbored doubts about their future. But seeing this, it became clear that one thing about this day would stay in all their minds for years to come.

  What they were witnessing wasn't a fight.

  It was an execution.

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