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“Depends on when you ask him. It changes by the day. He’s a stone cold villain though…

just crazier than a shithouse rat on bath salts.

” He made a swirling “insane” motion at his temple.

Typically, her uncle described truly delusional people as “a visionary” or “a dude/bitch that makes sense, for once ,” so for him to recognize someone else’s insanity was very rare indeed.

And terrifying. If Hector Hopper said you were nuts, you must be REALLY friggin’ nuts.

Like more nuts than the Planters factory.

Like “squirrels must follow you home from the park,” kind of nuts.

“You want someone to terrorize your enemies, he’s your guy.

” Her uncle assured her. “He’ll take care of your little political spat for you…

for a price . And it won’t be cheap. The best never is. ”

“How much?”

“I’ll see if I can get you the family discount.” He placed the duck puzzle on his lap and started to wheel himself from the room, eyes scanning the other residents, waiting for them to make a play for his prize. “Goes by… ‘ Multifarious.’ ”

****

Two days later, Multifarious was standing on the street in front of the Agletarian embassy, insane and alone and planning a series of horrible murders.

All in all, it was a fairly ordinary night .

A lesser assassin would have brought a team of mercs, but Mull worked alone now.

She wasn’t about to let anyone that close, ever again.

She’d had her fill of partners. And, honestly, humanity.

Which was fine, given her job. Generally speaking, “hired killer” was a bad profession to go into if you were a people person.

On the other hand, having “nothing but irritated contempt for everyone” was definitely something that every killer should include on their resume.

Most solo assassins would have gone all ninja on this bitch; sneaking in by zip-lining onto the roof or tunneling in from the sewer, but Mull had never been a fan of unnecessary steps. That was just bullshit mercenaries did to make themselves look cool.

There were quicker and easier ways to get into a building, especially when there was a party going on.

If there was one thing all evil rich people loved, it was parties.

There were a shitload of galas, masquerades, and charity benefits in this town, all of which provided the perfect cover.

Someone really should tell them one day that if they’d only stop having parties, none of their shit would get stolen, killed, kidnapped, or blown up.

But no one had asked Mull for advice on that yet, so she didn’t bother to tell them.

Personally, Mull had wanted to simply blow up the entire building.

No fuss, no muss. The targets would be eliminated and the explosion would be awesome .

But her clients had insisted that there be no collateral damage.

Which was stupid. Why would you hire someone like Mull if you were at all worried about a little bloodshed?

It was like hiring Monet and then complaining about all the damn water lilies.

Everyone wanted to stand in the way of her art.

Philistines.

She turned her head to look at the large security gate and the guards which were patrolling the grounds, checking invitations.

All in all, they were doing a fairly competent job.

Good for them. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be blamed for what was about to happen.

There weren’t enough people in the world who enjoyed their jobs, even if the jobs were in the “evil dictatorship” sector .

Mull was personally always looking for a career in the evil dictatorship sector, but she was really holding out for a management position.

Generally speaking, you shouldn’t ever take a job which put you on the bottom rung of a totalitarian regime.

There was little chance for advancement and the company benefits all involved toiling.

These particular guards didn’t seem to be letting the situation bother them. They were focused. Professional. Orderly.

Mull didn’t trust order. Because it always depended on things staying orderly. But that just wasn’t the way the world was. Order was only temporary. As soon as you introduced an unknown element into the mix, order crumbled into chaos.

And Multifarious was chaos. That’s where she lived and thrived.

Order limited your options, it told you what to do and who to be… but anything could happen with chaos.

She casually threw several tire spikes into the road, just as one of the limousines made the turn into the driveway of the building.

Three tires immediately exploded, the rims causing a shower of sparks and smoke to be thrown into the air as they ground against the pavement.

The limo lost traction and crashed into one of the security planters next to the gate.

The guard in the security booth frantically waved at the driver, and the occupants of the limo rushed out, obviously worrying about there being some kind of bomb.

The best part about killing rich assholes was that they either arrived at a party without a date, because they were losers, or they arrived with a dozen skanky women, because they were losers who wanted everyone to think their dick was bigger than it was.

And that was Mull’s ticket into any party in the world.

Because Natalie Quentin was welcomed pretty much everywhere. She was a complete nonentity.

The partygoers milled around, watching security fuss over the stricken vehicle and try to clear it from the entryway, and Mull figured she had about twenty seconds before the guests got sick of waiting for their chauffeur to settle the matter with the guards, and would just walk through the gate instead.

And once that happened, all Mull had to do was nonchalantly walk through the gate with the rich asshole and his entourage.

It wasn’t like the guy who arrived at a party with a dozen skanks really took the time to learn all of their names anyway. He wouldn’t notice one more.

Sure enough, the partygoer and his gang of slutty women got bored and were making their way towards the building itself.

The man flashed his invitation and pointed to his dates, and they were ushered forward.

Mull smiled flirtatiously at the guard as she strolled by him, taking her “date’s” arm and being escorted inside.

All too easy.

Technically speaking, it would have been just as easy to sneak into the party dressed as herself, but Party Line was more at home at parties than Mull was anyway.

People were generally suspicious of a guest wearing a full facemask with a Kilroy symbol etched into it.

Since casualties had to be kept to a minimum, Multifarious had chosen to wear Party Line’s dress and Natalie’s face.

It had been a group decision, and like all group decisions, it left no one particularly happy.

Plus, Mull’s way probably would have involved strolling up to the guard booth and putting two into the security guy’s head and one in his chest with a silenced .45, which would have gone against the client’s instructions.

No unnecessary casualties.

Which meant no fun.

Being forced to listen to the inane demands of idiots completely sucked.

If Monet’s clients had told him he couldn’t paint what he wanted and instead had to paint something hideously soulless, Mull would have bet he’d paint Impressionistic haystacks and colorful water lilies all over their fucking corpses!

But whatever.

Natalie’s wholesome little cherub girl-next-door of a face did put more people at ease than Multifarious’ mask and white combat gear, which was good. And Mull did like nice things. Particularly if they were shiny.

She spun in a small circle, admiring her tight blue sequined evening dress.

It set off Natalie’s candy apple red hair and sparkling smile quite nicely.

On a normal day, it wasn’t really something that Natalie would ever consider wearing, but Party Line had insisted, so Multifarious was helpless to stop it.

It was all very confusing, but Natalie looked too nice to even care at the moment.

Not that Natalie herself would have thought so, but no one listened to her anyway, so who cared.

Nat was ridiculous and the rest of her knew it.

Getting advice from her would be like getting advice from Hello Kitty . All rainbows and sunshine and bullshit.

Mull couldn’t stand Natalie most of the time. Even when they were both Party Line.

She surreptitiously abandoned her date as soon as they were inside, and made her way towards the buffet area. Mull hated to work on an empty stomach.

She popped some shrimp cocktail into her mouth, hoping that she wasn’t allergic to shellfish today. You could never really tell. Some days she might be, some days not. Her whole life was like that and it all depended on the luck of the draw.

She absently looked around the room, noticing with a frown that there were quite a few members of the Freedom Squad in attendance at the Agletarian embassy.

Her client had not mentioned that Capes would be involved.

Particularly the most powerful Capes around.

These weren’t the “corner store robbery” kind of superheroes, these assholes were pure “giant asteroid of space dragons is going to collide with the city!” style heroes. They were big league shit.

It was a small matter, since Mull could handle them, but it did complicate things.

Party Line’s powers were not at a level where she could go toe-to-toe with the entire Freedom Squad.

Last Tuesday? Mull would have owned all those jackbooted little bitches and sent them cryin’ home to mama.

But today was a brand new day, and the powers she had today weren’t going to damage the city’s go-to protectors, even though the protectors in question were shady as all fuck.