>>5636241"Uh...no, but yes?" you reply.
"What does that mean?" CC asks.
"It means that, yeah, when I met her for the first time, it was kind of for that. But I do consider her my friend, now. She's the first one I made here, in fact--Sam doesn't count because I knew him before."
"But you did start hanging out with her because you felt bad for her?" CC asks.
"I don't want to say that."
"Hey, it's okay man. Lot of people feel bad for Edith." CC glances over at her. "There's that thing that happened to her with Glass. But even if she wasn't kidnapped and impersonated by a BOL metamorph, well, there's her being her." CC says.
"She's not as helpless as you might think." you say.
"She's pretty darn helpless when it comes to making friends." CC says. "It may not seem that way because you're one of hers, but you're on a very short list, dude."
You grin. "Maybe it's an elite list?"
Edith gets up, and flaps over to your table/
"Oh shoot, here she comes..." CC mutters.
Yeah. You guess you were gossiping about her. Sort of.
"Hey Izzy, come on!" Edith pulls on your sleeve. "I want you to meet Risa! She's my teacher!" Edith looks at the other two speculos. "Oh hey there, CopyCat, Just-A-Hero, just need to borrow Izzy a minute."
"Cool." JAH says.
"Go ahead." CC says.
"But they barely finish getting the words about by the time Edith's pulled you toward the table with the rather scary lady in the nightmare insect suit.
Seeing your reticence, the woman drops the helmet. She doesn't remove it. Instead, it dissolves away.
You're happy to find a human face and not, like, a robot skull.
"Hey." she says. "Risa Raleigh. I'm the the 4th Red Bee. The Red Queen."
"Red Bee...like the guy from the 40's?" you ask.
"Yeah. You probably saw him on the Flashback Channel."
"Izzy couldn't believe you were training me in detective work!" Edith brags.
"Hey now! I was only a little incredulous!"
Edith sticks her tongue out at you.
You stick your tongue out at her.
"Ha. Okay, kids, sit down. Take a look at what I'm working with Edith on, Izzy."
Risa directs you to a honeycomb shaped grid of light on the table. Inside the grid, you see a grizzly image...
