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If her breasts were cold, the only gentlemanly thing to do would be to warm them with his palms, right? That would be downright heroic…

“Oz?” She asked softly, like she was seeing someone entirely different. “You okay?”

Oz couldn’t answer. He was afraid it would be incomprehensible.

His erection pressed against the front of his pants hard enough that he was becoming increasingly concerned about permanent physical injury.

The pain merely added to the lust though, making him angry and eager to be rid of his clothes.

“…Oz?” She all but whispered.

And that snapped him out of his momentary lapse of control. No matter how much he might want that woman, there was no excuse for scaring her. Oz scared a lot of people with his behavior, but he’d never actually scared her before. And it made him feel ashamed.

“I’m fine.” He cleared his throat, trying to return his voice to normal. “Just… tired.”

It was a lie. And they both knew it.

“I’m sorry.” He told her honestly. “You don’t need to be afraid of me. Ever.”

“I’m not afraid of you. I just…” She swallowed, looking uncomfortable. “At least my stocking is straight now.”

Neither one of them wanted to deal with what had just happened, so the topic was dropped without further comment.

It did nothing to really sooth Oz’s desire though, if anything, conversing with her just made it grow stronger.

He’d always found her way of looking at the world and the carefree tone of her voice to be so entirely attractive.

Even when she was Multifarious. And those erections had been even odder and more inappropriate for him than this one was.

Because he had never even seen Mull’s face.

Or knew whether or not she was a woman. At the time, he’d been a little disturbed about it.

But he just… liked her. Mull was sexy and fun.

Thankfully, it had turned out that the woman he was lusting after and the masked sexless coworker he…

sometimes had inappropriate thoughts about, where one and the same. It really made things simpler.

But Oz had been alone his entire life. He could deal with unfulfilled desire.

She didn’t seem to notice the trauma she was doing to his nether regions, absently leaning over to pick up the case she was carrying.

The stunning sight of her body at a new angle, was physical agony for him.

Oz turned away, wincing in pain and trying to somehow rearrange his body so that the pressure against his fly was lessened. The action was useless. He simply wanted her too much.

Natalie opened the case. “I brought supplies, by the way.”

He looked down at the pieces of a very large weapon which were secured in place by straps. “I don’t think we’ll need a rifle. This is simply going to be observation, and then Arn and Flannery are going in undercover.”

She shook her head and began assembling the weapon.

“Technically, it’s too big to be a ‘rifle,’ this is a ‘ cannon.’ ” She patted the side of the ridiculously long 20mm weapon.

“It’s five times more powerful than Syd’s silly little elephant gun.

Over three times as powerful as a fifty cal.

This is what you use when you want to kill Robocop, as he’s standing behind a tank and a cinderblock wall and another Robocop.

It’s like hitting someone with a lead brick which is traveling at twice the speed of sound.

This is my baby.” She beamed in obvious pride, running her finger over the small image of a pink sleeping smiley face, which was wearing a princess hat, with a line of green Zs over its head. “I call her: ‘The Dreamland Express.’”

“Don’t you think that’s a bit of an overkill?”

“If something’s worth killing, it’s worth overkilling, Oz.” She set up the sniper weapon on the edge of the roof. “Very rarely in life will you ever find yourself saying: ‘Damn, I wish I’d brought a smaller caliber weapon.’”

“I just think perhaps and anti-tank gun isn’t the best choice for our current circumstances.” He continued.

“Do the Agletarians have tanks in there, Oz?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“But you don’t know that they don’t have tanks either.

” She exclaimed, like it was the height of logical thought.

“So I’m going to go with the biggest gun I got, and then if the situation calls for it, we’ll work our way down from there.

” She snapped the sniper scope into place and secured the gigantic weapon’s heavy bi-pod mount.

“I modified it to be full auto once, but the chain of rounds weighed over two hundred pounds, and firing it melted down the barrel and dislocated my retina.”

Oz wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “That… that must have been very hard for you.”

“Well, the next day I didn’t have eyes at all, so it worked out.”

Once again, Oz was at a complete loss. “Okay...” He finally got out, constantly amazed by the world Natalie lived in and unsure how he could function in it.

“Got something for you too.” She reached into the bag. “Things could get loud, and you’ll need to be strapped.”

“I don’t really like guns.” He shook his head. “I can do just fine without them.”

“Yeah, but your powers are weird and they freak you out. You’ll hesitate to use them, and hesitation gets you killed in a fight.

” She pulled the silver weapon from the case.

“A custom Colt M1917 revolver.” She jammed the magazine into place.

“It’s a .45, double-action. Six shots. Super simple.

Point it at what you want to die.” She stared at it silently for a moment, lost in thought.

“Roy carried this through the war...” She cleared her throat self-consciously.

“It… it’s my father’s gun.” She clarified.

“He shot Nazis with it. So, if you’re looking for the weapon that stands for something good, this is your buddy.

It’s never done anything but stop genuinely evil men.

Roy was a hero. In the truest sense. You…

you would have liked him.” She held the weapon out for him.

“I’ve never used his gun for any job. It shouldn’t be used for the things I do. It’s meant for White Hats.”

Oz recognized that it would be an insult not to take the weapon, so he did. He looked down at the Kilroy symbol etched in the side, then slid the pistol into his waistband.

“Do not lose that and don’t die.” She ordered harshly, then paused. “Please.”

“I won’t lose it.” He assured her. “I’ll keep it safe.”

“It’s meant to keep you safe, moron.” She sounded exasperated as she reached for his radio and pressed the transmit button. “This is The Mad Hatter. Alice and I are in position at the Tea Party, over.”

Oz frowned. “Does that have to be my codename?”

“Hush, Alice.” She waved off his concern. “Stop distracting me.”

“Well, couldn’t I be one of the other characters from the book?”

“What book?”

“ Alice in Wonderland, obviously.”

“What the hell does that have to do with anything?” She sounded completely baffled. “Why would you bring up some random book right now?” She spread her arms out questioningly. “You’re so weird sometimes, Alice.” She pressed the transmit button again. “Cheshire Cat, you copy?”

“This is Cat, I read you, Hatter.” Traitor’s voice came over the radio. “The Doormouse and I are about to serve the tea. Two minutes out.”

“Copy.” She put the radio down and turned to look at the building across from them.

“So, we’ve got 50+ hostiles by my count, spread out over the grounds and bottom floor.

An unknown number of hostiles inside, along with our target.

No signs of the kidnapped people though.

” She paused, thinking it over. “My suggestion: blow up the building.”

“But Traitor and Flannery are about to make their way inside!” He argued. “And we’re here looking for innocent kidnapped people.”

“Meh.”She shrugged.“Fuck’em all.”

Oz shook his head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.

” He picked up his binoculars, watching as Traitor drove their stolen guard jeep back towards the entrance, stopping at the guard booth so that the man could somehow talk his way inside.

“Door guards, metal detectors, an elevator which only operates if a special coded key is inserted, a separate keycard is needed on the seventh floor landing, and finally there is a lock on the door to the main office which can only be opened with an iris match.” Oz informed her, updating her on the research he’d been doing all morning.

“Gotcha.” Natalie nodded at the news.

“Now, Flannery and Arnold are disguised as soldiers and will lie their way inside. They will carefully make their way to the back of the base, where they’ll cut the power at exactly 3:45.

The backup power will kick in 2 minutes later, and we will use that time to loop the video playback on all of the security cameras so that we can approach undetected.

We will infiltrate the base and hook up with Arnold and Flannery, and we will enter the ventilation system and then lower ourselves down into the commander’s office.

Information suggests that he will return to his office between 4:00 and 4:30, at which point we will take him.

Our extraction will be covered from the back fence by Flannery.

If the situation goes dynamic and he makes a run for it, we will pursue but not engage in the city itself.

If we are discovered, we will evacuate three blocks east, where I have placed a clean getaway vehicle.

” He firmed his jaw, recognizing that the plan needed to be executed flawlessly, as this might well be their only chance to catch the Agletarians sleeping.

“We need to move quickly but deliberately. We need to get in there silently and then get out again without...”