Adaptability was always his greatest strength.
People heard 'Aegis,' and thought 'invulnerable'; saw him lift a dumpster or fly, and thought 'yet another Alexandria package.' The truth was that he was just as easy to hurt as anyone off the street — but he was far, far harder to cripple or kill. He could see through his skin after taking a faceful of acid, or respire through an exposed liver after his lungs had been ripped out. He'd done both before, at need, and healed up afterward in days. The same sort of total redundancy and body control enabled his feats of strength — nothing people hadn't done before, to lift a car off their child… but nothing they could do at will, either.
He didn't try to correct the misapprehension — it was usually good to be thought invulnerable and incredibly strong. And sometimes, the advantage worked the other way: most Alexandria package capes, once you got past the invulnerability, were all too human. Find a way to wound them, and they were out of that fight at the very least. Alexandria package capes often died in the first fight that wounded them.
Usually to an Endbringer.
More than once, the belief that if he was wounded he was out of the fight had saved Carlos' life.
More than once it had saved his teammates' lives.
Nor did that adaptability stop with the physical. He led the wards because he was the oldest – simple as that, with no regard to aptitude or inclination. The Protectorate had weighed the benefits of a safe — well, safer — trial leadership run for each of its Wards against the benefits of optimally led Ward teams, and had opted for the former. He couldn't argue with the results in his own case.
Forced to lead, he had adapted to become a leader. Saddled with responsibility, he had become responsible. Charged with enforcing discipline, he had found self-discipline. Tasked with charming new recruits, he drew on memories of his more charming friends and made himself… friendly and accessible.
'Charming' was hard to pull off. Probably part of why he still didn't have a girlfriend.
He'd worked hard to reshape himself into a good leader. He might not be able to match Armsmaster's relentless focus or Miss Militia's calm assurance, but he'd done what he could. To teach his Wards how to explore the limits of their power, find the limits of their own body, and get up again. To make a difference that was never large enough, and keep trying. To let them remain children, instead of child soldiers. And, above all, to bring them home so they could grow up to be heroes.
And now this.
He'd gone over the mission a dozen times in his head already.
If he'd known that Taylor had been involved with Lung's capture, would he still have picked an ABB corner to hit? It had been a perfect recruitment mission, a well calculated blend of excitement and routine. Show them a fight against real villains, and you might scare them off. Show them how a Ward patrol usually went, and you'd bore them off. Should he have bantered over that cuffed but conscious thug? The Book said no; his internal simulation of Dean said yes… and right then, he'd been focused on getting her signed up for the Wards.
He sighed.
And if he'd known her name, he would never have made that joke about her tailoring her own uniforms. Too close to the truth. Too close for her to tell him not to use it, either, without drawing attention to it. Had it been his fault?
Director Piggot had said, repeatedly, that there was no proof that this was targeted at a Ward recruit, that Bakuda had had a pattern of random bombing before Lung had reined her in, and that Bakuda would have to be crazy to go after Ward families because the Protectorate would simply destroy her afterward. Carlos could see the sense in it, but logic wasn't much help. Multiple Ward families were already planning extended 'vacations,' and all of them were asking for more protection.
He'd spent the last two days playing eye-in-the-sky for a relentless series of raids on ABB properties and dealers, and the sweep had yielded dregs. Nothing useful. From all that could be found on the street, none of their illegal businesses were earning. The low level members had taken off their colors and vanished into the crowd, and the lieutenants were hiding in a basement somewhere. Or a shallow grave. Maybe they were expecting the backlash from hitting a Ward recruit, maybe they were laying low while the power struggle to replace Lung got underway — impossible to know.
Carlos finished entering a report on his most recent late-night raid: three paragraphs that boiled down to 'no result' (not counting the 18 single-item blanks on the form), phrased in the Protectorate-approved format. Who knows, maybe in that mass of empty detail was something one of the Thinkers could pick up on, and make tomorrow's raids successful.
He shook his head, sent the report off, and opened the file on the girl at the center of this mess. Woke this morning, possible concussion. Signed out of the medical wing by Clockblocker.
And then, nothing.
He leaned back, fingers drumming on the desk before him. The paper trail shouldn't stop there — officially. As a practical matter, Dennis had raised the skill of avoiding paperwork to an art. His paperwork was never on time, but never quite late enough to evoke disciplinary action. Under the circumstances, a documentation gap there was normal — expected even. Another issue, another day, and he might just have chosen to raise it at the morning briefing.
Tonight, he got up and made his way to the center of the dome that served as Ward territory deep beneath the PRT headquarters. The movable walls were currently configured to have that space as a break area, and at this hour there were only four Wards there. Missy was sitting in a chair reading a book (Nancy Drew), her feet tucked up under her, and tilted at an angle where she could see Dean over the book's edge, or hide behind it if necessary. John was sitting on the couch, playing a game on his phone, but he too had half his focus directed at the main table, where Dean and Dennis were playing to their audience.
Carlos paused at the edge of the room, listening: a mock-serious argument about whether the Wards would settle next month's patrol rotations with a powers-allowed game of Jenga or one of poker. He grinned. Vista knew better than to believe them, and Browbeat… needed easing into the group anyway. This kind of gentle inclusion had Dean's fingerprints all over it.
"Dennis? A word."
The bickering duo broke up, Dean seamlessly settling down next to John and pulling up a fighting game on the big screen. Carlos and Dennis entered a small side room, Carlos shutting the door behind them.
"I checked the file on our guest."
Dennis smiled. "And nothing? Piggy grabbed Dean and me, asked us to rush her into the Wards. Didn't want to do anything on comms where it'd be recorded, so I just… waited to file anything until I could talk to you in person."
Aegis frowned.
Dennis was next up to lead the team, and he might go very far indeed if he learned from the experience — his ability was of astounding power and flexible utility both. While it'd never been tested, it was believed that he could lock down even an Endbringer with a touch, freezing them outside time, and that same touch made for effortless nonlethal captures, or could preserve dying teammates for medical attention, or… the applications were limitless.
In the hands of someone brave and idealistic, with leadership talent, that kind of power marked you out for command of a major city's Protectorate team. In the hands of an irreverent kid who thought rules were just noise, well — it made for an awful lot of paperwork. Most of which got dumped on his team leader.
Like now.
To be fair, learning when to stand up for your team despite pressure from above was one of the lessons that a term leading a Ward team was designed to teach. And Carlos himself would have disagreed with that decision… but he would have seen the reasoning behind it. And Dennis should have too.
"If we keep her alive, we can fix whatever wrong we do her now." He paused, and looked at the redhead until his eyes dropped briefly.
"Not that I'll fault you for wanting to look after her, but do understand that Director Piggot had the same goal. So tell me what you did with her."
"She wanted to see her mother's grave…" Carlos winced. "So Dean and I took her out there, kept watch. Just sat there, talked to some other mourners. One of them wanted my autograph." Dennis grinned. "After that, we dropped her off at her aunt's with the promise to pick her up tomorrow."
The screeching noise of metal crumpling interrupted him. Aegis released the table and stood. "She doesn't have an aunt."