Super Thieves

Carter

"What exactly is our plan of attack supposed to be?" Birdman skeptically smirked as he stared down the three of us in the conference room, "walk in and take the artifact and then walk out?"

"It worked for us the first two times. We'll go get the artifact and be back before you know it," Heather chuckled.

"You seriously think we'd let you go alone? There's no way in hell that's happening," Birdman said with a small laugh that quickly turned into a deadly growl.

"We could always leave and sell the location to Black Ice," Heather replied calmly as she took a step towards the feather beast. He glared back and once again decided to back off. We're lucky that he needs us as badly as he does, otherwise we'd be collard and thrown in prison once we got the job done.

"You three aren't going alone, that is non-negotiable," Birdman sighed, "but you can operate as you see fit. Myself and two other heroes will be joining you in case anything goes wrong."

"Deal," Heather said simply, "Carter, tell them where it is."

I lifted my laptop onto the conference table and logged in, pulling up a map of Las Vegas with the museum's location circled.

"Las Vegas, Nevada. There are no reports of Black Ice being spotted near the area, so it should be fairly easy to get in and out," I said, pointing at various locations on the map, "I suggest a small team of undercover supers travel with us to avoid drawing his attention."

"I'll be taking Gravity Girl and Glow Woman with us, we leave in two hours. Get whatever gear you need and meet us at hangar B12," the hero said with a dismissive wave of his hand, he outstretched his wings and flew out of a hatch in the ceiling.

"You heard the man," Andrew mumbled as he lead the way out of the conference room. The three of us made it back to our quarters and started to pack for the trip. Heather and Andrew hardly spoke to each other except for the occasional, "can you pass me that?", or, "where's my thing?". I don't know what it'll take to make them apologize to one another but there's been this weird tension in the air ever since Tokyo. And after talking with Heather last night I could tell it's been getting worse. It hasn't started to affect our performance...not yet at least.

"Be prepared for anything," Heather whispered as she concealed her dual pistols in the bottom of her backpack. She laced up her black combat boots and brushed some dust off of her black jeans. I tossed her one of her grey zip up hoodies and slipped my loaded backpack over my shoulder. The three of us always wore the same standard uniforms, black boots, black pants, and a black hoodie to cover our faces. The masks were a personal touch reserved only for when we were on a job. In all honesty, Heather and I could blend in as typical college students. Black seems to be a popular color nowadays. Andrew would have a slightly harder time, big, bulky adult men like him always look a little shady decked out in black.

"One step closer to stopping Black Ice," Andrew said back as he let us out into the hallway. Heather led the way towards the elevator and Andrew brought up the rear. Glow Woman joined us on the ground floor and brought us to the hangar where Gravity Girl and Birdman were waiting.

They silently followed us onto the jet they were standing in front of. It felt like we were prisoners being escorted to our deaths or something, and it was even worse knowing a reality like that could easily come true. Heather and I sat in the back of the jet, buckled into our seats with our noses buried in our laptops. Andrew uncomfortably sat next to Glow Woman while Birdman and Gravity Girl sat near our pilot in the front. There was a quiet hum of conversations mixed with the buzz of the jet's thrusters. All of a sudden I could hear Glow Woman's voice in perfect clarity out of my comm link. Heather must've patched us into the channel.

"I've served with the NSL for nearly twenty years, I even fought in the Hero Villain War," she said to Andrew with a small laugh, "war between normal people is terrible enough, but when you add super powers into it you mind as well quadruple the casualties."

"What was it like?" Andrew asked her quietly.

"Imagine if shooting a single bullet had the same power as a nuclear bomb. Now, imagine that over two hundred heroes and villains were pulling the triggers."

"So it was devastating?"

"We managed to keep most of the fighting out of cities and populated areas, but there are a few towns dotted around the world that still haven't recovered from the damage."

"How'd you end it all?"

"The Founding Five decided they had enough. They're the strongest heroes in the NSL and the few villains left standing were rounded up," Glow Woman answered. Her voice quickly turned sad and quiet, "we almost caught Black Ice during the war. He was one of the top leaders, but he went missing. When the Five announced the war had ended our leading member, Power Woman, was declared dead soon after."

"You think Black Ice killed her?" Andrew said just as softly.

"Yes. And I also think this is his second chance at winning a war against superheroes," she replied. The voices abruptly cut off and I looked over at Heather to see what was going on.

"I detected a hacking attempt on our channel, they must've picked up the signal," Heather mumbled to, "nothing to worry about. But I'm sure they think Black Ice is somewhere nearby now."