The Tide Rises

[skybright]

Father Rick surveyed the long, low-ceilinged room in the basement of Our Lady of Refuge, glancing over the faces of the assemble parishioners. The handful of mutants in the room perched nervously on the battered metal folding chairs, or talked together in low voices.

Padre smiled as Regina Dawson slipped down the stairs to the meeting room; he gestured her to the front of the room and touched her elbow, nodding at the group.

"Not quite as many as I'd hoped." He murmured with a shrug.

Daws chuckled and pushed back her fedora. "Way more than I expected, Padre." Her tail twitched as she added "And more than we had last night."

"Well," The priest replied, "We may want to wait to count our chickens until after everyone's had their say. Speaking of which," He nodded to the door, "Your friends still planning on coming?"

Daws nodded. "So far as I know." She took a deep breath and added quietly, "I guess we'll see what we've gotten ourselves into."

[Jordanna]

When Alex, Sid, and Miriam arrived at the church, they found Henry approaching from another direction. The mortician's first action was to hug Miriam, looking clearly relieved to see her safe and well.

"I'm so glad to see you," Henry said softly, and drew back to look at her with faint amusement. She was wearing one of Consuela's drab, oversized handmade dresses, and her once-auburn hair was now dyed a plain shade of brown. "I presume you're trying to look unremarkable."

Miriam shrugged. "I'm not even sure I should be here at all. I just want to stay out of the way and listen."

As she was speaking, Alex's attention was drawn to an approaching woman who stood out considerably more than Miriam. The well-dressed platinum blonde came up to the church's picket fence with a hesitant step, but her pace quickened when she saw him.

"Hi, Gracie," Alex greeted her, squeezing her hands and giving her a peck on the cheek. He turned to the others; he had already told them about Grace, but Miriam and Henry had never met her. "This is Grace Duval," he told them.

Greetings were exchanged, and then the little group moved into the church. They were met by a big Native American with a blandly curious expression.

"We're here for the meeting," Henry said. "Can you point us in the direction of the basement?"

Mike Whitebird blinked. "It's this way," he said, turning and limping off down a side hall. He led them down the stairs to the basement.

"Not many people," Grace murmured, looking at the already-gathered audience.

"But it's more than us." Sid stepped forward, looking around for Daws.

[skybright]

Daws grinned as she caught sight of Alex, the Doc -- dressed in a rather shapeless floral-print dress -- and Henry Casselton, accompanied by Sid and a woman Daws didn't know. Mike Whitebird returned the grin, and Daws waved at the small group with a beckoning gesture.

As the group joined them, Daws nodded at Mike. "Everyone, you've already met Mike Whitebird." She gestured at the priest. "This is Father Rick Steele. Padre, this is Alex Malone, Sid Rosenstein, Henry Casselton," Daws lowered her voice, "Doctor Miriam Van Linden, and . . ." She nodded at the blonde woman that had accompanied the others, "I'm afraid we haven't had the pleasure."

[Jordanna]

Grace flushed with uncomfortable shyness, but Sid put a hand on her shoulder. "This is Grace Duval. She's a dancer at the Paragon. A friend."

The young woman raised her eyes. "And a mutant," she blurted out.

Alex grinned at her, then shrugged to Daws. "That only came out a few days ago."

[skybright]

Daws grinned. "Welcome to the club." She shot a sly look at Alex and added "We're thinkin' of havin' t-shirts printed up."

Padre nodded at the assembled group. "It's a pleasure to meet all of you. From what Daws has told me, you've all taken a lot of risk to come here." He blinked gravely at all of them and added "Should we get started?" He gestured to a group of empty chairs.

They complied, settling in; Daws, never very fond of chairs, leaned up against the wall, tail twitching.

Padre cleared his throat and said, quietly but clearly, "Thank you all for coming."

The room quieted, as the assembled people turned their attention to the priest. He went on, "I know you've each got a reason for being here; I think it's best we begin by simply bringing those reasons into the open.

"Nicholas Tiernan. You all know the name. You all know what he's capable of; the good he does for people like myself and others is balanced by a malice for our human brothers and sisters. I am here," He surveyed the room, "Because I believe that all men are brothers, and a man who does evil to my brother does it to me. I will not stand for that evil.

"They say that evil triumphs when good men do nothing." The priest chuckled quietly. "I like to think of myself as a good man. But whether I am or not -- I will not do nothing. That is why I am here."

The priest fell silent, but he raised an inquiring eyebrow at Daws.

The detective straightened, took off her fedora, and cleared her throat.

"I'm a private eye. I make it my living to help people, as best I can do it. Two of the people I made it my business to help wound up dead." She paused, sighed and went on. "Nicholas Tiernan was responsible for them dying. And I'm not gonna let him keep on being responsible. I'm not gonna let anyone else get hurt because their opinion didn't mesh with Tiernan's, or because they got in Tiernan's way, or just because Tiernan wanted to kill someone for fun.

"I make it my business to help people." Daws straightened her shoulders, "And now I've made it my business to help everyone, by stoppin' Nicholas Tiernan. That's why I'm here."

She glanced at the Padre, who nodded in approval; then she raised an eyebrow at the small group of people in the front row -- the ones she'd come to think of as friends.

[Jordanna]

The small band of rebels exchanged glances, a silent question passing between them to determine who was going to make a confession next.

Miriam took a deep breath and moved to rise, but Alex and Henry, sitting on either side of her, both gently held her back. It was more than protectiveness toward her; if anyone they couldn't trust was in that room, it would be more than suicidal to reveal herself.

Finally, Sid rose and stepped forward, rubbing his hands together.

"I'm... Sid Rosenstein," he began hesitantly. "I'm not a mutant, but--but my daughter is. And that only showed up after Nick Tiernan... murdered my wife."

A murmur went through the audience. Sid shrugged brokenly and swallowed hard.

"He did it for no reason. I was ready to pay the protection money he wanted from my club. I wasn't gonna fight it--'cause I didn't want people like all of you to get hurt."

He closed his eyes and shook his head. "But people like you are getting hurt--by Tiernan. I have a little girl at home now, trying to deal with the fact she's a mutant... and doing it without her mother."

Sid's voice broke slightly, and his helplessness escaped in a plea he had never intended to express with such emotion. "Please... please, help me stop this man from hurting anyone else."

[skybright]

The room was quiet for a moment after Sid's emotional plea; then a thin, mousy-looking man in a tweed jacket stood to his feet.

"I've been working for Nicholas Tiernan for three years," he said reedily, looking at his feet, "He helped me open up my business. I . . . I knew he was doing wrong things, hurting people -- but I looked the other way." He closed his eyes and added painfully "It's hundreds of people looking the other way that let Tiernan do things like . . . like what he did to your family." He looked up resolutely. "I won't look the other way anymore. No matter what it costs me."

There was a murmur of agreement from most of the assembled individuals; several others stood and added similar testimonies to what had already been said.

Then a short, brightly-dressed young woman with tea-colored skin and a shock of white hair stood up, raising her voice challengingly. "So we wanna stand up. So what?" She crossed her arms and glanced around haughtily. "The cops won't do nothin', 'cause Tiernan's rich. The rest of the mutants won't do nothin', 'cause he's one of us. What's a handful a' people in a church basement supposed to do against a big man like Tiernan?"

The eyes of the room turned expectantly to Padre, Daws, and the others -- they seemed to have been silently appointed as the leadership of this ragtag meeting.

Padre cleared his throat. "That's an excellent question, Ana. We've already taken our first step -- we've found each other. We've spoken out. Now," He surveyed the room, "Anyone have some suggestions for our next step?"

[Jordanna]

Miriam leaned over and whispered for a moment to Henry. He nodded, and rose to speak for her.

"Involving the police is too risky, at least for now. We haven't solid enough proof for them to act, and even if we did, it could lead to violence from both prejudiced humans and the mutants who still protect Tiernan. If we're to avoid a racial conflict, mutants have to bring him down themselves. What we need to do is spread the truth further, and convince the ones who cling to Tiernan that he can't be allowed to continue."

"And how do we do that?" a voice retorted from the crowd.

Henry frowned, looking to his companions. When they maintained a troubled, uncertain silence, he turned to Daws, hoping the woman who had access to Tiernan himself would have some ideas.

[skybright]

If Daws hadn't learned from painful experience that biting her lip was a bad habit for a woman with fangs, she'd have done so. The question of exactly how to strike back at Tiernan was quickly becoming the trickiest part of the whole convoluted affair.

She scratched behind her left ear and finally half-shrugged. "Sounds like I'm not the only one here with ties to Tiernan's organization." She nodded briefly at the thin, reedy man who'd spoken earlier. "Those of us who do work for him, however peripherally, had better keep it up -- and keep an ear open. You never know what you might hear, or what might prove useful.

"Eventually the bunch of us might end up doing some actual physical resistance." Daws grinned. "Not that I'm recommending us blowin' up bridges or anything; but you'd be surprised what a bunch of well-placed civilians can do to throw a monkey wrench into anyone's plans.

"But for the time being, I think our best bet is the sleeper cell approach. Don't take any big offensive actions just yet; stick to planning and waiting. Keep an eye out for folks who might be with us, for information we could use against Tiernan: for anything, really. If you find someone you think might be sympathetic, feel them out and tell them the truth. Whisper half the truth in someone's ear, and let the rumors spread for themselves. Heck," She chuckled, "We could spray-paint 'down with Tiernan' in the subways, for that matter.

"Sooner or later," She concluded, "Somethin'll come up. Best thing we can do is be right there when it does."

Daws fell silent and surveyed the others in the room, waiting to see what the response to her suggestions would be.

[Jordanna]

"I hate the idea of a waiting game," Sid murmured, "but I guess it's all we can do."

Henry frowned thoughtfully. "Miss Dawson, I remember your mentioning once that there are mutants on the police force. Is there a chance we could find any allies among them?"

[skybright]

Daws nodded slowly. "We might, at that. I know of a couple -- old business contacts and the like. But mutant cops keep their mutations under the tightest wraps of just about any mutants in the world; some of them might not like throwing in their lot with anything that would link them to the mutant world -- even peripherally. But it's worth a shot."

Padre cleared his throat and nodded at one of the men near the back row. "Jakob, you own a printing press. Could you create some sort of flyer or handbill -- something we could distribute anonymously?"

The red-skinned mutant in question hesitated for a long moment before he nodded. "Sure."

Daws nodded. "It's a start." She glanced around the room and added "We've got something we didn't have yesterday -- we've got each other. And that's a power Nicholas Tiernan's gonna have to reckon with."

[skybright]

The meeting broke up shortly thereafter, with the Padre's announcement that any further meetings would be announced by word-of-mouth and a few final words of caution.

Daws took the opportunity to hand over the suitcase she'd pillaged from Doctor Van Linden's apartment; then (ignoring Henry Casselton's skeptical look) she explained briefly how she'd had the Twins create a false paper trail for Van Linden's bank account.

Daws shrugged apologetically. "Afraid you're not gonna see the benefit of anything you 'bought' -- fact it, the cards and the checking account are both pretty much untouchable for you, now, unless you want the real cops hot on your tail. But it'll give me something to show Tiernan, next time I check in. And I get the feeling that's something I'm gonna need."

She said her goodbyes, nodded in farewell to Father Steele (who was talking in low tones with Jakob, the owner of the printing press) and slipped quietly up the stairs to the exit.