One of the most annoying things in the world was having a closet full of good clothes that suddenly become ugly when they're needed.
Vidya stood at her open closet, realizing that she had the sense of style of a lumberjack. There were at least seven plaid flannel shirts of varying colors and not much else—at least, nothing that fit a first date, unless she wanted the white blouse with the mysterious, permanent art stains.
Missions were still a little rare, so she'd decided to go ahead on her date with Jonah on the day after she'd asked him out, since it was a free Saturday. And on the off chance she got an assignment during the date, she'd take care of it. This was her life now: a balancing act between high school and heroism. May as well get used to it.
She grabbed a navy-green plaid shirt and layered a light jacket over it, perfectly comfortable for a Los Angeles winter. She tucked her mask and her pager into the pockets and twirled around for an opinion.
Amber lowered her magazine, which, ironically, featured Frostbite and Devaris on the cover. "You look great."
"The plaid looks stupid with the jacket, doesn't it?"
"No..."
Vidya raised an eyebrow. "You're trailing off. That's a bad sign."
"Girl, you look fine." Amber rolled off the bed in one fluid motion, slapping the magazine onto the desk. "But are you sure you don't want to put your pager on silent?"
"Having it on silent on a weekend during daytime would make it look like I have no commitment," Vidya pointed out. "And the odds of getting a mission are low. I've honestly spent more time being a figurehead than a hero."
"Is that a bad thing?"
"Not at all," Vidya admitted. It felt nice to be known, to be looked up to. She might spend a lot more time doing corporate things than hero things, but there was nothing wrong with that.
Amber straightened Vidya's jacket and brushed off lint only she could see. "Perfectly casual."
Vidya nodded. She put her ear to the door and waited until she heard Mom and Jose settling into their home office. They knew she had a date today—she wasn't too shy to tell them that much, but actually walking past them while on her way to the date was an embarrassment milestone she wasn't ready for. She snuck out of the house with Amber, who drove her to Santa Monica and dropped her off with a suggestive wink.
The entrance to the Santa Monica Pier stood in all its revamped glory. The original sign had been destroyed three years ago during the Giant Maggot Incident of 2017, and as an apology for the Marvels not stopping Maggotzilla fast enough, Celestro had funded the entire rebuilding. The new sign was the same style as the old one, but it was prettier and shinier and more likely to hold up against giant larva.
Vidya stood on the sidewalk just under the sign, waiting with her hands in her pockets. Everything happened so fast that she'd had no time to scroll through hundreds of blogs of dating tips, which she'd always pictured herself doing before her first date. She wondered if he was as nervous as she was.
Jonah was coming up the sidewalk with a cheerful smile that looked so much more genuine than she could have hoped for. She'd been crazy enough to ask him out, but at least he'd been crazy enough to say yes, so there must be something between them.
And if it didn't work out as a relationship, maybe it would at least lead to a friendship.
Together they walked, side by side, into the Santa Monica Pier. Jonah made a joke about Maggotzilla, and she laughed. As tense as that incident had been—she remembered watching the news coverage with her family, all of them quiet—it was a joke now. Everyone who visited the Pier thought about it and laughed. No one had been injured, no one had died, and the property damage was repaired swiftly, so it was nothing more than a blip in history.
To most people, anyway. Vidya wondered if the Marvels were traumatized by it. Juggernaut should be.
"So..." Jonah trailed off when they were done talking about the maggot.
This was where all those dating tips would've come in handy: to fill the inevitable awkward silence. Vidya cleared her throat, grasping at straws. "So...how are you?"
"Good." He shrugged. "College applications are over, so it's the time when every senior starts slacking, you know?"
Vidya laughed. The general attitude of the entire twelfth grade was, we're over this. It was infectious. She'd slack off, too, if she weren't in risky territory with calculus.
"How are you?" he asked.
"Good." She shrugged, too. "Amber and I are working on a project for the upcoming art showcase, and I..." She was about to mention that she had a new job that kept her busy, just to be half-honest, but that would be too big of a hint.
"What?" he asked.
"Nothing." She shook her head. "I don't really have much else to say."
Horrible choice of words—now he might think that she thought that he was boring. You idiot, she thought of herself.
"Let's get some snacks," she suggested before he could read too much into what she'd said.
They got funnel cake, and then they stood at the railing overlooking the ocean and talked. It got easier by the minute. Vidya slowly relaxed, and so did he. At one point, he asked if she wanted to go on the Ferris Wheel. She loved Ferris Wheels, but she wasn't stupid. She could see it now: them at the top, enjoying their date, and then her pager goes off, and she's screwed.
She suggested they get cotton candy instead.
It was after her first bite of fluffy, artery-clogging sugar that something in her pocket buzzed. She froze, holding the cotton candy in front of her face to hide her shock. The buzz had come from her left pocket. Was that the one with her phone, or her pager? She sneakily pulled it out only an inch to see what it was...
It was her pager.
Vidya handed her cotton candy to Jonah. "I'm going to the bathroom really quick."
He took it and nodded. "I'll wait here."
Once she was out of his sight, Vidya walked in the opposite direction from the bathroom. If Jonah was looking, he'd probably assume she was going to a different bathroom than the one that was just around the corner from where they had been standing.
Vidya pulled out her pager to read the message. It wasn't a demand from Fox to go to a last-minute meet-and-greet or interview; it was an actual mission. She shook her head at the irony—the one day she was hoping not to get one, and she got one. At least it was a solo assignment.
Vidya found a secluded spot. She may not have wanted this to happen, but she had prepared for it. Her jacket was one of those reversible ones with two completely different designs, and she flipped it inside out. She took off her shoes and threw them under some tarp. Her pants were just plain, common jeans, so she left them alone. She curled her braid into a haphazard bun and pinned it down with bobby pins she'd put in her pocket, and lastly, she put on her mask.
Without the suit, she may not look exactly like Frostbite, but nobody, not even Jonah—if he watched the news later—would recognize Vidya.
She took off into the sky, flying away from the Pier as fast as possible. The cold air tickled her bare feet as she headed back to LA. She knew exactly where Lorenzo's Pub was, even though she'd never gone to the parties her classmates threw there (the owner was the older sister of eleventh-grader Linda Lorenzo. She and her friends got away with a lot.)
Vidya entered the restaurant-bar and ducked. A half-full glass shattered against the door, the alcohol running down the dark wood and pooling around her feet on the floor.
Looking around, Vidya had no idea how the fight started, or where it was headed. Tala Turan, the minor supervillain who was causing distress, was screaming her head off behind the counter. She swept her hands across shelves of drinks in glass bottles, which fell to the floor and shattered. Intense anger radiated from her every movement. The other patrons were pressed up against the back wall, too afraid to make for the door because they'd have to go past Tala. Only one guy was unbothered; he sat alone at a table, calmly holding a wad of napkins up to his nose.
After most of the bottles were destroyed, Tala turned around sharply. Her hands clenched, her eyes flashing green as they did when she used her powers.
Vidya calmly raised her hands. Why attack when you can subdue was the policy she tried to stick to, but Tala had a reputation for never backing down. No matter what, there was a fight coming.
"Calm down," Vidya implored. "Tala, what's wrong?"
Tala scoffed. "Are you trying to talk me down?"
Vidya cracked a sheepish smile. "Is it working?"
Tala grabbed one of the remaining bottles and hurled it with an arm that was much stronger than it looked. Although they were nowhere near the action, the bar guests simultaneously flinched.
Vidya froze the bottle as it flew through the air, caught it, and threw it at Tala's feet. The villain stumbled over it, caught off guard, but she didn't fall over. She exhaled sharply through her nose, her fists lighting up bright, absinthe-green.
Vidya wanted to know the reason for this fight, but villains didn't like to talk, and why would they? They didn't need to explain themselves to the heroes that fought them, only to the court that tried them. All Vidya could do was guess. Despite the broken glass and the screaming, it didn't look like Tala was on a murderous rampage. She was just violently angry.
Tala grabbed a stool, her energy-laden hands electrifying it with green light, and she threw it. Vidya stepped to the side, careful not to step on any broken glass. She'd thought her shoes could have been a potential giveaway, but now she regretted leaving them behind at the Pier. The stool crashed through a window, narrowly missing a parked car outside.
Vidya eyed Tala's glowing hands. The villain didn't deserve to be called minor; her powers were stronger than even some of Celestro's heroes.
Vidya flew forward and grabbed Tala's hands, sending off green sparks, and encased each one in a thick, heavy block of ice. Vidya pulled back before she could be kicked away. The weight of the ice pulled Tala down, her legs bent awkwardly as she tried to lift her heavy ice fists off the ground. Her hands still glowed green, and it looked like there were distorted Northern Lights inside the blocks. Vidya watched carefully, but Tala's anger wasn't powerful enough to break the ice.
Tala's eyes returned to their normal dark brown. It was an acceptance of defeat. "You little bitch," she muttered.
Through the window, Vidya beckoned the police inside. They lifted Tala up and shoved her into the back of a police van, and she didn't resist. She only muttered angry promises at them and glared at Frostbite until the doors were closed on her.
There was a whistle, and a voice behind Vidya said, "Impressive, Frostbite."
Vidya turned around. The one guy who'd calmly sat at the table with a napkin to his face was still there. Now that she got a good look at him, she blinked in surprise. He wasn't wearing his supersuit, but he was easily recognizable without it. There were pale red Lichtenberg figures on his skin, coming up from under his shirt and over the left side of his jaw and partly up onto the left side of his face. The longest scar ended right under his left eye, which was a pale blue, unlike the other eye—the normal eye—which was green.
It was Kennedy Laughlin, aka Strike, the leader of the Golden Four.
Vidya went up to his table, resting her hands on the back of the chair that was directly across from him. "What are you doing here, Strike?" she asked. "What happened?"
"Please, call me Kennedy." He blinked hard, wincing. "I was minding my own business when Tala walks in, sees me, attacks, and starts throwing a tantrum. We're usually the ones that arrest her, you see, so she's got a grudge."
Vidya knew that Tala was a frequent enemy of the Golden Four, and that was what confused her. "So Tala starts attacking," she said, narrowing her eyes but trying not to sound too accusing, "and you just sat here and did nothing?"
"First of all." Kennedy moved the napkin away. His nose was purple and blue and a little swollen—Tala's handiwork. "I can't feel my face. Second, I did do something. I called it in, and Celestro sent you, and I think you did a damn good job."
Vidya assumed it was a sarcastic compliment. She'd learned not to expect kindness from heroes, especially Celestro's, but after a quick moment of silence, she realized he was being genuine.
"Thank you," she said. She made a small ice ball in her hand, wrapped it in a tissue from her pocket, and handed it to him. "I should get going."
Kennedy held her makeshift ice pack to his nose with a wink and said nothing else.
Vidya hurried out the door and took off into the sky, risking a glance at the time on her phone while she flew to the Pier. It had been twelve minutes since she left Jonah; that was acceptable, right?
She found her secluded spot on the Pier and changed back from Frostbite into Vidya. She pulled on her shoes, reversed her jacket, slipped the mask into her pocket, undid her bun, and smoothed down her braid. Every step felt excruciatingly slow.
She speed-walked across the boardwalk, slowing down when Jonah was within sight. "Sorry," she said. "I got distracted by a mime."
She hoped he wouldn't ask to see the mime, because she had no idea if there were any mimes on the Pier right now. Thankfully, he just nodded and handed her back her cotton candy, asking her what she wanted to do now.
"You know what?" Vidya looped her arm through his and tugged. "Let's go on that Ferris Wheel."
________________
That night, Vidya detailed almost the entirety of the day for her report. She stood in the center of the meeting room, and Juggernaut sat in his chair, listening. He probably didn't care about the extra details, but he wasn't telling her to shut up, either, so she kept at it. She explained that she'd been on a date in Santa Monica, which was why she wasn't in her supersuit, and that everything went perfectly well and that she even got to meet Strike, who seemed pretty cool.
"Anyway." Vidya shrugged when she was done with the word vomit. "That's it."
He smiled. "You did a great job."
"Thank you!" Two heroes being nice in one day—what a surprise.
Juggernaut nodded to himself, eyes drifting off to the floor. Suddenly they were back on her, and he asked, smileless, "Who were you with last night?"
Vidya blinked. "What?"
"I was flying across the city yesterday," he explained calmly, "and I swear I saw you and two others fighting the Tricksters." He paused, as if waiting for her to deny it. "I was on a time-sensitive trip, so I didn't have a chance to take another look and see who your new friends were. I was hoping you could tell me."
Vidya remembered the shadow that passed over the alley, the one she'd assumed was a bird. If Juggernaut hadn't been on a time-sensitive trip, if he'd decided to intervene...what would've happened?
Vidya swallowed, speechless. So far, he'd been nothing but friendly. Now that the facade was slipping, she felt a twinge of fear, and it was uncomfortable. It was hostile. She was suddenly afraid that something bad would happen if she gave up David and Aisha's names. Celestro had no reason to hurt them in any way...but the company was unpredictable and secretive, and she didn't want to put her friends at risk. It felt wrong.
"With all due respect," she said slowly. "I don't want to tell you...and I don't have to."
Vidya held her breath. Juggernaut stared at her evenly, his expression completely blank. Flamethrower would've slapped her if Vidya said anything like that to her, but Juggernaut didn't even look the slightest bit annoyed.
"Frostbite," he said, still calm. A little cold. "You can hang out with whoever you want, but you're part of this team." He shook his head without breaking eye contact. "Don't forget that."
Vidya swallowed again, her throat dry. "I won't," she said quietly. She knew the conversation was over, so she turned and left, alarm bells ringing in her head.
_________________________
"Please stop whistling."
Flamethrower paused only long enough to smirk. Then she started whistling again, louder this time, leaning toward Phase as they walked side by side in the night to make sure he heard it clear as day. He glanced at her, but he didn't say anything.
She shook her head, unsurprised. Phase's negative reactions never went beyond an annoyed tone or look. He was too good for his own good, the kind of good that didn't deserve to exist when everything around him was a dumpster fire. Flamethrower couldn't wait to see what happened when someone pushed him over the edge. One day, she thought, amused. You'll be just like us.
An idea popped into her head. "If I mentally whistle, would you hear it?"
He looked horrified. "Please don't—"
She did it anyway, imagining an obnoxious whistling tune—Baby Shark—and trying to broadcast it to his mind.
Phase shook his head with obvious relief. "Didn't work."
"Worth a shot."
They stopped across the street from the warehouse. In the darkness of the evening, it was little more than a rectangular bulk of shadow, just like every other building nearby. There was a bit of light shining through one of the grimy windows. The warehouse was supposed to be empty, but it looked like someone might be home.
Flamethrower sighed through her nose, nostrils flaring. "This is stupid. What exactly did that tip say?"
"That there may or may not be some sort of smuggling operation going on here."
"We're the fucking Marvels," she said, throwing up her hands. "Why are we responding to something that the police can easily take care of themselves?"
"Good question." Phase crossed the street without her, saying over his shoulder, "Why don't you go and ask Juggernaut?"
Flamethrower threw up her middle finger. Menial work might not bother him, but it was beneath her. Dispatch's process was simple: they got calls or sourced jobs themselves and then decided who to send the mission to. If it wasn't flashy enough, it went to the other hires. If it was serious, it went to Juggernaut, and he distributed the mission to whichever of the Marvels he saw fit. If none of them took it, he sent the assignment back to dispatch to do with it what they pleased, drop it or hand it off to someone else. A simple task like checking out a warehouse for smuggling should never have gotten to dispatch at all, let alone be assigned to the Marvels. It was ridiculous.
They stood in front of a side door, held on by clunky, rusty hinges that would give someone tetanus if they so much as touched them.
Phase held out his hand. "I can take you through the wall."
Flamethrower scoffed and pointed a finger in his face. "Hey, I've been on the team longer than you, which means I'm in charge."
"Fine." Phase put his hand down. "How do you want to get inside?"
Flamethrower rested her hand on the door, fingers spread. The hinges melted, dripping down and pooling on the ground with a sizzle. The red-hot door no longer had any support, and with a gentle push, it fell backward with a loud bang.
Phase didn't even look at it. "We just lost the element of surprise," he said flatly.
She went through the opening, shrugging. Anyone inside was already screwed—why not tip them off and let them cower? It was more fun that way.
She lit a flame in her palm so she could see. The warehouse looked like crap. The ground was scrubbed clean of whatever fake flooring it had been plastered with ages ago, and there were cobwebs and twisted cables hanging from the cracked ceiling. It smelled like gunpowder and wet mice.
"I'll take the top floor," she said. The closest staircase was missing most of its steps, so she grabbed onto the railing and hauled herself up.
The second level looked less like a warehouse and more like a haunted, video-game asylum, but at least it smelled better. There was a single wide hallway with doors that led to hell knew where, all looking like they hadn't been touched in years. There wasn't a single sign of smuggling: no remnants of drugs, no illegal weapons, no people. Still think this is a worthy mission? she asked Phase, and though he didn't answer, she knew he was rolling his eyes.
There was more light on this floor, due to a broken window that allowed streetlight to flood in, so Flamethrower extinguished her hand with a sigh. There were three closed doors to check, but she doubted they hid anything worthwhile.
She pushed open the first door gently, but it still fell off its hinges. Inside was an old bathroom with wet sinks, and there was a group of rats swimming in one of them. She opened the stalls one by one in case anyone was hiding, though she'd be disgusted if anyone was desperate enough to hole up on one of these nasty toilets. There was no one.
Flamethrower walked back into the hallway. "Any luck?"
"Nothing!" Phase called out from downstairs.
She went to the next door and leaned her ear as close to it as she possibly could without touching the decaying wood. There was heavy breathing on the other side, as well as some muttering.
Flamethrower smiled, lighting up her hands in preparation, but then the door flew open, smacking her in the face and knocking her over. Someone stumbled over her in an attempt to run away, but she reached out and closed her fingers around the guy's ankle. The heat seared through the leg of his pants and cooked his skin, and he screamed as the smell of burning flesh wafted through the air.
Flamethrower got up calmly, releasing his ankle. The pathetic idiot was limping away so slowly that she had plenty of time to think. There was no one else in the room he'd come out of, and no one ambushed her, which meant he'd been here alone, but there were suspicious crates pushed against the wall. Drugs or weapons, she didn't bother checking. She followed him, noticing that there was a knife tucked into his belt, and he hadn't used it against her. He must've forgotten about it in his rush to get away.
You moron.
Flamethrower held out her hand and engulfed him in flame. The screaming grew louder but quieted almost immediately as he was reduced to a burning corpse. This level now smelled just as bad as downstairs.
Some of the floor was starting to catch fire, which was normal. What was weird was that the fire started to spread in one direction, as if someone had soaked a certain path in gasoline. Flamethrower followed it, and the flames ultimately went under the door she hadn't opened yet.
She opened it, and in the split-second before everything went to shit, she noticed two things: a small pile of tanks labeled propane, and a body that was tied to the pile with a black bag over his or her head.
The flames and heat were already in the room, and as per the laws of nature, thermodynamics, and other sciences she couldn't be bothered to mention, the propane blew up.
Flamethrower was thrown back, tumbling against the floor, which shook and splintered and was probably well on its way to collapsing. She stood up slowly, arching her back to check if any bones were broken. Nope. There were splinters of wood all over her hands, though, and she brushed them off with a scowl. The entirety of the second level—and probably the whole warehouse—was engulfed in fire, and she stood there calmly, unharmed.
Then she remembered Phase.
"Phase?" she called out, voice rising in panic at the thought that she may have gotten him killed. "Noah?"
Flamethrower rushed toward the staircase—although punching through the floor and dropping down would be easier than running down steps she wouldn't be able to see—when the floor in front of her collapsed. She skidded to a stop and peered down to the ground level. Phase was standing here with his head craned up, staring at her, completely unsurprised. The flames were going right through him, as if he weren't there.
Flamethrower leaned closer to the hole in the floor, trying to hide her relief. "How did you go intangible so fast?"
"I'm always intangible around you."
She scowled. "Don't trust me, do you?"
"Why should I? You just blew everything up!"
"How the hell was I supposed to know there was a closet full of fucking propane?" she snapped. He was right, though. If she'd been more careful with throwing around her fire, the propane wouldn't have blown up.
"Forget it." He looked at something she couldn't see from here. "Come down here."
Flamethrower sat on the edge of the sunken floor and slid down, landing in a crouch next to him. He pointed at the burning corpse that lay in front of them.
"What happened?" he asked. "Is that the smuggler?"
"No." That guy's corpse would be much bigger than this one. Flamethrower held up her hand, using her power to remove the flames and give the poor corpse some mercy. "There was a person tied to the propane."
"Already dead, or still alive?"
"I don't know. I didn't get to check."
They went closer to examine the details, but there were barely any. The body was at the exact spot of the explosion, so it was gruesomely mutilated. The parts that had been blown off were probably strewn all over the building.
"Why would a lone smuggler tie a hostage to propane?" Flamethrower asked. "Or, maybe it's two entirely separate things."
Phase tilted his head, staring at the corpse. He looked sorry for it; of course he would be. "I don't know."
"Do you think it's important enough for Celestro to look into?"
He thought about it for a moment and then shrugged. "Maybe."
__________________________
three years earlier
The Giant Maggot Incident of 2017
After twelve years on the job, Juggernaut thought he'd seen enough to not be too surprised by anything new. But Jonah P. Magnum seemed to have taken that as a challenge, and now there was a gigantic maggot terrorizing Los Angeles and Santa Monica.
Juggernaut stood with his team, watching the larva slowly dismantle the Santa Monica Pier. The pale, wiggling Maggotzilla—as the news had named it—was sure to give children nightmares for years to come. Juggernaut himself didn't think he'd get over this—not because he was scared, but because he was annoyed. It was so fucking ridiculous, and of course it had to happen here and now, when he was the one responsible for taking care of shit like this.
"Any ideas?" he asked flatly.
No one answered right away. Maggotzilla somehow had skin that was bulletproof, so any military or police help was useless. Ghost and Lady Marvel couldn't do anything, and the other two were thinking.
"I would use my powers," Echo said, "but in order to make it enough to actually harm something so big...I'd probably cause an earthquake and do more damage than the insect itself."
Everyone shook their heads, dismissing the idea. Juggernaut glanced over his shoulder at Alder, whose lips were drawn into a thin line. She was quitting at the end of this week, and she'd unfortunately come face-to-face with an oversized maggot during her last few days on the job.
"Sorry, Alder," Juggernaut said.
"Shut up," Alder snapped. She twirled a vine around her fingers, thinking. "I would try to hold it down with vines, but they'd have to grow from the ground, and that many vines... it would do a lot of damage to infrastructure."
Everyone shook their heads again.
"You know," Lady Marvel said, "this would be a lot easier if you just lasered it in half."
Everyone nodded. Juggernaut sighed. Fox had already forbidden him from lasering it. Maggotzilla hadn't killed or harmed anyone yet, so Fox didn't think it was necessary for him to reveal his superpower for something that wasn't worth it.
Juggernaut seriously considered just idly waiting for some poor guy to get crushed; Fox would certainly let him use the lasers then. Right now, she was expecting him to think of something else.
Ghost raised an eyebrow, looking from Lady Marvel to Juggernaut. "Neither of you can get through its skin?"
They both could, but it didn't matter. Juggernaut had stuck his arm in and released a small bomb, which exploded and took out a chunk of the maggot's side. It did nothing. The maggot was so fat and massive that a tiny injury so close to its skin didn't do anything. Lady Marvel suggested they throw a bomb into it, because a throw would make it go deeper than arm's length, but they had no way of knowing how hard to throw it. The bomb might just go straight through the maggot and get out on the other side and detonate against a building. Too risky.
"I don't mean to alarm you," Alder said, "but a maggot is fly larva."
"So?" Echo asked.
"So maybe we might want to stop it before it, you know, pupates and hatches into a giant fly?"
"Flyzilla," Ghost said, shaking her head.
Lady Marvel looked at Juggernaut sideways. "I cannot believe this is happening," she muttered under her breath, closing her eyes with a laugh.
Juggernaut took two small grenades from her, sighing. He'd been putting off this idea in hopes that something better might come up, but they were out of options.
"Nobody laugh," he snapped, taking a few steps back to get a running start.
Everyone except Lady Marvel looked confused. She already knew what was happening, and she held her hand over her mouth to hide a smile. He'd never hear the end of this.
Juggernaut took off into the sky, cursing Fox and all her descendants. He stopped to stare into where he thought Maggotzilla's eyes might be—if it had any. Then, since bullets couldn't go through it, he flew through the maggot himself. He kept his eyes closed because he wasn't interested in knowing what the inside looked like. He released two grenades inside its body: one near the head, the other somewhere in the middle.
It took one second to shoot through the maggot, and when he got out on the other side, he landed on a roof and turned around to watch. Juggernaut pressed his hands to his face, wiping off the maggot guts. He was covered in gross slime. So. Fucking. Ridiculous.
The Marvels were definitely laughing now.
Within a few seconds, Maggotzilla exploded.
And there went the blip in history.