Agent of SHEAR

You know, it really sucks to work for the government. The low salary, long hours, and less time off are bad enough. Some branches are worse then others, though. I didn't listen when people tried to tell me that. Fresh out of high school, I fell for the bit about them only taking the best of the best and saving the country. So I up and joined SHEAR (Super Hero Engagement, Assessment, and Research), the government agency that has to deal with supers.

If you didn't know already, we get a whopping zero respect out there. Turns out that when you constantly have civilians in technicolor pajamas doing your job for you everyone starts to think you're useless. It certainly doesn't help when the "high-tech" gear we have was obsolete decades ago. Just about any twat with superpowers will barely be affected by the stun guns, and don't get me started on the joke that's supposed to be our armor.

Now don't get me wrong, I of all people know that we do a lot of good out there. It's just that most of what we do doesn't make headlines. Helping supers control their powers, researching super-resistant infrastructure, setting up cover identities... but you don't care about any of that, do you? Nope, everyone always just wants to ask me about the Tanger Incident.

Well, among the other things SHEAR is incompletely equipped for, we're in charge of first response to unknown phenomena. Interdimensional portal in Brooklyn? We're it. Alien spaceship shows up? Guess who has to make first contact. This time it was a huge surge of Arctulian energy at a shopping outlet. I was already on assignment in state, so of course I got switched to the response team.

They had already evacuated everyone by the time we got there. Security detail always sweeps the area first, then if it's clear we'll let the scientists in. We have to wear awful environmental hazard suits with radiation detection patches. At least, normally we would but Arctulian energy gives a false positive for radiation, so it was just the hazard suits. You can't even use a stun gun properly in those things.

So we check out every nook and cranny in these abandoned shops and restaurants, but we don't find anything. No people, no swirly energy things, no orbs, not a thing out of place. Frankly, that freaked me out. There's always a reason for these things, and if you don't see one at first, then it's probably dangerous. However, official protocol says a clear security sweep means we let the researchers in to poke around until they unleash it. And of course I got assigned to babysitting the researchers instead of, say, guarding the perimeter.

Well, nothing happened for a while. The researchers set up all their instruments and talked to each other about technobabble. I was never good at science, so I didn't know what they were seeing. I figured as long as they weren't running I was probably fine. This went on for a good three, maybe four days before trouble finally hit.

It's never a good sign when one of the researcher's gizmos explodes. Then, of course, my radio crackled to life with assorted shouting. As always, one of the other blokes in security managed to screech out that they were under attack, but the radios died before they could say by what. Honestly, no one ever follows protocol and says what's attacking FIRST. It would make life so much easier for the rest of the security detail but NOOO...

Anyway. I had to wait while the scientists packed up their gear so we could get out. At first they wanted to stay and get more data because apparently something or other was spiking and off the charts, but I insisted. Once they had finally finished, we rushed toward the perimeter. 

They both got out just fine. I smacked headfirst into an energy barrier that popped up at the front of the parking lot. They turned around, shouted, banged on the field a bit. I yelled at them to get to safety. Everyone knows that the security detail is screwed if the researchers can't get the data out. Plus I would have had to turn around and help fend off the attack anyway.

And the attack... You know, it really was scary. I know it doesn't sound like it would be, but really what we saw was something so fast we could barely see it making everyone disappear. Plus we still had to figure out a way to fight back and find the missing agents. So it still would have been scary even if we had known at the time that we were facing a bunch of pixies.

...I really wish people would at least pretend to take that seriously. Sure, pixies are tiny and have those little flashy wings, but when they're on the warpath they...

You know what? I'm just going to wait until you stop laughing.

So yes, we did all get taken. We got lucky and stunned a couple of them, but like I said, the pixies... I'm just going to call them enemy fliers so you don't snicker. The ENEMY FLIERS were fast, and our stun guns are slow. We didn't really have anything else to fight back with at the time, so we were sitting ducks out there.

Turns out when a p-- when an enemy flier takes you, they put you in some sort of alternate reality bubble. So we fell on our butts into the middle of a field of wild flowers. The enemy fliers came back once they had rounded up all of us. I'm still not entirely sure what they wanted, but they played music and made everyone wear floral necklaces and -- Look, do you want to hear the story or not? Do I have to duct tape your mouth shut?

Anyway, the enemy fliers left after a few minutes. I think they got bored. I tried to compare notes about how to try to escape, but half the other agents fell asleep, and most of the rest were babbling about pretty lights. That's when I remembered I had been just about the only person still wearing an air filtration mask while on guard duty. Paranoia pays off. Stupid pixie dust CAN YOU PLEASE KEEP A STRAIGHT FACE FOR FIVE SECONDS

Well, the next time the enemy fliers came back they dumped a bunch of junk from the outlets into the field. Shoes, plates, candy; I have no idea why they took what they did but they shooed everyone toward it like it was some enormous treasure. The enemy fliers were pretty distracted by it. I decided that was as good an opportunity as any. I waited until they were all watching one of them trying to turn a dish cloth into a cape. I held my breath, moved in, and grabbed one of the enemy fliers. I shouted, "Let us go back or this one gets it!"

Well, that was maybe not the smartest thing I could have done. I think I turned into a bear, then a statue, then a mailbox, and then a sloth in the space of about a second. I still managed to hang onto the enemy flier somehow. That's when the flowers near me started biting me. Let me tell you, nothing hurts quite like a dandelion, they can get really sharp teeth. When that didn't work, they tried to zap me with MY stunner that they had stolen when I wasn't looking. I dodged. I told you those things are slow.

They finally screeched and the security detail found itself back on the concrete floor. The enemy fliers hovered around me menacingly. I hesitantly let the one in my hand go. It whirled into the air, and all the p-- all the enemy fliers chattered. They started to fly away, and our radios crackled to life in unison. "Barrier down, barrier down, move in for extraction! Alpha team..."

My radio suddenly snapped off, and the enemy flier I had grabbed was staring me in the face. I gulped, then there was a flash of light. It flew off cackling, leaving me to wonder what exactly it had hoped to accomplish.

The extraction team showed up shortly afterward. I helped them bring out the incapacitated members to the med station. We passed some researchers on the way, and from what I could understand the Arctulian energy had dissipated. 

Once I was done carrying the first stretcher to the station, I turned to go help with the rest. The other agents stopped me. "You need to get checked out, obvious energy exposure, make sure that's not permanent..." That's what got my attention. I started pestering them about what, exactly, "that" was.

They finally handed me a mirror. Turns out that stupid enemy flier had turned my hair purple. And yes, it does seem to be permanent. I can't even dye it back to how it used to be. Seems like overkill to me. I mean, changing someone's hair for fighting back after you kidnapped them? On the plus side, I couldn't do covert operations anymore, so I guess that was good. Those are always really dangerous. I also could have sworn this one magic blast heading straight for my head swerved away at the last second, but who knows.

Of course, the really annoying part is when that reporter got in and took pictures. I hate being the face of the Tanger Incident. Everyone I meet always says something like, "Hey, you're that agent whose hair got turned purple by a bunch of pixies! How lame is that?"

Will you please stop... you know what? Forget it. We're done with this interview.