Optics.

Director Piggot swivelled her monitor around 180 degrees so the other occupants of her spartanly-appointed office could see it. She viciously jabbed 'Enter' on her keyboard, and the video began playing. It was a series of clips from various news segments.

The over-groomed host with the helmet-hair and a cheap-looking C.G. background that revealed this clip as being from a local channel was wrapping up a piece on the Iron Cloud. A picture of the massive vessel could be seen in the background, hanging over the city like bad omen. The host was in the middle of addressing the viewer directly in a serious tone.

"...worries which were only exacerbated by the response from Sky Captain, the creator and owner of the craft."

The background picture switched to that of a humanoid dog in a brown suit and poorly-tied red tie standing behind a podium with a bouquet of microphones arranged on top. The image expanded until it filled the entire screen, and the clip played. The canine mutant's demenour was that of a waiter trying to placate a disagreeable customer.

"No, no, there's really very little risk of that." He responded to an unheard question. "The anti-gravity suspenders are extremely reliable, and we have quadruple back-ups all operating on entirely separate circuits. It's more likely that the rectors will all go critical and glass half the eastern sea-board than the anti-grav'll cut out." There was a slightly shocked silence. Apparently trying to fill the void, Sky Captain began to ramble. "I mean, if the reactors did all go critical at the same time then the Iron Cloud would definitely crash, but honestly there really wouldn't be much left of it to crash at that point. It would be more of a rain of white-hot, radioactive shrapnel distributed over hundreds of miles…." At this point a huge man built like a gorilla wearing a breathing mask hurried on stage and more-or-less shoved Sky Captain away from the microphones. The huge man leaned down to the mikes.

"What I think we should all take away from this…." The clip ended, cutting off the attempted damage control.

A few frames of old-fashioned T.V. static had been inserted by whoever edited this compilation to indicate that one segment had ended and another began. A different figure stood behind a different microphone-strewn podium, this time the man was definitely human, tall and dower, wearing red-and-black armour, with a pump-action shotgun slung across his back. There was no mistaking Buckshot for anyone else. He stood at parade-ground rest and addressed the assembled press like a military man receiving a dressing-down he in no-way believed himself to deserve.

"Yes, I'm familiar with the footage in question." He responded curtly. A voice came from the crowd of reporters.

"Don't you think the force you used was wildly excessive? You nearly killed him. How can the general public trust capes if they employ that kind of lethal response on a whim?" This seemed to touch a nerve. Buckshot's face remained granite-impassive, but he lent forward slightly and grasped the sides of the podium.

"First of all," He spoke through gritted teeth. "That scumbag was directly and explicitly threatening the life of a God. Damned. Child. If you don't think that warrants a lethal response then frankly you're part of what's wrong with this country. Second I am a fu-" He reigned himself in somewhat, "I am a frigging brain-surgeon with this thing." He thumbed over his shoulder, indicating the shotgun. "If I wanted him dead then we'd be rolling him into a ditch as we speak. I could land a kill-shot from half-a-mile away with a hand-gun if I wanted to. Hell, give me a throwing knife and I could take out…." At this point a fat, bespectacled man wearing a sport jacket over a tee-shirt appeared from left of frame and practically lunged for the podium, dismissing Buckshot with a frantic flapping of his hands.

"Thank-you Buckshot," The fat man panted breathily into the microphones, "So, that was….."

Again the clip ended with a burst of static. Glen, the fat man from the video and the P.R.T.'s head of 'image' currently sitting in front of Piggot's desk watching along, pushed his glasses up as he pinched the bridge of his nose. Armsmaster, the leader of the Protectorate East-North-East, sat next to him in full power-armour. The top half of the super-hero's face was hidden by his helmet, but his jaw was tightening as the video progressed. The next clip followed.

This time it was an on-the-scene reporter covering some incident which, by the look of the wrecked cars and buildings with visible fire damage in the background, had been quite destructive. The looming presence of the Iron Cloud blotting out part of the sky in the background dated the clip as having happened in the recent past. The reporter, a young asian woman in business-wear jogged up to an anthropomorphic wild boar in a purple-and-white body-suit stretched over his muscular frame, who was standing next to a police van into which several officers were loading various handcuffed skin-heads.

"We have the Wards hero Wild Hog who was actually involved in bringing this violent conflict to a swift end. Wild Hog, what happened here exactly?" With that she thrust the microphone under the young hero's snout.

"Uuuhh…" He stuttered, caught completely off-guard, "Well, ah, the, uh, that is to say, we got a call about some gang violence between the Empire and the A.B.B., and by the time we got here it had escalated way more. Like, way, way more. It was a full-blown gang rumble."

"So it was pretty bad?"

"Ah, it could've been worse. We think they were both about a gnat's whisker away from calling in cape backup. Let me tell you, if, like, Purity, or Oni Lee, or god forbid someone like Gator or Lung had showed up, we wouldn't be loading up paddy-wagons, we'd be loading up the meat wagons!" He paused, then seemed to decide that he needed to clarify. "That's what we call the ambulances, especially when they need to take corpses away. 'Cause if it really had been Gator we wouldn't need any wagons at all, he'd just…" The young hero waved his hand as though shooting imaginary lightning from his fingertips, "katchow!! and vaporise, like, everyone in his field of vision."

"I… I see." The reporter seemed a little taken aback at his candour. Wild hog seemed to warm to the subject.

"I mean, I guess if it was Lung We could probably just get a leaf-blower and tidy away the remains! Saves on the cost of cremation if you get my drift! Heh heh!" He chuckled at his own joke. The reporter did not.

At that point a tiny form literally flew in from off-screen. Bumble grew to her full size and interposed herself between her case 53 team-mate and the camera, although she still only came up to his chest.

"Do you have authorization for this interview?" She demanded from the reporter, at which point the clip ended. In Piggot's office Bumble shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

The portly director of the P.R.T. stabbed her finger into the enter button again, pausing the video, and span the monitor back towards herself.

"The video is entitled 'Most Terrifying Cape Media Fails'. It continues for another twelve minutes. Do any of you have anything to say about this?"

Glen spoke first.

"We do the best we can, but there are some things that are simply beyond our control. The press is already supposed to come to us before they interview any of the Wards, but we weren't informed it had even happened." He shot a meaningful glance at Bumble, who shrank (figuratively) under the attention. "We didn't know about it until we saw it on the evening news. We lodged a complaint with the station and got Youth Guard involved right away. They pulled it from the news cycle, but of course by then it was too late."

"As for Sky Captain, he's not even a Protectorate cape. Much as we might want to we can't claim ownership of all footage of all parahumans globally. If he wants to run his mouth then legally we can't stop him."

"Is there really no work-around?" Asked Piggot.

"We can apply pressure to the media through the usual channels, but again, it's already out there, the damage has been done. Plus, if it's on the internet there's no scrubbing it short of some highly, highly illegal application of Tinker-tech. Even if we went through with it, people would put two and two together, and it'd do more damage to our image than all the quote 'terrifying media fails' in the world."

"And what about Buckshot boasting about his lethality?"

Armsmaster answered.

"He went through the same public-relations training as the rest of us. Sometimes the media can just get under your skin. People make mistakes."

"When capes make mistakes people get killed." Piggot retorted sharply, adding "I don't want to see Buckshot in front of a camera again. Ever. Understood?"

"Understood." Assented the armoured Tinker.

"All Protectorate E.N.E. capes are to attend refresher-courses on media relations. That includes the Wards." She directed another glower towards Bumble, who actually literally shrank several inches. "As for this 'Sky Captain', I want him and his colleagues in my office A.S.A.P.. We'll see if I can impress upon them the importance of having the general public not think of apocalyptic destruction every time they see a cape."

"Armsmaster, I want you to send Buckshot up to me right away, I'll speak to him personally, and Bumble? Send me Wild Hog, I've got some words for him, too.

She returned to typing on her keyboard. Without looking at any of them she spoke.

"Dismissed."