#diamonique

The first thing she saw was the world’s most adorable puppy, tucked into the elbow of the idiot ringing her doorbell at three am, and wagging its tail about a mile a minute.

The second thing she saw was the person herself, and her stomach plummeted to the earth’s core.

The woman was tall. Diamonique would have guessed six and a half feet tall, though the hefty black combat boots probably added an inch or so. Her long, black hair was formed into medium-tight curls, and left loose in a way that would be dangerous in a fight. What skin Diamonique could see was dark bronze, but all that was visible was the woman’s eyes and forehead. She wore a mask over the lower part of her face, black with the neon green outline of fangs.

Sparkwave.

Diamonique shut the door.

DingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdongDingdong

When Diamonique pulled the door open again, she was ready to shove a spear of crystal straight into Sparkwave’s heart. “What the hell, man!”

Sparkwave shoved the puppy into Diamonique’s arms; the (much) shorter young woman had to drop her crystal onto the welcome mat to avoid dropping the dog. In her confusion, Diamonique was shoved aside as Sparkwave stomped inside.

“Get out of my house,” Diamonique snarled. “Before I call the police.”

“Relax, creampuff.” Sparkwave wore her old motorcycle jacket, but Diamonique thought that the rest of the uniform was new. Sparkwave’s infamous heist had been before Diamonique’s time, but she’d read all the stories and profiles on the woman. The mask disrupted her voice a little; it was a markedly female voice, and a low one, but sounded metallic and tinny. Diamonique probably wouldn’t recognize it again if Sparkwave ever spoke without  it. “I’m not gonna do anything.”

“Why are you here?” Diamonique demanded. She thrust the puppy in Sparkwave’s direction. “What’s with the dog?”

“Peace offering.” Sparkwave strode into the living room as if she owned the place, and sprawled all over Diamonique’s couch. “Dom said you always wanted  corgi.”

Diamonique felt chills running all over her skin again. “Dom? Where is he? What did you do to him!”

“Nothing.” Sparkwave propped one boot up on the coffee table. “He’s just fine. I swear. Call him later, if you want. Look. You’re the only authorized cape in Denver right now, right?”

Diamonique frowned down at the puppy, which was now squirming and trying to lick her face. She flicked her fingers, and the foot-long sliver of crystal she had dropped at the door filled with light, and zipped straight back to her hand. “Get out.”

“Make me.” Sparkwave stared levelly at Diamonique. “’Course, if it came to a fight, I’d just go straight for the dog -”

“What!” Diamonique clutched the puppy closer, and Sparkwave snorted.

“Take a day off tomorrow,” Sparkwave said. “You don’t want to be involved in what’s gonna go down.”

Stiffly, Diamonique said, “I’m sorry, but I don’t take orders from supervillains.”

“That’s a false dichotomy.” Sparkwave stood up. “You can’t separate people into absolutes like that, unless they’re like, Hitler, or something, and Sparkwave’s never killed anyone.” Tipping her chin back, Sparkwave eyed Diamonique for a second, and then added, “I’d think a little girl protesting police brutality would understand that.”

“Bait.” Sparkwave rocked back onto one heel, crossing her arms over her chest. “A trap. For one of the real ‘villains.’ Dom’s involved. You better not be.”

The puppy squirmed and whined in Diamonique’s grip. Numbly, she finally set it down, and it immediately sprinted over to investigate her kitchen - it probably smelled food in the trash. “Are - Are you threatening me?”

“No. I don’t do threats.” Sparkwave combed her thick, unruly hair away from her face. “Your brother volunteered for this. He said you wouldn’t understand, and we better make sure you stay put tomorrow.”

Diamonique clenched her teeth. “I’m not going to ‘stay put,’” she seethed. “Tell me what’s going on!”

“I told you what I can. If everything goes right, no one will be hurt. If everything goes wrong, Dom, at least, still won’t be hurt. So you have nothing to worry about, and no reason to get involved.”

Diamonique let out a sharp laugh. She and Sparkwave both looked over at a crash from the kitchen; groaning under her breath, Diamonique stuck her head inside to see that the puppy had managed to pull down the recycling bin.

“You have a vet appointment tomorrow,” Sparkwave said. When Diamonique turned around, the masked woman handed her a folded packet of papers. “Vaccinations and stuff. Eleven am. It’s all in your name. If you miss it, the vet charges a fee.”

“What?” Diamonique couldn’t believe this. “You really think handing me a puppy is gonna stop villain activity tomorrow?”

“Yeah, I really do,” Sparkwave said, “especially since you don’t have a clue what’s going down. Better not see you tomorrow.”

Eli groaned as they rounded the corner. “We’re going to be here forever.”

Their usual cafe was filled with people, the line stretching out the door. Javed was certain that the crowd wouldn’t have been so numerous, if not for the damage from Denver’s latest superfight evident up and down the other side of the street. Cops had practically gift-wrapped half the block in yellow police tape, but they hadn’t forced any of the business on the other side of the road to close. They probably should have. More than half the coffee shop’s clientele were probably here just to gawk at the damage.

He and Eli filed into the back of the line that stretched just out the door; he checked his phone with a sigh.

“Good thing I’m out with the boss,” Eli commented, “or else I’d get in trouble for being late on the way back.”

“No, it’ll still count,” Javed said blandly. He wouldn’t, actually, hold it against Eli, but it was worth it to hear Eli whine, “What?”

They finally squeezed into the cafe itself. There wasn’t much seating, and all the tables were crowded with five, six, seven people when they were only meant to seat four each. Javed and Eli had finally fought their way to the counter, when he caught a sight of familiar afro-styled black hair.

“Cape,” Javed muttered under his breath to Eli, turning aside and hoping Diamonique hadn’t noticed either of them. He didn’t hold out much hope - Eli was impossible to miss, with his bright pink hair and standing head and shoulders above nearly everyone else in the cafe.

Except the barista, funnily enough, who perked up when she saw another friendly giant. She and Eli were having an animated conversation about doorways and shower stalls when someone practically shouted, “You!”

"Thank you,” Javed interrupted hastily, stuffing a ten dollar bill in the girl’s tip jar and grabbing their drinks the second she set them on the counter. She and Eli both looked disappointed to have the conversation cut short, but when Eli noticed a certain young superhero struggling towards them through the crowd, his face cleared.

He cleared a path to the door much easily than Javed would have managed; Javed stuck close to Eli’s back until they were outside. “Hey!” someone shouted at their backs, but Javed stoically pretended not to hear.

“For the record, I didn’t touch her when she broke into HQ,” Eli muttered to Javed. 

He scowled at his too-hot coffee. “Maybe you should’ve,” he muttered. Eli frowned down at him. Javed wouldn’t have faulted Eli for breaking a few of her bones. Or all of them. Maybe just her neck. 

Without verbal agreement, the both of them cut into an alley as their tagalong, still several feet behind them, yelled, “Get back here! I’m talking to you!”

They almost made it to the other side without incident - but then Diamonique dropped down in front of them, furious and hanging onto a chunk of clear crystal like a twenty-four-year-old black Mary Poppins. Eli backpedaled before he could run over her, and backed into Javed instead.

He swore as a bit of coffee splashed onto his wrist. “This is harassment,” he snapped at the short young woman in front of them.

“No,” Diamonique snapped right back, shoving her crystal into her messenger bag, “this is an investigation.”

“Do you even have your license?” Eli wanted to know. “You’re like, twelve years old.”

“You piece of -” With an effort, Diamonique clenched her jaw on that last word and sucked in a deep breath, closing her eyes. Javed arched his eyebrows, silently impressed at her restraint. He then reprimanded himself for being impressed by any brat who dared break into his office and attack his people.

She had pulled her hair back into two buns, tied off with pink and blue ribbons. Her cheerful yellow jacket was at odds with the pure rage in her actions as she rummaged around in her bag again. “You,” she seethed at the two of them, “have a lot of nerve coming around here after last night.”

Eli frowned, then glanced at Javed. “Last night?”

Diamonique froze mid-action, her arm still half-buried in her bag. She looked incredulous, then insulted, and then nearly as angry as Kawai whenever someone so much as breathed on her guns.

“Are. You. Serious!” Diamonique’s voice squeaked, and Eli let out a cough that sounded suspiciously like a giggle. “I know it was you people! You took out half of downtown Denver!”

Eli and Javed exchanged looks. “That doesn’t sound like us,” Eli said.

“No,” Javed said dryly, pressing the minor coffee burns on his wrist to his mouth. “We would never take out an office building.”

“Hey, that was one time,” Eli complained. “And it was empty. And not my fault.”

“That one definitely wasn’t,” Diamonique snapped. “Quit screwing around.”

She finally found what she was looking for in her bag, and yanked it out. The grin immediately fell from Eli’s face as she shoved a jacket at them. It was a black jacket with thin plates of body armor sewn into it. More importantly, a logo was embroidered on the back: a circle intersected with an off-center X, the letters MI taking up the largest empty space.

Eli looked anxiously at Javed, who pressed his lips together. He forced himself to take another sip of coffee, though he was rapidly losing any desire to finish it off. He would have denied that that was MI’s logo, except for the fact that Eli wore a very similar jacket right at that very moment.

“So why are you back here, then?” Diamonique demanded. “Come to make sure your buddies did a good job? Thirteen people died in that building collapse!”

Javed handed his coffee to Eli, and then he yanked the jacket out of Diamonique’s hand. “That wasn’t us,” he said, but his stomach sank as he held the very familiar jacket, checking the tag. “Where did you find this?”

“Give that back,” she snapped instead, reaching for it. Eli stuck his extra cup of coffee in the crook of his elbow, then put a hand on Diamonique’s head and gently pushed her back. Javed looked over the scuffed jacket, checking the pockets, and sticking a finger into the torn lining that showed off one of the inside segments of kevlar. “That’s evidence!”

“If it was evidence, and if this were an investigation, you’d have this in a plastic baggie and a police detective,” Javed said dryly. “You don’t have a license, Diamonique, it was suspended after you and your friends pulled a B&E.”

Stiffly, she said, “That - That’s not the point. This is proof this time, you guys are up to no good!”

“We were out trying to get coffee,” Eli said patiently. He blocked Diamonique again when she tried to get to Javed. “Seriously, where did you get this?”

Diamonique huffed through her nose. “That - I’m not telling.”

Javed pinched the bridge of his nose. “No MI agent would be stupid enough to leave this behind on an op,” he told her. “Or kill thirteen civilians. They’d be suspended for both those things.”

“What - really?”

Javed gave her a dry look. “Do we look like mass murderers to you?”

Diamonique cocked her head to the side, eyebrows raised. “Yeah, kind of.”

“...That’s fair.” Javed draped the jacket over his arm and took his coffee back from Eli. “We take a very dim view of collateral damage, Diamonique. You may not be familiar with the concept.”

“Or overly familiar,” Eli muttered into his drink. Diamonique scowled at the both of them.

“Then why would that jacket be in the rubble of a destroyed building?” she said archly. “Were you handing out swag to some college kids you’re trying to sucker into your scam?”

Eli grinned. “Nah, we give out baseball hats and those cool puffy vests. Seriously, though, those jackets are over a thousand dollars apiece, I’d rather give up all my vacation days than pay for losing one.”

“It’s just a jacket.” Diamonique crossed one arm over her chest. “You’re seriously telling me that no MI grunt in the history of ever forgot his jacket while he was committing a crime?”

“Hey, it could’ve been a she,” Eli sniffed. “Don’t be sexist.”

“It could’ve been a they,” Diamonique retorted, “quit subscribing to the gender binary.”

Javed pinched the bridge of his nose. “We’ll look into this,” he told Diamonique, and fished a business card from his wallet. “How can I reach you?”

She blinked. “What?”

“This is our office number,” Javed said patiently, wishing capes weren’t so damn stupid. “Now, in polite society, it is common to offer a number of your own, so that when I know how this jacket ended up at a blast site, I can tell you.”

Diamonique hesitated, then gingerly reached around Eli - still in the way - to gingerly take the card, as if she thought it would burst into flames. “Wait, are you - are you offering to help me?”

“I’m offering to clear my - to clear our name,” Javed said thinly. “I wouldn’t help you if you were dying of thirst in a desert.”

“Geez, Emmanuel, what’d she ever do to you?” Eli protested in a murmur. Javed shot him a look.

“Helped beat the hell out of my employees for no ------ reason,” Javed snapped, and had the pleasure of startling a guilty look onto Diamonique’s face. She glanced at the number on the card, sighed, and dug around in her massive satchel.

“We had a reason,” she mumbled, scribbling something on a slip of paper. “Just - Just text me if you find something, all right?”

“Mm.” Javed took the paper just as reluctantly as she had accepted his card. “I don’t text.”

Diamonique rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Don’t leave town,” she told them, tilting up her chin in an obvious attempt to sound authoritative. It didn’t quite work when Javed and Eli were both taller than her. She whipped around on her heel and stalked off.

Eli rubbed a hand over his hair. “’Clear my name’?” he asked, glancing down. Javed frowned and tossed his mostly-full coffee cup in a nearby dumpster, before shaking out the jacket.